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THE 
 
 BAMPTON LECTURES 
 
 FOR M.DCCC.LXIV. 
 
OXFORD: 
 
 BY T, COMBE, M.A., E. PIOKARD HALL, AND H. LATHAM, M.A. 
 
 PRINTERS TO THE UNIVERSITY. 
 
THE 
 
 PROGRESS OF DOCTRmE 
 
 IN THE 
 
 NEW TESTAMENT, 
 
 CONSIDERED IN EIGHT LECTURES PREACHED BEFORE 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD, 
 
 1864, 
 
 ON THE rOUNDATION OF 
 
 THE LATE KEV. JOHN BAMPTON, M.A. 
 
 CANON OF SALISBURY, 
 
 BY 
 
 THOMAS DEHANY BEENARD, M.A. 
 
 OF EXETER COLLEGE, 
 
 BECTOK OF WALOOT. 
 
 MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 
 M.DCCCLXIV. 
 
 I'Thi right of Translation and Repi-oduction is irserved.'] 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 9240291 81 233 
 
EXTRALT 
 
 FROM THE LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT 
 
 OF THE LATK 
 
 EEV. JOHN BAMPTON, 
 
 CAXOX OF >ALI?BrRY. 
 
 '■ I give and bequeath my Land> and Estate? to the 
 
 •• Chancellor. ^Ll^te^^. and Scholars of the University oi' 
 ■' Oxford for ever, to have and to hold all and singular the 
 "■ said Lands or Estates upon trust, and to the intents and 
 " purposes hereinafter mentioned; that is to say, I will and 
 •■ appoint that the Yice-Chaneellor of the University of Ox- 
 •' ford for the time beinc shall take and receive all the rents, 
 •• iss-,;es. and profits thereof, and alter all taxes, reparations. 
 " and necessary deductions made that he pay all the re- 
 ■■ mainder to the endowment of eight Divinity Lecture Ser- 
 " mens, to be established for ever in the s;iid Univei-sity, and 
 '■ to be performed in the manner following : 
 
 •• I direct and appoint, that, upon the lirst Tuesday iu 
 •• Easter Term, a LectureT be yeivrly chosen by the Heads 
 " of Colleircs only, and by no others, in the room adioiaiEi: 
 •■ to the Printing-House, between the hours of ten m the 
 
vi EXTRACT I'ROM CANON BAMPTON S WILL. 
 
 " morning and two in the afternoon, to preach eight Divinity 
 " Lecture Sermons, the year following, at St. Mary's in Ox- 
 " ford, between the commencement of the last month in Lent 
 " Term, and the end of the third week in Act Term. 
 
 " Also I direct and appoint, that the eight Divinity Lecture 
 " Sermons shall be preached upon either of the following Sub- 
 " jects— to confirm and establish the Christian Faith, and to 
 " confute all heretics and schismatics — upon the divine au- 
 " thority of the holy Scriptures — upon the authority of the 
 " writings of the primitive Fathers, as to the faith and prac- 
 " tice of the primitive Church — upon the Divinity of our Lord 
 " and Saviour Jesus Christ — upon the Divinity of the Holy 
 " Ghost — upon the Articles of the Christian Faith, as compre- 
 "■ bended in the Apostles'" and Nieene Creeds. 
 
 " Also I direct, that thirty copies of the eight Divinity Lec- 
 " ture Sermons shall lie always printed, within two months 
 " after they are preached ; and one copy shall be given to the 
 " Chancellor of the University, and one copy to the Head of 
 " every College, and one copy to the Mayor of the city of 
 " Oxford, and one eojjy to he put into the Bodleian Library ; 
 " and the exj)ense of printing them shall be paid out of the 
 " revenue of the Land or Estates given for establishing the 
 " Divinity Lecture Sermons ; and the Preacher shall not be 
 "■ paid, nor be entitled to the revenue, before they are j)rinted. 
 
 " Also I direct and appoint, that no person shall be cpali- 
 '^ fied to preach the Divinity Lecture Sermons, unless he hath 
 '' taken the degree of Master of Arts at least, in one of the 
 " two Universities of Oxford or Cambridge ; and that the 
 " same person shall never preach the Divinity Lecture Ser- 
 " mons ivfice." 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 X HE title given to these Lectures may perhaps suggest 
 different expectations as to their scope. It may appear to 
 some to announce an intention of drawing from the New 
 Testament materials for a historical enquiry into the growth 
 of christian doctrine, as it took place in the minds and 
 under the hands of the Aj)ostles. To others it may in- 
 dicate a purpose of shewing that the New Testament itself 
 exhibits a scheme of progressive doctrine, fashioned for 
 permanent and universal use. The Lectures will be found 
 to address themselves not to the first, but to the second 
 of these attempts j not examining the New Testament col- 
 lection, in order to ascertain the chronological sequence of 
 fact, but contemplating it, as it is, for the purpose of ob- 
 serving the actual sequence of thought. In so doing, we 
 are concerned, not only with the component parts of the 
 New Testament, but with the order in which they are 
 placed. On this subject some prefatory words are needed, 
 lest it should seem that the order here followed has been 
 adopted, merely because it comes naturally to us, as that 
 with which we are familiar in our own Bibles. 
 
Vlll P HE PACE. 
 
 When this particular arrangement of books^ which may 
 be, and often have been, otherwise arranged, is treated as 
 involving a course of progressive teaching, it may seem 
 that an unwarrantable stress is laid on an accidental order, 
 which some may regard as little more than a habit of the 
 printer and the binder. The Lectures themselves ought to 
 give the answer to this idea ; for if the familiar order does 
 exhibit a sequence of thought and a sustained advance of 
 doctrine, then the several documents are in their right 
 places, according to the highest kind of relation which 
 they can bear to each other; and if they had come into 
 our hands variously and promiscuously arranged, it would 
 yet be incumbent on one who would study them as a whole, 
 to place them before him in the same, or nearly the same, 
 order as that which they have actually assumed. 
 
 It will be seen that the importance here ascribed to the 
 order of the books is ascribed strongly to its chief divisions, 
 and more faintly to its details. The four Gospels, the Book 
 of Acts, the collection of Epistles, and the Apocalypse, are 
 regarded as severally exhibiting definite stages in the course 
 of divine teaching, which have a natural fitness to succeed 
 each other. Within these several divisions, the order of 
 the four Gospels is treated as having an evident doctrinal 
 significance (Lecture II.), and a certain measure of propriety 
 and fitness is attributed to the relative positions of the 
 Pauline and the Catholic Epistles, and again in a less 
 degree to that of the several Pauline Epistles themselves, 
 (Lecture VI.) 
 
 But while it belongs to the scope of the Lectures to 
 point out reasons of internal fitness for a certain arrange- 
 ment of the books of the New Testament, it does not 
 enter into their design to discuss the subject on its other 
 
PEE PACE. IX 
 
 side, and to treat of the custom of the Church in re- 
 gard to the order of the canon. Yet this is a point 
 on which, in some minds, enquiry will naturally arise, 
 and to them some short account of the state of the case 
 is due. 
 
 In speaking of the custom of the Church, it must first 
 be remembered, that the New Testament was not given 
 and received as one volume, but that it grew together by re- 
 cognition and use. As the several books gradually coalesced 
 into unity, it might be expected that there would be many 
 varieties of arrangement, but that they would on the whole 
 tend to assume their relative places, according to the law 
 of internal fitness, rather than on any other principle which 
 might exercise a transient influence, as for instance that 
 of the relative dignity of the names of their authors, or 
 that of their chronological production or recognition. In 
 fact, this tendency shews itself at once, in the earliest 
 period to which our enquiries are carried back by extant 
 manuscripts, by catalogues of the sacred books given by 
 ancient writers, and by the habitual arrangement of the 
 oldest versions. A short summary of the testimony derived 
 from these sources is given in the first Note in the Ap- 
 pendix, by reference to two writers whose works have laid 
 the Church under no common obligations ». From that re- 
 view of the case, it will be apparent that the order in 
 which we now read the books of the New Testament is 
 that which, on the whole, they have tended to assume ; and 
 that the general internal arrangement, by which the entire 
 collection forms for us a consecutive course of teaching, 
 has been sufficiently recognised by the instinct, and fixed by 
 the habit, of the Church. 
 
 » See Note I. 
 
P 11 E F A C E. 
 
 It remains to add a word of explanation as to the method 
 in which the Progress of Doctrine in the New Testament 
 has been here treated. Two ways of handling the subject 
 may suggest themselves : one^ that of exhibiting the gradual 
 develojament of particular doctrines, through successive stages 
 of the divine course of instruction ; the other, that of 
 marking the characteristics ir.nd functions of those stages 
 themselves as parts of a progressive scheme. The first 
 method would be suited to the purpose of proving the fact 
 of the progress of doctrine : the second to the purpose of 
 sliewivg tliaf that fact Involves the tiiiity of a divine plan, axiA. 
 therefore the continuity of a divine authority. The latter 
 purpose appeared the more likely to be practically useful, 
 at least in the present day. The advanced character of the 
 doctrine in some books, as compared with others, is indeed 
 sufficiently obvious, and is not only admitted, but sometimes 
 exaggerated into a supposed incongruity, or even incon- 
 sistency, in the views of the sacred writers. It was, 
 then, not the reality of the progress of doctrine, but the 
 true character of it, which seemed especially to solicit 
 attention ; and in this point of view the subject is here 
 considered. 
 
 It was in fact originally suggested by the strong disposition, 
 evinced by some eminent writers and preachers, to make a 
 broad separation between the words of the Lord and the 
 teaching of his Apostles, and to treat the definite statements 
 of doctrine in the Epistles, rather as individual varieties of 
 opinion on the revelation recorded in the Gospels, than as 
 the form in which the Lord Jesus has perfected for us 
 the one revelation of himself 
 
 Such a habit of thought must frustrate the provision 
 which our great Teacher has made, for enduing those that 
 
PllEF.iCE. XI 
 
 believe on his name with the vigour of a distinct^ and the 
 repose of a settled faith. One of the most effectnal safe- 
 guards against that danger will be found in an intelligent 
 appreciation of the progressive plan on which God has 
 taught us in his written Word : and if the view which is 
 taken in these Lectures of the range of New Testament 
 teaching should^ in any quarter and in any measure^ con- 
 tribute to that end, the prayer which has been associated 
 with their preparation will have received its answer. In 
 all our works the first and the last resort is the thought 
 of that mercy which answers prayer. I have need to 
 revert to it now. One who Jias taken up a subject con- 
 nected with the Holy Word, under a strong sense of the 
 usefulness which may belong to a due exposition of it, must 
 feel a proportionate sorrow in the review of an inadequate 
 treatment. But it is enough. The desires and the regrets 
 which attend our ministrations in the Lord^s household are 
 better uttered to God than to man. 
 
 For one defect only it seems right to offer an excuse. 
 I think that many of the points, \vhich in the Lectures 
 are necessarily touched in a cursory manner, ought to have 
 been more fully worked out and illustrated in Notes and 
 References : and it would certainly have been a satisfaction, 
 in rapidly skirting the confines of so many fields of recent 
 and laborious study, to borrow contributions from writers 
 by whom they have been thoroughly explored. Only a 
 few such additions have been made, as they occurred at 
 the moment. I may be allowed to plead that the circum- 
 stances, in which I was placed during the preparation of 
 these Lectures, have made it impossible for me to do more. 
 Scarcely had this office been confided to me, before I was 
 called to enter on the care of a parish of fifteen thousand 
 
XU PREFACE. 
 
 soulsj the affairs of which required immediate^ and have 
 compelled almost incessant attention. Of the effect of this 
 pressure of duties it will not be proper for me to say- 
 more, than that it has caused the omission which is here 
 acknowledged. 
 
ANALYSIS or THE LECTURES. 
 
 LECTUKE I. 
 
 THE NEW TESTAMENT. 
 St. John xvii. 8. 
 
 OUBJECT proposed. Its connection with the ministry of the word, 
 and with the present tendencies of thought. 
 
 I. Preliminary positions. 
 
 1 . There is divine teaching in the New Testament— doctrine given 
 
 by the Father to the Son — by the Son to men. 
 
 2. The divine teaching coincides in extent with the New Testa- 
 
 ment. Not to be restricted to words of the Lord in the flesh. 
 Eflfect of such restriction. Forbidden by the Lord's words. 
 Not to be extended through the whole Christian age. Pro- 
 gress of doctrine through all Church history — is a progress 
 of apprehension by man, not of communication by God. 
 No advance in divine teaching after the apostolic age ever 
 admitted by the Church. 
 
 .3. The plan of the divine teaching is represented in the New 
 Testament. In what sense it can be said that it exhibits 
 a scheme of doctrine progressively developed. 
 
 n. Outlines of the subject. 
 
 I. Reality of the progress of doctrine. Visible in the Old Testa- 
 ment — in the New Testament. 
 
xiv ANALYSIS OF THE LECTURES. [lECT. 
 
 2. Stages in the progress of doctrine in the New Testament- 
 
 marked by Gospels, Acts, Epistles, Apocalypse. 
 
 3. Principles of the progress of doctrine in the New Testa- 
 
 ment—constituted by the relations of the doctrine (a) to its 
 Author, (/3) to the facts on which it is founded, (y) to the 
 human mind, (S) of the several parts of the doctrine to 
 each other. 
 
 Survey of the New Testament as a progressive scheme, (pp. 1-32.) 
 
 LECTUEE II. 
 
 THE GOSPELS. 
 St. Mark i. i. 
 
 The beginning of the Gospel. The whole life and ministry of Christ 
 on earth may be thus described — represented in the New Testament 
 by the four Gospels. 
 
 I. The Gospel Collection in its relation to the whole New Testament 
 
 forms the initiatory stage of a progressive plan. Fitted to this 
 place and function, as presenting the person of Christ. Effect of 
 the transparent style — of the fourfold repetition — of the fourfold 
 variation. Communication of personal knowledge of Jesus Christ 
 is the beginning of the Gospel. 
 
 II. The Gospel Collection in itself exhibits a progressive plan — (i) in 
 
 the division into two distinct stages ; (2) in the character of the 
 synoptic Gospels relatively to each other; (3) in the character 
 of St. John's Gospel relatively to the others. Unity of the whole 
 representation — one Lord Jesus Christ. Unity and progress in 
 the parts imply design in the whole— the Holy Ghost the de- 
 signer. 
 
 The Gospel Collection, in its general effect, prepares us for further 
 teaching, by creating the want, giving the pledge, depositing the material, 
 and providing the safeguard, (pp. 33-60.) 
 
II-IV.] AXALYSTS OF THE LECTIUES. XV 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 
 'I'HE GOSPELS. 
 
 Heb. ii. 3. 
 
 The Lord himself the first Teacher. His personal teaching in the 
 Gospels is initiator)'. 
 
 L I. Includes the substance of all Christian doctrine. Its occasional cha- 
 racter — but the occasions pre-ordained. Instances of pregnant 
 sayings. 
 
 2. Yet does not hear the character ofjinulity, — n. in its form- — S. in 
 its method — y. in its substance — as moral teaching, full and 
 open, as revelation of a mystery, reserved and anticipatory. 
 The mystery being fundamental to the ethic, this reserve 
 creates the need of further teaching. Instances in the doc- 
 trines of Forgiveness of sin and Acceptance in prayer. 
 
 II. I. Is a visibly progressive system. Comparison of the first and the 
 last discourses, Matt, v-vii. and John xiv-xvii. 
 
 2. Yet declares itself incomplete, and refers us to a subsequent stage 
 of teaching. Transitional character of the last discourse. 
 Plain assertions of incompleteness. Promises of things to 
 be spoken after. The personal teaching of Christ to be 
 completed in the dispensation of the Spirit. 
 
 Saving purpose of the whole testimony, which only attains its end in 
 those who "have life through his name." (pp. 61-89.) 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 
 Acts i. 1-4. 
 
 The Gospels and the Acts linked together as parts of one scheme — 
 the one commencing, the other continuing, the teaching of Jesus 
 Christ. Two points to be observed in the second stage of divine teaching 
 in the New Testament. 
 
xvi ANALYSIS OF THE LECTURES. [lECT. 
 
 I. The Teacher is the same. Evidence of this. The Book of Acts is 
 a record of the personal action of the Lord Jesus in the per- 
 fecting of his word and the formation of his Church. The 
 method of this action : — 
 
 I. Special interventions. Survey of these. Given at critical 
 moments, and at the steps of progress — particularly in the 
 history of St. Paul. Relations of the course of action to 
 the course of doctrine,— as the pledge of its authority — 
 as the means of its completion. Testimony of the Epistles 
 to this personal action of the Lord in the progress of 
 doctrine. St. Paul's statements as to the sources of his 
 doctrine. 
 
 3. Habitual guidance of the Apostles by the Holy Ghost. Nature 
 of the gift at Pentecost — shewn, from the promise, from the 
 facts, and from the testimony of the Apostles, to have involved 
 the Gospel itself. Hence a divine authority attaches to the 
 whole Apostolic teaching, in its interpretations and inferences 
 as well as in its witness of facts. 
 
 n. The method is changed. Reason for the change. The change is a 
 sign and means of progress. The history of salvation being finished, 
 must be followed by the interpretation of it, and by the exhibition 
 of its effects in human consciousness. This is achieved by the 
 change in the method of divine teaching, signified by the words, 
 " He dwelleth with you and shall be in you." Action of the 
 indwelling Spirit to Ije distinguished according to its purpose — in 
 the founders of the Church to communicate truth — in the mem- 
 bers of the Church to receive it. (pp. 90-1 ig.) 
 
 LECTURE V. 
 
 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 
 
 Acts v. 42. 
 
 Further questions to be answered by the Book of Acts. Its purpose to 
 answer them. Character and scheme of the Book. Its place and function 
 in the evolution of doctrine. 
 
 I. It gives the general character of the christian doctrine in its second 
 stage. 
 
V, VI.] ANALYSIS OF THE LECTURES. xvii 
 
 1 . A preaching of Christ. Comparison of the preaching recorded 
 
 in the Gospels and that recorded in the Acts — the one of the 
 kingdom, the other of the person. The difference in the 
 preaching accounts for the difference in the effect. 
 
 2. A preaching of the work of Christ, in its main features and their 
 
 results — of his death as the source t)f forgiveness, of his 
 resurrection as the source of life. Progress of doctrine in the 
 summing up and exposition of the past. 
 
 II. It gives the course of events through which the doctrine was matured. 
 Outlines of the historj' in this point of view. The doctrine cleared 
 and formed in the course of this history, chiefly in respect of two 
 principles : a. The Gospel is the substitute for the Law — Jewish 
 theory of the Law — Judaising attempts negatived and superseded ; 
 p. The Gospel is the heir of the Law — inheriting its ideas and its 
 Scriptures. St. Paul's conflict for these positions. Largeness of 
 the results deduced from them in the Epistles. 
 
 Value of a divine summing up of the meaning and effects of the mani- 
 festation of Christ, (pp. 120-147.) 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 
 THE EPISTLES. 
 
 Rom. i. 17. 
 
 Marks of the continuity of doctrine, in passing from the Acts to the 
 Epistles. The point at which the Book of Acts leaves us — it has pre- 
 sented the Gospel as a system, but 1. in its external aspect — all the dis- 
 courses in the Book are addressed to those who are not yet Christians ; 
 2. as a doctrine in outline — coextensive with the Apostles' Creed. 
 
 Need of further divine teaching. The Epistles are the voice of the Spirit 
 within the Church to those who are within it — presenting the internal aspect 
 of the Gospel, and filUng up its outlines by perfecting the christian faith 
 and educating the christian life. 
 
 The Epistles are fitted for this work by their 
 
 I. Form. The Epistolary form pecuUar to the New Testament — indi- 
 cates fellowship — addresses itself to actual life, and various 
 conditions of mind. 
 
 b 
 
xviii ANALYSIS OF THE LECTURES. [LECT. 
 
 II. Method. One of reasoning, interpretation of Old Testament 
 Scriptures, utterance of personal feelings and convictions— is a 
 method of association rather than of authority, of education 
 rather than of information, yet pervaded by authority, and 
 blended with direct revelation . 
 
 HI. Authorship. Chiefly that of St. Paul, who had not been with 
 Jesus and was born out of due time. Inference, that these 
 writings form a stage of doctrine in advance of that in the 
 Gospels, as shewing the results of the manifestation of Christ. 
 The same kind of teaching in the Catholic Epistles, by four 
 other authors, chosen representatives of the Twelve. 
 
 IV. Relative characters, (i) St. Paul's Epistles, grouped and cha- 
 racterised, form a body of doctrine. (2) Need and effect of the 
 Epistle to the Hebrews. (3) The Catholic Epistles confirma- 
 tory and supplementary. 
 
 'I'he Epistles a provision for the exigencies of the christian life. The 
 exigencies must be known — the provision must be used. (pp. 148-178.) 
 
 LECTURE VII. 
 
 T H E E P I S T L E S. 
 
 I Cor. i. 30. 
 
 The doctrine in the Epistles, as a stage in advance of the doctrine in the 
 preceding books, is distinguished by 
 
 I. Its general character— & doctrine of the life in Christ— shews the fulfil- 
 
 ment, and gives the interpretation, of the promise, " At that day ye 
 shall know that I am in the Father, and ye in me, and I in you." 
 Discrimination of the points in the promise. In the Epistles all 
 things are " in Christ Jesus." Need of a correspondence with this 
 character in our own habit of mind. 
 
 II. Particular doctrines ai affected by this general character. Examples. 
 
 ( I ) Doctrine of salvation — in the Gospels— In the Epistles. Increased 
 definiteness, especially as to the consciousness of atonement and 
 redemption. (2) Doctrine of adoption— m the Gospels— in the 
 
Til, Tin.] iSALYSlS OF THK LEiTUKEJ. xix 
 
 EpisUfs. The form of it fuller — the ground of it c^cirer. A new 
 sense of it &om the gift of the Spiri;. 3^ Doctrime of irt rship — 
 in the Gospels — in the E; isUes. Plainei rerelaiion of access by 
 saorinoe — bv mediation — in the Holy Ghost. 14^ Ethieal doctrine 
 — ^in the Gospels — in the Epistles. AJv.mced to a higher point by 
 the knowleJfe of higher relations, motives, anJ powers foimd " in 
 Christ Jesus." 
 Retr*«pect of the course of doctrine — 11^ unity, and ]>rOi;ress . Our }>er- 
 sonal duty in regard to it. (pp. 170 — 204.'' 
 
 LECTITIE VIII. 
 
 THE APOCALYPSE 
 
 Ret. xxi. ; 
 
 The Apocalypse f\ilms the piomisie, " He shall shew you thing? to come" 
 — and completes the line of history and j>rophecy. Is related to the l.»st 
 discourse in St. M^uhew, as the Epistles are to that in St. John. The 
 Lord himseii is stti', the levealer. 
 
 Connection betw^e^en the pn^gress of prophecy and the progivss of 
 doctrine. 
 
 Dccirinal bearing of the bock in 
 
 I, TSc iran/ riicJt it sitpp<»es — concerned with the destinies of the body. 
 the Church. The corporate life distinguished from the indiridtial 
 He in the Epistles. Contrast between the ideal character of the 
 Church and the indications of its actual history. In the later 
 Epistles the tokens and rerelacocs of the future grow darker. 
 Thus 3 want has been created which oeirands a further word of 
 God. Stsse of mind to which the Book Is addressed. 
 
 n. T«<; satisfaetioii riici it prx'riiits — as being a doctrine of consum- 
 mation. 
 
 I. A doctrine of the Cn»*i; of the consiiirmation. The personal 
 salvation of the indindual and the geoeral salvation of the 
 Church have the s.ir.:e groimd. namely, the Atoning Sacri- 
 fice, — implied by "' the Lamb." ,is the aixxalyptic name of 
 
 Christ. 
 
XX ANALYSIS OF THE LECTUEBS. [lECT. VIII. 
 
 2. A doctrine of the History of the consummation— shewing the 
 
 inner nature of events— by connecting things seen with things 
 not seen— by presenting the earth as the battlefield of spiritual 
 powers. 
 
 3. A doctrine of the Coming of the Lord— the announcement of 
 
 this is the key-note of the Book— all else a part of this. In 
 the Epistles the coming is connected chiefly with the personal 
 life— here with the corporate life— as the close of the world's 
 history. 
 
 4. A doctrine of Victory — completes the teaching of the Epistles on 
 
 the victory of the Lord — and of his people. 
 
 5. A. Aocir'ineoi Judgment. " The Prince of this world is judged." 
 
 Judgment of the usurping Power — of the world — of nations — 
 of persons. 
 
 6. A doctrine of Restoration. There is to be a perfect humanity. 
 
 Humanity ordy perfect in society. The city a type of society 
 in its maturity. Failure of earthly societies to realise the ideal. 
 Realisation promised in the Bible. Need of the final vision to 
 complete the teaching of God. The Bible an account of the 
 preparation of the City of God —by expectation, prophecy, and 
 type — by the reconstitution of men's relations to God, and to 
 each other — both effected by the Gospel. Other systems have 
 despaired of human society. Completeness of the Bible in 
 providing for the perfection of man, in a corporate as well as 
 a personal life. 
 
 Final survey of the progressive teaching of the New Testament in its 
 several stages, represented by the — Gospels — Acts — Epistles — Apocalypse. 
 Fitness of this survey to increase the sense that the doctrine is not of 
 the world — and the confidence that it is of God. (pp. 205 — 235.) 
 
LECTURE I. 
 
 THE NEW TESTAMENT. 
 
 St. John xvii. 8. 
 / have given unto them the words which thou gavest me. 
 
 UN the truth of this saying stands the whole 
 fabric of creeds and doctrines. It is the ground of 
 authority to the preacher, of assurance to the be- 
 liever, of existence to the Church. It is the source 
 from which the perpetual stream of christian teach- 
 ing flows. AU our testimonies, instructions, ex- 
 hortations derive their first origin and continuous 
 power from the fact that the Father has given to 
 the Son, the Son has given to his servants, the 
 words of truth and life. 
 
 I am now called, not so much to preach the 
 words thus given to us, as to enquire concerning 
 them. It is a secondary and subsidiary ministry. 
 
 Our first charge is, " Go stand and speak in the 
 temple to the people all the words of this fife." 
 We go ; and our words not only meet the wants 
 
 B 
 
2 LECTURE 1. 
 
 of conscience, but stir the activities of thought ; 
 and a cloud of questions rises round us, which must 
 be dissipated while it is gathering, but which will 
 still gather while it is being dissipated. Thus the 
 preaching of the words of life to the people is 
 evermore attended by an incidental necessity for 
 extensive and various discussion. 
 
 The iustitution of these Lectures is a testimony to 
 that necessity, and a testimony also to the relation 
 which such discussion bears to the main object for 
 which the Word was given. For if this pulpit 
 is devoted on these occasions to the deliberate 
 treatment of some particular question, that is only 
 on account of the bearing which such questions 
 may have on the work which the Church fulfils 
 in testifying the Gospel of the grace of God. 
 More especially is it fitting that one, who is 
 halaitually engaged in the work of preaching and 
 teaching, should keep as near as he can to this 
 ultimate practical aim. Therefore, invoking the 
 guidance of God, I shall submit to you some 
 considerations on the progress of doctrine in the 
 New Testament, a subject which on the one side 
 touches the living ministry of the Church at its 
 very heart, and on the other is specially affected 
 by the present tendencies of sacred criticism. 
 
 Into all our parishes and all our missions the 
 thousands of evangelists, pastois, and teachers are 
 sent forth with the Bible placed in their hands, 
 and with solemn charges to draw from its pages 
 the gospel which they preach. But when those 
 
LECTURE I. 3 
 
 pages are opened, they present, not the exposition 
 of a revelation completed, but the records of a 
 revelation in progress. Its p'arts and features are 
 seen, not as arranged after their development, but 
 as arranging themselves in the course of their 
 development, and growing, through stages which 
 can be marked and by accessions which can be 
 measured, into the perfect form which they attain 
 at last. Thus the Bible includes within itself a 
 world of anticipation and retrospection, of prepara- 
 tion and completion, whereby various and vital 
 relations are constituted between its several parts. 
 These relations enter as really into the scheme of 
 Scripture as do the several parts themselves ; and 
 must be rightly understood and duly appreciated, 
 if the doctrine, which the Book jdelds upon the 
 whole, is to be firmly grasped by the student or 
 fairly presented by the preacher. 
 
 In this way the subject of progressive teaching 
 in Scripture is implicated with the living ministry 
 of the Church. How it is affected by the present 
 tendencies of sacred criticism there is no need to 
 explain, for it is known to all that the studies of our 
 day are directed to a minute and laborious examina- 
 tion of the internal characteristics of the books of 
 Scripture, and more particularly of their mutual 
 relations, and of the differences of doctrine both in 
 amount and form which they exhibit on comparison 
 with each other. Notwithstanding all reasons for 
 anxiety, sometimes even for giief and indignation, 
 which we may find in the actual handling of the 
 
 B 2 
 
4 LECTURE I. 
 
 subject, we liave cause to be thankful that the 
 piogressive character of revelation is thus coming 
 more distinctly before* the mind of the Church. In 
 regard to any subject the observation of successive 
 stages of design must be expected ultimately to 
 conduce to a more thorough comprehension of the 
 tiling designed, and will also naturally tend to place 
 the observer in closer contact with the mind of the 
 desig-ner. So will it be with the written woi'd. 
 
 Only a part of the general subject is before us 
 now. We shall be occupied with the last stage 
 through which the revelation of God was perfected, 
 as exhibited in the canonical books of the New 
 Testament. But though only a part of a larger 
 subject, this is itself one of great extent a,nd various 
 aspect, and on this account some preliminary words 
 are necessary, in order to fix the point of view from 
 which it will be regarded. I shall therefore devote 
 the chief part of this intr(xluctorY lecture to secure 
 for myself the following positions. 
 
 1. That by doctrine shall be here meant divine 
 teaching, or truth as communicated by God. 
 
 2. That the course of divine teaching under the 
 christian dispensation shall be considered to coin- 
 cide in extent with the New Testament Scriptures. 
 
 3. That the relative character and actual order 
 of the parts of the New Testament shall be taken, 
 as adequately representing the progressive plan on 
 which this course of divine teaching was perfected. 
 
 When I have strengthened these positions by 
 such explanations as time will allow, I will close 
 
LECTURE L 5 
 
 tliis introduction of the subject, by pointing out 
 that the progressive system of teaching in the New 
 Testament is an obvious fact, that it is marked by 
 distinct stages, and that it is determined by natural 
 jyrinciples. 
 
 I. I. First, then, I assume that the doctrine here 
 spoken of is divine teaching, and that by its pro- 
 gress is meant a systematic advance in its com- 
 munication from God. 
 
 That some doctrine contained in the New Testa- 
 ment must be thus characterised, we are assured by 
 the assertion of the Lord Jesus in the text : "I 
 have given unto them the words which thou gavest 
 me." Words then have been given to men, which, 
 not only in their original source, but in their inter- 
 mediate channel, are absolutely and incontestably 
 divme. Over and above those discoveries of the 
 mind of God which are contained in the natural 
 order of things, and which we may discern by an 
 intuitive faculty or infer by a reasoning process, 
 we have that which, hi the clearest, fullest, strongest 
 sense, must be called the " ivord of God." Nay, he 
 has not only given us a word ; he has done more, 
 he has given us u'ords (fuj/uaTa), separate, articulate, 
 definite communications, each as truly divine as is 
 the whole word which they compose. Such words 
 of God were spoken of in old time as "coming to'' 
 particular persons, who were to be the messengers of 
 those words to others. The Prophets testified, when 
 they spoke, that " the word of the Lord came to 
 them ; " and the testimony was authenticated of 
 
U LECTURE I. 
 
 God and accepted of men. But the commiuiications 
 made through them were only introductory. " In 
 sundry parts and in divers ways God having spoken 
 of old to the Fathers in the Prophets, at the end of 
 these days spake to us in his Son." Those to whom 
 the word of God came were succeeded by him who 
 is himself the " Word of God." He became man, and 
 stood forth as the one leal and eternal Prophet, the 
 medium of communication between the mind of God 
 and the mind of man. Then he was iii the world, 
 but he "was in heaven," in the concourse of men 
 but " in the bosom of his Father." His flesh was as 
 a veil between the two worlds, and he who dwelt in 
 it read on the one side the secrets of the Most Holy, 
 and on the other presented them to the apprehen- 
 sions of mankmd. On the one side he received, on 
 the other he gave. He shewed to the world the 
 woiks which he had seen with his Father ; he spoke 
 to the world the words which he had heard with 
 his Fathei ; and in closing his personal teaching in 
 the flesh, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, 
 " I have given unto them the words which thou 
 gavest me." Imagination itself can go no further. 
 If we asked for assurance that men had really re- 
 ceived the words of God, it wovdd be impossible to 
 conceive a higher authoiity, a more plain assertion, 
 or a more unqualified statement. On this point I 
 need say no more. My only purpose in touching it 
 has been to refresh in your minds the remembrance, 
 that the doctiine about which we enquire is, in some 
 pait of it at lea!^t, truly and incontestably divine. 
 
LECTURE I. 7 
 
 2. More perhaps needs to be said in order to 
 justify the next step which I would take, in the 
 assumption that the course of this divine teaching 
 coincides in extent with the Scriptures of the New 
 Testament. Have I the right to extend the course 
 of divine teaching so far 1 If so, have I the right 
 to refuse to extend it farther 1 At first sight the 
 text might suggest that the character of doctrine, 
 which has been just asserted, should be limited to the 
 words spoken by the lips of the Lord Jesus when on 
 earth. If we pass beyond this, and include words 
 spoken by the lips of men, we may seem compelled to 
 extend our thovights to a progress of doctrine carried 
 on to the end of time. In neither of these cases 
 will the course of the divine communication of 
 christian truth coincide with the extent of the New 
 Testament. In the one case it wiU be comprised 
 , in the Gospels alone, which leave us some of their 
 most peculiar doctrines only in short summaries or 
 pregnant germs ; in the other case it may be pro- 
 longed through an indefinite series of accessions, which 
 will always leave the Church in doubt, as to what 
 the faith delivered to it is, and stiU more in doubt 
 as to what it may hereafter turn out to be. 
 
 What then are the words to which the descrip- 
 tion in the text applies 1 or rather, within what 
 limits shall we seek them 1 
 
 Undoubtedly the Lord speaks of all the words 
 which he had already uttered to those disciples as 
 their teacher in the days of his flesh. But is the 
 saying true only of those words ? Is it to be re- 
 
8 LECTURE I. 
 
 stricted to that stage of teaching which had then 
 reached its conclusion, and of which at the time the 
 assertion might seem to be made 1 Or is it also true 
 of other words? words for mstance which he gave 
 after he was risen 1 or, again, words which he gave 
 after he was glorified 1 
 
 To those who would study the evolution of doc- 
 trine in the New Testament this question is of 
 vital importance, for if, after we have passed the 
 first stage of teaching, the authority which we re- 
 cognised there is withdrawn, our treatment of the 
 subsequent teaching must be conducted in an altered 
 spirit and on other principles. Having bowed in 
 sdence before the Divine Teacher, we shall recover 
 our freedom of opinion when we are left with his 
 followers. Only at first shall we tread securely on 
 the rock : we must then look well to our steps, 
 and be free to choose our path among the irre- 
 gularities and uncertainties of a more shifting soil ; 
 for we shall pass from words which the Son of 
 God gave to men, to the expansions of those words 
 and the deductions from them which the men who 
 first received them have given to us. Our study 
 of the progress of doctrine within the limits of the 
 New Testament would thus be entirely changed in 
 its character, as we passed from the Gospels to the 
 subsequent books. Only in the first stage would 
 the progress of doctrine bear the meaning of the 
 progress of its communication by God. In the se- 
 cond stage, it could but signify the progress of its 
 apprehension by men. The Acts and Epistles would 
 
LECTURE I. 9 
 
 thus form only the first chapter of the history of 
 the Church, separated from its subsequent chapters 
 by a much narrower interval than that which marks 
 them off from the Gospels which precede them. 
 They would in fact be simply specimens of human 
 apprehensions of divine truth ; specimens of singular 
 value, because produced under peculiar advantages ; 
 but yet, like any other individual apprehensions, 
 modified by the personal character and historical posi- 
 tion of those who formed them. They would there- 
 fore be liable to such deductions on these accounts as 
 liistorical criticism might suggest, and would remain 
 rather as warrants for various explications by other 
 minds and ia other ages, than as fixed canons of the 
 truth for ever. 
 
 I ask then whether the giving of the words of 
 God was completed when the text was uttered, or 
 whether there was a distinct part of the process 
 yet to come ? 
 
 The discou.rse in which the saying occurs has 
 supplied the answer. Its distinctive character is 
 that of transition, closing the past but opening 
 the future, representing a later stage of teaching 
 as the predestined completion of the earher, and 
 cementing both into one, by asserting for both the 
 same source, and difixising over both the same 
 authoiity. This function in the progress of divine 
 teaching, which belongs to the discourse in the 14th, 
 15th, and 1 6th chapters of St. John, must come more 
 distinctly into view at a later stage of our enquiry. 
 It is now sufficient to refer to it in passing, as 
 
10 LECTURE I. 
 
 an evidence that the very words, of which the text 
 specifically and indubitably speaks, include the asser- 
 tion of the same divine gift and authority for other 
 teaching which was yet to come. 
 
 Thus we stand on the declaration of the giver 
 of the word himseK, when we consider the progress 
 of christian doctrine in its commimication from God 
 as extending, not only over one stage in which it was 
 delivered by the Lord in the flesh, but through a 
 second stage in which it was delivered by the same 
 Lord through the Spirit. It might indeed have 
 seemed natural, at the point where the voice of Jesus 
 ceases, to draw the line which should terminate the 
 words which were given by the Father to the Son, 
 and by the Son were given to men, a line of broad 
 demarcation, separating those words from all others 
 whatever. But that very voice forbad the act, and 
 admonished us that, when it should seem to have 
 ceased, it must yet be recognised as carrying on the 
 couise of communications which were not then com- 
 plete. I now say no more on this important point, 
 because a clear understanding upon it ought to be 
 one of the chief results of the enquiry which lies 
 before me. 
 
 But a second question is waiting for me now. If 
 I see that the proposal to restrict the divine au- 
 thority to the communications of the Lord's own lips 
 has been negatived by himself, I am left to extend 
 that authority to communications from the lips of 
 men. Then where am I to stop 1 Am I any longer 
 within the limits of the New Testament ■? I have 
 
LECTURE I. 11 
 
 looked forth on the ocean. Am I, or am I not, 
 actually launched upon it ? I am compelled to turn 
 towards the vast and confusing prospect, in order 
 to mark the limits within which I claim the right 
 to remain. 
 
 Now if the second part of the New Testament 
 simply rehearsed to us certain definite revelations, 
 which the writers alleged that they had received, 
 no difficulty would exist. Their testimony to these 
 would be on the same footing (or nearly so) with 
 the testimony of the Evangehsts as to the discourses 
 of our Lord. But this is not their method. We have 
 the revealed truth presented to us in the Epistles, 
 not only as a communication from God, but also as 
 an apprehension by man. The great transition from 
 the one stage to the other is exhibited before our 
 eyes as already effected. We have the gospel, as it 
 existed in the mind of Peter and of Paul, of James 
 and of John. It is thus presented to us in combina- 
 tion with the processes of human thought and the 
 variations of human feehngs, in association with 
 pectiliarities of individual character, and in the course 
 of its more perfect elaboration through the exigencies 
 of events and controversies. 
 
 But is not this accormt of the second pai-t- of the 
 New Testament also the account of the whole sub- 
 sequent histoiy of doctrine in the world, that is, of 
 Church history in its essential and mward character 1 
 Certainly it is so ; and therefore the Acts and the 
 Epistles stand to the ecclesiastical historian as the 
 first chapters of his work, for there he already finds 
 
12 LECTURE I. 
 
 the aspects which the revealed truth bears to human 
 minds and assumes in human hands, and the manner 
 in which its parts and proportions come to be dis- 
 tinctly exhibited through the agency of men and the 
 instrumentaHty of facts. And this is a process which 
 goes on through descending ages, and in which every 
 generation bears its part. It has gained accessions 
 from all those varieties of the hiiman mind which 
 have been placed in contact with revealed truth, from 
 the idiosyncrasies of persons, of nations, of ages, from 
 Fathers and Councils, from controversies and heresies, 
 from Hellenist, Alexandrian, and Roman forms of 
 thought, from the mind of the East and the mind of 
 the West, from corruptions and reformations of reli- 
 gion, from Italy and England, from Germany and 
 Geneva, from authority and enquiry, from Church 
 and Dissent. These words and others like them re- 
 present the varying measures of apprehension, and 
 the varying kinds of expression, which the gospel 
 revelation has found among men. The " develop- 
 ments of doctrine," (to use a word which some time 
 since was very familiar to many of us) — the develop- 
 ments of doctrine thus originated were the joint pro- 
 duct of the revealed truth and the condition of the 
 muid which received it. The revealed truth was 
 one, but the conditions of the human mind are in- 
 finitely various, and hence an endless variety in the 
 developments themselves, — a variety which sometimes 
 melts into a higher harmony, but more often jars on 
 our ears in irreconcdable discord. 
 
 I am not here concerned with the degrees in which 
 
LECTURE I. 13 
 
 different developments have represented or perverted 
 truth, and in which they have more conspicuously 
 exhibited the element of the divine truth or that of 
 the human infirmity. I would only observe that 
 through all this confusion there is in some sense a 
 progress of doctrine. Even by misapprehensions and 
 perversions the relations of the Word to the human 
 mind are more perfectly disclosed. In partial sys- 
 tems of religion those parts of the entire scheme 
 which they have more particularly adopted often 
 come to be seen under a stronger hght. But espe- 
 cially it is evident that certain great fea^tures of truth 
 emerge from periods of conflict and the drivmg mists 
 of controversy, and swell u]3on the sight with outHnes 
 more defined and a power more recognised than had 
 seemed to belong to them before. The names of 
 Athanasius, Augustine, and Luther recall in a mo- 
 ment some of the most obvious examples of this fact 
 in regard to the doctrines of the Nature of Christ, of 
 Original Sin, and of Justification by Faith. 
 
 There were periods then at which these doctrines 
 stood forth with a vividness, precision, and force, 
 which gave them as it were a new place in the appre- 
 hensions of men, affecting of course by their increased 
 definiteness and expansion the proportions of the 
 whole body of truth. These however are only pro- 
 minent instances of a general and continuous fact. 
 Every age, every Church, every sect, every contro- 
 versy, in some way or other contributes something to 
 the working out, the testing, or the illustrating of 
 some part of the revelation of God. Our Enghsh 
 
14 LECTURE I. 
 
 mind has borne its part, and the religious movements 
 of our own day will deposit some residuum of mate- 
 rials for future thought and knowledge. Our mis- 
 sionary efforts wiU, in this respect also, have results 
 of theii' own, and Christianity in India or in China, 
 when it has in some degree lost its Enghsh type, 
 and entered into fuU relations with the peculiar 
 minds of those peculiar races, wiQ perhaps make as 
 distinct additions to the history of doctrine, as we 
 recognise in passing from the theology of the Eastern 
 to that of the Western Church. The history upon 
 the whole both has been and will be a long disclosure 
 of the perverse tendencies and infirm capacities of 
 man. Yet a special providence over the Church and 
 the hving Spn-it in it has been proved as well as 
 promised : and he who looks back upon the tortuous 
 and agitated course of thought, perceives that the 
 truth is not only preserved, but in some sense ad- 
 vanced, the definitions of it becoming more exact, 
 the construction of it more systematic, and the de- 
 ductions from it more numerous. 
 
 Thus the history of the apprehension of Christian 
 truth by man, which commences within the New Tes- 
 tament, is continued in the history of the Church to 
 the end of time ; and still, while it is continued, it 
 is in some sort a history of progress, and one in which 
 the Spirit of God mingles, and which the providence 
 of God moulds. 
 
 What then is it which draws the line of separa- 
 tion between the apostoHc period and all the subse- 
 quent periods of this history ■? It is this — That the 
 
LECTURE I. 15 
 
 apostolic peiiod is not only a part of the history of 
 the apprehension of truth by man : it is also a part 
 of the history of the communication of truth by God. 
 It is the first stage of the one, and the last stage of 
 the other. The aspect which the Gospel bears in the 
 writings of the Apostles is a communication from 
 God of what it really is, a revelation of what he in- 
 tended that it should be in the minds of men for 
 ever. This character of the apostohc writings has, 
 without variation of testimony, been acknowledged 
 by the Church from the beginning ; but this acknow- 
 ledgment has been confined to these writings, and 
 has never been extended to subsequent expositions 
 or decrees. Councils and doctors have claimed a 
 right to be heard, only as asserters and witnesses of 
 apostoHc teaching. No later communications from 
 heaven are supposed or alleged. What has been 
 handed down,- — what is collected out of the writings 
 of the Apostles, — is the professed authority for all 
 definitions and decrees ; and all reference to (what 
 may appear to be) other authority is based upon the 
 fact, asserted or imphed, that in the quarters ap- 
 pealed to there was reason to recognise some special 
 connection with the apostolic teaching. This fact, 
 moreover, comes out most clearly at those moments 
 in which (what might be called) an advance of doc- 
 trine is seen most evidently to take place. If the 
 doctrine of the Nature of Christ shews a new dis- 
 tinctness and firmness of outline after Nice and 
 Constantinople, yet that form of the doctrine pro- 
 fesses to be, and when examined proves to be, only 
 
16 LECTURE I. 
 
 a formal definition of the original truth. Nothing- 
 new has been imported into it ; only fresh verbal 
 barriers have excluded importations which were 
 really new. If the doctrine of Justification by Faith 
 seems, at the era of the Keformation, like a new 
 apparition on the scene, yet it is advanced, and is 
 received, only as the old Pauline doctrine reasserting 
 its forgfotten claims. 
 
 Even palpable innovations have supjaorted their 
 pretensions by the plea of an imaginary tradition, 
 descending from the days when it was confessed that 
 the communications of God had been completed. Our 
 own days have seen fresh evidence of the tenacity 
 with which the Romish Church holds to this theory, 
 while making that last addition to the articles of the 
 faith which seemed to imply that it was abandoned. 
 Then, when the pretence of a tradition appeared to 
 have tuiaUy given way rmder the ever accumulating 
 mass of novelties, minds accustomed to the logic of 
 facts began to cast about for some other theoiy, 
 which should admit of being reconciled with them. 
 The exposition of such a tlieoiy began in this pul- 
 pit, and was completed in the commmiion into which 
 its author speedily passed. It was a theoiy which 
 virtually claimed for the Chui'ch the power to create 
 new doctrine, instead of a mere authority to deter- 
 mine what was old. But the claim could not secure 
 adoption, though it had been boldly acted upon, 
 and seemed necessary to the controversial position of 
 Rome. The settled sense of Christendom as to the 
 revelation of the truth was not to Vie violated. 
 
LECTURE I. 17 
 
 ^e^\y-" defined" doctrines were still to be pronounced 
 true and necessary on the ground that they had been 
 held by the Apostles, though no evidence of that fact 
 survived, and that they had been handed down by 
 tradition, though no trace of the tradition could be 
 found. The gift thus ascribed to the " Infallible Au- 
 thority" was not an inspiration to know the truth of 
 new doctrines, but a revelation of the fact that they 
 were old. The new position has been in fact aban- 
 doned by those who offered, but have not been suf- 
 fered to hold it^ ; and we are still able to say, that 
 only in transient moments of enthusiasm, and by 
 some insignificant and eccentric sects, has there been 
 any definite allegation, that doctrinal commimications 
 from God have been received since the last Apostle 
 died. 
 
 The sum of what has been said is this. (First), 
 There are words (definite doctrinal communications) 
 of which it is said by the Lord Jesus, " The words 
 which thou gavest me I have given them." (Secondly), 
 These words are not only those which he spake 
 with his lips in the days of his flesh ; they include 
 other words, afterwards given through men in the 
 Spirit, during a period of time which is represented 
 to us by the books of the New Testament. (Thirdly), 
 Those words were finished in that period, and have 
 received no subsequent additions. The description 
 in the text not only cannot be shewn to belong, but 
 has never been supposed to belong, to any words 
 which have been spoken since. 
 
 " See Note II. 
 
18 LECrVRE I. 
 
 On these three points the judgment of the Church 
 has been all but luiiversal and unchanging. In 
 speaking therefore of progiess of doctrine in the 
 New Testament, I speak of a course of communica- 
 tion from God which reaches its completion within 
 those limits, constituting a ^'erfected scheme of divine 
 teaching, oj^en to new elucidations and deductions, 
 but not to the addition of new materials. 
 
 3. The books of the New Testament aie the foim 
 into which this divine teaching has been thrown for 
 permanent and universal pui-poses, and by the will of 
 God they constitute the only repiesentation of it for 
 all men and for ever. I have now to add that they 
 give the representation, not only of its substance, 
 but also of the plan on which it was progressively 
 matured. 
 
 It must here be remarked that there are two ways 
 in which we may exhibit the progressive develop- 
 ment of any system of things, whether it be a 
 scheme of religious doctrine, a science, a political 
 constitution, or anything else which has completed 
 itself by degrees — one may be characterized as the 
 historical, the other as the coustrvctive method. In 
 the one case we eno[uire after the exact succession 
 of events through which the result was reached ; 
 in the other we discriminate the stages of advance 
 in the result itself The representation of progress 
 made in the one case would be regulated simply by 
 the (jrdcr of fact, while that which would be pro- 
 duced in the other would be rather governed by the 
 nrder of thouglit. Now if we consider the New 
 
LECTURE I. 19 
 
 Testament as representing a progressive development 
 of doctrine, it is so in the latter sense more than in 
 the former. It is rather a constructive than a simply 
 historical representation. For instance, in the de- 
 velopment of the manifestation of Christ in the 
 flesh, the words and deeds recorded by St. John 
 must be restored, on the historic principle, to their 
 proper places in the actual order of events ; on the 
 constructive principle, they properly coalesce into a 
 separate whole, as bringing out a view of that mani- 
 festation which is an advance in the order of thought 
 upon the view which the synoptic Gospels present. 
 So in a historic representation of the formation of 
 apostoHcal doctrine we should have to trace the 
 successive steps and occasions of its advance, to 
 secure the exact chronological arrangement of St. 
 Paul's Epistles, and to insert them in their several 
 places in the narrative of his labours. On the other 
 hand, the purposes of a constructive representation 
 may be better served by keeping the records of the 
 external activity of the Church separate from its 
 directly doctrinal writmgs, or by placing those doc- 
 trinal writings in a different order from that of their 
 chronological production. Thus the New Testament, 
 as a whole, presents to us a course of teachipg on the 
 constructive rather than on the histoiic principle , 
 and it is in this sense that I propose to take the 
 book as an adequate representation, not only of the 
 substance of the divine teaching, but of the plan and 
 order of its progress. 
 
 It may be said, that there is a. difference between 
 
 C 2 
 
20 LECTURE I. 
 
 the progress of doctrine as it actually was during the 
 time which the New Testament covers, and the repre- 
 sentation of it which we have in those particular 
 writings. Yes ! and there woidd be a difference 
 between the actual course of some important enter- 
 prise, — say, of a military campaign for instance, — 
 and the abbreviated narrative, the selected docu- 
 ments, and the well-considered arrangement, by 
 which its conductor might make the plan and ex- 
 ecution of it clear to others. In such a case the 
 man who read would have a more perfect under- 
 standing of the mind of the actor and the author 
 than the man who saw ; he woidd have the whole 
 course of things mapped out for him on the true 
 principles of order. Such is the position of every 
 reader of the New Testament, who accoimts that the 
 Lord, by whom the historical development of truth 
 was guided, is also the virtual author of that repre- 
 sentation of it which lies before him. 
 
 We have not then to make out a chart from 
 materials given to us, but to study one which is 
 already made. Tracing the course of doctrine as it 
 is seen to advance through those pages, we shall 
 have no need to reconstruct for ourselves the actual 
 order in which the truth was historically developed. 
 Whatever were the measures and gradations by 
 which it was opened out to the Church at first, here 
 are the measures and gradations by which it is 
 opened out to the Church for ever. Indeed, the 
 plan on which the Lord perfected his promised 
 teaching was one which could only be seen in 
 
LECTURE I. 21 
 
 retrospect. Conducted through the medium of j)er- 
 sons and events, and by the use of local occasions, 
 the method of procedure must at the time have very 
 imperfectly disclosed its real system and coherence. 
 Parts of the truth for instance were being cleared and 
 settled in some Churches, which perhaps were scarcely 
 enquired for in others, yet the decision was of the 
 Lord, and destined for the whole body. A transient 
 occasion demanded the interference of a particular 
 Apostle, and through his sentence was given some 
 fundamental and eternal principle. Among all that 
 was done and written and said, in that scene of in- 
 tense activity and incessant movement which the 
 apostolic writings open to us, it would have been 
 hard indeed at the time to follow with steady eye 
 the great lines of advancing doctiine, and to single 
 out the acts and documents which would adequately 
 represent the results secured. Only when these 
 lesults had been firmly deposited in the Church, 
 could the successive contributions of the divine 
 teaching be recognised, and thei]' relative order dis- 
 cerned. To exhibit this plan of things there was 
 need, not of a mass of accidental records, but of 
 a body of lecords selected and arranged. It might 
 seem that we had no right to attribute such a 
 character as this to a collection of writings which 
 are upon the face of them independent and occa- 
 sional. Yet it is certain that, when taken as a whole, 
 this is its effect, and that it makes upon the mind 
 the impression of unity and design. He who reads 
 through the Koran, (albeit the work of a single 
 
2-J LECTURE I. 
 
 author,) finds himself oppressed, as by a shapeless 
 mass of accidental accretions. He who reads through 
 the New Testament finds himself educated as by an 
 orderly scheme of advancing doctrine. The several 
 lionks seem to have grown into their places as com- 
 ponent parts of an organic whole ; and " the New 
 Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ" 
 Hes before us as an account of a perfected revelation, 
 and a course of divine teaching designed and pre- 
 paied by one piesiding mind. 
 
 II. Having now accomplished the preliminary 
 steps, I wiU close this introductory Lecture by 
 pointing out the reality of the progress of which I 
 speak, the stages through which it is perfected, and 
 the 'p'f'inciple.s by which it is regulated. 
 
 I. The realitii of this progress is very visible ; and 
 moie especially so when we regard the New Testa- 
 ment as the last stage of that progressive teaching 
 which is carried on through the Scriptures as a 
 wiiole. Glance from the first words to the last, " In the 
 beginning God created the heavens and the earth" — 
 " Even so, come. Lord Jesus." How much lies be- 
 t^^'een these two ! The one the first rudiment of 
 re\'elation addiessed to the earhest and simplest 
 consciousness of man, that, namely, which comes to 
 him through his senses, the consciousness of the 
 material world which lies in its grandeur round him : 
 the other the last cry from ^vithin, the voice of the 
 heart of man, such as the intervening teaching has 
 made it ; the expression of the deiinite faith which 
 li;i,K been found, and of the certain hope whicli has 
 
LECTURE I. 'IW 
 
 been left, by the whole revelation of God. The 
 course of teachmg which carries us from the one to 
 the other is progressive throughout, but with differ- 
 ent rates of progress in the two great stages which 
 divide it. In the Old Testament the progress is 
 protracted, interrupted, - often languid, sometimes so 
 dubious as to seem like retrogression. Accessions 
 take place in sundry paiis, in divers manners, at 
 times undei' disguises of eaithly forms, seeming to 
 suggest mistakes, which have to be themselves c(n- 
 rected. Yet thi'ough it all tlie doctrine grows, and the 
 revelation draws nearer to the p-reat disclosure. Then 
 there is entire suspension. We turn the vacant page 
 which jeprosents the silence of 400 years, — and we 
 are in the New Testament. 
 
 N(.)W again there is progress, but rapid and un- 
 broken. Our steps before were centuries ; now they 
 are but yeai's. From the manger of Bethlehem on 
 earth to the city of God comiiug down fi'om heaven 
 tlie great scheme of things unrolls before us, without 
 a check, without a break. It is in harmony with 
 pi'ocesses of nature and with human feelings, that 
 preparations shoidd be slowly matured, but that final 
 results should rapidly unfold. Wlien life becomes 
 intense it can no more endure delays, or develop 
 itself by languid progression. The root was long- 
 before it shewed the token of its presence, the stem 
 and leaves grew slowly, but yesterday the bud 
 emerged from its sheath, and to-day it is expanded 
 in the flower. A swift coarse of events, the period 
 of one human life, a few (•(jiitemporiLiry writers hiiAe 
 
24 LECTURE I. 
 
 given us all the gospel that we need to know under 
 our present dispensation, all that we shall ever know 
 till Jesus comes again. 
 
 But there is, as has been observed, a plan of pro- 
 gress though its coiu'se is swift, and I would take 
 note first of its stages and then of its principles. 
 
 2. Its stages I do not now examine ; but just mark 
 them off as they catch the eye. First we are con- 
 ducted through the manifestation of Christ in the 
 flesh : we see and hear and leain to know the living 
 person, who is at once the source and the subject of 
 all the doctrine of which we speak. He is presented 
 as the source of doctrine, delivering with his own lips 
 the first Christian instructions, the first preaching of 
 a present gospel and the pregnant principles of truth. 
 He is presented as the subject of doctrine, for it is 
 himself that he offers to us by word and deed as the 
 object of our faith, and the events which we see ac- 
 complished in his earthly history are the predestined 
 substance of all subsequent instruction. But within 
 this stage of learning there is not only continuous 
 development by the course of events and acciunu- 
 lation of facts, but at a certain point a great change 
 occius, which is visible to every eye. It is the point 
 where we pass from the synoptic Gospels and come 
 under the teachings of St. John. Now we rise to 
 heaven, and go back to " the begimiing," and set forth 
 from " the bosom of the Father." Now we are taught 
 to recognise the glory of the person of Christ, with 
 a consciousness not changed but more distinct, with 
 acknowledgments not new but more articulate. In 
 
LECTURE I. 25 
 
 the former Gospels we have walked with him in the 
 common paths of life ; in this we seem to have joined 
 him on "the holy mount." It is almost like the 
 change which was witnessed by the three disciples, 
 who had walked conversing by his side, and then 
 suddenly saw his coimtenance altered and his raiment 
 white and glistering. Such is the effect upon our 
 minds, not merely of the last Evangehst's own expres- 
 sions, but of that selection of words and acts which it 
 was his commission to make and to leave. 
 
 We close the Gospels and open the books which 
 foUow. We have passed a great landmark and are 
 farther on our way ; yet the line of doctrine which 
 we pursue seems to have sunk to a lower level, for 
 we cease to be taught by the lips of the Incarnate 
 Word, and are remitted to the discourses and writings 
 of men. Is this progress 1 He assured us that it 
 would be ; and we find that it is. 
 
 We are under the dispensation of the Spirit ; and 
 in the book of Acts are borne, by seeming accident 
 but by invisible guidance, straight along that line of 
 fact and of thought in which we are to find the fuU 
 developments of the truth which was given in the 
 Gospels. 
 
 In matter of doctrine the book of Acts is our intro- 
 duction to the Epistles. Here if the authority of the 
 teacher seems lowered from what it was in the 
 Gospels, the fulness of the doctrine is visibly in- 
 creased. Its more mysterious parts are seen ex- 
 panded and defined. Statements which might seem 
 of doubtful meaning in the former stage have foimd 
 
26 LECTURE I. 
 
 a fixed interpretation in the latter. Suggestions of 
 thought in the one have beciime habits of thought in 
 the other. What were only facts there have become 
 doctrines here ; and truths, which just gleamed from 
 a parable or startled us in some sudden saying, are 
 now deliberately expanded into manifold and recog- 
 nised relations with the feelings and necessities of man. 
 The nature and consec|uences of the woi'k of Christ 
 on earth, the offices for men which he now fulfils in 
 heaven, the living relations which he bears to his 
 people in the Spirit, the discoveries of his majesty 
 and communications of his glory which are ready to 
 be revealed mthe last time, all these are seen in the 
 apostolic writings, sometimes asserted as perspicuous 
 doctrine, more often blending and kindling together 
 in the inward life of the spiiit, giving the form to 
 the chaiacter and the motives to the life. 
 
 Yet a further change takes place as we reach the 
 close of Scriptures. This inward and personal life in 
 the Spirit is not a,ll. There is a kingdom of Christ, 
 which has its form, its history, its destinies. In the 
 later Epistles we see a constituted society, and hear 
 the sounds of a coming conflict : the Church appears 
 on tJic defensive, and the steps of invisible powers are 
 moving round her. The prophetic book which fol- 
 lows transports us into the unseen world, and opens 
 the temple of God in heaA'en, and shews us the con- 
 ]iection of the history of the Church with things 
 above and things Ijelow ; and guides through the 
 dim confusion of tlie conflict to the last victory of 
 the Laml_i, leaving us at last among the full eftects 
 
LECTURE I. 27 
 
 of I'edemption, in a new heaven and a new earth, and 
 in a holy society and city of God. 
 
 3. Having cast our eye along the stages of advance, 
 we next enquire after the principles by which it is 
 governed ; and we find them in the relations which 
 the doctrine bears to its author, which it bears to the 
 facts on which it is founded, which it bears to the 
 human mind to which it is addressed, and which its 
 component parts bear to each other. 
 
 a. The relation of the doctrine to its author is the 
 ground of its continuous unity, and unless there be 
 unity we have no right to speak of progress : for 
 succession is of many, but progress is of one. The 
 unity of the New Testament doctrine lies in this, that 
 it is the teaching of one mind, the mind of Christ. 
 The security for this is given to us in two ways : first 
 by the fact that there is no part of the later and 
 larger doctrine which has not its germs and principles 
 in the words which he spake with his own Hps in 
 the days of his flesh. It is provided that all which 
 is to be spoken after shall find support and proof 
 from his own pregnant and forecasting sayings. Se- 
 condly, it is made clear by his -own promises before- 
 hand, by facts which evidence his personal adminis- 
 tration, and by the distinct assertions of the men 
 whom he employs, that, when his own voice has 
 ceased on earth, it is nevertheless he who teaches 
 still. The testimonies of this are scattered along our 
 whole path, till we come to the last vision itself, 
 in which he personally reappears, " to shew unto his 
 servants the Revelation which God gave unto him," 
 
28 LECTURE I. 
 
 renewing thereby for the last time the assertion 
 of our text, "I have given unto them the words 
 which thou gavest me." 
 
 /S. The relation of the doctrine to the facts on which 
 it is founded is a principle by which a certain mea- 
 sure of progress is necessarily constituted. Chris- 
 tian doctrine does not groimd itself on speculation. 
 It begins from the region and the testimony of the 
 senses. Its materials are facts, and it is itself the 
 interpretation and application of them. It is there- 
 fore reasonable that the facts should be completed, 
 before they are clearly interpreted and fully applied. 
 Jesus must have died and risen again before the doc- 
 trine concerning his death and resurrection can be 
 brought to Hght. Not till the Son of Man is glo- 
 rified can we expect to arrive at a stage of doctrine 
 which shall give all the meaning and the virtue of 
 facts which tiU then were not completed. Up to 
 that time we are in the midst of a history of which 
 his own saying is true, " What I do thou knowest not 
 now, but thou shalt know hereafter." 
 
 y. The relation of the doctrine to the human mmd 
 does also plainly necessitate a particular kind of pro- 
 gress in the method of its communication. The 
 doctrine was not meant to be an opinion but a power : 
 " The words that I speak tmto you they are spirit 
 and they are life." It therefore had to pass from 
 the form of a divine announcement into the form of 
 a human experience. It had to establish its own 
 connection with the world of human thoughts and 
 feelings. Once spoken by the mouth of the Lord, it 
 
LECTURE I. 1'9 
 
 might perhaps have been left to make this transition 
 according to the natural laws of the human mind. 
 But the transition in itself was too great, the conse- 
 quences of error in the first stage of it wotdd be too 
 momentous, for the Author and Finisher of our faith 
 to leave the Church to her ordinary resources at so 
 critical a moment. He would give a divine certamty 
 and authority to the first human apprehensions of his 
 truth. He would make it sure that he had himself 
 conducted those first experiences and applications of 
 the word, by which future experiences and applica- 
 tions might be guided and tried for ever. Therefore 
 the word spoken to men by the voice of Jesus changed 
 into a word spoken in men by his Spirit, creating thus 
 a kind of teaching which carried his word into more 
 intimate connection with human thought and more 
 varied apphcation to human Hfe. 
 
 S. Lastly, the relation of the several parts of doc- 
 trine to each other would call for a certain orderly 
 course of development. There is a natural fitness 
 that the knowledge of the Lord himself should pre- 
 cede the knowledge of his work, and that we should 
 wait on his ministry on earth before we apprehend 
 his ministry in heaven, and that we should see that 
 we are reconciled by his death before we understand 
 how we are saved by his life ; embracing the meri- 
 torioiis means before we expatiate among the glorious 
 issues. It is reasonable that an acquaintance with 
 Christ himself, and a knowledge of his work and 
 grace, should be given first, and that, from the source 
 thus provided, the rules and motives of conduct 
 
;h) lfajture I. 
 
 slioukl afterwards l.tc elicited. It is i'it;lit that we 
 should be i'ully and clearly instructed in the things 
 of our present dispensation, and in the life of faith 
 tlirough which we are passing now, and in the king- 
 dom of an inward and spiritual giace, and then that 
 we should be subsequently informied, and more dimly 
 and briefly too, of the gieat history of the unseen 
 conflict with which we are more remotely concerned, 
 and of its final issues when the foiincr things will 
 have i)assed away and God shall make all things 
 new. These vaiious paiis of the doctrine, though in 
 some degree commingling and inteifused, do yet on 
 the whole sort themselves out in Gosj)els, Epistles, 
 and Apocalypse. 
 
 Lift up now your eyes on this iiKinument of a 
 distant age which you call the New Testament. Be- 
 hold these remains of the original literature of a 
 busy Jewish sect ; these occasional writings of its 
 leaders, emanating from diffeient hands and gathei'ed 
 from different localities. They are delivei'ed to you 
 collected and aiianged, though by means which you 
 cannot ascertain. They aie befo]'e yf)U now, not as 
 accidentally collected writings, but a,s one l)ook ; a 
 design completed, a body oig-anised, and pervaded by 
 one iin\ard life. The several parts grow out of and 
 into each other with mutual supjiort, corielative func- 
 tions, and an orderly develojiment. It is a, " whole 
 body fitly joined together and co)iipa,cted by that 
 which every joint supplies, according to the etfectufil 
 working in the measure of every part, making in- 
 crease of the body to the building itsell' up" in ti-uth. 
 
LECTURIi 1. 31 
 
 It begins with the person of Christ, and the facts 
 of his manifestation in the flesh, and the words whicli 
 he gave from his Father ; and accustoms us by de- 
 grees to behokl his glory, and to discern the drift 
 of his teaching and to expect the consequences of 
 his woik. It passes on to his body the Church, 
 and opens the dis])ensation of his Spiiit, and carries 
 us int(3 the life of his people, yea down into the secret 
 places of their hearts ; and there translates the an- 
 nouncements of God into the experiences of man, and 
 discovers a conversation in heaven and a life which is 
 hid with Clnist in God. It woi'ks out practical aj)- 
 plications, and is careful in the details of duty, and 
 provides for difficultie and perplexities, and suggests 
 the order of Churches, and throws up bariiers against 
 the wiles of the devil. It shews us things to come, 
 the course of the spiritual conflict, and the close of 
 this transient scene, and the coming of the Lord, and 
 the resuirection of the dead, and the eternal judg- 
 ment, and the new creation, and the hfe everlasting. 
 
 Thus it is furnished for all emergencies and prepared 
 for perpetual use. It dominates the restless course of 
 thought, and is ever being interpreted by experience 
 and events. It is an authority which survives when 
 others perish, and a light which waxes when otheis 
 wane. By it, as the insti'ument of God for the edu- 
 cation of men, nations are hrmianised and chuiches 
 sanctified. And yet more i eal :uid lasting than these 
 are the results whicli it secures. An elect nation 
 is being gathered from among us, and an eternal 
 Church prepared, which shall supplant all transient 
 
32 LECTURE I. 
 
 and provisional societies in that day for which the 
 whole creation waits. Here is the final scope of the 
 Book of our covenant, in its combination with that 
 older volume which it continues and completes. 
 
 Then is it not to each of us a matter of the deepest 
 personal concern, that the truth which it teaches and 
 the spirit which it breathes should have entered into 
 his OAvn soul ; and that he should thus become a par- 
 taker in the life which it reveals, an example of the 
 character which it demands, and an inheritor of the 
 portion which it promises % But this cannot be, un- 
 less he yield to the Written Word the confidence 
 which it claims. Oh, deal worthily, deal trustfully 
 with such a guide as this ! Venture your souls on 
 the words of which the Lord has said, " I have given 
 Tuito them the words which thou gavest me." Re- 
 ceive the message, receive the form in which it is 
 left to you, "not as the word of man, but as it is 
 in truth, the word of God," and then you will find 
 that it " effectually worketh also in them that believe," 
 for he who obeys from the heart that form of doctrine 
 into which he is delivered, finds that a course of pro- 
 gressive teaching is opened in his own soul, to which 
 the Holy Scripture will never cease to minister, and 
 which the Holy Spirit will never cease to guide. 
 
LECTUEE 11. 
 
 THE GOSPELS. 
 
 St. Mark i. i. . 
 The heginnimj of the Gospel of Jems Christ, the Son of God. 
 
 W ITH reverential and afi'ectionate interest we look 
 back to the beginnings of those things which possess 
 our allegiance as established powers, or are daily 
 enjoyed as familiar blessings. The thought that 
 they had a beginning, that there was once a time 
 when they were not, gives a freshness to the feelings 
 with which we regard them ; while the comparison 
 of the state of commencement with the state of per- 
 fection brings with it a natural pleasure, in marking 
 the tendencies and the tokens of all that has 
 happened since. No words can open the heart to 
 these impressions so powerfully as those which have 
 just been uttered. The beginning of the Gospel of 
 Jesus Christ, the Son of God, places us at the opening 
 of the mystery of godliness, of the salvation of the 
 world, of the glory which fills the heavens, and of 
 the kingdom which endures for ever. 
 
34 LECTURE II. 
 
 The expression with which St. Mark opens his 
 narrative impHes that the Gospel is then an estab- 
 hshed fact and a completed scheme, and that he here 
 returns to the moment when the fact began to assert 
 itself before the world as already present, and the 
 scheme to shew itself as in actual progress. The 
 beginning of the Gospel (according to this Evan- 
 gelist) is not found at the birth of Jesus, when the 
 communications of Heaven were made but to few, 
 and died suddenly into silence ; but from the time 
 when John did baptize in the wilderness, and when 
 Jesus began to shew himself, and " the word of the 
 beginning of Christ" was publicly proclaimed, never 
 to be again suspended till it should have become the 
 word of a completed Gospel. It is indeed the habit 
 of the Apostles to represent the publication of the 
 GosjDel as historically commencing at the same point 
 of time. " The word," says St. Peter, " which God 
 sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace by 
 Jesus Christ, — that word began from Galilee, after 
 the baptism which John preached » ;" and St. Paul, 
 in presenting to the Jews " the word of this salva- 
 tion," dates its proclamation from the time " when 
 John had first preached before his coming the 
 baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel**." 
 
 Biit the expression which is used in the text of 
 the opening of the public life of Jesas may also be 
 trvdy applied to the whole period of that life. The 
 Gospel, considered as fact, began from the Incar- 
 nation, and was completed at the Resurrection ; 
 
 a Acts X. 36, 37. b Ibid. xii. 24. 
 
LECTURE II. 35 
 
 but the Gospel, considered as doctrine, began from 
 the first preaching of Jesus, and was completed in 
 the dispensation of the Spirit. "When the Lord 
 quitted the world, he left the material of the Gospel 
 already perfect, but the exposition of the Gospel 
 only begun ; and in the subsequent consciousness 
 of his disciples, the period of the commencement of 
 the word and the period of its perfection must 
 have been strongly discriminated from each other. 
 
 When living in the perfect dispensation of the 
 Spirit, and going to others in the fulness of the 
 blessing of the Gospel of Christ, they would re- 
 member how that Gospel dawned gradually on their 
 minds during the few years in which its facts had 
 been passing before their eyes, how imperfectly they 
 had understood those facts, how inadequately they 
 had apprehended the teaching by which the facts 
 were accompanied, how true it was that what their 
 Lord did they knew not then, but that they were 
 to know it afterwards. To them that whole period 
 of time must have seemed but an initiatory stage, 
 a " beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ the 
 Son of God." 
 
 And so it was. The Gospel which Jesus preached 
 was a Gospel which in its main particulars had 
 yet to be fulfilled, and which could not be fully 
 opened till it had been fulfilled. While the facts 
 were still incomplete, the doctrine was yet in its 
 commencement ; and we have on this account the 
 right to describe by the words of the text, not only 
 the first steps but the ivhole of the manifestation 
 
 D 2 
 
36 LECTURE II. 
 
 of Christ in the flesh. The beginning of the Gospel" 
 is a name which in one sense comprehends " all 
 that Jesiis began both to do and teach until the 
 clay when he was taken up." 
 
 To us this stage of the divine teaching is repre- 
 sented by the writings of the four Evangelists; and 
 I would now consider this collection, first relatively, 
 as the beginning of the orderly development of the 
 christian doctruie in the whole New Testament, and 
 then separately, as a course of teaching which bears 
 within its own limits a certain character of sys- 
 tematic advance. 
 
 Two such tojjics, included in a single Lecture, can 
 receive little more than a suggestive treatment ; but 
 I pray that this may not occasion any defect of 
 that careful reverence, with which the fourfold Gospel 
 must be ever touched by those who see in it the 
 very ark of the covenant, where the cherubim of 
 glory overshadow the mercy-seat. 
 
 I. First, then, we have to observe how the Gospel 
 collection is fitted to its place and fulfils its function, 
 as the coimnencement of the christian doctrine in the 
 New Testament. 
 
 Now the christian doctrine is a doctrine con- 
 cerning facts which have occurred and a person 
 who has been manifested within the sphere of human 
 observation. The foundations of all that is to be 
 known of the word of life are laid in "that which 
 was seen with the eyes, and heard with the ears, and 
 handled with the hands " of men. Then it is neces- 
 saiy for every learner that, before all inferences or 
 
LECTURE II. 37 
 
 applications, the facts tliemselves as meie pheno- 
 mena should first be rendered in the cleaiest light. 
 Hence our elementary lessons aie narratives of the 
 simplest form. A plain report of woids and deeds, 
 easy and inartificial in the extieme, in which the 
 most stupendous events elicit no aiticulate expiession 
 of feeling, without appearance of plan or system, with 
 scarcely a comment or reflection, and in which a word 
 of explanation ahnost startles us — such is the cha- 
 racter of the three first of those Avritings which 
 form the giound and contain the material of all 
 subsequent christian doctrine. No literary fact is 
 more remaikable than that men, knowing what these 
 writers knew, and feeling what they felt, should have 
 given us chronicles so plain and calm. They have 
 nothing to say as from themselves. Their narratives 
 place us without ]^:reface, and keep us without 
 comment, among external scenes, in full view of facts, 
 and in contact with the living peison whom they 
 teach us to know. The style of simple recital, un- 
 clouded and scarcely coloured by any perceptible 
 contribution from the mind of the writers, gives 
 us the scenes, the facts, and the person, as seen in 
 the clearest light and through the most transparent 
 atmosphere. Who can fail to recognise a divine 
 provision, for placing the disciples of aU future ages 
 as nearly as possible in the position of those who 
 had been personally present at " the beginning of 
 the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God 1 " 
 
 The importance, in the whole course of instruction, 
 of first fixing on the mind both the objective leality 
 
38 LECTURE II. 
 
 of the facts and the living portrait of the person, 
 is further intimated by the fourfold repetition of 
 the history. Four times does the Lord walk before 
 us in the glory of grace and truth, and, whatever 
 correspondences or valuations the Gospels may ex- 
 hibit in other parts of their narratives, four times 
 are the great facts of the death and resurrection of 
 Chiist rehearsed to us in the minuteness of circum- 
 stantial detail. We do not go forward to further 
 disclosures, till the historical facts have been ensured 
 to \is by testimony upon testimony, and the portrait 
 has grown familiar to us by line upon line. 
 
 Far on in the holy books, when the scriptural 
 structure is nearly perfected, oiu' eyes are turned 
 back to the ground of visible, audible, tangible 
 realities from which we started. 
 
 " That which was from the beginning, which we 
 have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which 
 we have looked upon, and our hands have handled 
 of the Word of life, (for the life was manifested, and 
 we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto 
 you that eternal life, which was with the Father and 
 was manifested to us,) that which we have seen and 
 heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have 
 fellowship with us°." 
 
 Yes, it is true. We have fellowship with those 
 that speak, not only in their spiritual relations with 
 their Lord (which they fully understood only after he 
 was gone), but in their remembrances of him in that 
 earlier time when he was yet with them. Their 
 <= I .Tohn i. 1-3. 
 
LECTURE II. 39 
 
 witness is eflfectual for this end. For us also it is all 
 real. He dwelt among us. We beheld his glory. 
 We caught the gracious words that proceeded out of 
 his mouth. So things went with him. So he looked 
 and moved and spoke. So he wrought and suffeied 
 and died. We have stood by the cross of Jesus. 
 We have entered the empty sepulchre. We have 
 seen him alive after his 2)assion. He has shewn us 
 his hands and his feet. We have been led out as 
 far as to Bethany, have seen the hands lifted up to 
 bless, and watched the ascending form. 
 
 Open these pages where we will, the sense of 
 reality revives within us. We feel afresh that we 
 have not followed cunningly devised fables, have not 
 loved an idea, or trusted in an abstraction. We know 
 in whom we have believed, and feel that our Re- 
 deemer is owe friend. We are solemnised as in a 
 holy sanctuary, and secure as in a familiar home. We 
 have escaped from doubt and debate, and no longer 
 criticise or reason. We have recovered the mind of 
 little children. We sit at the feet of Jesus : and the 
 faith which came into his presence languid and dis- 
 concerted, departs invigorated and refreshed. 
 
 Brethren, let me urge upon you the habitual study 
 of the holy Gospels for this revival of the reality 
 and simplicity of faith. Let me urge it more espe- 
 cially upon those who converse in the region of 
 abstract ideas, whether they frequent the ordered 
 paths of systematic divinity, or wander in the free 
 excursions of speculative thought. Dear as the Gospel 
 stories are to the simple peasant, they are yet more 
 
40 LECTURE II. 
 
 necessary to the student and the divine ; for there are 
 influences in abstract thought and in dogmatic discus- 
 sion which will drain the soul of Hfe unless fitting 
 antidotes be used : and there is no antidote so efiec- 
 tual, as is formd in a continual return to those scenes 
 of historic fact in which the word of God has given 
 us our first lessons in Christ. 
 
 This necessity for habitual converse with the evan- 
 gelical narratives is a sufficient proof of the wisdom 
 which assigned them the place and the space which 
 they actually fill, and especially which ordained that 
 the picture of our Lord's earthly life should be given 
 to us not in one gospel, but in four. 
 
 I suppose we all feel how different would have 
 been the effect of possessing one " Life of Christ," 
 however full and systematic. We spend more time 
 and (if I may use the expression) feel more at home 
 in the four successive chambers than we should have 
 done in one long gallery ; and the impression of all 
 that is there shewn to us sinks deeper into the heart, 
 from the repetition of many passages of the stoiy 
 under slightly varying lights and in different relative 
 connections. Lively attention, minute observation, 
 careful comparison, and enquiry which is never fuUy 
 satisfied, are awakened at every step by that singular 
 combination of resemblances and differences ; and the 
 mind is thus engaged to dwell longer on the scenes, 
 conversing among them in a more animated spirit, 
 and with an intei'est which is perpetually refreshed. 
 We know the immense expenditure of labour in our 
 'own da}' on the comparative characteristics of the 
 
LECTURE II. 41 
 
 Gospels, and the manifold attempts to harmonise or 
 to reconstruct them, to ascertain the point of view of 
 the writers, and to accoiuit for the variations in their 
 selection and position of incidents and in the turn 
 which they give to discourses. Whatever be the 
 spirit in which such attempts are made, they at least 
 afibrd an incidental witness to the care which divine 
 wisdom has taken to detain and occupy our minds at 
 the outset in those scenes in which alone we can 
 learn to know Jesus Christ himself. 
 
 It is plain that the four histories are modified 
 by their own instinctive principles of selection and 
 arrangement, which do not indeed announce them- 
 selves, and almost elude our attempts to ascertain 
 them, but yet restdt in giving fotir discriminated 
 aspects of their conunon subject, as the Royal Law- 
 giver, the Mighty Worker, the Friend of Man, and 
 the Son of God — four aspects, but one portrait ; for 
 if the attitude and the accessories vary, the features 
 and the expression are the same*^. 
 ■ Who does not perceive the immense assistance 
 hereby given to us for receiving the knowledge 
 of Christ 1 One representation, however full, would 
 still have suggested the thought, " This is the 
 impression made upon a single mind. Who can say 
 what part of it is due to the idiosyncrasies of the 
 Avitness '{ If we had the impressions of another mind, 
 perhaps we should have a different image." As 
 it is, we derive the unpression from four differ- 
 ent quarters, and the image is still the same. It 
 
 d Note ITI. 
 
42 LECTURE II. 
 
 is represented from four different points of view ; but, 
 however represented, it is the same Jesus. The con- 
 ception is one, and its rmity attests its truth. We 
 feel that we see him as he was. No human being that 
 ever trod the earth has left behind a representation of 
 himself more clear and living, and more certain in its 
 truthfulness, than is that which we possess of the 
 Prophet of Nazareth in GaKlee. 
 
 From time to time some fresh portrait may appear. 
 Some adventurous imagination, charmed and yet per- 
 plexed by the Gospel story, may attempt to recon- 
 struct it in accordance with the spirit of the world. 
 Unable to receive as real the sole example of sinless 
 humanity, it may introduce into the picture touches 
 of the error and infirmity which are not there : and 
 may mistake the awful gleams of the indwelling 
 Godhead for the glimmer of an enthusiasm which 
 deludes and is deluded. The world may read the 
 bold romance, and half commend the creation of 
 fancy. But the creations of fancy perish as they 
 rise, and the Jesus of the Gospels remains ; not only 
 as a perfect ideal, but as a vivid reality, a represen- 
 tation which apjoears after every fresh attempt to 
 change it, more glorious in majesty and beauty, 
 and more conspicuous also for truthfulness and life. 
 
 In jDlacing the statement of the person of Christ 
 as the first work of the Gospel histories, and as 
 the beginning of the Gospel itself, I speak in ac- 
 cordance with the spirit of those books and of the 
 whole ensuing system of doctrine. Jesus Christ 
 created the Gospel by his work ; he preaches the 
 
LECTURE II. 43 
 
 Gospel by his words ; but he is the Gospel in 
 himself. The expression is but the condensation 
 of a hundred passages of Scripture which declare 
 him to he that, which, in more timid but less 
 adequate language, we might say that he wrought, 
 or that he taught, or that he gave. " I am the 
 resurrection and the life**." He " is our peace f," he 
 "is our lifes," he "is the hope of glory l^." "He 
 of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, 
 and sanctification, and redemption' :" and they who 
 are saved "are made partakers of Christ''," not 
 merely of his gifts, whether they be gifts of grace 
 or gloiy. Is it not indeed the distinguishing 
 feature of the Christian system, that it places 
 the foundation of salvation in hving relations with 
 a living person, rather than in the adoption of 
 opinions or of habits ? that under it the believer 
 is, not the man who maintains the doctrine of the 
 Trinity, or holds "justification by faith," but the 
 man who has "come to" Christ and "abides in" 
 him ? 
 
 These are the Lord's own words : they are fun- 
 damental words in relation to all that is added 
 afterwards : they are, in matter of doctrine, the 
 beginning of the Gospel. The writings of the 
 Evangelists do not present to us a scheme of doc- 
 trine as to the nature of Christ or as to the work 
 which he does. They present to us the Lord Jesus 
 
 <: John xi. 25. f Eph. ii. 14. S Col. iii. 4. 
 
 li Col. i. 27. 'I Cor. i. 30. k Heb. iii. 14. 
 
44 LECTURE II. 
 
 liimself, as he shewed himself to men in order to 
 win their confidence and fix their trust. Men 
 learned to know him and to trust him befoie they 
 fuUy understood who he was and what he did. 
 
 The faith which, in the Gospel stories, we see 
 asked for and given, secured and educated, is a 
 faith that fastens itself on a living Saviour, 
 though it can yet but little comprehend the method 
 or even the nature of the salvation. Thus the New 
 Testament, in giving us these narratives for our 
 first lessons in Christian faith, teaches us that the 
 essential and original nature of that faith lies, not 
 in acceptance of truths which are revealed, but in 
 confidence in a person who is manifested. " He that 
 Cometh to me," " He that believeth on me," is. the 
 Lord's own account of the child of the new 
 covenant who is the fit lecipient of advancing doc- 
 tiine. Faith, as seen in the Gospels, results not 
 in the first place from the miracles which justify 
 and sustain it, but from the peisonal impression 
 which appeals to the conscience and the spirit in 
 man. The first disciples believed befoie a miracle 
 had been shevsoi. It was imputed as a fault, " Except 
 ye see signs and won'dexs ye will not believe^ :" 
 and it was a condescension to inferior spiritual 
 sensibihties when the simple word " Beheve me™ " 
 was changed to " Or else believe me for the very 
 \\ork's sake." As it Avas with those disciples so 
 also is it with ouiselves. The evidential works 
 have their r)wn most important, most necessary 
 ' Jolin iv. 48. I" Ibid xiv. 11, 
 
LECTURE II. 45 
 
 office : but the Lord himself is his own evidence, 
 and secures our contidence, love, and adoration by 
 what he is more than by what he does. 
 
 We pass on from the Gospel histories into a 
 dispensation of invisible offices and spiritual rela- 
 tions, and we carry with tis the personal knowledge 
 of him by whom these offices and relations are 
 sustained. It is this which secures that they 
 should not be to iis a system of ideas and abstrac- 
 tions, of words and names. The Mediator between 
 God and man, the High Priest in the spiritual 
 temple, the King on the unseen throne, is this 
 same Jesus who went in and out among us, whom 
 we have seen sitting in the house at Bethany, or 
 by the well at Sychem, receiving sinners, preaching 
 to the poor, comforting his friends, and suffering 
 little children to come to him. With an acquaint- 
 ance already formed, a confidence already secured, 
 and a love already awakened, we can pass with 
 a prepared heart to more abtruse revelations of 
 the same Lord, when he is presented as the righteous- 
 ness of the sinful in the Epistle to the Romans, 
 as the predestined source of life in the Epistle 
 to the Ephesians, as the sacrifice and priest of 
 the new covenant in the Epistle to the Hebrews. 
 Having first known himself, we are ready for the 
 Spirit to take of the things which are his and shew 
 them to us. 
 
 II. Our reflections hitherto have tiu-ned upon the 
 relation which the Gospel collection bears to the 
 whole New Testament, and we have looked at it 
 
46 LECTURE II. 
 
 as the beginning of a course of doctrine extending 
 through the books which follow. It is now further 
 to be noted, that its own separate ivork is itself 
 fulfilled on an apparent plan of progressive de- 
 velopment, which is constituted by the relative cha- 
 racters of the Gospels viewed in the order which 
 they have habitually assumed. 
 
 (i.) The collection is divided into two parts 
 by a line of demarcation perceptible to every eye 
 and recognised in every age ; the first three Gos- 
 pels forming the one part and the fourth Gospel 
 the other. The former naturally precedes, and in 
 its effect prepares us for the latter. We are to 
 learn the great lesson of the manifestation of Christ : 
 and here, as in most other subjects, the order 
 of fact is not the order of knowledge. In the 
 order of fact the glory of the divine nature pre- 
 cedes the circumstances of the earthly manifesta- 
 tion ; but in the order of knowledge the reverse is 
 true. Events occurring in time, a place in human 
 history, and the external aspect of a life, must supply 
 the antecedent conditions for the higher disclosures. 
 Thus the triple Gospel, which educates us among 
 scenes of earth, prepares us for that which follows. 
 Our minds are led along that very course of thought 
 over which they woiild have moved if we had been 
 eye-witnesses of the manifestation of Christ, in that 
 we are familiarised with its ordinary aspect and 
 most frequent characteristics, before our thoughts are 
 rivetted on those pecviliar passages in which the 
 revelation of glory is most concentrated, and which 
 
LECTURE II. 47 
 
 serve to interpret aU that we had before felt to be 
 implied. 
 
 (2.) Again, if the synoptic Gospels are taken by 
 themselves, we observe, even withm the limits of this 
 division, certain orderly steps of advance. Each of 
 these narratives has its own prevailing character, 
 whereby it makes its proper contribution to the com- 
 plete portrait of the Lord : each also has its own 
 historical associations, whereby it represents a sepa- 
 rate stage in the presentation of Christ to the world. 
 Both the internal characters and the historical asso- 
 ciations of the several Gospels have been fully wrought 
 out by recent writers, and are now generally under- 
 stood. Yet they must be shortly noticed here, for 
 the due elucidation of the statement that the books 
 in combination constitute a progressive course. 
 
 The record of St. Matthew, ever recognised as the 
 Hebrew Gospel, is the true comraencement of the 
 New Testament, shewing how it grows out of the 
 Old, and presenting the manifestation of the Son of 
 God not as a detached phenomenon, but as the pre- 
 destined completion of the long course of historic 
 dispensations. It is the Book of the Generation of 
 Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the son of Abraham. 
 It founds itself on the ideas of the old covenant. 
 It refers at every step, especially in its earlier chap- 
 ters, to the former Scriptures, noting how that was 
 fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets. It is a 
 history of fulfilment, presenting the Lord as the 
 fulfiller of all righteousness, the fulfiller of the Law 
 and the Prophets, not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 
 
48 LECTURE II. 
 
 It sets him forth as a King and Lawgiver in that 
 kingdom of heaven for which a birthplace and a 
 home had been prepared ui Israel : and thus cor- 
 responds to that period in the historical course of 
 events when the word was preached to none but to 
 the Jews only ". 
 
 The Gospel of St. Mark is traditionally connected 
 with St. Peter, who first opened the door of faith to 
 Gentiles, and has the appearance of being addressed 
 to such a class of converts as it was given to that 
 Apostle to gather, men, like the devout soldiers of 
 Ca3sarea, in whom the Koman habit of mind was 
 colovu-ed by contact with Judaism. It is the Gospel 
 of action, rapid, vigorous, vivid. Entering at once on 
 the Lord's ofiicial and pubUc career, it bears us on 
 from one mighty deed to another with a peculiar 
 swiftness of movenient, and yet with the life of 
 picturesque detail. Power over the visible and in- 
 visible worlds, especially as shewn in the casting out 
 of devils, is the prominent characteristic of the pic- 
 ture. St. Peter's saying to Cornelius has been well 
 noticed as a fit motto for this Gospel, " God anointed 
 Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with 
 power, who went about doing good and heahng all 
 those who were oppressed of the devil." In re- 
 lation t(j the expansion of the word from its first 
 home in Jewry to its ultimate prevalence in the 
 whole earth, this Gospel occupies an intermediate 
 position between those of St. Matthew and St. Luke. 
 Its representation of the Lord is disengaged fiom 
 n See Note IV. 
 
LECTURE II. 49 
 
 those close connections with Jewish life and thought 
 which the first Gospel is studious to exhibit, while it 
 is wanting in that breadth of human sympathy and 
 special fitness for the Gentile mind at large, which we 
 recognise in the treatise of St. Luke. 
 
 This, latter Gospel intimates its character in this 
 respect by a genealogy which presents to us not the 
 son of Abraham, but the son of Adatn ; and it car- 
 ries out the intimation by special notice of our Lord's 
 familiar intercourse with human life, his tender sym- 
 pathies with human feelings, his large compassion for 
 human woes. The preface, addressed to a GentUe 
 convert, indicating the position of the writer in re- 
 gard to the facts which he will relate, and speaking 
 in the language of classical composition, shews us at 
 the outset that we have passed from Jewish asso- 
 ciations to a stage m the history of the world, when 
 its purpose of expansion has been proved, and its 
 character of universality established. The whole 
 tone of this Gospel constitutes it pre-eminently a 
 Gospel for the Gentries, specially adapted to the 
 Greek mind, then, in some sense, the mind of the 
 world. Its internal character thus accords with its 
 historical position, as the Gospel of St. Paul, written 
 by his close companion, and circulated, we cannot 
 doubt, in the Churches which he founded. 
 
 As the book of Acts shews iis three stages in the 
 outward progress of the Gospel, first within the 
 bounds of Judaism, then in the work of St. Peter, 
 spreading beyond those limits in the Roman direction, 
 and finally in the ministry of St. Paul, delivered 
 
 E 
 
50 LECTURE II. 
 
 freely and fully to the world ; so do the synoptic 
 Gospels, as they stand in the canon, correspond with 
 a singular fitness to those three periods. We are 
 going forward as we pass through them, and are 
 completing the representation of Christ, not by mere 
 repetition or fortuitous variation in our point of view, 
 but in a certain orderly sequence, corresponding to 
 that in which the knowledge of liim was historically 
 opened to the world. The evangehcal narratives are 
 the proper monuments of a Gospel, which first as- 
 serted itself as the true form of Judaism and the 
 legitimate consummation of the old covenant, and 
 then unfolded its relations with the whole race of 
 mankind, and passed into the keeping of a Catholic 
 Church. 
 
 3. If in traversing the synoptic Gospels we march 
 in the line of a historical advance, it is still more 
 plain that we do so when we pass to the teaching of 
 St. John. 
 
 The Gospel of Christ had no sooner completed the 
 conflicts, through which it established its relations to 
 Judaism and to the world, than it entered on those 
 profound and subtle, those various and protracted 
 controversies, which turned on the person of Christ. 
 This was the natural course of events, whether we 
 regard the tendencies of human thought, the wiles 
 of the devil, or the government of God. If the 
 revelation of Christ himself (as distinguished from 
 what he taught and what he wrought) is the foun- 
 dation of the whole Gospel, it would be first to 
 explore this mystery that the activities and subtleties 
 
LECTURE II. 51 
 
 of thought would address themselves ; it would be 
 first to destroy this mystery that the assaults of the 
 enemy would be directed ; it would be first in se- 
 curing this mystery that the divine guidance of the 
 Church would be made manifest. One Apostle, the 
 first and the last of the "glorious company," was chosen 
 as the chief instrument for settling human thought, 
 defeating the wiles of the devil, and certifying the 
 witness of God. There was but one moment in which 
 the conditions for such a production could co-exist. 
 It must be after a speculative theosophy had begun 
 to form its language and manifest its aberrations. 
 Yet it must be while the voice of an eyewitness 
 could still be lifted up, to tell what eyes had seen, 
 and ears had heard, and hands had handled of the 
 Word of Life ; so that the clearest intuitions of the 
 divinity of Jesus might be for ever blended with 
 the plainest testimony of the senses concerning him. 
 Such a moment was secured by the providence which 
 ordained that John should live till the first heresies 
 had shaped themselves. The disciple who first came 
 to Jesus, who followed him most closely, who lay in 
 his bosom, who stood by his cross, who believed when 
 others were confounded, who saw with more penetrat- 
 ing eye the glory which they all beheld, was reserved 
 to complete the written statement of the person 
 of Christ, in a record which has been designated 
 from ancient days as "the Gospel according to the 
 Spirit." 
 
 As the other Gospels respectively make prominent 
 the ideas of law, of power, and of grace, so does this 
 
 E 2 
 
52 LECTURE II. 
 
 present the glory of Christ. " We beheld his glory, 
 the glory as of the Only-begotten of the Father"." All 
 the disciples beheld it, but there was one whose pure, 
 lofty, and contemplative spirit fitted him to be the 
 best recipient, and therefore the best exponent, of the 
 sublime disclosure. To him, therefore, the office was 
 assigned, and his Gospel is its fulfilment. He begins, 
 not like his predecessors from an earthly starting- 
 point, from the birth of the son of Adam, or the son 
 of Abraham, or the opening of the human ministry, 
 but in the depths of unmeasured eternity and the 
 recesses of the nature of God ; and then bringing 
 the First-begotten into the world, traces with adoring 
 eye the course of word and deed by which he mani- 
 fested forth his gloiy, and at last delivers his record 
 to others, " that they may believe that Jesus is the 
 Son of God, and that believing they may have life 
 through his name p." 
 
 We have now seen that in the three synoptic 
 Gospels the representation of Christ, as he lived and 
 conversed amongst men, is carried on by three suc- 
 cessive stages, from its first Jewish aspect and funda- 
 mental connection with the old covenant to its most 
 catholic character and adaptation to the Gentile 
 mind ; and that these steps correspond to and are 
 comiected with the historical stages of advance, by 
 whcih the word of God passed from its first home to 
 its destined sphere of influence. We have seen that 
 in the fourth Gospel we rise to a more distinct 
 apprehension of the spiritual mystery involved in 
 
 " John i. 14. P Ibid. XX. 31. 
 
LECTURE II. 53 
 
 the picture which has been presented ; and further, 
 that this advance also is connected with historical 
 conditions, subsequent in time to those tinder which 
 the preceding books originated. The course of 
 teaching thus produced is according to that principle 
 which places the earthly things as the introduction 
 to the heavenly, and keeps everything in " its own 
 order, first that which is natural, and afterwards that 
 which is spiritual." 
 
 And yet these stages of progress are constituted 
 only by differences of degree. There is nothing 
 expanded in one book which has not been asserted 
 in another. Take whatever may seem to you the 
 distinguishing idea of any one of them, and you 
 find a strong expression of it in all the others. The 
 Judaism of St. Matthew reaches out to the calling 
 of the Gentiles ; and the catholic spirit of St. Luke 
 falls back upon its Jewish origin. St. John, in ex- 
 hibiting the divine nature of Christ, exhibits only 
 what the others have everywhere implied and fre- 
 quently affirmed. "The Johannean conception of 
 Christ," as it has been termed by some, who wovild 
 place it in opposition to preceding representations, 
 is in fact their explication and confirmation. In the 
 former Gospels we behold the Son of God, pro- 
 claimed by angels, confessed by devils, acknowledged 
 by the voice of the Father ; with authority and 
 power commanding the visible and invisible worlds, 
 and at the central moment of the history transfigured 
 on the holy mount before the eyewitnesses of his 
 majesty. The first word in the Temple declares 
 
54 LECTURE II. 
 
 to his earthly parent his conscious relation to his 
 Father ; the last charge to the Apostles founds the 
 Church in the name of the Father, the Son, and 
 the Holy Ghost ; while, in the intervening period, 
 some voice of self-revelation more deep than usual is 
 from time to time suffered to fall upon our ears ; 
 like that which so many commentators have noticed 
 as a kind of anticipation of the language of St. 
 John, " All things are delivered to me of my Father ; 
 and no man knoweth who the Son is but the Father, 
 neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, 
 and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him''." 
 
 On the other hand, it is in the record of St. John 
 that we read words which, if found in another 
 Gospel, would have been eageiiy urged as antagon- 
 istic to "the Johannean conception." We can 
 imagine what use would then have been made of 
 the argument (John x. 34-36) founded on the text 
 " I have said ye are gods," or of the assertions, 
 " The words which ye hear are not mine," and 
 " The Father is greater than I." Now standing 
 in connection with the claim to the incommunicable 
 Name, and with the statements, " All things that 
 the Father hath are mine," and " I and the Father 
 are one," that argument and those assertions cannot 
 be mistaken ; but they serve to confirm the unity 
 of that revelation of God manifest in the flesh of 
 which one aspect is more fully exhibited in one 
 part, and the other aspect in the other part of 
 the Evangelical record''. 
 
 « ,"\ratt- xi, 27, and Luke x. 22, r Note V. 
 
LECTURE II. 55 
 
 Asserting then the peculiar development which 
 the last Gospel gives to the doctrine of the person 
 of Christ, we also assert that there is no variation 
 from the original conception. The exposition is con- 
 tinuous ; the picture is one. From the beginning 
 of St. Matthew to the end of St. John it is one 
 Lord Jesus Christ, as really the Son of Man in 
 the last Gospel as in the first, as really the Son of 
 God in the first Gospel as in the last. Only we find, 
 in passing under the teachmg of St. John, that here 
 the great mystery shews more vivid and mature ; that 
 the intuitions of it have become more conscious and 
 clear, and the assertions of it more definite and 
 indisputable ; ■ that we have advanced from the 
 simple observation of facts to the state of restro- 
 spection and reflection, and that we have attained 
 to the formation of a language fitted to the 
 highest conceptions of him, who is the Only- 
 begotten of the Father, the Life, and the Light, 
 and the Truth, and the Word Eternal. 
 
 Such is the character of the Gospel collection, 
 regarded as an exposition of the doctrine of the 
 person of Christ. As a scheme characterised by 
 unity and progress it has obviously the appearance 
 of design : and the appearance of design is an 
 argument for its reality. 
 
 But whose design is this, which appears not in 
 the separate books, but in the collection taken as 
 a whole 1 The agents were severed from each other, 
 and wiote as their respective turns of mind and 
 histoiica] circumstances deteimined. Where then 
 
56 LECTURE II. 
 
 was the presiding mind which planned the whole, 
 and, in quahfying and employing the chosen agents, 
 divided to every man severally as he would ? By 
 the voice of the Church as a body, by the ever 
 accumulating consent of her several members, an 
 unchanging answer comes down from age to age. 
 The Spirit of the Lord is here. 
 
 Yes ! the Spirit was to testify of Jesus, and 
 the four-fold Gospel is his penuanent testimony. 
 In it he has provided that the foundations of our 
 faith should be laid in the region where the 
 foundations of all human knowledge lie, namely, 
 in the evidence of the senses, in that which " eyes 
 have seen, ears have heard, and hands have handled 
 of the Word of Life." He has provided that the 
 object of our faith should be known to us as he 
 was known to those who saw him, that he should 
 be clearly known by the simplicity, fully known 
 by the variety, and certainly known by the unity, 
 of the narratives which give to the world the 
 perpetual and only representation of its Redeemer, 
 Finally, he has provided that the representation 
 should be completed by a progressive course of teach- 
 ing, which first famiharises us with the conversation 
 of our Lord among men in its general and ordinary 
 aspect, and then admits us to the more concentrated 
 study of the glory and the mystery, which had 
 already made themselves felt at every step. 
 
 I have only to add, that the divine teaching 
 thus given, even when viewed separately, has the 
 ajipearance of being not a Avhole scheme ending 
 
LECTURE II. 57 
 
 in itself, but a part of a larger scheme. I mean 
 that the general effect of the manifestation which 
 is made in the Gospels is such as almost necessitates 
 farther disclosures. 
 
 One shining with the glory of the Only-begotten 
 of the Father, but clothed in the poverties and in- 
 firmities of man, has walked before us in power and 
 weakness, in majesty and woe. He has come close to 
 us, and drawn us close to him ; has touched every 
 chord of our hearts ; has secured our imphcit trust, 
 and become the object of adoration and love : then 
 he has hung upon a cross, has sunk into a grave, has 
 risen, has ascended, and is gone. It was a brief dis- 
 pensation, and is finished once for all. What did it 
 mean 1 What has it done 1 What are our relations 
 with him now 1 and in what way has this brief ap- 
 pearance afiected our position before God and the 
 state and destiny of the soul 1 What is the nature 
 of the redemption which he has wrought, of the 
 salvation which he has brought, of the kingdom of 
 God which he has opened to all behevers 1 
 
 These were questions left for the Disciples when 
 Jesus was gone ; and, when the reader of the Gos- 
 pel story reaches its close, these questions remain for 
 him. The Disciples would recal what their Master 
 had spoken, in order to gather the whole result of 
 the words of his lips. The reader also will review 
 that personal teaching of Christ which is interwoven 
 with his visible manifestation, and will ask whether 
 it gives an answer to the questions which the mani- 
 festation suggests ; whether it does so fully or par- 
 
58 LECTURE II. 
 
 tially, as a final communication, or as the commence- 
 ment of information to be completed afterwards. 
 This is the subject which will next claim our 
 attention, as the first step in the enquiry, how the 
 Christian doctrine was added to the Christian facts 
 — the divine interpretation to the divine inter- 
 vention. 
 
 The relations between these two parts of the 
 Gospel have now in some measure come into view. 
 We have seen that the evangehcal narrative creates 
 the want and gives the pledge of an evangehcal 
 doctrine ; that it also deposits its material and pro- 
 vides its safeguard. 
 
 a. The narrative creates the want, in that it leaves 
 the mind of the reader in a state of desire and 
 expectation, since the stupendous facts which it re- 
 cites cannot but suggest anxioiis enquiries which wait 
 for clear replies, and vast speculations which demand 
 a firm direction. 
 
 /3. And this want seems to carry with it the fledge 
 that it is raised in order to be satisfied. We feel 
 sure that God has not given us the external manifes- 
 tation of his Son, and then left the questions which 
 arise out of it unanswered and the hopes which 
 it suggests undefined. In the fulness and vivid- 
 ness of the record of the facts we find an implied 
 assurance, that their purposes and results shall also 
 be made clear, and receive in their proper place their 
 own proper exposition. 
 
 7- Again, the history deposits the material of the 
 doctrine ; for that material is nothing else than 
 
LECTURE II. 59 
 
 Christ manifest in the flesh — his incarnation, his 
 obedience, his holiness, love, grace and truth, his 
 death and passion, his resurrection and ascension, 
 and then, beyond these, his glorified life, and liis 
 coming and his kingdom, in which the past history 
 finds its necessary and predicted issues. These, 
 brethren, are the topics of the evangelical teaching, 
 and the constituent elements of the truth, seeing 
 that in this manifestation of the Son of God all that 
 men had known before has received its full illus- 
 tration and its final seal, and that which they had 
 not known has been once for all revealed. AU that 
 is to be learned is comprised within this circle. The 
 deep mine of truth lies beneath this spot. " In 
 him (as the mystery of God) are hid all the treasures 
 of wisdom and knowledge'." 
 
 §. Lastly, the narrative provides the safeguard of 
 the doctrine. Before we arrive at the latter form of 
 teaching, we have been secured against its possible 
 dangers, having been already taught in the most 
 efiective way to feel that our trust is not in a name 
 which we learn, but in a person whom we know ; not 
 in a scheme of salvation, but in a living Saviour. 
 I cannot say how strongly I feel the value of the 
 Gospel narrative in this last point of view ; and 
 I feel it most when I observe the effect of other 
 methods, which have trained the minds of disciples 
 mainly by schemes of doctrine without the admixture 
 in its due proportion of the ever fresh and healthful 
 element of history. Blessed be the wisdom of God, 
 
 6 Col. ii. 3. 
 
60 LECTURE II. 
 
 which has ordered the teaching of the New Testament 
 upon its actual plan, laying first the Kving knowledge 
 of the Lord Jesus as the broadest aiid safest basis for 
 doctrine and instruction in righteousness. The order 
 thus obsei^ved in the written word teaches how the 
 knowledge of Christ will best be opened out to every 
 single soul. He only is duly prepared for more 
 abstract revelations of the nature of the redeeming 
 work and of its present and future issues, in whose 
 heart the past manifestation in the flesh is clearly 
 reflected, and who thus has worthily received into 
 his own soul " the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus 
 Christ the Son of God." 
 
LECTURE III. 
 
 THE GOSPELS. 
 
 Heb. ii. 3. 
 
 How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation, which at 
 the first began to be spohen by the Lord? 
 
 T ROM age to age this question lias fulfilled its 
 office. Men, trusting in their immunity from cri- 
 minal acts, have found themselves confronted by an 
 accusation which they could not answer, and con- 
 victed of guilt of which they had never thought. 
 Still may this question reach one heart after another 
 amongst ourselves, and flash the sense of sin and 
 ruin on those who even now, and even here, are 
 practically neglecting so great salvation ! 
 
 Not, however, on this question, but on the fol- 
 lowing words, have I now to fix your attention ; 
 words which are added to aggravate the sin of that 
 neglect, and to illustrate the certainty of a corres- 
 ponding retribution ; but which do so by the mention 
 of a fact which falls into our present line of thought 
 
62 LECTURE III. 
 
 at the jDoint which we have now reached. This 
 " so great salvation began to be sjooken by the 
 Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that 
 heard him ; God also bearing them witness by signs 
 and wonders, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according 
 to his own will." 
 
 It began to be spoken by the Lord. The word of 
 the old covenant is repeatedly declared to have 
 been "received by the disposition of angels*" — 
 "ordained by angels b" — "spoken by angels"." The 
 ministering spirits, the messengers and servants of 
 the Lord, were employed to introduce the pre- 
 paratory system. On the other hand, the salva- 
 tion of the new covenant is introduced, not by the 
 servants, but by the Lord in person. His introduc- 
 tion of it was not confined to providing its con- 
 ditions and foundations, by the manifestation of 
 himself, and by the redemption which he wrought. 
 He was the messenger and teacher of this salvation, 
 as well as its author and giver. It was fully wrought 
 by the Lord ; but, besides that, it began to be 
 "sjjoken" by the Lord, its announcement coming 
 first from his own lips. Yet this personal speaking 
 was only a certain stage in the course of its pub- 
 lication. It began to be spoken by the Lord, {apxhv 
 Xa^ovaa XaXeiaOa Sia tov Kvplov,) and when he ceased 
 to speak the word was not yet completed. It was to 
 be cleared and assured to the world by those that 
 heard him ; who, having been educated and com- 
 missioned by him for the purpose, proceeded to 
 
 » Acts vii. 53. I' Gal. iii. 19. '■ Heb. ii. 2. 
 
LECTURE III. 63 
 
 pi each the Gospel with the Holy Ghost sent down 
 from heaven, and with adequate proofs of the co- 
 attestation of God. 
 
 This account of the personal ministry of the Lord 
 Jesus, as an initiatory stage of the word of salvation, 
 gives me the subject of which I have now to treat. 
 Evidently it is one of the very highest importance in 
 its bearings on the subsequent stages of doctrine ; on 
 which we shall enter in a very different spirit, if we 
 consider the word spoken by the Lord in person as a 
 finished word, oi' if we regard it as a word begmi. 
 
 As steps which may be of use towards attaining 
 a true view of the case, I would lay down the 
 following propositions. 
 
 First, The teachmg of the Lord in the Gospels 
 iiicludes the substance of all christian doctrine, hut 
 does not hear the character of finality. Secondly, 
 The teaching of the Lord in the Gospels is a visihly 
 progressive course, hut on reaching its highest point 
 announces its own incompleteness, and opens an- 
 other stage of instruction. 
 
 I. 1. The teaching of the Lord in the Gospels in- 
 cludes the substance of all christian doctrine. Never 
 was teaching more natural than his. It was drawn 
 forth by occasions as they arose. It shaped itself 
 to the character, the words, and the acts of those 
 whom he met *in' the highway of the woild. It 
 borrowed its imagery from the circumstances and 
 scenery of the moment. Such teaching as this would 
 not seem likely to embrace the whole circle of truth. 
 We should expect to find it partial and fragmentary ; 
 
64 LECTURE III. 
 
 full in some points, deficient in others, according as 
 the occasions for evoking it had or had not arisen. 
 
 Yet surely the whole course of the manifestation 
 of the Son of God wotild be governed not by accident, 
 but by a special divine predestination : and there must 
 have been a providential appointment of the fittest oc- 
 casions and the most perfect conditions, in order that 
 he who came from God to speak the words of God 
 might adequately accomplish his mission. Then the 
 general state of the religious atmosphere at the time 
 of his appearing, the strongly discriminated develop- 
 ments of opinion in Pharisees and Sadducees, the 
 condition of individuals who came across his path, 
 the scenes and circumstances in which he met them, 
 were all prepared by divine governance, to further 
 the effectual fulfilment of his mission as the teacher 
 of men. Thus it came to pass, that not only in set 
 discourses (which seldom occur), but in transient 
 conversations and sudden repHes, in words drawn 
 forth by the appeals of the wretched, by the temp- 
 tations of enemies or by the errors of disciples, in 
 strong denunciations of the wicked or in tender con- 
 solations of the weak, the mind of Christ has been 
 expressed on all points, and the store of divine 
 sentences is ftdl. 
 
 Shall I enter into detail, and begin to shew how 
 the whole argument on justification in the Epistle 
 to the Romans is involved in the assertion, that " the 
 Son of Man was lifted up, that he that believeth 
 on him should not perish but have everlasting life ^ ?" 
 
 d John iii. 14, 15. 
 
LECTURE in. (J.") 
 
 — how the exposition of the christian standing in the 
 Epistle to the Galatians is comprehended in the 
 words, " The servant abideth not in the house for 
 ever, but the son abideth ever. If the son make 
 you free ye shall be free indeed '^l" — how the sacri- 
 ficial doctrine of the Epistle to the Hebrews is im- 
 plied in all its parts by the words, " This is my blood 
 of the new covenant which is shed for you and for 
 many for the remission of sins* 1" Though such proof 
 in detail is here impossible, it would yet be easy to 
 shew that every doctrine expanded in the Epistles 
 roots itself in some pregnant saying in the Gospels ; 
 and that the first intimation of every tnith, revealed 
 to the holy Apostles by the Spirit, came first from the 
 lips of the Son of Man. In each case the later 
 revelation may enlarge the earlier, may shew its 
 meaning and define its application, but the earlier 
 revelation stands behind it still, and we owe our 
 first knowledge of every part of the new covenant 
 to those personal communications in which the sal- 
 vation began to be spoken by the Lord. 
 
 In all things he was to have the pre-eminence (eV 
 ■Kamv mTo<s TrpooTevwv), in speaking as well as in acting, 
 not only as the Life, but also as the Light of men. 
 The more we study the records of that short ministry 
 in the flesh, the more we are impressed with the fact 
 that all the past and all the future are gathered 
 up in it. Past inspired teaching here finds its 
 meaning interpreted and its authoiity sealed, whilst 
 (so to speak) the several chapters of future inspiied 
 
 e John viii. 35, 36. f Matt. xxvi. 28. 
 
 r 
 
66 LECTURE III. 
 
 teaching are opened by pregnant summaries and 
 certified by anticipatory sanctions. That is indeed 
 a time " of large discourse, looking before and after," 
 and the words of Prophets on the one side, and of 
 Apostles on the other, are for ever justified and 
 maintained by the words of him who came between 
 them. 
 
 There was nothing then on the lips of the 
 preachers of the Gospel, but what had been 
 " begun to be spoken" by its first preacher ; and 
 in followins; to their utmost the words of the 
 Apostles we are still within the compass of the 
 words of the Loid Jesus. 
 
 2. Yet those words do not hear the character of 
 finality. The doctrine delivered in the Gospels 
 appears to need, and to promise, further explanations, 
 combinations, and developments. The character 
 of that ministry on the whole is introductory. 
 It is so in its form, in its method, and in its 
 substa7ice. 
 
 a. Our Lord's general teaching, in regard to its 
 form, is cast in the mould of parable or jiroverb. 
 So it appears more esjDecially in the first three 
 Gospels as compared with the fourth : and it is 
 agreed on all hands that the former represent 
 the ordinary course of the teaching of Jesus ; 
 and that the latter purposely collects into one 
 view those stronger assertions of divine mysteries, 
 which were made on particular occasions, and 
 which, when thus combined, form for us a more 
 advanced stage of revelation. Yet in St. John 
 
LECTURE HI. 67 
 
 also the characteristic form of parable continues, 
 though its visible diminution corresponds with the 
 increased intensity of revealing light. 
 
 There can be no need to exhibit the fact of 
 this prevailing character of our Lord's discourse. 
 It is to be noticed, not only in the large amou.nt 
 of professed parables, but in the general habit of 
 proverbial sayings, that is, sayings which glance 
 by us, as condensed and momentary parables, 
 suggesting much that it would take long to tell, 
 or, at least, sayings which have more or less 
 the shape and air of proverbs, complete in them- 
 selves, terse and pointed, fashioned for common 
 memory and common use, meaning more than 
 they say, and, by strong antithesis or seeming 
 paradox, fitted to arouse reflection, and to fix 
 on the mind some principle of thought or conduct. 
 This characteristic of our Lord's teaching does 
 not exist in that of his servants. It is pectdiar 
 and distinctive : and not without reason, for it 
 falls in with that character of germinating fulness 
 which has been already ascribed to the personal 
 ministry of Christ ; and not less plainly with 
 that character of initiation which is now to be 
 asserted. 
 
 It is of the essence of proverbial speech that 
 it detaches itself from particular occasions, that 
 it has a capacity for various applications, and 
 a fitness for permanent use, and embraces large 
 meaning within narrow hmits. It therefore fitted 
 well the lips which were to utter the great principles 
 
 F 2 
 
68 LECTURE III. 
 
 of christian thought, and to leave them amongst 
 men for all times and occa,gions. Yet this form 
 of teaching belongs to the introduction of know- 
 ledge. It seems intended to set the mind working, 
 and to rouse the spirit of enquiry by partial or 
 disguised discoveries of truth. " To them that 
 are without," said our Lord, " all these things are 
 done in parables s/' intimating that the use of 
 that form of instruction is appropriate to the pre- 
 liminary and probationary stage. In its fullest 
 degree it belongs originally to those that are 
 without, though, by means of hght afterwards 
 afforded, it continues to minister large instruction 
 to those that are within. To the multitude our 
 Lord's teaching was mainly of this character : to 
 his disciples it was obviously less so. To them " it 
 was given to know the mysteries of the kingdom 
 of God, but to others in parables''." Yet to them 
 also, through aU their time of training, we see 
 that this mode of speech is largely used, and 
 when the personal mtercourse is about to close, 
 they receive the assurance that the teaching of 
 the future will herem differ from that of the 
 past : " These tilings have I spoken unto you in 
 proverbs, but the time cometh when I shall no 
 more speak imto you in proverbs, but I shall shew 
 you plainly of the Father*." The words remain as 
 a sufficient testimony that the peculiar character 
 
 g Markiv. 1 1. cKetmis ro'is i'^01 — yet certainly not to keep them 
 without, but as the appropriate means to draw them within. 
 ^ Luke viii. lo. i John xvi. 25. 
 
LECTURE HI. m 
 
 of language, in which the salvation began to be 
 spoken by the Lord, is a mark of an intro- 
 ductory stage, and, so far as it prevails, is both 
 a sign that the time for shewing plainly is not yet 
 come, and a pledge that it is to follow. 
 
 ;8. As the form of the teaching leads to this con- 
 clusion, so also does its method. It is seemingly 
 to a great degree a method of chances and 
 occasions ; carried on by words svdted to the 
 moment, by separate addresses, or replies to particu- 
 lar persons, and by explanations added to paiticular 
 acts. It is moreover m these communications, 
 rather than in the dehberate discourses, that the 
 higher revelations of his Gospel are for the most 
 part contained. When " he opened his mouth and 
 taught " in the Sermon on the Mount, he dehvered 
 to those who were entering his kingdom the 
 great principles of moral 7'ighteousness. But it 
 is from words dropped as it were in a private 
 conversation by night, or in collision with the 
 provocations of unbelievers, or amid sighs and 
 sorrows by the grave of a friend, that we derive 
 our plainest assurances of the mysteries of his 
 salvation. Whde we gather up the precious things 
 of his ordinary discourses, we are made sensible 
 that other truths are implied, deeper than those 
 which are announced, and from time to time the 
 words which assert those deeper truths break with 
 a kind of suddenness on our ears. It would 
 hardly appear likely that such a mode of teach- 
 ing was intended to be final, rather we should 
 
70 LECTURE III. 
 
 expect it to prove (as in fact it did) the prefatory 
 announcement of a coming system of truth, in 
 which the several sayings would discover their co- 
 hesion and the condensed assertions would expand 
 into their fulness. 
 
 J. If the form and method of the personal teaching 
 of Jesus suggest the conclusion, that it was meant 
 to be, not the whole of his teaching to men, but only 
 the initiatory stage of it, that conclusion becomes 
 more sure when we come to consider the substance 
 of the doctrine itself 
 
 The doctrine bears a double character. It is, first, 
 the clearing, restoring, and perfecting of truth already 
 known ; and it is, secondly, the revealing of a mys- 
 terious economy which had not yet been divulged. 
 It is, I suppose, obvious to every reader of the 
 Gospels, that the doctrine contained in them is much 
 more full and explicit in the first of these characters 
 than it is in the second ; that all which belongs to 
 human duty and character comes out habitually to 
 view in the clearest light, while the discoveries of 
 that secret scheme of things, by which the divine 
 purposes are worked out, are either made by impli- 
 cation, or are marked by a certain brevity and reserve. 
 This fact is generally lecognised, and especially by 
 those minds which shrink from the more mysterious 
 parts of revelation. These fall back upon the Lord's 
 own teaching in the Gospels, as containing more 
 to which they can cordially assent, or at least less 
 which troubles and perj^lexes them, than they find 
 in the writings of his followers. All that troubles 
 
LECTURE in. 71 
 
 and perplexes them is indeed there ; but the restiicted 
 measure of its exposition allows them more easily 
 to ignore its presence. Such men fly to the Seimon 
 on the Mount, and linger over parables and dis- 
 courses, which instruct us in the great original truths 
 of the fatherhood of God, of heartfelt prayer, of 
 love and forgiveness, of lowliness and truth, of 
 obedience and self-sacrifice, of confidence in pardoning 
 mercy, and of faith (yet only general and jJieliminary) 
 in him whom God hath sent. 
 
 It is indeed true that in passing through the 
 synoptic Gospels we meet with few expiess and 
 definite assertions of the real nature and efliects of 
 the mediatoiial woik of Christ ; and if we drop 
 out of notice those few strong sayings, and are con- 
 tent to take the lowest meaning of every expression 
 that sounds ambiguous, and are resolutely insensible 
 to the suggestion of typical miracles and to the im- 
 plications contained in the whole history, we may 
 peihaps arrive at the Gospel of St. John with no 
 higher convictions than were exjsressed by the 
 enquirer, whom we there find utteiing the dubious 
 acknowledgment, "Master, we know that thou ait 
 a teacher come from God," {on utto Qeov eXt^XvOa^ 
 SiSdcTKaTiOi). 
 
 But having acknowledged this much, we must 
 from this point acknowledge much more. We find 
 that the Gospel on which we have entered has col- 
 lected for us the scattered sayings, in which, from 
 time to time, our Lord asserted his highest offices, 
 and opened the mysteiy of his work, One aftei- 
 
72 LECTURE III. 
 
 another the great testimonies concerning himself fall 
 on our ears : yet, in regard to every one of them, 
 we are made to feel that the intimations given are 
 at the time beyond the apprehensions of the hearers, 
 and this not only on account of the dulness of the 
 particular persons, but because the testimonies imply 
 events which have not yet happened, and are frag- 
 ments of a revelation for which the hour is not yet 
 come. Glance through a few of these sayings : — The 
 heavens open, and the angels ascending and de- 
 scending on the Son of Man'' ; the Temple destroyed 
 and raised up again in three days' ; the biith of 
 water and the Spirit'" ; the Son of Man who came 
 from heaven, who goes to heaven, and who is in 
 heaven" ; the lifting up like the serpent in the wilder- 
 ness, that men may not perish o ; the water which he 
 will give, spiinging u\) into everlasting lifeP ; the 
 eating the flesh and drinking the blood as the means 
 of everlasting life and of being raised up at the last 
 day*!. These sayings, and many others like them, are 
 tittered to hearers whose perplexity is made apparent, 
 and are at the time left unexplained, to await the 
 light which they are to receive from future events 
 and later discoveries. This (if I may so call it) 
 anticipatory character of our Lord's teaching, with 
 regard to the work which he came to fuM, strikes us 
 most forcibly, when we compare his mode of speaking 
 on the subject with the full and explicit language 
 
 k John i. 51. 1 Ibid. ii. 19. m \\,\^^ \\\ g. 
 
 " Ibid. 13. Ibid. 14. I. Ibid. iv. 14. 
 
 '1 Ibid. vi. 54. 
 
LECTURE III. 73 
 
 which becomes famihar to us in the writings of his 
 Apostles. 
 
 And if this account of one part of his teaching 
 be true, an evident consequence follows in regard 
 to the other part. Grant that the discoveries of the 
 redeeming work of Christ are in any measure re- 
 stricted and deferred, and it follows that a large part 
 of the teaching on human duty must be restricted 
 and deferred in proportion. Instructions in faith 
 in himself must wait for their perfecting, until the 
 things to be believed concerning him have grown 
 clear. Instructions in our relations to God (whether 
 bearing on the hope of a penitent or on the confidence 
 of a child) have not attained their completion, while 
 the grounds of forgiveness and acceptance are in any 
 manner obscure. Finally, instructions on duty and 
 character mvist be deficient in some of their most 
 important elements, while the motives which flow 
 from redemption cannot be assumed as recognised, 
 because Jesus has not yet died ; while the life in 
 the Spirit, and the power of the resurrection, and 
 the citizenship in heaven, cannot be realised, because 
 Jesus has not yet revived, risen, and ascended. 
 
 In illustration of these assertions I will instance 
 the treatment of the two doctrines of the forgive- 
 ness of sins and the success of prayer. We know 
 how intimately in the evangelical system these two 
 doctrines are associated with the personal agency 
 of our Redeemer, the one with his atoning sacrifice, 
 the other with his priestly mediation. But it is 
 certain that in his own teaching on earth they are 
 
74 LECTURE III. 
 
 not so treated. Other truths concerning them are 
 brought forward when these are absent. 
 
 Take the first example. "Forgive and ye shall 
 be forgiven'' ;" " Her sins, which are many, are for- 
 given, for she loved much^ ;" "I forgave thee aU 
 that debt because thou desiredst me*;" "He smote 
 upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me 
 a sinner"," and then "went down to his house jus- 
 tified rather than the other." Lastly, in the great 
 parable of forgiveness the erring son simply returns, 
 and the Father falls on his neck and kisses him. 
 " Father," says he, " I have sinned against heaven 
 and before thee," and straightway he is clothed 
 with the best robe, and has the ring on his hand, 
 and the shoes on his feet. " He was dead and is 
 alive again : he was lost, and is found." There is 
 no mention of any intercessor, no typical hint of 
 sacrifice or other atonement, no condition anywhere 
 supposed, but what is included in " because thou 
 desiredst me," or in the presence of penitence and 
 tenderness of heart, and the absence of an un- 
 forgiving spirit towards others. Yet at other times 
 there fall from the Lord's own lips some few words 
 at least, which reveal himself as the channel, and 
 his blood as the purchase, of the forgiveness which 
 he preaches so freely. " The Son of Man has power 
 on earth to forgive sins " ;" " My blood shed for 
 many for the remission of sins^." These sayings 
 give a momentary insight into the depths of the 
 
 ' Luke vi. 37. ^ Ibid. vii. 47. * Matt, xviii. 32. 
 
 " Luke xviii. 13. ^ Matt. ix. 6. y Ibid. xxvi. 28. 
 
LECTURE III. 75 
 
 subject, and disclose something of the mysterious 
 means by which forgiveness has been procured, and 
 through which, when once revealed, it must be 
 sought. It is evident that such a revelation can- 
 not remain as a mere associated idea, that it must 
 become fundamental, and give a peculiar and dis- 
 tinctive character to the christian doctrine of the 
 forgiveness of sins. But we ?ee that it is not 
 wi'ought out in the Gospels. Must we not then 
 expect that this will yet be done ? and that, in 
 some futiore stage of divine teaching, we shall find 
 the word " Forgive and ye shall be forgiven" ele- 
 vated and opened into " Forgiving one another as 
 God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you^," and the 
 hope of forgiveness placed for ever on its true basis 
 of faith in him, "ia whom we have redemption 
 through his blood, even the forgivenes of sins ^?" 
 
 Again, take the doctrine of acceptance and suc- 
 cess in prayer. How earnest and how strong are 
 our Lord's declarations on this subject ! It is need- 
 less to rehearse them, but these precious assurances 
 are here connected only with the earnestness, im- 
 portunity, and simplicity of the worshippers, and 
 with a general faith in the Father's Avill to give 
 good things to those that ask him. We might be 
 ready to say, " The whole instruction amounts to 
 tlais, — Dismiss all heathen and aU Pharisaic notions 
 on this subject. Go simply to God as your Father. 
 Ask, and ye shall receive." Yet he who has taught 
 us, before he ceases to speak, adds something more. 
 
 z Eph. iv. 32. ^ Ibid. i. 7. 
 
76 LECTURE III. 
 
 At the highest point of his teaching we hear him 
 say, " No man cometh unto the Father hut by 
 me^ ;" " If ye shall ask anything in my name I will 
 do it"." Here is an immense accession of revelation, 
 which, when fully comprehended, must give its 
 character to the whole christian doctrine and to 
 the whole christian habit of prayer. But if we are 
 ever to see this consequence wrought out by divine 
 teaching, we must find it in some future stage of 
 instruction, in which the access to the Father by 
 the Son, and the new and living way which he 
 has consecrated for us, and the offices of the High 
 Priest over the house of God, shall be recognised 
 as the true grounds of the full assurance of faith, 
 for him who draws near to God in prayer. 
 
 The argiunent then stands thus. The doctrine of 
 the Gospel includes special revelations which must 
 from, their nature hecome the foundations of moral 
 and spiritual life. But in the doctrine of the 
 Gospels they are not so treated, nor indeed could 
 they be, since the revelations themselves are chiefly 
 anticipatory allusions to facts which have not yet 
 taken place. In these revelations the teaching cul- 
 minates rather than commences. They are the point 
 at which it arrives, not that from which it starts. 
 The doctrine does not therefore bear the character 
 of finality. We expect another stage, in which 
 these special revelations shall be, not only cleared 
 and combined, but shall hold that fundamental 
 place in the whole system of instruction which 
 
 b John xiv. 6. c Ibid. xvi. 23. 
 
LECTURE III. 77 
 
 they tend inevitably to assume. And thus, from 
 the consideration of the substance and proportions 
 of the doctrine in the Gospels, as well from the 
 observation of its form and method, I conclude 
 that I am here only in an initiatory stage of divine 
 teaching, and that another part of the course must 
 lie before me. 
 
 II. But I am not left to draw this conclusion. The 
 doctrine of the Gospels not only looks as if it 
 were to be followed by another stage of teaching, 
 but declares that such is the fact. I come to my 
 second proposition, that the personal teaching of the 
 Lord is a visibly progressive system, which, on reach- 
 ing its highest point, declares its own incompleteness, 
 and refers us to another stage of instruction. 
 
 I. Place side by side the first discourse in St, 
 Matthew and the last in St. John, and the truth of 
 the first part of this proposition is at once apparent, 
 namely, that the personal teaching of the Lord is 
 a visibly progressive system. The Sermon on the 
 Mount at the opening of the ministry, and the ad- 
 dress in the upper room delivered at its close, are 
 separated from each other, not only by difference 
 of circumstance and feeling, but as implying on 
 the part of the hearers wholly different stages in 
 the knowledge of truth. There is a gTcater interval 
 between these two discourses than there is between 
 the teaching of the Gospels as a whole and that of 
 the Epistles. 
 
 The first discourse is the voice of a minister 
 of the circumcision clearing and confirming the 
 
78 LECTURE III. 
 
 divine teaching given to the fatheis. Blessings, 
 laws, and promises are alike founded on the Old 
 Testament language, which the speaker at the 
 same time adopts and interprets. He keeps in 
 a line with the past, while he makes a cleai- 
 step in advance. He gives, not so much a new 
 code, as a new edition of the old one. The word 
 of authoiity, "/ say unto you," is directed not 
 to destroy but to fulfil. It is the authority of the 
 original law-giver, clearing up his own intentions, 
 and disallowing the perversions of men. As plainly 
 as the first discourse links itself to the past, so 
 plainly does the last discouise reach on to the 
 future. If the one reverts to what was said in 
 old time, the other casts the mind forward on 
 a day of knowledge which is dawning and a new 
 teacher who is coming. In j^assing from the one point 
 to the other, we have left behind us the language and 
 associations of the Old Testament : we have entered 
 a new world of thought, and hear a new language 
 which is being created for its exigencies. What 
 makes the thought and the language new 1 One 
 single fact ; namely, that the true relation of the 
 Lord Jesus to the spiritual life of his people is now 
 in a measure revealed. " Ye believe in God, believe 
 also in me :" — this is the keynote of the whole 
 address. And in the same strain it continues, " No 
 man cometh unto the Father but by me ;" " Abide 
 in me and I in you;" "Without me ye can do 
 nothing." How foreign would such words have 
 been in the Sermon on the Mount ! We are 
 
LECTURE III. 79 
 
 not unprepared for them here, though even heie 
 they mean more than can be yet undeistood. I do 
 not speak of single expressions, but of the whole 
 doctrine on faith and prayer, and love, and service, 
 and hope, and life. All subjects have here 
 assimied their distinctively christian character : 
 they are " in Christ Jesus." The faith fixes itself 
 on hitn, and on the Father through him. The 
 prayer is " in his nam.e." The love is a response 
 to his love. The service is the fruit of union 
 with him. The hope is that of being with hivi 
 where he is ; to abide in him is the secret of 
 life, safety, fruitfuluess, and joy; and the guiding- 
 power of this new state is not the explanation 
 of a Ifiw, but the gift of the Holy Ghost the Com- 
 forter. Compare these ideas with those which 
 characterise the first Gospel teaching, and you 
 see how far you have been carried from the point 
 at which you started. You see how much must 
 have intervened in the gradual revelation of Christ, 
 and in the gradual advance of his teaching, before 
 such a stage of doctrine could be reached. 
 
 And much had intervened. To shew how much, 
 it would be necessary to trace through all the Gospel 
 record the unfolding of the salvation, as it began 
 to be spoken by the Lord, and the steps by 
 which it was brought about, that the Master and 
 the disciples should become the Saviour and the 
 believers, and that the external hearing and follow- 
 ing should pass into the mysterious relations of 
 an inward and spiritual union. It is enough to 
 
80 LECTURE III. 
 
 lecal the fact that, through all the works of 
 mercy, the corrections of error, and the instructions 
 in righteousness, a deeper lesson yet is sinking 
 into the minds of his hearers, in the growing 
 sense of a profound and inetfable relation borne 
 by him to the human race and to every human 
 soul. He makes it felt, that he stands before 
 men as the one object on which faith must fasten, 
 as the one who has power on earth to forgive 
 sins, who is come to seek and to save that which 
 is lost, who gives rest to the heavy laden, as the 
 giver of eternal life, as the quickener of whom 
 he will, as the bread which came down from 
 heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die, 
 as giving his flesh for the life of the world, his 
 life a ransom for many, his blood as the blood of 
 the new covenant shed for many for the remission 
 of sins. Testimonies like these gather as we advance ; 
 and while the Lord in his ordinary teaching fulfils 
 his mission as the expounder of the laws, and 
 the example of the character, and the prophet of 
 the destinies of the kingdom of God, he discloses 
 at the same time by these scattered sayings a 
 far deeper and more fundamental relation to that 
 kingdom and to all its several members. 
 
 But while these disclosures are yet in progress 
 they are suddenly cut off. The ministry must 
 end : the hour is come. We enter the upper room, 
 and attend the last discourse, which is the close 
 and the consummation of the teaching of the Lord 
 on earth. 
 
LECTURE III. 81 
 
 2. We turn then to that portion of the word of 
 God which extends from the beginning of the 14th 
 to the end of the 17 th chapter of St. John. There, 
 in words most simple but unfathomably deep, 
 adchessed first to men and then to God, there 
 flow forth the thoughts which belong to that 
 hour. Oh tender solemn words ! oh words of 
 majesty and love, of divine sorrow and joy ! words 
 for the saddest moments, the loftiest moments, the 
 last moments of life ! Not in the cold spirit of 
 one who would prove a pomt do I turn to them 
 now, though it be indeed to decide a question. 
 But what a question ! Not one affecting some 
 single doctrine which some text in the discourse 
 may touch, but one affecting all the doctrine 
 before and after, all that began to be spoken by 
 the Lord and was confirmed to us by them that 
 heard him. It is the question whether the point 
 which we have reached is final or central : whether 
 the true teaching of God here reaches a close or 
 effects a transition. There is no uncertainty in 
 the answer, for to give that answer is one main 
 piu"pose of the discourse. The Lord speaks to 
 the occasion. He would have it understood to 
 what point in the progress of his teaching we 
 are come, and what is the relation between that 
 which is now ending and that which is about to 
 begin. 
 
 At the first glance it is plain that the character of 
 the discourse is distinctly transitional, that it an- 
 nounces not an end, but a change; and that, in 
 
82 LECTURE III. 
 
 closing one course of teaching, it at the same time 
 opens another. As the first discourse linked the 
 personal teaching of Christ to the Law and the 
 Prophets which went before it, so the last discourse 
 links that teaching to the dispensation of the Spirit 
 which is to come after it. The fact on which the 
 fu'st is founded is that the Law of God has been 
 given to men as the guide to righteousness : the fact 
 on which the last is founded is that Jesus himself 
 has now been presented to men as the object oi faith. 
 And as it was intimated in the one case that the 
 lesson of righteousness was yet incomplete, and was 
 to be peifected by Jesus himself, so it is intimated in 
 the other that the lesson of faith is yet incomplete, 
 and is to be perfected by the Holy Ghost whom 
 he will send. 
 
 Fii'st, the narrative is careful to shew us that this 
 lesson of faith had been imperfectly learned. The 
 auditors are the men whom the Lord had chosen 
 and trained, and who had watched most closely the 
 whole course of his manifestation. Yet, as he pro- 
 ceeds, what do we hear 1 " Lord, we know not 
 whither thou goest, and how can we know the 
 way ■? " " Shew us the Father and it suificeth us." 
 " How is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us 
 and not rmto the world 1" " What is this that he 
 saith ? we cannot tell what he saith." By such 
 voices of faint and partial appiehension or of sore 
 perplexity, we learn how far the teaching of the past 
 had gone with them, in regard to those truths which 
 were being then set forth. 
 
LECTUEE III. 83 
 
 But it might be, notwithstanding, that the 
 course of divine instiuction was complete, and 
 that events yet to come and reflection on the pai-t 
 would be sufficient to open to them its meaning. 
 Not thus does the Loid reply. Mingled with sad 
 reflections, that he has been so long time with them 
 and that yet they have not known him, he gives the 
 consoling assurance that their instruction in the truth 
 is not yet ended. A pait of it is over, but only a 
 part ; and a part which had its hindrances as well 
 as its helps. The presence of Chnst in the flesh 
 had been a help to what they had alieady learned ; 
 it was a hindrance to what they had now to learn d. 
 While he sat there before them in the body, it was 
 hard to understand the mysteiy of a spiritual union. 
 That hindrance is to be removed ; " It is expedient 
 for you that I go away." 
 
 Then the teaching which he had given them must 
 close. Yes, but another teaching shall be substituted ; 
 which shall be also his, though suited to the new 
 relations which he shall bear to them in his gloiified 
 state. " It is expedient for you that I go away, for if 
 I go not away the Comfoiter will not come unto 
 you, but if I depai't, I will send him unto you." 
 Then follow those precious promises of the coming 
 and office and work of the Holy Ghost, which expand 
 their fulfilment over the whole Church and through- 
 out aU ages. But while it is clear that, in the way 
 of extension and of inference, many of the words 
 aUow and invite this wider application, it is far 
 
 J See Note VI. 
 G 2 
 
84 LECTURE III. 
 
 more evident that in their first intention tliey are 
 directly addressed to those who heard them, and 
 meant to meet the question of the particiilar crisis 
 which had then arrived®. 
 
 No more distinct assurance could have been given 
 that those future teachers of the world were not 
 then at the end, but only at a ceitain point in the 
 progress of their education, and that a teaching re- 
 mained for them, which should both continue and 
 surjrass that which they had already received. 
 
 But had they not heaid the truth from their 
 Lord 1 Yes ; and it was to be the office of the 
 Spirit to recall to their minds the truth which they 
 had heard, as the text and substance of their future 
 
 e " I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Com- 
 forter, that he may abide with you for ever ; even the Spirit of 
 truth ; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, 
 neither knoweth him : but ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, 
 and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless, I will come 
 unto you." John xiv. i6-r8. "At that day ye shall know that I 
 am in the Father, and ye in me, and I in you." ver. 20. " These 
 things have I spoken to you, while abiding with you ; but the Com- 
 foi'ter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my 
 name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your 
 rememln-ance, whatsoever I have said unto you." ver. 25,26. " When 
 the Comforter is come, he shall testify of me." xv. 26. "He shall 
 reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment : of 
 sin, because they believe not on me ; of righteousness!, because I 
 go to my Father, and ye see me no more ; of judgment, because the 
 prince of this world is judged. I have yet many things to say unto 
 you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit, when he, the Spirit of 
 truth, is come, he shall guide you into all ti-uth ; for he shall not 
 speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall hear that shall he speak; 
 and he shall shew you things to come. He shall glorify me, for he 
 sliall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you." xvi. 8-14. 
 
LECTURE III, 85 
 
 knowledge. " He sliall bring all things to your re- 
 membrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." But 
 though in the teaching of Jesus all the truth might 
 be implied, it was not all o-jyencd ; therefore the 
 Holy Ghost was to add that which had not been 
 delivered, as weU as to recall that which had been 
 already spoken. There is an evident contrast in- 
 tended, with regard to extent of knowledge, between 
 " these things which I have spoken while yet piesent 
 with you," and " all things which he shall teach you." 
 Nay, there is the plainest assertion which could be 
 made, that things were to be said afterwards which 
 had not been said then ; and those not few but many 
 — (" I have yet many things to say unto you ") — not 
 of secondary importance but of the highest mojnent 
 (" Ye cannot bear them now" — ov Suvaa-Oe ^aa-rd'^eiv). 
 They are things of such a kind as would now weigh 
 down and oppress your minds, seeing that they 
 surpass your present powers of sj)iritual apprehen- 
 sion. But these many and weighty things shall not 
 be left untold : " When he, the Spirit of truth, is 
 come, he shall guide you into all the truth. ' He 
 shall guide you (oStTyiia-et), as by successive stejos and 
 continuous direction (eiV Traa-av rhv aX^Oeiav), into the 
 whole of that truth of which the commencements 
 have now been given ; and especially into the 
 highest and central part of it. For it is also made 
 plain on what subject this light shall be poured, 
 and into what mysteries this guidance shall lead. 
 " He shall testify of vie ;' " he shall glorify me ;" 
 " he shall take of mine and shew it unto you ;" 
 
86 LECTURE III. 
 
 " at that day ye shall know that / am in the Father, 
 and ye in me, and 1 in you!' Not then for some 
 secondary matters {details of Church order or rela- 
 tions of JeAvs and Gentiles) was this light and 
 witness of the Holy Ghost reserved (though to these 
 questions also the divine guidance extended), but 
 rather for the great and central mystery of godliness, 
 embracing the nature, work, and offices of Jesus 
 Christ, his mediatorial relations to the Father and 
 to the Church, the redemption of men by his blood, 
 and the salvation of men by his life. But instead 
 of attempting to enumerate these great ideas, it were 
 better to comprehend them all in his own vast and 
 unexplained expression, " He shall take of mine 
 (ev Tov ejuou Xt/ylreTai), and shall sliew it unto you/' 
 
 We have now reviewed the teaching of oiu: Lord 
 in the flesh, in order to draw from it an answer to 
 this question, " Is the revelation of the great salva- 
 tion given to us in that teaching to be considered 
 as final and complete V The answer has been, " No ! 
 It has riot the apjjearance of being final, and it 
 expUcitly declares that it is not complete. When 
 it was ended, it was to be followed by a new 
 testimony from God, in order that many things might 
 be spoken which had not been spoken then." 
 
 The testimony came ; the things were spoken ; and 
 in the apostohc writings we have their enduring 
 record. In those writings we find the fulfilment of an 
 expectation which the Gospels raised, and recognise 
 the performance of a promise which the Gospels 
 gave. If we do not, the word of salvation, which 
 
LECTURE III. 87 
 
 began to be spoken by the Lord, has never been 
 finished for us. Then, not only woiild the end be 
 "wanting, but the beginning would become obscure. 
 The lessons of holiness would still shine in their 
 own jDure light, and the rebukes of human error 
 would shew in their severe outlines ; but the words 
 which open by anticipation the mystery of the great 
 salvation, flashing sometimes on its deep foundations, 
 sometimes on its lofty summits, would but dazzle and 
 confuse our sight ; and we should be tempted to turn 
 from their discoveries, as from visions which had no 
 substance, or from enigmas which we could not 
 interpret. 
 
 And so in fact they treat the personal teaching 
 of Christ who give not its due honour to the sub- 
 sequent witness of his Spirit, regarding the apostolic 
 writings as only Petrine, Pauline, or Alexandrian 
 versions of the Christian doctrine, interesting records 
 of the views of individuals or schools of opinion 
 concerning the salvation which Jesus began to speak. 
 No ! the words of our Lord are not honoured (as 
 these men seem to think) by being thvis isolated ; for 
 it is an isolation which separates them from other 
 words which also are his own, words given by him in 
 that day when he no longer spake in proverbs, but 
 shewed his servants plainly of the Father. The brief 
 communications in which the salvation began to be 
 spoken by the Lord must lose half their glory, if a mist 
 and darkness be cast over that later teaching which 
 was ordained to throw its reflex light upon them. 
 Our thoughts have now arrived at the point M^here 
 
88 LECTURE III. 
 
 the (lay of " speaking in proverbs" changes into the 
 day of " shewing plainly." It is a critical moment ; 
 for, whatever progress of doctrine the change may 
 involve, all om- satisfaction in its incieased distinct- 
 ness of outline and accumulated fulness of detail 
 must depend on oui- assurance that the teacher is 
 still the same. My next duty will therefore be that 
 of noting the cai'e which he himself has taken to 
 fix that assurance on our minds. His care is 
 never wanting where it is needed, and we have 
 cause to praise his holy name that in this, as well 
 as in so many other ways, he lias knit together 
 the one body of his written word by living and 
 indissoluble bands, so that its interdependent parts 
 fuliil eflPectually tlieir several functions, in com- 
 mencing or completing the one testimony of the 
 o-reat salvation. 
 
 It is of the testimony that I now speak. More 
 happy is that common ministry in which we present 
 the salvation itself Only foi' the sake of the salva- 
 tion does the testimony exist. There is a deep 
 interest for every considerate naind in the form, 
 the plan, the character, of the sacred writings ; but 
 it is not a merely literary or intellectual interest : 
 it is one created by the object for which the writings 
 aie given. The reader of the Gospels is not suffered 
 to close the volume without a soleinn admonition 
 of the purpose for which it has been placed in 
 his hands. " These things are written that ye may 
 believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and that 
 believing ye may have life through his name." 
 
 o 
 
LECTURE III. 80 
 
 Does it wound our hearts to see this wondrous 
 record naisapprehended, its unity denied, its gloiy 
 darkened 1 Perhaps it is a sadder sight in the eye 
 of heaven when its inspiration is vindicated, its per- 
 fection aj)preciated, its majesty asserted, by one who 
 at the same time for himself neglects the great sal- 
 vation. Such a case is not impossible — perhaps is 
 not uncommon. The Day wUl declare it. At least 
 let it be remembered, that the study of the testimony 
 is one thing, and the enjoyment of the salvation 
 is another, and that the record of the things which 
 Jesus did and said has attained its end with those 
 only, who, " believing, have life through his name." 
 
LECTURE ly. 
 
 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 
 
 Acts i. 1-4. 
 
 The former treatise hare I made, Theojohilus, of all that 
 Jesus hegan loth to do and teach, 
 
 Until the day in which he was taken up, after that he through 
 the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the Apostles tohom 
 he had chosen : 
 
 To ivhom also he shetved himself alive after his passion by 
 many infallible proofs, being seen of them^ forty days, and speak- 
 ing of the things pertainmg to the kingdom of God : 
 
 And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that 
 they should not depart from Jerusalem, but tcait for the promise 
 of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me. 
 
 With these words we enter on a new stage of 
 history and of doctrine, and they are words which 
 connect it with the past. The hnks of Scripture 
 (if I may so call them) iiniting one part to another, 
 and assisting our sense of the continuity of the whole, 
 are worthy of especial notice. Thus the Gospels have 
 been brought to a fit and (as it seems from the final 
 words) an intended conclusion, at the end of the 
 twentieth chapter of St. John ; but yet another 
 chapter is added, as if dictated by some after- 
 
LECTURE IV. 91 
 
 thought, which in its effect links the whole Gospel 
 record to the book which succeeds it. The miracle 
 which had already foreshadowed the work of the fish- 
 ers of men is repeated, but with altered circumstances, 
 typical of the change which was at hand. For now 
 the Lord is no longer with them in the ship, but stands 
 dimly seen upon the shore ; yet from thence issues 
 his directions, and shews the presence of his power 
 working with them in their seemingly lonely toil. 
 Then the charge is left to " feed his sheep," and 
 lastly, the future destinies of the two chief Apostles 
 are suffered to be faintly seen. 
 
 In like manner does the book of Acts at its 
 opening attach itself to the preceding record ; throw- 
 ing back our thoughts on " the former treatise of 
 all that Jesus began*both to do and teach," and then 
 passing rapidly in review the last circumstances 
 which connect the Apostles with their Lord, as 
 the instruments which he had chosen and prepared 
 for the work which he had yet to do. Thus 
 the history wliich follows is linked to, or (may I not 
 rather say) welded with, the past ; and the founding 
 of the Church in the earth is presented as one con- 
 tinuous work, begun by the Lord in person, and 
 perfected by the same Lord through the ministry of 
 men. This is the point on which I have now to 
 insist. "The former treatise" dehvered to us, not 
 all that Jesus did and taught, but " all that Jesus 
 began both to do and teach, until the day when 
 he was taken up." The following writings appear 
 intended to give us, and do in fact profess to give 
 
92 LECTURE IV. 
 
 us, that which Jesus continued to do and teach after 
 the day in which he was taken up<''. 
 
 There are then two points which claim our at- 
 tention when we pass beyond that day, and enter 
 on the second . stage of New Testament doctrine. 
 One is that the authority is continued ; the other 
 is that the method is changed. Our enquiries will 
 naturally be directed, (i) to the evidence for the first 
 fact, and (2) to the reasons for the second. 
 
 I. First, then, I turn to the books which lie before 
 U.S, to ask ivhat evidence they give, that the divine 
 authority, ivhich was self-evident in the first stage 
 of teaching, is continued also in the second, or, in 
 other words, that this is as really as the other a part 
 of revelation, and a period of divine communication 
 of truth to man. The fundamental part of this 
 evidence consists in the words, which were cited in 
 the last lecture, from the mouth of the Lord himself : 
 for ill the words of his lips is centred the evidence 
 for all teaching which he has given us through the 
 lips of men. But we are now to see how these 
 intimations are supported in the books which follow. 
 
 I. We find, then, that the doctrinal writings of the 
 Apostles are prefaced by the book of Acts, some 
 account of that which was done being given as an 
 introduction to the record of that which was taught. 
 The function of this book in the scheme of Scrip- 
 ture is of very high importance, in other respects, to 
 which we must advert hereafter, and especially in 
 that which concerns us now. It is a record of the 
 " Note VII. 
 
LECTURE IV. 93 
 
 personal action of the Lord Jesus Christ in the 
 Jirst evolution of his gospel and formation of his 
 Church. 
 
 With him and with his last words on earth the 
 book begins, reminding us of his commission and 
 commands to the Apostles whom he had chosen. 
 Then we see him depart, and they are left to their 
 work. Yet they do not begin it tiU the promised 
 Spirit is come ; they wait for the promise of the 
 Father, which they have heard of him. One trans- 
 action in the interval shews their own assurance 
 that he who directed them so lately intends to 
 direct them stiU : " Thou, Lord, which knowest the 
 hearts of aU men, shew whether of these two thou 
 hast chosen, that he may take part in this ministry 
 and apostleshipb." Such language ititimates the re- 
 lation in which they stiD. felt themselves to their now 
 unseen Master. But soon the promised gift is be- 
 stowed, and the dispensation of the Spirit has begun. 
 And what in their view is the dispensation of the 
 Spirit ? It is the agency and gift of Jesus. " Being 
 by the right hand of God exalted, and having re- 
 ceived of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, 
 he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and 
 hear"." 
 
 This view of the operation of the Spirit, as the 
 medium through which the Lord Jesus wrought and 
 taught, is carried through the whole course of the 
 history which follows. As in the promise, so in the 
 history, " Tlie Comforter will come unto you " — " / 
 b Acts i. 24. "^ Ibid. ii. 33. 
 
94 LECTURE IV. 
 
 will come unto you," — are but two sides of one and 
 the same fact. On critical occasions and at each 
 onward step the hand of the Master is made dis- 
 tinctly visible. The first martyr dies for a testimony, 
 which is felt to be an advance on what had been 
 given before, being understood to imply that "this 
 Jesus of Nazareth shaU destroy this place, and change 
 the customs which Moses dehvered us ;" and his 
 words are sealed by the vision of his Lord in glory. 
 The consignment of the Gospel to the Ethiopian 
 proselyte was another step in advance, and for this 
 " the angel of the Lord spake unto Phihp." The 
 preaching of the word to Gentiles, and their ad- 
 mission into the Church, was a greater step ; and 
 for this the Lord intervenes by the mission of an 
 angel to CorneHus, by a vision and a voice of the 
 Spirit to Peter, and by a kind of second Pentecost 
 to the converts themselves. But, when the greatest 
 step of all is to be taken in the outward course of 
 the Gospel, then most visibly does the great Head 
 of the Church make manifest his personal adminis- 
 tration. A new Apostle appears ; not hke him who 
 was added before Pentecost, completing the number 
 of the original college, and losing his individuality 
 in its ranks ; but one standmg apart and in advance, 
 under whose hand both the doctrines and the des- 
 tinies of the Gospel receive a development so ex- 
 tensive and so distinct, that it seemed almost another 
 Gospel to many who witnessed it, and to some who 
 study it seems so stiU. How striking is the special 
 authentication appropriated to this stage of teaching ! 
 
LECTURE IV. 95 
 
 This man's conversion, education, commission, direc- 
 tion, the Lord Jesus undertakes himself. Suddenly 
 he meets him in the way, shines forth upon him 
 in a light above the brightness of the sun, speaks 
 to him by a voice from heaven, calls him by name, 
 convinces, adopts, directs him, commands Ananias 
 concerning him, and (apparently on repeated occa- 
 sions) announces the use which he has decreed to 
 make of " the chosen vessel." The subsequent his- 
 tory is marked by continual testimonies of the same 
 divine intervention, given at every step which might 
 involve the doubt whether it were of Paul or of 
 Christ. When his soul clave to the ministry among 
 his own people, he was forced from it by immediate 
 command : " It came to pass that, while I prayed 
 in the Temple, I was in a trance, and saw him saying 
 unto me. Make haste and get thee quickly out of 
 Jerusalem, for they wiU not receive thy testimony 
 concerning me : depart, for I will send thee far 
 hence unto the Gentiles'*." When he had fixed 
 himself as a settled teacher in Antioch, " the Spirit 
 said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work 
 whereunto I have called them." When he would 
 have confined himself to the eastern continent, and 
 turned, in his contemplated circuit, first to Asia and 
 then to Bithynia, " the Spirit suifered him not," and 
 a divine message enabled him to "gather assuredly 
 that the Lord had called him" to carry his Gospel 
 into Europe. Again, in Corinth the Lord's own 
 voice directed him to remain, as in the head-quaiters 
 d Acts xxii, 17, 18, 21. 
 
96 LECTURE IV. 
 
 of the Grecian world. In Jerusalem, when dis- 
 heartened and perhaps doubtful of the course he 
 had taken, his Master came to assure him of the 
 acceptance of his past testimony, and announce the 
 purpose that he should bear witness also at Rome ; 
 and finally, m the sliipwreck itself, when all hope of 
 being saved was taken away, the declaration of the 
 divine piupose was made yet more distinct : " Fear 
 not, Paid, thou must be brought before Csesar." 
 
 Thus does he, who at the commencement of 
 the history was seen to pass into the heavens, 
 continiie to appear in person on the scene. His 
 Apostles act, not only on his past commission, 
 but under his present direction. He is not wholly 
 concealed by the cloud which had received him 
 out of their sight. Now his voice is heard ; now 
 his hand put forth ; and now through a sudden 
 rift the brightness of his presence shines. And 
 these appearances, voices, and visions are not mere 
 incidental favours ; they are, as we have seen, 
 apportioned to the moments when they are ivanted, 
 moments which determine the course which the 
 Gospel takes, and in which a manifestation of 
 divine guidance proves the divme guidance of 
 the whole. The ship rushes on its way, shunning 
 the breakers, dashing through the billows, certain 
 of its track. The crew work it, but do not guide 
 it. We can see the strong movements of the helm, 
 and from time to time discern a firm hand which 
 holds it. No chances, .no winds or currents, bear 
 it along at their will, but he who has launched 
 
LECTURE IV. 97 
 
 it guides it, and he knows the course which it 
 takes. 
 
 The divine direction, which is thus exhibited 
 in the book of the Acts, is indeed the direction 
 of a course of action rather than a course of teach- 
 ing. It seems to be the guidance of the move- 
 ments of the Gospel, rather than of the formation 
 of the Gospel ; and ovir present enqioiry is con- 
 cerned with the progress of its formation, not with 
 the progress of its extension. Yet in the apostohc 
 period these two kinds of progress co-exist, and 
 (as it were) cohere ; and the outward divine 
 direction of the one is offered as surety for the 
 inward divine direction of the other. In the earlier 
 period, the things which Jesus began to do were 
 the proof and support of the things which he 
 began to teach ; and in the later period, that which 
 he continued to do, in the acts of his Apostles, 
 is the pledge that in their doctrine also it was he 
 who continued to teach. The inference is natural 
 and is plainly intended, — If the introductory his- 
 torical hooh manifests the direction of the Lord 
 in the acts of these men, then vyi the subsequent 
 doctrinal books we must own his direction in their 
 teaching. Such an inference would be reasonable, 
 if we regarded the teaching as simply an accom- 
 paniment of the acting ; such an inference is in- 
 evitable, when we see that the delivery of the 
 truth to the world is the one end and object of 
 what is done. 
 
 I must further observe, that the facts recorded 
 
 H 
 
98 LECTURE IV. 
 
 in the book of Acts are not only a pledge of the 
 divine authority of the doctrine in the Epistles, 
 but are also the means through which that doc- 
 trine was perfected. As the Gospel was guided 
 through its conflict with the contemporaneous Ju- 
 daism ; as it spread from the Hebrews to the 
 Grecians, to the dispersion, to the devoiit persons, 
 to the heathen beyond ; as it passed from Jerusalem 
 to Antioch, to Corinth, to Kome ; as it was pre- 
 sented to men first through Peter, and then through 
 Paul, — its doctrines were gaining at every step ' 
 in definiteness and fulness. Questions arose which 
 compelled decision; new states of mind in receivers 
 of truth called out, not new principles of truth, 
 but new apphcations of it ; and the growth of 
 Churches and the advance of christian life led to 
 the settlement of points, which could not have been 
 raised till such a state of things had arisen. Under 
 these circumstances, a divine guidance of events was 
 only a means for the divine guidance of doctrine. 
 If the Lord himself sensibly interfere, to send Peter 
 to Csesarea, and to call Paul to bear his name 
 before Gentiles and kings, then not only those steps, 
 but the doctrinal results of them, are visibly in- 
 cluded in the purpose of God and marked with 
 the seal of heaven. 
 
 More than this we can hardly ask for from the 
 book of Acts, seeing that its province is in the 
 outward scene, and its office is to record the march 
 of events. We pass from it to the Epistles with 
 the fullest assvirance which such evidence can afford. 
 
LECTURE IV. 99 
 
 that the doctrine which they contain is given by 
 the Lord Jesus, and that, if it appear an advance 
 upon that which he spake with his lips in the days 
 of his flesh, that advance has been matured by 
 himself 
 
 In the Epistles which have for their province, 
 not history but doctrine, some direct statements on 
 this subject might perhaps be expected. Whether 
 expected or not, they are certainly foiind. The great 
 body of the Epistles are the writings of St. Paul. 
 The change ia the aspect of their doctrine as com- 
 pared with the Gospel type bears chiefly the impress 
 of his mind. It has been called, and may be properly 
 called, the Pauline doctrine. Is it also absolutely 
 the doctrine of Christ 1 or is it an individual variety 
 of that doctrine, to be regarded (so far as it seems 
 peculiar) as one allowable form of the original truth 1 
 a token that there shall be, a warrant that there 
 may be, various systems of opinion in the Church 1 
 The question in fact is this. Is the voice of Paul 
 speaking in the Scriptures to be taken by the Church 
 as the voice of Jesus ? This question has been an- 
 swered by the history in the Acts. We have already 
 recalled to our minds the special choice, and caU, 
 and commission, and direction, which were assigned 
 to the Apostle born out of due time ; the confir- 
 mation of his proceedings when they were most 
 questioned, the divine fellowship in his course when 
 it seemed most lonely. But there is yet a more 
 direct answer than this ; one which his own words 
 supply. 
 
 H 2 
 
100 LECTURE IV. 
 
 In his wi-itings in general he is careful to assert 
 the reality of his apostleship, as conferred by imme- 
 diate appointment and bearing the seal of God ; 
 and it is observable, that the strength of these ex- 
 pressions is proportioned to the occasions when the 
 authority of the office involves the aixthority of the 
 doctrine. In the Epistle to the Galatians, when 
 he has to maintain his gospel as being the gospel, 
 we find the precision which marks the language of 
 one who knows what insinuations he has to negative : 
 "Paul, an Apostle, not of men [air avOpunrwv), neither 
 by men {Si' avOpwirov), but by {8ia) Jesus Christ, and 
 God the Father, who raised him from the dead." 
 He declares himself to have been placed, not ori- 
 ginally from men, nor mediately by any man's 
 ministry, but by the very hand of Christ, in the 
 chair from which his instructions are dehvered, and 
 thus he attaches the authority of the commission 
 to the instructions which are given under it. But 
 he goes farther, and affirms that those instructions 
 themselves were no less immediately received from 
 the Lord Jesiis, than was the commission imder 
 which they were dehvered. 
 
 Let me ask your attention to the language which 
 this Apostle uses, when speaking of the sources 
 whence the matter of his preaching was derived. 
 Take first two passages from the First Epistle to the 
 Coiinthians. He says (ch. xi. 23-25), "/ have re- 
 ceived of the Lord that which also I delivered unto 
 yoii, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which he was 
 betrayed took bread ; and having given thanks, he 
 
LECTURE IV. 101 
 
 brake it, and said, Take, eat : this is my body, which 
 is broken for you : this do in remembrance of me. 
 Likewise also he took the cup, when he had supped, 
 saying, This cup is the New Testament in my blood : 
 this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance 
 of me." Again (ch. xv. 1-7), the same expression, 
 though less full, is used in reference to another class 
 of facts : " Brethren, I declare \mto you the gospel 
 which I preached unto you, which also ye have 
 received .... For I delivered unto you first of all 
 that which I also received, how that Christ died for 
 our sins according to the Scriptures ; and that he 
 was buried, and that he rose again the third day 
 according to the Scriptures : and that he was seen of 
 Cephas, and then of the twelve ; after that, he was 
 seen of above five hundred brethren at once ; . . . . 
 after that, he was seen of James ; then of all the 
 Apostles." Now place by the side of these state- 
 ments two others, taken from the Epistles which 
 foUow. To the Galatians he says (ch. i. 11, 12), "I 
 certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was 
 preached of me is not after man ; for / neither 
 received it of man (irapa avOpw-n-ou TvapeXa^ov), neither 
 ivas I taught it, hut by revelation {Si a7roK:aXt;\|/-ewy) 
 0/ Jesus Christ ;" and to the Ephesians (iii. 2, 3) he 
 speaks in the same strain, thovigh with less emphatic 
 precision : " Ye have heard of the dispensation of 
 the grace of God, given to me to you-ward : how 
 that by revelation he made hnovm unto me the 
 mystery," {Kara airoKoKv^iv eyvoopiae fioi ro [xvaTrjptov). 
 Between the first and the second of these pairs 
 
102 LECTURE IV. 
 
 of texts a very remarkable difference appears. In 
 the first, St. Paul seems to represent his own preach- 
 ing as a link in the chain of tradition, " I received," 
 " I dehvered," {vapeXa^ov, TrapeSooKa) : nor yet as the 
 first link, for even the fuller expression, rendered 
 " I received of the Lord," (otto tov Kvplov), does not 
 so fitly import an immediate communication, as a 
 reception of that which had originated from the 
 Lord, and was handed down by his commandment d. 
 St. Paul, therefore, here appears to stand, in respect 
 to the sources of his information, on the same 
 footing as the Evangehst who was associated with 
 him, and to speak of the facts of the manifestation 
 of Christ, " even as they dehvered them unto us 
 (kuOws TTupiSoa-av ^fx.ti'), who from the beginning were 
 eye-witnesses and ministers of the word." On the 
 other hand, in the second pair of statements, the 
 contrary assertion is made, namely, that his gospel 
 was not received from man, nor taught by man, 
 but communicated immediately by revelation of the 
 Lord Jesus. 
 
 The state of the case thus brought to light is in 
 exact accordance with the view which is here taken 
 of the manner in which the Lord perfected his 
 word. The Gospel which the Apostles preached 
 was a combination of historic facts with their spi- 
 ritual interpretations ; and the expression, " Gospel 
 which I preached," is used by St. Paul in different 
 places with more immediate reference to the one 
 or the other of these elements. In the passages 
 a See Note VII. 
 
LECTURE IV. 103 
 
 from the Epistle to the Corintliians he speaks of 
 the first and fundamental part of his preaching, 
 referring expressly to the publication of historic 
 facts : — Christ died — he was buried — he rose again — 
 he was seen of Cephas, &c. On the same night that 
 he was betrayed he took bread — he gave thanks, 
 and brake it — he said, Take, eat, &c. ; and we learn 
 that the Gospel, as a body of historic fact, was 
 received by the Apostle Paul, as by all others who 
 had not seen the Lord in the flesh, from those who 
 were the appointed witnesses of his visible mani- 
 festation. In the two latter passages it is otherwise. 
 Not the historic facts, but " the mystery" connected 
 with them, is spoken of (in the address to the 
 Ephesians) as the subject of the revelation received. 
 And the Gospel of which he writes to the Galatians 
 is plainly not thought of on its historical, but on 
 its doctrinal side. The " other Gospel " into which 
 the converts were " being removed " was not another 
 account of the hfe of Jesus, but another set of 
 inferences connected with it. When he went up 
 to Jerusalem by revelation, and privately commu- 
 nicated to those of reputation " the Gospel which 
 he preached among the Gentileg," we are sure that 
 he laid before them, not the substance of the history 
 which we read in St. Luke's narrative, but the sub- 
 stance of the doctrine which is embodied in his 
 own Epistles. The whole argument to the Galatians 
 turns upon the doctrinal element of the Gospel. It 
 is of this, therefore, that he so solemnly afiirms that 
 he was not taught it by agency of man, but received 
 
104 LECTURE IV. 
 
 it as direct revelation from the Lord ; and this 
 affirmation is made, not merely in respect of the 
 general doctrine, but specifically of those parts of 
 it which it was given to hiin to develop and defend : 
 " the Gospel which was preached by me," — " my 
 Gospel," as he elsewhere calls it, the Gospel under 
 that particular aspect which he admits to be the 
 subject of extensive doubt and complaint. The part 
 in the progress of doctrine committed to St. Paul 
 was to define, to settle, and to carry out to its 
 practical consequences the principle of free justifi- 
 cation in Christ, which {as a principle) was acknow- 
 ledged and held before his voice was heard ; and 
 we learn from his own statements, that, for this 
 special work, not only a special commission, but a 
 special revelation was given him by the Lord Jesus, 
 so as to clear and settle his own mind, on those 
 points on which he was sent to clear and settle 
 the minds of others. In this way he was a minister 
 and a witness, not of those things which he had 
 heard from others, nor of those things which he 
 had only thoiight out for himself, b\it of those things 
 which his Lord had showed him in personal visits 
 and distinct communications, according to the an- 
 nouncement made at the first commencement of 
 this peculiar intercourse, " I have appeared unto 
 thee for this purpose, to make thee a minister 
 and a witness, both of those things which thou 
 hast seen, and of those things in the which / will 
 appear unto thee," {(Sv re ef^e? wv re ScpOija-oimal croi®). 
 <= Acts xxvi. 1 6. 
 
LECTURE IV. 105 
 
 No! he was not only an inspired teacher adorned 
 with the title of Apostle ; he was an Apostle in 
 the strictest sense of the word, a commissioned witness 
 to others of direct communications of Jesus Christ 
 to himself; one appointed to confirm to others the 
 salvation which, in his own hearing, had begun to 
 be spoken by the Lord. 
 
 The appearances and revelations vouchsafed to the 
 Apostle of the Gentiles are thus conspicuously seen 
 to connect themselves with the agency assigned to 
 him in the progress of doctrine ; and the more care- 
 fully we examine his history and weigh his language, 
 the more sensibly do we feel ourselves in the presence 
 of that great fact, on the reahty of which the faith of 
 succeeding ages has reposed, namely, the continued 
 personal administration of the Lord Jesus in founding 
 his Chiu-ch and perfecting his word. 
 
 This administration was manifested, as we have 
 seen, by selection of agents, direction of events, an- 
 gelic messages, visits in visions, special instructions, 
 and distinct revelations ; yet these numerous inter- 
 ventions do not constitute the entire system of divine 
 guidance, or even the chief part of it, but are rather 
 to be regarded as additions to the normal method 
 of administration which they serve both to assist and 
 authenticate. 
 
 2. The real guidance of the Apostles by their Lord 
 was not occasional, but habitual, not through sepa- 
 rate interventions, but through the Holy Ghost 
 dwelling in them. So the promise ran that it should 
 be ; and so in fact it was. 
 
106 LECTURE IV. 
 
 The Day of Pentecost is the opening of the second 
 period of the New Testament dispensation. It 
 stands alone, as does the day which now we call 
 Christmas : the one the birthday of the Lord, the 
 other the birthday 'of his Church ; the one proclaimed 
 by praises sung by hosts in heaven, the other by 
 praises uttered in the various tongues of earth. 
 
 The change is meet, becaiise the Spirit now con- 
 veys the true knowledge of the wonderful works 
 of God into the recesses of the human heart. A 
 dispensation is begun, in which the mind of God has 
 entered into mysterious combination with the mind 
 of man, and henceforth the reveahng light shines, 
 not from without, but from within. 
 
 " O God, who at this time didst teach the hearts 
 of thy faithful people by the sendmg to them the 
 light of thy Holy Spirit !" So speaks the Collect 
 for Whitsunday ; and, in so speaking, seizes at once 
 the central idea of the event. That idea is often 
 imperfectly apprehended ; for in the dispensation of 
 the Spirit there is so much that is visible on its 
 surface, that our thoughts are apt to be arrested 
 before they penetrate to its centre. Tongues and 
 prophecies, and signs and wonders, gifts of the Holy 
 Ghost dispensed according to his will, are visible 
 results of the event, and they witness to the Gospel 
 and clear its way. Below these superadded faculties, 
 we are conscious of a mighty influence in the region 
 of the emotions. We feel the presence of that com- 
 fort and strength, of that glow and fervour and joy, 
 by which we see the men animated in the exercise 
 
LECTURE IV. 107 
 
 of their new powers, and hear them speak with 
 tongues and magnify God. But we must go further. 
 The new powers seem as it were born from the new 
 impulses, but whence do the new impulses proceed 1 
 Is there not a cause for these 1 Does the Holy 
 Spirit limit his entrance into man to the region of 
 emotion, which is but the surface of our natvire, 
 without reaching those inner springs from which, ac- 
 cording to the laws of that nature, the emotions should 
 themselves be quickened 1 No ! be sure that the Holy 
 Ghost has occupied the heart and centre of our being, 
 and that, as the tongues are given as a vent for the 
 fervour of emotion, so the fervour of emotion has 
 its own origin in a sudden access of intellectual light. 
 New apprehensions of truth, new views of things, 
 which those thus visited had seen but had not un- 
 derstood, now burst in a moment on their minds, and 
 from that moment continued to grow more distinct 
 and more extended before their now enlightened 
 eye. God at that time not only stirred, but taught, 
 the hearts of his faithful people, and sent to them 
 not only the warmth but "the light" of his Holy 
 Spirit. 
 
 If this had not been so, what fulfilment would 
 there have been of those promises of the Lord which 
 we lately recalled to mind, respecting the nature and 
 effect of the gift which was to follow his departure 1 
 He told his Apostles that they should "receive 
 power," and he told them that they should receive 
 " comfort," but we have seen that that on which 
 he chiefly dwelt was the light of knowledge which 
 
108 LECTURE IV. 
 
 should rise upon their minds. "In that day ye 
 shall know ;" " he shall bring all things to yovir re- 
 membrance ;" " he shall teach you all things ;" " he 
 shall guide you into all truth ;" " he shall receive of 
 mine and shall shew it unto you." These are plain 
 assertions. It is enotigh that they were made by 
 him who gave the gift, and certainly knew how to 
 describe it. The rehearsal of these assertions be- 
 longed to the last stage of our enquiry ; the evidence 
 of their fulfihnent is the thing before us now. 
 
 Those to whom these promises are given exhibit 
 at the time a dimness of apprehension, a perplexity 
 and disorder of thought, an incapacity to understand 
 the things which they hear and see, which we, en- 
 lightened from the light which they afterwards ob- 
 tained, most um'easonably count to be wonderful. 
 It could not have been otherwise with the strongest 
 and most penetrating intellects. But the fact of 
 their condition of mind is undoubted, whether we 
 ascribe it to personal deiiciency or to the necessity of 
 the case. 
 
 They were dealt with accordingly. From the mo- 
 ment when they saw their Lord ascend, they were in 
 full possession of all the external facts of which they 
 were appointed to bear witness. But they were not 
 in possession of the spiritual meaning, relations, and 
 consequences of those facts, and therefore the hour 
 of their testimony was not come, and the interval 
 was passed not in preaching but in prayer. As 
 soon as the promise is fulfilled they lift up their 
 voice and speak. Never were men so changed. 
 
LECTURE IV. 109 
 
 Who does not note the accession of boldness, faith- 
 fuhiess, and fervour ! But these are not separated 
 and unsupported gifts. They manifestly have their 
 origin in the cei-tainty of assurance and intensity 
 of conviction. The Trapp>]a-la proceeds from irXtjpo- 
 <f)opia ; according as it is written, " I believed and 
 therefore have I spoken, these also beheve and there- 
 fore speak." Their clear firm testimony rises ia a 
 moment before the world, never hesitating or waver- 
 ing, never to sink or change again, only manifesting 
 more fully, as time advances, the largeness of its 
 compass and the definiteness of its announcements. 
 Ever after they speak as men would do, who were 
 conscious of a ground of certainty which could not 
 be questioned, who could say that things " seemed 
 good to the Holy Ghost and to them^ ;" that their 
 word was " not the word of man but the word of 
 Gods ;" that it was " the Spirit that bore witness'^ ;" 
 that they " preached the Gospel with the Holy Ghost 
 sent down from heaven* ;" that " things which eye 
 had not seen nor ear heard, and which had not en- 
 tered into the heart of man, had been revealed to 
 them by the Spirit, which searcheth the deep 
 things of God ;" that they " had received, not the 
 spirit which is of the world, but the Spirit which 
 is of God, that they might know the things which 
 are freely given of God ;" that they " spoke these 
 things, not in words which man's wisdom taught, but 
 which the Holy Ghost taught ;" and that they "could 
 
 f Acts XV. 28. s I Thess. ii. 13. 
 
 h I John V. 6. 'I Peter i. 12. 
 
110 LECTURE IV. 
 
 he judged of no man," because " none knew the mind 
 of the Lord so as to instruct him, and they had the 
 mind of Christ^." It is enough. The three testi- 
 monies concur — the testimony of him who gave the 
 Spirit, the testimony of those who received it, and 
 the testimony of the facts which ensued on its re- 
 ception. 
 
 Are we then at a loss to know what was the 
 nature of the gift which tlie Holy Spirit brought 
 for the piorposes of the apostolic work 1 Certainly 
 it was vast and various — " a sevenfold gift ;" but its 
 most essential part lay not in tongues and powers 
 which witnessed to the Gospel, not in the fervour 
 and boldness which preached it, rather it tvas the 
 Gospel itself. 
 
 The Gospel which the Apostles preached consisted 
 of two elements, a testimony of external facts which 
 fell within the region of the senses, and a testimony 
 of the virtue of those facts in the predestined go- 
 vernment of God, and of the consequences of them 
 in the spiritual history of men, neither of which 
 was it possible for the senses to certify. For the 
 first testimony they needed but a clear and faith- 
 ful memory. For the second also the same faculty 
 would suffice, but only up to a certain point ; 
 namely, as far as they had received and under- 
 stood the exposition of transcendental truth from 
 the hps of the Lord Jesus. But we have seen 
 that the salvation only began to be spoken by the 
 Lord, and that he himself asserted that it would 
 
 ^ I Cor. li. 9-16. 
 
LECTURE IV. 11] 
 
 not be fully revealed by him, or understood by them, 
 until tbe Spirit came. If the Spirit on his coming 
 did not complete that revelation, then the Gospel 
 "which the Apostles preached must have been, in 
 some of its most important features, partly a word 
 of God and partly a word of man. Their witness 
 of the death, and resurrection, and ascension of Jesus 
 would demand an unqualified acceptance, but their 
 representation of the sacrificial character and atoning 
 merits of the death, of the life-giving power of the 
 resurrection, and of the mediatorial office in heaven, 
 would be the result of their own inferences from the 
 words which they had gleaned from their Lord ; and, 
 instead of being judged of no man, they would be 
 judged of every man who could take a different view 
 of the words which they repeated from that which 
 they had taken themselves ™. Thus the whole system 
 of their doctrine would stand (like the image in the 
 dream) on feet part of iron and part of clay, and 
 would not wait long for the hour of its overthrow. 
 But he who, in the face of all which has been now 
 recalled to mind, should still treat their doctrine in 
 this light, would plainly accuse of falsehood, not only 
 the men, but their Lord himself; who, if he spoke 
 true when he gave them the Spirit, led them thereby 
 "into all the truth." The guarantees for this fact 
 could hardly have been plainer or stronger than they 
 are. We thank God that he has provided them, and 
 we pass into the second stage of New Testament 
 teaching with adequate assurances that he who be- 
 
 m See Note VIII. 
 
112 LECTURE IV. 
 
 fore taught us on earth now teaches us from heaven, 
 and that we still " hear him and are taught m him." 
 
 II. We have not then changed our teacher, but he 
 has changed his method : and I have now to pouit 
 out tJie reasons of the change, by showing that it 
 was fitted to conduct the advance of doctrine from 
 the point at which it had then arrived. 
 
 It may be said that the change was simply a 
 matter of necessity, because he who had spoken 
 with his hps was now to be received up into glory, 
 and could no longer talk with liis servants on earth. 
 But though the change might be necessary, it was also 
 " expedient " — expedient for them. So he represents 
 it to his motmiing and perplexed disciples, and adds 
 the support of a strong asseveration. " Nevertheless 
 I tell you the truth, it is good for you that I go 
 away ; for if I go not away the Comforter wiU not 
 come unto you^." The change then takes place as 
 an advantage to those who are subjected to it. 
 For them a stage of revelation has come which 
 demands a method of teaching more penetrating 
 and internal than that which they had tiU then 
 enjoyed. 
 
 It is in this character that the superiority of the 
 later method consists, as is pointed out by the plain 
 distinction, " He dweUeth ivith you, and shall be in 
 you." Here are two methods appropriated to the 
 two stages of New Testament teaching : and it is 
 clear as day that the second is an advance upon the 
 first. In the one, the teaching power is separated 
 
 g John xvi. 7. 
 
LECTURE IV. IIB 
 
 from, and external to, the mind which is being- 
 taught ; in the other, it is interfused and commingled 
 with it. The words, in the one, are divine announce- 
 ments fitted to form the apprehensions of man : the 
 words, in the other, are expressions of human appre- 
 hensions already formed under the divine agency. 
 The teaching power has thus changed its method, 
 in order to meet the exigencies of a more difficult 
 stage of instruction. 
 
 The facts are finished when Jesus is glorified ; 
 the manifestation of the Son of God is perfect, the 
 redemption is accomplished, and the conditions of 
 human salvation are complete. 
 
 The history must now be treated as a whole, of 
 which the plan and purpose have become apparent. 
 The time is come "for the full interpretation of the 
 facts, of their effects in the world of sjoirit, and of 
 their results in human consciousness. 
 
 A doctrine then is needed, which shall sum up 
 the whole bearing of the manifestation of Christ, 
 which shall throw a full fight on its spiritual effects, ^ 
 and which shall guide the minds of men in their 
 appfication of it to themselves. Such a doctrine 
 might be given from God m one of two ways : by 
 voices from heaven, declaring what view men ought 
 to take of the history which had passed before them, 
 and what their faith and feelings ought to be con- 
 cerning it ; or by voices from men themselves, 
 expressing the view which they did take, and the 
 faith and feelings which were actually in their hearts. 
 In the one case, we should have Apostles, who would 
 
 I 
 
114 LECTURE IV. 
 
 be to us the messengers of God, oidi/ while they 
 testified that they had received such and such revela- 
 tions, and while they recited those revelations to 
 us word for word : but all their other words would 
 come to us on their own merits, as simply the words 
 of holy and enlightened men. In the other case, we 
 should have Apostles, whose representations of their 
 own view of all which they had heard and seen, whose 
 expositions of their own convictions and feelings, 
 and of the processes of their own thoughts con- 
 cerning the things of Christ, would be to us so 
 many revelations from God of what he intended to be 
 the result of the manifestation of his Son in human 
 hearts. 
 
 Who does not see that this kind of teaching would 
 exceed the other in completeness and effectiveness ? 
 It would be more complete ; for we should thus 
 have the word presented to us in the final form 
 which it was meant to take, that, namely, of a word 
 divelUng in us — a divine announcement changed 
 already into a htmian experience. It would be more 
 effective ; inasmuch as example is more so than pre- 
 cept, and the same voice, being to us both the voice 
 of God and the voice of man, would affect our 
 hearts with the double power of certainty and sym- 
 pathy. Such a method of teaching could only be 
 possible, under some system of divine action which 
 should fuse into one the thoughts of God and the 
 thoughts of man ; and this was effected by the gift 
 of the Holy Ghost to the Apostles for the work 
 whereto they wei'e called. 
 
LECTURE IV. Ur> 
 
 I say for the work ivhereto they tvere called, for 
 the same Spirit is diverse in operation, and divides 
 to every man severally as he will. When the Church 
 was anointed from above, the manifestation of the 
 Spirit pervaded her whole frame, " like the precious 
 ointment on the head, which ran down upon the 
 beard, even upon Aaron s beard, and went down to 
 the skirts of his garments." Even " on the servants 
 and on the handmaids" did the Lord pour out of his 
 Spirit, and the supernatural presence was disclosed in 
 a vast scale of various gifts, ranging from that which 
 was intense and supreme to that which was super- 
 ficial and ancillary. But we speak now of that which 
 was supreme. "First Apostles." The ointment is 
 poured first upon the head ; and from thence the 
 ghttering drops descend upon the raiment. All 
 the members have not the same office : — Are all 
 Apostles ? No ! the authorities, standards, and types 
 of truth are so by direct commission, and the gift 
 which they receive is one which makes them so 
 indeed. As the office, so is the gift. 
 
 An incommunicable office has an incommunicable 
 gift. An office which is to be solitary and supreme 
 in the Church for ever has a gift adequate to secure 
 the implicit confidence of long-descending ages. 
 
 Voices may be heard among us now which tend 
 to impair that confidence ; complaints of the dis- 
 tinctive use of the word ' inspiration,' as applied 
 to the Scripture writers ; assertions that " the Scrip- 
 tures are before, and above all '^things, the voice of 
 the congregation." 
 
 I 2 
 
116 LECTURE IV. 
 
 On what do these complaints and assertions rest ? 
 On the true conviction, that, in all the Church, and 
 in all ages, there is the presence of the same Spirit. 
 Yes ! and on the false assumption, that the gifts 
 of the Spirit are to all the same gifts. There is 
 no principle in the Bible more clear, than that the 
 gifts of the Spirit are diverse, and are, in charac- 
 ter and proportion, adapted to the works which 
 God assigns, and appropriated to the offices which 
 he creates. Now it is certainly one thing to be a 
 member, and another thing to be a founder, of the 
 Church. It is one thing to receive or to propagate 
 the tnith, and another to deliver it with the au- 
 thority of God, and to certify it to the world for 
 ever. 
 
 The same clear view of the way of salvation, and 
 of the unsearchable riches of Christ, which gladdened 
 the soul of St. Paid, might gladden the soul of one 
 who heard his words, and may now gladden the soul 
 of one who reads them. For both there is the same 
 Spirit and the same testimony ; btit the Spirit is 
 given to the one, that he may originate that testi- 
 mony, to the other, that he may receive it. There 
 is a difference between being builded into the holy 
 temple, which is the habitation of God through 
 the Spirit, and being constituted a foundation, on 
 which the future buUding is to rise at first and to 
 rest for ever. Such was the separate function of 
 the Apostles of the Lord and Saviour, a function 
 which they shared with the special messengers of 
 God who went before them, and even with their 
 
LECTURE IV. 117 
 
 Lord himself. "Ye are built," said they to their 
 brethren, — " Ye are built on the foundations of the 
 Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being 
 the chief corner-stone n." The corner-stone is but 
 part of the foundation, though it be the first and the 
 chief part ; and this consolidation of the corner-stone 
 with the adjacent foundations, as one basement to 
 sustain the building, exhibits in the plainest manner 
 the fact, that the Chtirch, in respect of its faith, 
 rests upon a testimony which was delivered, partly 
 by Jesus Christ in person, and partly by the agents 
 whom for that purpose he ordained. Their inspi- 
 ration as believers associates them with the whole 
 Church ; their inspiration as teachers unites them 
 only with their Lord. 
 
 The consciousness of this position appears in the 
 records of their preaching, and breathes through 
 all their writings a lofty and unyielding authority. 
 They speak as men having the Spirit to those to 
 whom it is also given, yet as men empowered to 
 dehver the truth which the others were only enabled 
 to receive. St. Paid addresses himself to " those 
 that are spiritual," but he shews them that it is 
 he, and not they, who is " put in trust with the 
 Gospel," and that the word which he utters is one 
 to which they can add nothing, and in which 
 they can change nothing. St. John exhorts those 
 " who have an unction from the Holy One," but 
 as having himself a kind of anointing in which they 
 do not share, whereby he delivers the " message," 
 
 n Eph. ii. 20. 
 
118 LECTURE IV. 
 
 and the " witness," and tLe " commandment," which 
 they on their part recognise and accejjt. No ! the 
 voice that sounds from these pages is not the voice 
 of the congregation, but the voice of those who 
 founded it by the will of God ; and that character 
 the congregation itself has asserted for the word 
 in all ages. The written word has been the canon 
 of the Church, because it was a voice which came 
 to it, not because it was a voice which proceeded 
 from it o. 
 
 To us at this day this word has come ; and to 
 us at this day the anointing from the Holy One 
 flows down. For you, for me, (thank God !) the 
 teaching of the Spirit remains. It remains for the 
 servants and the handmaids : and many an obscure 
 and lowly brother in the streets around us can say 
 for himself, as truly as St. Paul could say, " I have 
 received the Spirit that is of God, that I may know 
 the things which are freely given to me of God." But 
 one who thus speaks can know that his convictions 
 are really the teaching of the Spirit of God only in 
 so far as they correspond with the eternal types 
 of truth, which ascertain to us what the teaching 
 of the Spirit is. Now, as in those apostolic days, 
 he which is spiritual can shew that he is so only 
 " by acknowledging that the thmgs which " those 
 appointed teachers "wrote to us are the command- 
 ments of the Lord ;" for the gift of the Holy Ghost 
 to others is not a gift whereby they originate the 
 knowledge of new truths, but a gift A\'here1)y they 
 See Note IX. 
 
LECTURE IV. Ill) 
 
 lecoguise and apprehend the old unchanging mys- 
 tery, still receiving afresh the one revelation of 
 Christ, ever approaching, never surpassing the com- 
 prehensive but immovable boundaries of the faith 
 once delivered to the saints. This is the gift, the 
 only gift, which we desire for our Church and for 
 ourselves ; for it is one which makes the written 
 word a living ^vord, which fills a Church with joy, 
 and seals a soul for glory. 
 
LECTURE Y. 
 
 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 
 
 Acts v. 43. 
 Theif ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ. 
 
 Jesus CHEIST is gone up into glory, and the 
 Holy Ghost has come down into men : and we 
 have seen that these events are represented to us, 
 not as closing the course of revelation, but as 
 opening a new stage of it. The questions which 
 met us on the threshold have been answered, and 
 we go forward with the full assurance that our 
 first teacher is our teacher still, and that his 
 second method of instruction is an advance upon 
 the first. 
 
 We have now to ask, first, \Miat change appears 
 in the aspect of the doctrine ? and then, What is the 
 plan on which it continues to advance ? 
 
 For a reply to these questions I address myself to 
 that introductory book which gives us the external 
 history of this part of the dispensation of truth. 
 
LECTURE V. 121 
 
 It is not the function of a historical record to work 
 out expositions of doctrine, but such a book may 
 be expected to present the ge?ieral character' which 
 the doctrine bore, and to clear to our view the 
 agencies and the stages by which it was matured. 
 This is precisely what is done in the book of Acts. 
 It is the purpose of the book to do it ; a pur- 
 pose which ought to be more fully recognised than 
 it is. 
 
 There are works which are done with so natural 
 and graceful a facihty, that it seems to the superficial 
 observer as if anyone cotdd have done them, or as 
 if he who did them was only guided by casual 
 impulse, while a more careful student will perceive 
 that singular gifts were necessary to produce the 
 results which seem so easy, and that a comprehensive 
 design and an accurate judgment presided over ar- 
 rangements which appear fortviitous. Such a work 
 is the Acts of the Apostles. In a narrative all alive 
 with graphic details, and written in a style of ani- 
 mated simplicity and natural ease, it carries us 
 through a period of human history of incalculable 
 interest and importance : one in which the effects of 
 the manifestation of the Son of God were developed 
 and tested ; in which the life which he had intro- 
 duced among men disclosed its nature and power, 
 and the truth which he had left commenced its 
 struggles and conquests ; in which the christian 
 Church was constituted, gradually detached from its 
 Jewish integuments, and brought to the consciousness 
 of its freedom and catholicity ; in which it verified 
 
122 LECTURE V. 
 
 its credentials, proved its arms, recognised its des- 
 tinies, and commenced its victories ; in which im- 
 pulses were given which would never cease to 
 vibrate, and precedents were established to which 
 distant ages would refer ; in which solemn and ex- 
 citing scenes, marvels and miracles, saintly and heroic 
 characters, their labours, their conflicts, their suffer- 
 ings, their journejings, their collisions with all classes 
 of men, seem to force upon the historian a confusing 
 multiplicity of materials. Yet through all this he 
 makes liis way straight in one direction, as a man 
 guided by that instinct of selection which belongs to the 
 ruling presence of a definite purpose. It is just this defi- 
 niteness of purpose which is apt to pass unobserved. 
 It is nowhere announced, and the luiconstrained 
 freedom of manner and easy inartificial style suggest 
 no thought of it. We seem sometimes to be reading 
 a collection of anecdotes or personal memoirs of 
 certain A230stles, and some critics have dealt with 
 the book, as if indeed it were but a chance collection 
 of stories with which the author had happened to 
 l)ecome acquainted, or as if a fragment of the acts 
 of St. Peter liad been prefixed to a journal of the 
 travels of St. Paul. 
 
 But we know St. Luke's intelligent, enquiring mind, 
 liis oj^portunities of information, his " perfect under- 
 standing of all things from the very first," his 
 personal intercourse with those " who from the be- 
 ginning had been eye-witnesses and ministers of 
 the word." We cannot for a moment suppose that 
 liis acr|uaintance with the "acts of tlie Apostles" 
 
LECTURE V. 123 
 
 was limited to the facts recorded in the book ; that 
 he knew nothing of the proceedings of John or 
 James, or of the manifold movements and events 
 wliich were going on by the side of those' which 
 he has related. In fact, there is not a book upon 
 earth in wliich the principle of intentional selection 
 is more evident to a careful observer. There is 
 indeed no reason given, why one speech is reported 
 and one event related at length, in preference to 
 others which are passed over or slightly touched ; 
 yet when we reach the conclusion we see the reasons 
 in the result. We find that by an undeviating 
 course we have followed the development of the 
 true idea of the Church of Christ, in its relations 
 first to the Jewish system, out of which it emerges, 
 and then to the great world, to which it opens 
 itself When the words and deeds of Philip or 
 Stephen, of Peter or Paul, are implicated with this 
 progress of things, we find ourselves in their com- 
 pany, but when we part from St. Peter without 
 notice of his after-course, when we leave St. Paul 
 abruptly at the commencement of his two years in 
 Rome, we are given to understand that we have 
 been reading, not their personal memoirs, but a 
 higher history, which certain portions of their 
 careers serve to embody or to illustrate. Even 
 when the book is considered by itself, the unity 
 and completeness of the resiilt is plain ; but when 
 we look at it in its place in Scripture, observe its 
 function there, and its relation to the books which 
 follow, we see most clearly the definite purpose with 
 
124 LECTURE V. 
 
 which it places us and keeps us in that particular 
 line of historical fact which involves the pi'ogress 
 of doctrine. 
 
 It may be said that this is claiming too much ; 
 for that, whatever amount of design may be at- 
 tributed to the author of the " Acts," we cannot 
 ascribe to him the prophetic purpose of fittmg his 
 book to its present place in Scripture. No, certainly 
 not to him ; but the Cluxrch has ever held that 
 another Mind presided over what was written in 
 these pages, a Mind which purposed that we should 
 have a Bible, and which, guiding the production of 
 its component parts, has made it what it is. 
 
 I speak in accordance with this view of Scripture 
 when I ask, What is the office which the book of 
 Acts fulfils in the evolution of doctrine in the New 
 Testament 1 
 
 For a reply to this question I would point to three 
 results which the book unquestionably yields. 
 
 1. It places in the clearest light the divine au- 
 tiiority of the doctrine given during the period which 
 it covers, as a doctrine deUvered by those who, for 
 that particular pvirpose, were filled with the Holy 
 Ghost, and were agents of the personal administra- 
 tion of the Lord Jesus Christ. Tlois, the first and 
 most important part of the office of the book, has 
 been considered in the last Lecture. 
 
 2. It represents the general character of the doc- 
 trine delivered by the Apostles to the world. 
 
 3. It traces the steps of extenml history through 
 wliich the doctrine "was intitured. 
 
LECTURE V. 125 
 
 These are the parts of its office on which I have 
 now to dwell. 
 
 I. The general character of the doctrine as it 
 appears ia the Acts of the Apostles is presented in 
 the words of the text, " They ceased not to teach 
 and preach Jesus the Christ," (ow eTravovTo SiSa- 
 
 c/covTe? Kai evayyeXtZoiuievoi ^Irjirodv tov Js-Olcttov). Similar 
 expressions continually recur : " he preached Christ 
 unto them a ;" "he preached unto him Jesus ^ ;" "he 
 preached Clirist in the synagogues ° ;" they " spake 
 unto the Grecians preaching the Lord Jesus'^;" "he 
 preached unto them Jesus and the resurrection e." No 
 such announcements as these are heard in the Gos- 
 pels. The preaching spoken of there is not of the 
 person but of the kingdom. Jesus comes " preaching 
 the kingdom of God*" ;" "preaching the Gospel of 
 the kingdoms ;" and his parables and common teach- 
 ing are not prominently about himself, but about 
 " the kingdom of heaven." So also his disciples are 
 sent out " to preach the kingdom of God," and are 
 even charged to " tell no man that he was Jesus the 
 Christ''," and are forbidden to publish the manifesta- 
 tions of the fact " untU the Son of Man be risen again 
 from the deadi." And because of the absence of this 
 personal proclamation by himself or his servants, we 
 find John the Baptist troubled and perplexed, and 
 sending a deputation of his followers in the hope of 
 
 a Acts viii. 5. b Ibid. 35. <= Ibid. ix. 20. 
 
 d Acts xi. 20. e iijid. xvii. 18. f Luke ix. 2. 
 
 s Matt. iv. 23, and Mark i. 14. ^ Matt. xvi. 20. 
 
 J Matt. xvii. 9. 
 
126 LECTURE V. 
 
 extracting such a public declaration ; and the mul- 
 titude at a later time complain, "How long dost 
 thou make us to doubt 1 If thou be the Christ, tell 
 us plainly'' ;" and the High Priest, at the very last, 
 imable to obtain testimony to such a public claim, is 
 compelled to resort to adjuration — " Art thou the 
 Christ, the Son of the Blessed • V 
 
 The change in the key-note of the preaching is 
 very significant. Things had been tending towards 
 it. The presentation of Christ to men had been 
 going forward, and the scheme on which it is set 
 before us in the Gospel collection marks the gradual 
 manner in which the eye, looking for the kingdom, 
 had come to be fixed upon the person. In the teach- 
 ing of the first Gospel the idea of the kingdom, in 
 that of the last the idea of the person, is predominant. 
 In the Acts the two expressions are sometimes 
 united, as when the Samaritans " believed Philip 
 preaching the things concerning the kingdom of God 
 and the name of the Lord Jesus'" :" and yet agam, 
 with more evident purpose, in the end of the book, 
 where Paul's exposition to the Jews at Rome stands 
 as the last appeal to that people — " To whom he 
 expounded, testifying the kingdom of God and per- 
 suading them concerning Jesus :" and yet again in 
 the closing verse, which describes the two years' 
 continuous ministry by the words " preaching the 
 kingdom of God, and teaching those things which 
 
 ^ John X. 24. 1 Mark xiv. 6r. 
 
 ™ Acts viii. 12. 
 
LECTURE V. 127 
 
 concern the Lord Jesus Christ"." Evidently on pur- 
 pose are the two expressions combined in this final 
 summary, in order to shew that the preaching of the 
 kingdom and the preaching of Christ are one : that 
 the original proclamation has not ceased, bu.t that in 
 Christ Jesus the thing proclaimed is no longer a 
 vague and future hope, but a distinct and present 
 fact. In the conjunction of these words the jirogress 
 of doctrine appears. All is founded upon the old 
 Jewish expectation of a kingdom of God ; but it is 
 now explained how that expectation is fulfilled in 
 the person of Jesus ; and the account of its realiza- 
 tion consists in the unfolding of the truth concern- 
 ing him (ra ■Kef}\ tov 'Irjtrov). The manifestation of 
 Christ being finished, the kingdom is already begun. 
 Those who receive him enter into it. Having over- 
 come the sharpness of death, he has opened the 
 kingdom of heaven to all believers. Those, there- 
 fore, who were once to " tell no man that he was 
 Christ," are now to make " all the house of Israel 
 know assuredly that God has made that same Jesus, 
 whom they had crucified, both Lord and Christ ;" 
 yea, they are to proclaim that fact to every nation 
 under heaven. 
 
 It is, I apprehend, by this change in the character 
 
 " Acts XXviii. 23, 31. AianapTvpojxiVOS Tt)v ^aa-iXeiav tov Qeov, 
 wetdaivTe airovs ra nepl tov 'Irja-ov. (ver. 23.) Kr]pv(T<Tmv ttjv ^aaiKdav 
 TOV &eov, KaiS(,Sd(TK(OV TU Trepi TOV Kvptov'lrja-ov. (ver. 31.) Compare 
 this summary of the apostolic teaching at the end of the book with 
 the summary of the last teaching of Jesus at its beginning : — 81' 
 rjfiepmD T€<T(Tapa.KOVTa OTrranoixevos avTo'is rai Xeycov to. Trfpt t^s ^aa-i- 
 \eias TOV 6eoi). (i. 3.) 
 
128 LECTURE V. 
 
 of the preacliiug, that we are to explain the sur- 
 prising difference in the effect of the preaching, as 
 seen in the Gospels and in the Acts. For some three 
 years, probably, did Jesus preach in the Temple, in 
 synagogues, in houses, on the seashore, and by the 
 wayside ; yet it is obviously but a scanty band of 
 professed believers whom he leaves upon the earth, 
 and these too appear jjossessed but with a dubious 
 and uncertain faith. On occasion of an important 
 gathering in Jerusalem, " the nvimber of names to- 
 gether were about an hundred and twenty"." The 
 largest number we ever hear of is that mentioned 
 by St. Paul — " above five himdred brethren at onceP ;" 
 and of these, according to St. Matthew, " some 
 doubted 1." But a few days later Peter lifts up his 
 voice, and "the same day there were added unto 
 them about three thousand souls''." And so the word 
 grows and multiplies, till we hear of " a great 
 company of priests obedient to the faith ^," and 
 " many ten-thousands of Jews which believe * ;" be- 
 sides the suddenly-rising, rapidly-growing Churches 
 in all parts of the Gentile world. Men have some- 
 times expressed then wonder at this difference in the 
 effect of the Lord's own preaching and of that of his 
 disciples ; and they have been fain to ascribe it to 
 the outpouring of the Spirit, which wrought a sudden 
 change in the hearts of the hearers. But we have 
 no encouragement to suppose that the three thousand 
 who believed on the day of Pentecost received any 
 
 Acts i. 15. P I Cor. XV. 6. a Matt, xxviii. 17. 
 
 r Acts ii. 41. « Ibid. vi. 7. *■ Ibid. xxi. 20. 
 
LECTURE V. 129 
 
 special gift of the Spirit (such as originated on that 
 day) until after they beheved. This was promised 
 by the Apostle as a gift, not preceding, but ensuing 
 on their baptism. " Repent," said he, " and be bap- 
 tised every one of you for the remission of sins, 
 and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost." 
 No ! It is not on the hearers, but on the preachers, 
 that the mighty influence is said to have come. The 
 true reason for the change in the effect of the doc- 
 trine is found in the change which had passed upon 
 the doctrine itself, when " the Spirit of truth was 
 come" to fulfil the prediction " He shall glorify me." 
 Christ was not preached before he suffered ; after he 
 was glorified he was. In the former period, he and 
 his followers " preached the kingdom of God ;" in 
 the latter, " they ceased not to teach and preach 
 Jesus Christ." Thus the great change in the effect 
 of the preaching, which might seem at first sight 
 to derogate from his glory, is, on further considera- 
 tion, seen to enhance it. Only when it is possible 
 freely and fully to pubhsh the one " name under 
 heaven given among men, whereby they must be 
 saved," are their consciences thoroughly roused and 
 their trust decisively secured. So has it been, and 
 so shall it be in the Church for ever. Oh, that the 
 apostolic lesson may still have its fruit amongst 
 ourselves ! that our evangehsts may still know where 
 their power lies ! and especially that it may be said of 
 all who go forth to the work from this place, " They 
 ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ !" 
 
 2. But now comes the question, What was this 
 
 K 
 
VJO LECTURE V. 
 
 preaching of Christ 1 Some have paraphrased it as 
 the preaching of his doctrine, of the holy lessons 
 ■which he taught. Some, again, as the setting forth 
 of his holy character, the beauty of his life, and the 
 attraction of his love. But if this were the main 
 idea of preaching Christ, then certainly the relative 
 effect of his own teaching and of that of his disciples 
 ought to have been just the reverse of what it was ; 
 for the actual hearing of the gracious words which 
 proceeded out of his mouth, and the actual sight 
 of his holiness and love, must be supposed more 
 effectual than the mere account of them by others. 
 Then Jesus Christ ought to have gathered the 
 thousands and his disciples the hundreds ; and the 
 faith inspired in the first period ought to have been 
 more decided and intense than that awakened in the 
 second. But the contrary was the case. There was 
 then sometliing in the later preaching which was not 
 present in the earHer. Was it that the Messiahship 
 of Jesus was then openly proclaimed, which men 
 had before been left to infer from the tilings which 
 they heard and saw 1 It was this — but more than 
 this. Not only was the fact of the Messiahship pro- 
 claimed, but the nature of it was explained. The 
 Christ who was now proclaimed was one who had 
 died and risen again, and whom the heavens had 
 received till the time of the restitution of all things. 
 In these three facts the manifestation of the Son of 
 God had culminated, and in them the true character 
 of his mission had appeared. The old carnal thoughts 
 of it had been left in his grave, and could never rise 
 
LECTURE V. 131 
 
 from it again. It was the " Prince of life " who had 
 risen from the dead ; it was the " King of glory " 
 who had passed into the heavens. And no less did 
 these facts declare the spiritual consequences of his 
 manifestation ; since they carried with them the im- 
 pHcation of those three corresponding gifts, which we 
 celebrate for evermore, saying with solemn joy, " I 
 believe . . . the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of 
 the body, and the life everlasting." 
 
 Towards these topics the preaching of Christ in 
 the Acts of the Apostles continually turns. Observe 
 how the first and present blessing (the forgiveness of 
 • sins) is ever adduced, as the result of the wondrous 
 history which the chosen witnesses rehearse. When 
 they have told of the cross and passion, it is in this 
 consequence flowing from it unto men that their ser- 
 mons culminate and close. " Him hath God exalted 
 to be a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to 
 Israel and forgiveness of sins" ;" " Repent and be bap- 
 tised every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for 
 the remission of sins" ;" "Repent ye therefore and be 
 converted, that your sins may be blotted ouf ;" "Be 
 it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that 
 through this man is preached unto you the forgive- 
 ness of sins ; and by him aU that believe are justified 
 irom all things from which ye could not be justified 
 by the law of Moses '■ ;" " To him give all the pro- 
 phets witness that, through his name, whosoever 
 believeth on him shall receive remission of sins'^." 
 
 " Acts V. 31. ^ Ibid. ii. 38. y Ibid. iii. 19. 
 
 z Ibid. xiii. 38, 39. » Ibid. x. 43. 
 
 K 2 
 
132 LECTURE V. 
 
 Such is the burden of the apostolical preaching, as 
 exhibited iu the rapid sketches and brief srunmaries 
 given in this book. It is a doctrine of " redemption 
 by his blood, even the forgiveness of sins," conveying, 
 through the simple act of faith, a present cleansing to 
 the conscience, as the necessary qualification for the 
 glory which is to follow. 
 
 Then, in the next place, that glory is shewn to arise 
 from the resurrection of Jesus, as the preparation for 
 it does from his sufferings. I need not remind you of 
 the " great power " with wliich, from one end of the 
 book to the other, " the Apostles give witness of the 
 resurrection of the Lord Jesus." Everywhere they 
 preach a " Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen 
 again." This event is presented by them not simply 
 as the seal of his teaching, or more generally (to use 
 the poor and shrunken phrase of later times) as the 
 proof of his divine mission, but as itself the cause and 
 the commencement of that new world and eternal life 
 which was consciously " the hope of Israel," and un- 
 consciously the hope of man. Turn especially to the 
 latter part of the book, and study the position taken 
 by St. Paul in the last crisis of his controversy with 
 the Jews. See how he falls back upon the resurrec- 
 tion of Christ, as involving the realisation of the hopes 
 of his people and the fulfilment of all the promises 
 of God. Some have treated as a mere expedient for 
 his own deliverance at the moment that one voice 
 which he cried in the Council, " Men and brethi-en, 
 I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee ; of the hope 
 and resiirrection of the dead I am called in question." 
 
LECTURE V. 133 
 
 But lie needed no expedient, for he was then in 
 Roman hands and under Roman protection. It was 
 no pretence to serve a turn ; it was the genuine 
 language of his heart. In all his other speeches at 
 this crisis the same idea reigns ^jredominant. 
 
 " I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise 
 made of God luito our fathers : unto which promise 
 our twelve tribes, instantly serving God day and night, 
 hope to come : for which hope's sake, King Agrippa, 
 I am accused of the Jews. Why is it judged by you 
 a thing incredible if God raises the dead ? " It is 
 the self-same sound which we heard in the first dis- 
 course given us from his lips, wh6n he cried to the 
 Jews of the Pisidian Antioch, " Now we declare unto 
 you glad tidings, how that the promise which was 
 made unto the fathers, God hath fulfilled the same 
 unto us their children, in that he hath raised up Jesus 
 again." 
 
 And when we read his mind upon this subject 
 more fuUy in i Cor. xv., and indeed in the whole of 
 his writings, we see how truly the resurrection of 
 Christ did, in his view, include the realisation of all 
 the hopes with which the old covenant was pregnant ; 
 how entirely it was to him the cause and actual com- 
 mencement, as well as the pledge and promise, of the 
 resvirrection and the life to man. 
 
 But I must not go further into this subject. I had 
 only to indicate that the general character of the 
 doctrine which appears in the Acts of the Apostles, is 
 an advance upon that delivered in the Gospels. I say 
 that it is so, inasmuch as it does more than merely 
 
134 LECTURE V. 
 
 testify to the facts of the manifestation of Christ, as 
 (to use an imperfect illustration) the summing up of 
 a judge is an advance upon the evidence on which it 
 is founded, since it adds to the rehearsal of that 
 evidence the selection of its critical points, the repre- 
 sentation of their force and bearing, and the intima- 
 tion of the conclusions to which they lead. Thus 
 does the preaching of the Apostles sum up the result 
 of all that the Gospels have disclosed, by the direct 
 preaching of Jesus to men's souls, and by preaching 
 him especially as the Christ who has been perfected 
 by death and resurrection ; by death which pro- 
 vides for the present necessities of conscience in the 
 forgiveness of sins, and by resiurection which pro- 
 vides for the longings and hopes of the soul in the 
 life everlasting. The messengers of God in this book 
 cease not to teach and preach Jesus the Christ, as a 
 Saviour by these means and in this sense. 
 
 II. It is, however, the book not of the words, but 
 of the acts of the Apostles, and we accordingly find 
 in it the intimations rather than the expositions of 
 doctrine. It assists our present enquiry in a manner 
 more appropriate to its historical character, by laying 
 down for us the course of external events through 
 ivhich the doctrine was matured. 
 
 I have already adverted to the systematic plan of 
 the book, as following out this course of events with 
 the instinct of an undeviating purpose. It carries us 
 straight from the Gospels to the Epistles, as the 
 span of some great bridge continties the road between 
 dissevered regions. Take it away and what a chasm 
 
LECTURE V. 135 
 
 appears ! " Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ, to saints 
 that are in Rome, in Corinth, Thessalonica, Philippi, 
 Galatia, Ephesus, Colossse." Who is this Paul, and in 
 what sense is he an Apostle 1 We knew him not 
 when the twelve were ordained. We saw him not 
 among the witnesses of the resuiTection. How came 
 the Gospel to these places ? and is it the same Gospel 
 for these Gentiles as it was for the Jews 1 As for 
 James, and Peter, and John, and Jude, we know and 
 revere their commission : but we saw them last in 
 partial ignorance and error, and we hardly know what 
 the value of their words may be. 
 
 We have noted on a former occasion the answers 
 to these questions which the book of Acts supplies — 
 the anointing of the Holy Ghost qualifying the men 
 to fulfil the commission which they had received, 
 the guidance of Christ given to their steps and 
 his attestations to their words and works, the call 
 and commission of St. Paul and his special appoint- 
 ment to a special work, and the spread of the 
 Gospel in the world, and the rise of the Gentile 
 Churches. By means of this information we are 
 brought to the point at which we can open the 
 apostolic writings, first with a due sense of their 
 divine authority, and then with a sufficient acquaint- 
 ance with the persons, scenes, and facts with which 
 they are connected, and (I may further add) with effec- 
 tive supports to our conviction of their genuineness and 
 authenticity. But neither of these functions of the 
 book is precisely that for which we now enquire. 
 Between Gospels and Epistles there is need for a 
 
136 LECTURE V. 
 
 connection of a more internal kind. During the in- 
 tervening time the doctrine was not only spreading, 
 it was clearing and forming itself, or rather was 
 being cleared and formed by the hand of its Divine 
 Author. This was effected through a certain line of 
 events and through the agency of particular persons. 
 With these events and persons the book of Acts is 
 occupied. 
 
 It begins at Jerusalem, it ends at Rome. Between 
 these two points questions have been settled, principles 
 carried out, and divinely implanted tendencies dis- 
 closed. Especially have the relations of the Gospel 
 to Jew and Gentile been fixed for ever. We see how 
 all the story progressively ministers to this result. 
 
 First Peter presents the Gospel as the fulfilment of 
 prophecy and completion of the covenant made with 
 the fathers. Then the Hellenist element seems to 
 eclipse the Hebrew, and Stephen rises to reason and 
 to die. A large space is therefore given to the 
 speech, which sets forth the progressive nature of the 
 dealings of God with Israel, and shews the drift of 
 that current of thought on which we are launched. 
 The death of Stephen is not only an individual 
 martyrdom, like that of James, so briefly mentioned 
 afterwards ; it is a great crisis, and stands as such in 
 the narrative, with a clear intimation of the position 
 which was assumed on the one side and rejected on 
 the other. Straightway the Gospel spreads. First 
 Hebrew, then Hellenist, by the ministiy of Philip it 
 soon becomes Samaritan, and at the next step by that 
 of Peter goes in to men uncircumcised. In the story 
 
LECTURE V. 137 
 
 of Cornelius, we have a detailed statement of the 
 means by which the Lord manifested his will, that 
 the Gentiles should hear the word and believe. Then 
 we pass from the side of Peter to that of the new 
 Apostle, to whom the carrying out of this principle is 
 committed. Antioch becomes our starting-point, where 
 the disciples are first called Christians. We follow 
 the steps of the traveller, and see far and wide that 
 God hath also to the Gentiles granted repentance 
 imto life. Then an opposi ig powar is felt within the 
 Church, and christian Judaism asserts that there is 
 departure from the original scheme. The Council 
 meets, and by testimonies of Scr'p ure and of fact 
 infers the verdict of God, and issues the high decision, 
 " It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us." Then, 
 and not till then, Europe is entered, and the great 
 centres of Greek life are occupied ; but still in every 
 place does the Apostle address himself first to the 
 Jews, and everywhere they reject and persecute him. 
 Finally, he returns to the head-quarters of the nation, 
 and presents himself there with every circumstance of 
 conciliation, but claiming his place in the covenant 
 and as a preacher of the hope of Israel. The scenes 
 and speeches cf that crisis are given with fulness, 
 because they define the position of the Christianity 
 which St. Paul represents towards the Jewish system, 
 and its final and furious rejection by the Jewish 
 people ''. " Believing all things which are written in 
 
 b Not, as some have put it, because Luke happened to be present. 
 Katber, Luke was present because the scenes and speeches were to 
 be reported. 
 
138 LECTURE V. 
 
 the Law and in the Prophets, and having committed 
 nothing against the people or customs of his fathers"," 
 he and his creed are forced from their proper home. 
 On it as well as him the Temple doors are shut. 
 Lastly, before the Jews at Rome he closes the long 
 struggle with the peroration furnished him by pro- 
 phecy : — " Well spake the Holy Ghost by Esaias the 
 prophet imto our fathers, saying. Go unto this people 
 and say. Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand ; 
 and seeing ye shall see, and not perceive. For the 
 heart of this people is waxed gross, and their ears are 
 dull of hearing, and their eyes have they closed ; lest 
 they should see with their eyes, and hear with their 
 ears, and understand with their heart, and should be 
 converted, and I should heal them. Be it known 
 therefore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent 
 unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it^." 
 
 Now let no man think that the rejection of Jews 
 and admission of Gentiles were the only result of 
 this long history. Another result has been involved 
 in it : Christianity itself has been finally drawn out of 
 Judaism, the delicate and intricate relations of the 
 two systems being dealt with in such a way, that 
 (so to speak) the texture of living fibre has been 
 lifted unimpaired out of its former covering, leaving 
 behind only a residuum of what was temporary, pre- 
 paratory, and carnal. In fact, the doctrine of the 
 Gospel has been cleared and formed; cleared of the 
 false element which the existing Judaism would 
 have infused into it, and formed of the true ele- 
 
 " Acts xxiv, 14 ; xxviii. 17. ^ Ibid, xxviii. 25-28. 
 
LECTURE V. 139 
 
 ments which the old covenant had been intended 
 to prepare for its use. 
 
 Two great principles, it seems to me, were fought 
 for and secured, which may be expressed (though 
 not with strict accuracy) by saying that the Gospel 
 is the substitute for the Law, and that the Gospel is 
 the heir of the Law. 
 
 a. In saying that the Gospel is the substitute for 
 the Law, I do not mean that it is so, as doing what 
 the Law had done before it came, nor yet as doing 
 what the Law had been meant, but had failed, to 
 do ; but only as doing that which the Law had 
 been supposed to do. The Gospel provides for 
 individual soids the means of justification and the 
 title to eternal life. This the Law had not done, 
 had not been meant to do, and by Prophets and 
 Psalmists had been asserted not to do. Yet it had 
 simk deep into the mind of those who were under 
 it, that this was the very thing which it did. Scribes 
 taught distinctly, and the people were possessed 
 with the idea, that there had been a Law given 
 which coTild give life, and that righteousness was 
 by that Law. Here was the conviction which had 
 entwined itself with their patriotism and their religion. 
 Here was their pride and boast, and the preroga- 
 tive which severed them from all mankind. Then, 
 as now, they looked for a Messiah, who was to per- 
 fect the keeping of the Law, and (in some sense) 
 to save other nations by reducing them to its obe- 
 dience, and (as appeared in the sequel) many received 
 Jesus himself as the Messiah, without any material 
 
140 LECTURE V. 
 
 change in that idea. But when the death of Jesus 
 was preached as procuring, and the resurrection of 
 Jesvis as originating eternal life, and when the simple 
 act of faith in him was proclaimed as the means 
 of sharing it, the antagonism of the two doctrines 
 appeared. 
 
 It was first in the arguments of Stephen, and 
 afterwards in the preaching of Paul, that this par- 
 ticular feature of the christian system made itself 
 felt in its bearing on the great Jewish error. Hence 
 the passion, the virulence, and the rancour with 
 which the two men were pursued. " This man ceaseth 
 not to speak blasphemous words against this holy 
 place and the law© " — so ran the accusation against 
 the first martyr : and years afterwards the super- 
 intendent of his execution heard the same words 
 shrieked out against himself, " Men of Israel, help ! 
 This is the man who teacheth all men everywhere 
 against the people, and the law, and this place ^." 
 False and odious allegations ! Yet the doctrine of 
 which the two men were the great exponents did 
 reaUy involve a flat contradiction of the prevailing 
 Jewish theory about the people, and the law, and 
 that place. Within the christian Church the same 
 theory held its ground, and in that quarter cost 
 the Apostle a still closer and keener conflict, in 
 order to vindicate and establish for Jew as well as 
 Gentile the great principle, " By grace are ye saved 
 through faiths," or, as St. Peter expressed the same 
 
 '■ Acts vi. 13. f Ibid. xxi. 28. g Eph. ii. 8. 
 
LECTURE V. 14] 
 
 truth, " Through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ 
 we shall be saved, even as theyl\" 
 
 Still the anxious pastor in his parish, still the 
 self-observant Christian in his own heart, learns how 
 deep-seated and how stubborn is that principle in 
 human nature, wliich seeks the starting-point of 
 salvation in self rather than in God, in doing rather 
 than in receiving, in work rather than in grace. By 
 the common Jewish theory of the Law, that principle 
 had fortified itself strongly, and clothed itself glo- 
 riously, with the usurped sanctions of God. The Ju- 
 daising doctrine would have perpetuated that usur- 
 pation in the Christian Church, and, in so doing, 
 would have neutrahsed the Gospel itself The keen 
 eye of the selected champion saw in a moment the 
 fatal consequences of customs turned into doctrines, 
 which others, who behoved as he did, were perhaps 
 inclined to regard with indulgence, as signs of an 
 affectionate veneration for ancient ordinances. 
 
 In his writings we see how his penetrating eye 
 discerned the danger, and how his unsparing hand 
 averted it : we see also that the intuitive discern- 
 ment and the impulsive vigour were the result of 
 a deep personal experience, both of the error which 
 he resisted, and of the truth which he defended. In 
 the Acts we are carried through the period of this 
 contest in the outward course of events, and when 
 the histoiy ceases in the hired house at Rome, the 
 Gospel has fought itself free, and severed itself from 
 Judaism, not merely in its form, but in its essence, 
 ■i Acts XV. 1 1 . 
 
142 LECTURE V. 
 
 proclaiming salvation by the grace of the Lord Jesus 
 Christ, and not by the works of the Law. 
 
 j8. The other principle which is contended for and 
 secured is, that the Gospel is the heir of the Law; 
 that it inherits what the Law had prepared. The 
 Law, on its national and ceremonial side, had created 
 a vast and closely- woven system of ideas. _ These 
 were wrought out and exhibited by it in forms 
 according to the flesh — an elect nation, a miraculous 
 history, a special covenant, a worldly sanctuary, a 
 perpetual service, an anointed priesthood, a cere- 
 monial sanctity, a scheme of sacrifice and atonement, 
 a purchased possession, a holy city, a throne of David, 
 a destiny of dominion. Were these ideas to be lost, 
 and the language which expressed them to be dropped, 
 when the Gospel came ? No ! It was the heir of 
 the Law. The Law had prepared these riches, and 
 now bequeathed them to a successor able to unlock 
 and to diffuse them. The Gospel claimed them all, 
 and developed in them a value unknown before. It 
 asserted itself as the proper and predestined con- 
 tinuation of the covenant made of God with the 
 fathers, the real and only fulfilment of all which 
 was typified and prophesied; presenting the same 
 ideas, which had been before embodied in the narrow 
 but distinct limits of carnal forms, in their spiritual, 
 universal, and eternal character. The body of types 
 according to the flesh died with Christ, and with 
 Christ it arose again a body of antitypes according to 
 the Spirit. Those who were after the flesh could 
 not recognise its identity : those who were after 
 
LECTURE V. 143 
 
 the Spirit felt and proclaimed it. The change was 
 as great, the identity was as real, as in that mystery 
 of the resurrection of the body which the same 
 preachers shewed : in which the earthly frame must 
 lay aside the flesh and blood which cannot inherit 
 the kingdom of God, and must reappear, dead and 
 raised again, another and yet the same, "sown in 
 weakness and raised in power, sown in dishonour 
 and raised in glory, sown a natural body and raised 
 a spiritual body." 
 
 But I should speak amiss, if I left it to appear 
 that the Gospel inherited the ideas only of the 
 preceding dispensation,, and not, in one sense, their 
 form also. Their written form it did inherit, un- 
 changed and unchangeable. The LaAv and the 
 Prophets, as scriptures, as a book, were still under 
 the new dispensation what they had been under the 
 old — the voice of the Spirit and the word of God. 
 Nay ! this written word belonged to the new dis- 
 pensation more truly than to the old, for these 
 scriptures also were now raised to newness of life, 
 and were recognised as prepared for the uses to 
 which they were now applied, and written less for 
 the immediate than for the ulterior purposes ; as 
 St. Peter has expressed it, " Not -unto themselves, but 
 unto us they did minister the things which are now 
 reported unto you by them that have preached 
 the Gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent 
 down from heaven i." This is ever the position of 
 
 ' I Peter i. 12. 
 
144 LECTURE V. 
 
 St. Paul, for, as one has truly said, " None of the 
 Apostles has laid such stress upon the Holy Scrip- 
 ture, as the Apostle of the Spirit and hbertyk." 
 And as this appears in his writings, so does it also in 
 the history. From his first reported speech at the 
 Pisidian Antiochi, which bases all upon the Scrip- 
 tures, still he goes on with the Scriptures m his 
 hand, till he stands and is judged, " behoving all 
 things which are written in the Law and in the 
 Prophets" ;" and finally parts from the Roman Jews 
 after "persuading them concerning Jesus, both out 
 of the Law of Moses and out of the Prophets, from 
 morning till evening"." This then is the position 
 taken at the beginning and fought for to the end; 
 and it is a striking sight to see how resolutely 
 St. Paul insists that he and his doctrine are the 
 true representatives of the Law and the Prophets, 
 while he is being persecuted and cast out, as having 
 betrayed and blasphemed them. 
 
 These two prmciples — what the Gospel does with- 
 out the Law, and what the Gospel derives from the 
 Law — do in fact contain the main substance of 
 apostolic teaching. On the one side, the principle 
 that men are "justified freely by God's grace through 
 the redemption that is in Christ Jesus o" is laid 
 as the deep foundation of all the various forms and 
 apphcations of evangelical triith. On the other, the 
 principle that the same things which were done 
 
 1^ Baumgarten ou the Acts, vol. iii. 78, (Clarke's Tr.) 
 
 ' Acts XV. 13-4T. '" Ibid. xxiv. 14. 
 
 » Acts xxviii. 23. " Rom. iii. 24. 
 
LECTURE V. 145 
 
 under the old covenant in tlie region of the flesh 
 are done under the new covenant in the region of 
 the spirit, opens out into the doctrine of the media- 
 torial work of Christ in the true tabernacle, the 
 sacrificial character of his death, the atoning virtue 
 of his blood, the sanctification of believers as a 
 kingdom of priests and an holy nation, and their 
 destined inheritance in a promised land and a holy 
 city of their God. The expansion of these doctrines 
 fills and forms all the Epistles, and each is distinctly 
 wrought out by itself, the one in the Epistle to the 
 Romans at the beginning, the other in the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews at the end, of the course of the 
 . Paulme writings. 
 
 It is in the Epistles themselves that we behold 
 this expansion and formation of doctrine. In the 
 Book of Acts we are conversant rather with the 
 providential circumstances through which the result 
 was obtained. Great principles are wrought out and 
 settled in men's minds only through some such 
 process as is here disclosed ; namely, by persons 
 raised up to represent them, by consultations, reason- 
 mgs, debates concerning them, by events which 
 compel their more distinct assertion and test their 
 liidden strength, and by the action of opposing prin- 
 ciples, firmly resisted in their fierce assaults, or in- 
 stmctively rejected in their subtle approaches. This, 
 the common course of the development and esta- 
 blishment of all principles, is here presented to us 
 as carried on under the manifested guidance of the 
 Lord himself; who, by special interventions, raises 
 
 L 
 
146 LECTURE V. 
 
 up the persons, guides the events, and certifies the 
 issues with his own signature and seal. 
 
 Blessing and praise be unto his holy name, be- 
 cause he has done this ! For he has thus added 
 to the manifestation of himself his own direction 
 as to the way in wliich it is to be used. On what 
 a sea of uncertainties we should else have been 
 latmched ! Observe the vague and wavering doc- 
 trine which ensues, whenever the divine attestation 
 of the apostolical teaching meets with discredit or 
 mistrust. Now the Gospel is nothing but a re- 
 publication, pure and perfect, of the Law of God ; 
 now it is a proclamation of liis universal fatherhood ; 
 now an exhibition of the beauty of holiness and the 
 attraction of love ; now the revelation of a righteous 
 King and Head of the human race ; now it seems 
 little else than a negation, a sweeping away of all 
 the ideas which a teaching supposed to be divine 
 had fashioned through preceding ages. So it is when 
 men proceed, as if the summing up of the mani- 
 festation of Christ had not been done for them, 
 but was left for them to do. From all partial or 
 perverted representations our refuge is with those 
 who were actually commissioned to do it, and who, 
 under a divine guidance adequate to the exigencies 
 of that commission, ceased not to teach and preach 
 Jesus Christ. Through the blessed ordinance of a 
 written word they have not ceased to do so now. 
 To us, even to us who are here alive this day, they 
 preach him still ; a Christ " who died for our sins 
 and rose again for our justification ;" a Christ who 
 
LECTURE V. 147 
 
 saves without tlie Law, yet one who is witnessed 
 by the Law and the Prophets. So they preach, and 
 so we believe. This was the beginning of the con- 
 fidence and the rejoicing of the hope to the Church 
 at its birth, and this begmning it will hold firm 
 unto the end. It is for us to see that we bear our 
 part in the long history of the faith, finding its 
 reality in the joy of oiu" own salvation, and trans- 
 mitting its testimony to the generation to come. 
 
 L 2 
 
LECTURE VI. 
 
 THE EPISTLES. 
 
 Rom. i. i, 7. 
 
 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an Apostle, separated 
 unto the gospel of God . . . To all that he in Pome, beloved of God , 
 called to be saints : grace to you and peace from God our 
 Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
 1 HESE words are the beginning and end of the 
 long superscription which opens the series of Apo- 
 stolic Epistles. That suj^erscription forms a close 
 and living union with the preceding book, in which 
 we have known Paul the servant of Jesus Christ, 
 his calling to be an Apostle, his separation to the 
 gospel of God, and have left him at its close testi- 
 fying to that gospel in Rome itself A still more 
 intimate union will disclose itself to any one who 
 studies the position which he takes up for his 
 gospel and himself in the Book of Acts, and then 
 considers the succinct and explicit assertion of the 
 same position in the intervening verses of this super- 
 scription, where he characterises the gospel to which 
 he was separated as that " which God had promised 
 afore by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures, con- 
 
LECTURE VI. 149 
 
 cerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who was 
 made of the seed of David according to the flegh ; 
 and declared to be the Son of God with power, 
 according to the spirit of hohness, by the resurrection 
 from the dead : by whom," he adds, " we have re- 
 ceived grace and apostleship for obedience to the 
 faith among all nations, for his name : among whom 
 are ye also the called of Jesus Christ." Here the 
 Apostle seems to stand before us as he did in the 
 previous history, firmly holding his ground in the 
 prophetic and historic line of the old covenant, and 
 from that standing point opening the dispensation 
 of the Spirit, which has its source and its pledge 
 in the resurrection, and claiming " all nations" for 
 the " obedience of faith." 
 
 This witness of continuity is especially important 
 in passing from the apostohc history to the apo- 
 stoHc writings, since the history gains significance 
 from the doctrine, and the doctrine derives authority 
 from the histoiy. The persons and events in the 
 Book of Acts are important because they were or- 
 dained for the working out of the truth of the 
 Gospel. But vjJiat is that truth which they worked 
 out? 
 
 Summaries of its general character occur in that 
 book continually, and the points which are being 
 cleared and established are strongly indicated : but 
 we have only summaries and indications, and the 
 sketches of doctrines presented to us are taken rather 
 from withovit than from within. If we except the 
 debate in the council of Jerusalem and the charge 
 
150 LECTURE VI. 
 
 to the elders of Miletus, all the discourses reported 
 in this book are addressed to those who are not 
 yet Christians. So Christ was preached to the 
 world — but how was he taught to the Church f 
 
 This element is wanting in the history : yet it 
 is one which we should have naturally looked to 
 find ; and, as we are brought into contact with so 
 many Churches, on whose incipient and unsettled 
 Christianity the labour of St. Paul was spent, its 
 absence is really remarkable. We are told how 
 he passed two years at Ephesus, and a year and 
 a half at Coiinth, " teaching the word of God among 
 them," how, revisiting his Churches, "he gave them 
 much exhortation," and how he "was long preaching" 
 in one assembly or another of the brethren : but 
 no particulars of these preachings, teachings, and 
 exhortations are given : and, considering that we 
 have specimens of every kind of address to those 
 that are ivithout, we might well ask, why there is 
 no example to shew how men were taught after 
 they had believed. But they who hold that the 
 scheme of Scripture as a whole is of the Holy Ghost 
 will not ask that question ; for they see that this 
 omission is part of a plan, which provides this ui- 
 foimation for us in a more worthy and perfect 
 way ; namely, by placing in our hands the collec- 
 tion of Apostolic Epistles. 
 
 These writings are addressed to those who are 
 already Christians ; as our text describes them, " called 
 of Christ Jesus — beloved of God — called saints." 
 Such high titles, repeated in the successive super- 
 
LECTURE VI. 151 
 
 scriptions, warn us that we are here in the esoteric 
 circle of doctrine. Whatever progress of doctrine 
 these writings exhibit, that fact is the key to it. 
 It inust be a distinctly subjective progress, working 
 out the results of the manifestation of Christ in 
 the consciousness of men. 
 
 Observe the point at which we have arrived, by 
 the time that we finish the Book of Acts, and open 
 the Epistle to the Romans. The facts of the mam- 
 festation of Christ have been completed, and have 
 been testified in all fulness and certainty by the wit- 
 nesses chosen of God. They have not only testified 
 of the facts, they have siunmed them up ; have an- 
 nounced their scope and p\u"pose in the counsels 
 of God, as effecting the redemption of the world, 
 and have called men to partake in the fruits of 
 that redemption by believing and being baptised. 
 They have given this testimony, not as of them- 
 selves, but with the Holy Ghost sent down from 
 heaven, whose witness is united with their own, 
 and whose indwelling presence is given also to 
 those who receive the testimony, in order to open 
 its meaning and to seal its truth. Thus a holy 
 Church is formed, which gradually proves itself 
 catholic, and shews at once its power of expansion 
 and its spirit of unity ; and within its protecting 
 frame-work there exists a communion of saints, 
 a common participation in the same spiritual posses- 
 sions by all whom a union with Christ has sepa- 
 rated and sanctified to God ; and thus men are 
 joined to the Lord and united with each other, and 
 
152 LECTURE VI. 
 
 rest in the consciousness that they have found the 
 forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and 
 the life everlasting. In its fundamental articles 
 the Creed is now complete. 
 
 To this point the Book of Acts conducts us, and 
 at this point it leaves us. 
 
 It may be said, what more should follow 1 
 Christians exist. Christian communities are formed. 
 Let them now be left to their ordinary and per- 
 manent resources. 
 
 So it might have been. — So in God's mercy it 
 was not. 
 
 A new life had begu^n, intellectual, moral, and 
 social, teeming with elements which could not but 
 work and expand. It would have been hard to 
 say with what force they would do so, or in what 
 direction. Now the great ideas of the Gospel are 
 old and familiar ; and the very words which repre- 
 sent them have been sorely battered by controversy, 
 and worn thin by use. But then the revelation 
 of Christ had just broken, like an unexpected- 
 morning, on a weary and hopeless world. The 
 stupendous events which had so lately passed on 
 earth, the j^resent actual relations with heaven 
 which were witnessed to men by proofs within 
 and around them, the prospect of things awful 
 and glorious hastening on, and perhaps already near 
 at hand, must have given a stimulus to thought 
 and feeling, the first sensations of which it is not 
 easy for us now to estimate. The Father revealed, 
 the Son incarnate, the Holy Ghost sent down from 
 
LECTURE VI. 153 
 
 heaven — redemption wrought, salvation given, the 
 resurrection of the body, the eternal judgment, the 
 second death, the life eternal — new principles of 
 thought, new standards of character, new grounds 
 of duty, new motives, new powers, new bonds between 
 man and man, new forms of human society, new 
 language for human lips — all coming at once upon 
 men's minds, placed them, as it M^ere, in a different 
 world from that in which they had lived before. 
 At the same time they carried into that world of 
 thought all the tendencies, infirmities, and perversities 
 of otir nature, and revealed truth had to settle itself 
 into lasting forms, to find its adequate expression, 
 and to have its moral and social consequences de- 
 duced, under a variety of inferences uncongenial 
 to itself So critical a 2-eriod, on which the whole 
 future of the Gospel hvuig, would seem to cry aloud 
 for a continued action of the living word of God ; 
 such as might, with supreme authority, both judge 
 and guide the thoughts of men, and translate the 
 principles which they had received into life and 
 practice. 
 
 The Lord recognised this necessity. He met it 
 by the living voice of his Apostles ; and their 
 Epistles remain as the permanent record of this 
 part of their work. They are the voice of the Spirit, 
 speaking within the Church to those who are them- 
 selves within it, certifying to them the true inter- 
 pretations and applications of the principles of thought 
 and life which as believers m Jesus they have re- 
 ceived. This is the function in the scheme of 
 
154 LECTURE VI. 
 
 divine instruction which belongs to these writings ; 
 and I propose now to note some particular aspects 
 in which their designation and adaptation to it will 
 appeal'. Without entering yet into the examination 
 of their actual doctrine, we shall see that the Epistles 
 are fitted to form a coui'se of teaching of the kind 
 described, by their form, their method, their author- 
 ship, and their relative character. 
 
 I. The form in which this teaching is given to 
 us is very significant. " The epistolary form," says 
 Bengel, " is a pre-eminence of the Scriptures of the 
 New Testament as compared with those of the Old*." 
 It is a suggestive remark, reminding us of that 
 open communication and equal participation of re- 
 vealed truth, which is the prerogative of the later 
 above the former dispensation ; indicating too that 
 the teacher and the taught are placed on one 
 common level in the fellowship of truth. The 
 Prophets delivered oracles to the people, but the 
 Apostles wrote letters to the brethren, letters cha- 
 racterised by all that fulness of um^eserved explana- 
 tion, and that play of various feeling, which are 
 joroper to that form of intercourse. It is in its 
 nature a more famihar communication, as between 
 those who are, or should be, equals. That character 
 may less obviously force upon us the sense, that 
 tlie light which is thrown on all subjects is that 
 of a divine inspiration ; but this is only the natural 
 effect of the greater fulness of that light ; for so the 
 moonbeams fix the eye upon themselves, as they 
 ^ See Note X. 
 
LECTURE VI. 155 
 
 burst through the rifts of rolling clouds, catching 
 the edges of objects and falling on patches of the 
 landscape ; while, under the settled brightness of the 
 universal and genial day, it is not so much the 
 light that we think of, as the varied scene which 
 it shews. 
 
 But the fact that the teaching of the Apostles 
 is represented by their letters, is a peculiarity, not 
 only in comparison with the teaching of the Prophets, 
 but with ancient teaching in general, which is per- 
 petuated either in regular treatises or in discourses 
 or conversations preserved in writing. The form 
 adopted in the New Testament combines the advan- 
 tages of the treatise and the conversation. The 
 letter may treat important subjects with accuracy 
 and fulness, but it will do so in immediate connection 
 with actual life. It is written to meet an occasion. 
 It is addressed to particular states of mind. It 
 breathes of the heart of the writer. It takes its 
 aim from the exigencies, and its tone from the 
 feelings of the moment. In these respects it suits 
 well with a period of instruction, in which the 
 word of God is to be given to men, not so much 
 in the way of information, as in the way of education ; 
 or in other words, in which the truth is to be de- 
 livered, not abstractedly, but with a close relation 
 to the condition of mind of its recipients. * 
 
 Thus it is delivered in the Epistles. Christ has 
 been received ; Christian life has commenced ; Chris- 
 tian communities have been formed ; and men's 
 minds have been at work on the great principles 
 
156 LECTURE VI. 
 
 which they have embraced. Some of these principles 
 in one place, and others of them in another, have 
 been imperfectly grasped, or positively perverted, or 
 practically misapplied, so as to call for explanation 
 or correction ; or else they have been both appre- 
 hended and applied so worthily, that the teacher, 
 filled with joy and praise, feels able to open ont 
 the mysteries of God, as one speaking wisdom among 
 them that are perfect. These conditions of mind 
 were not individual accidents. Rome, Corinth, Ga- 
 latia, Ephesus, supplied examples of difi'erent ten- 
 dencies of the human mind in connection with the 
 principles of the Gospel — tendencies which would 
 ever recur, and on which it was requisite for the future 
 guidance of the Church that the word of God should 
 pronounce. It did pronounce in the most effectual 
 way, by those letters which are addressed by the 
 commissioners of Christ, not to possible but to ac- 
 tual cases, with that largeness of view which belongs 
 to spectatoi's at a certain distance from the scene, and 
 with that closeness of application which personal ac- 
 quaintance dictates and personal affection insj)ires. 
 
 Thus the fuller exjKjsitions of truth contained in 
 the Epistles are based on what the first princijoles 
 of the Gospel had already -wrought in human hearts ; 
 and its doctrines are cleared and settled, developed 
 and combined, in correspondence with the ascertained 
 capacities and necessities of believers. 
 
 II. From the adaptation of the foim I pass to 
 that of the method which the apostolic writings 
 employ in the completion of evangelical doctrine. 
 
LECTURE VI. 157 
 
 The one is in perfect harmony with the other. It 
 is a method of companionship rather than of dicta- 
 tion. The writer does not announce a succession 
 of revelations, or arrest the enquiries which he 
 encounters in men's heai'ts by the unanswerable 
 formula, " Thus saith the Lord." He rouses, he 
 animates, he goes along with the working of men's 
 minds, by shewing them the workings of his own. 
 He utters his own convictions, he pours forth his 
 own experience, he appeals to others to "judge 
 what he says," and commends his words "to their 
 conscience in the sight of God." He confutes by 
 argument rather than by authority, deduces his 
 conclusions by processes of reasoning, and esta- 
 blishes liis points by interpretations and applica- 
 tions of the former Scriptures. Such a method 
 necessarily creates a multitude of occasions for hesi- 
 tation or objection, and it has been proposed to 
 meet these difficulties by the principle, that we 
 are boimd to accept the conclusions as matter of 
 revelation, but not to assent to the vahdity of the 
 arguments or the applicability of the quotations. 
 The more we enter into the spirit of the particular 
 passages which have been thought to require that 
 qualification, the more we feel that it can only 
 have seemed necessary, from a want of real and 
 deep harmony with the mind of Scripture. But 
 I have no call to enter on that subject ; my purpose 
 is simply to draw attention to the fact, that not 
 only in the conclusions given, but in the methods 
 employed in reaching them, there is an outward 
 
158 LECTURE VI. 
 
 guidance of the christian miiid and a visible purpose 
 to provide such guidance. 
 
 Consider, for instance, the argument on justifica- 
 tion in the early part of the Epistle to the Romans, 
 which accomplishes every step by the aid of the 
 former Scriptui'es. Why all this labour in proving 
 what might have been decided by a simple annoimce- 
 ment from one entrusted with the word of God 1 
 Would not the apostolc declaration that such a 
 statement was error, and that such another was 
 truth, have sufficed for the settlement of that par- 
 ticular question 1 Doubtless ! but it would not 
 have sufficed to train men's minds to that thought- 
 fulness whereby truth becomes their own, or to 
 educate them to the living use of the Scriptures 
 as the constituted guide of enquiry. 
 
 It is the same with those records of personal 
 experience, and those effiisions of personal feeling, 
 which teach us how the revelation of Christ tells 
 upon the believer's heart. We see, for instance, 
 in the yth and 8th chapters of the same Epistle, 
 the writer's own heart thrown open ; first in its 
 passage from the law of sin and death to the law 
 of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus ; and then 
 in the assured consciousness of the vast and various 
 blessings, present and future, which belong to the 
 children of God, and the heirs together with Christ, 
 whom nothing shall be able to separate from the 
 love of God which is in Christ Jesus their Lord. 
 This is not only definite information, it is also effective 
 education, shewing the revelation of God as wrought 
 
LECTURE VI. 159 
 
 into its ultimate and subjective form ; and assisting 
 by sympathy, and ratifying by example, the same 
 processes in other hearts. 
 
 Yet we should speak amiss, if we represented 
 the education of cliristian thought as carried on in 
 the Epistles only by methods which seem to place 
 the Apostle on the same level with his readers. No ! 
 there is everywhere present, in the lofty and un- 
 wavering testimony, the sense of an authority which 
 makes all things sure ; and whenever occasion arises, 
 as from Galatian perverseness or Corinthian disorder, 
 it asserts its unhesitating and uncompromising claims. 
 Again, when need so requii'es, there is a change 
 in the common method ; and the progress of doctrine 
 is effected in the prophetic manner, by definite 
 additions to former revelations : as when St. Paul 
 informs the Thessalonians, " in the word of the 
 Lord''," of some particiJars not before made known, 
 as to the manner in which the dead and the living 
 will meet the Lord at his appearing. Thus apo- 
 stohcal authority and direct revelation difPase over 
 the Epistles their certainty and their majesty ; but 
 yet the presence of these more commanding elements 
 is not suffered to overpower that general character 
 of doctrine, which is proper for those who are of 
 full age, and who have themselves " an unction 
 from the Holy One, that they may know all things c." 
 The mind of the teacher still enters into a free 
 companionship with the mind that is taught, so 
 as to exercise and educate the spiritual faculties, 
 b I Thess iv. 13—17. " i ^o\m ii. 20. 
 
100 LECTURE VI. 
 
 at the same time conducting them with decisive 
 authority to conclusions which tliey might else have 
 failed to reach. 
 
 III. Turn now to the aiithorsliip of these writings. 
 If the foi^m and method of this scheme of christian 
 education are impoitant features of it, so also is 
 the selection of its agents ; for here, as in other 
 departments of education, we may say that "the 
 master is the school." 
 
 Who are the appointed teachers of the Church 1 
 Peter and John, the two chief Apostles ; James 
 and Jude, the brethren of the Lord. We take 
 knowledge f them that they have been with Jesus, 
 and own the highest authority which association 
 with him can give. But the chief place in this 
 system of teaching does not belong to any one of 
 them, nor to all of them together. Their united 
 writings form but a second volume, and that a 
 very thin one, just one-fifth of the bulk of the 
 first, to which moreover it bears in some degree 
 a kind of supplementaiy relation. The office of 
 working out the principles of christian faith into 
 full proportions and clearly defined forms was as- 
 signed to another, to " Paul, the servant of Jesus 
 Christ, called to be an Apostle, separated unto the 
 Gospel of God, which he had promised afore by 
 his Prophets in his holy Scriptm-es." 
 
 Now is it not a remarkable, and almost a startling 
 fact, that this great office should have been assigned 
 to one, who had not been a witness of the Lord's 
 life on earth, and had nothiny to tell of things 
 
LECTURE VI. 161 
 
 which he had seen with his eyes, and heard with 
 his ears, and his hands had handled of the word 
 of life ? We remember the indis23ensable importance 
 of this qualification for the original apostlesliip, 
 as expressed on the appointment of Matthias, " Of 
 these men which have companied with us all the 
 time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among 
 us, beginning from the baptism of John unto that 
 same day in which he was taken up from us, must 
 one be ordained to be a witness with us of his 
 resurrection." Yet on him who had never com- 
 panied with him, or even with them, for one single 
 day, the most important, or, at least, the most 
 extensive and enduring part of the apostolic work 
 devolved. The peculiar qualifications, which in 
 other respects fitted St. Paul for the work whereto 
 he was called, have ever received a just appre- 
 ciation and ample treatment. We can all perceive 
 the active habit, the fervent spirit, the strong will, 
 the warm affections, the tender sensibility, the exer- 
 cised intellect, the subjective tendencies of thought, 
 the vivid consciousness of his own inward history, 
 the combination of Greek and Hebrew training, the 
 thorough grounding of the mind in the Law and 
 the Prophets, the profound experience of the false 
 theory of Judaism, in its effects on his own heart, 
 and in the practical consequences to which it once 
 carried him ; finaUy, the suddenness with which 
 the Gospel came upon him, making him to know 
 with a singular distinctness what is the contrast 
 between salvation sought by law through works, 
 
 M 
 
162 LECTURE VI. 
 
 and salvation found by grace through faith, and 
 what is the change in the whole world within, 
 when the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus 
 makes a man free from the law of sin and death. 
 
 Perhaps it is commonly felt that these qualifica- 
 tions ou.tweighed the disadvantage at which he stood 
 in comparison with the other Apostles who had 
 been with Jesus, and that this accounts for the 
 addition to their nvimber of one in other respects 
 specially fitted for the work, although born out of 
 due time. But it will better consist with the prin- 
 ciples on which his whole history must be judged, 
 if we say, that his being born out of due time ivas 
 itself one of his qualijications. 
 
 Now we must remember that it is the Lord, 
 foreseeiug and foreordaining all, who directs the 
 course of these events. If, after choosing and train- 
 ing the Twelve, he calls another man, who has 
 had no share in that training, and specially commits 
 to him a department of the apostolic work, we 
 cannot speak of such a step as an afterthought and 
 supplement, as we might do if it occurred in some 
 human undertaking, in which the original arrange- 
 ments had proved inadequate. We may be sure 
 that the call of St. Paul after the manifestation 
 of Christ was finished, was as much a part of the 
 divine plan, as was the call of the Twelve when 
 that manifestation was beginning, and that the 
 later call must have corresponded as truly with 
 his appointed work, as the earlier call did with 
 tJieirs. 
 
LECTURE VI. 163 
 
 We are here led to the more distinct observation, 
 that the apostoHc testimony was twofold, — first to 
 the facts of the manifestation of Christ, secondly 
 to its intended consequences in the spiritual state 
 of man. 
 
 It was necessary that those who were to represent 
 the Lord to the world, in his words and deeds, his 
 mind and life, should be men on whose hearts the 
 holy image had been stamped by closest intercourse, 
 and who could testify to others of what their eyes 
 had seen. They who were so qualified did their 
 work, and gave the knowledge of Jesus to mankind. 
 Modern study traces the distinct outlines, and finds 
 the solid frag-ments of their oral narratives deposited 
 in the written Gospels. Still, further, St. Luke's 
 preface shews that these narratives were the regu- 
 lar instruments of christian education, "the things 
 whijrein" catechumens " were instructed <^'." This 
 kind of instruction has found its permanent form 
 in the fourfold Gospel. 
 
 But believers were also to be trained to the full 
 apprehension of the effects of the manifestation in 
 their own spiritual life. The apostolic teaching on 
 this subject is represented for ever by the Epistles, 
 and those documents are in a remarkable degree 
 restricted to that particular oflB.ce. We should 
 naturally have expected in apostolic teaching an 
 abundant reference to the words and acts of our 
 Lord Jesus, as the prolific sources of instruction. 
 But we do not find such reference, nor anything 
 
 " hoyoL wepi hv KaTrjxqOt]?. Luke 1. 4- 
 
 M 2 
 
164 LECTURE VI. 
 
 like it, till we come to the Epistles of James, Peter, 
 and John, and catch again the sound of words which 
 we had heard from their Master and ours. The 
 great doctor of the Church had no such remem- 
 brances. His relations with the Lord only com- 
 menced after Jesus was glorified and the dispen- 
 sation of the Spirit had begun. If the others were 
 the Apostles of the manifestation of Christ, he was 
 the Apostle of its results ; and, in the fact of passing 
 under his teaching, we have sufficient warning that 
 we are advancing from the lessons which the life, 
 and the character, and the words of Jesus gave, 
 into the distinct exposition of the redemption, the 
 reconcihation, the salvation which residt from his 
 appearing. In this way it was provided that the 
 two correlative kinds of teaching, which the Church 
 received at the first, should be left to the Church 
 for ever in the distinctness of their respective de- 
 velopments ; for this distinctness of development in 
 the second kind of teaching is both announced and 
 secured by its being confided to St. Paul. 
 
 Yet a danger might arise ; a danger which did 
 attend his living ministry, and which recent theories 
 have been eager to revive. It might appear, that the 
 Gospel which he preached was not so much a stage 
 of progress as an individual variety, and that in 
 following it out we had diverged from the track of 
 the original doctrine, and were no longer sustained 
 by the authority of the Twelve. 
 
 The Twelve, therefore, are joined with St. Paul, 
 as authors together with him of the doctrinal canon 
 
LECTURE VI. 165 
 
 of the Church, fulfilling this office through Peter and 
 John, their natural leaders and original representa- 
 tives, and in a more restricted measure through 
 James and Jude, the brethren of the Lord, to the 
 former of whom, in the second stage of the Church's 
 history, so eminent and peculiar a position is as- 
 signed. Had we been permitted to choose our in- 
 structors from among " the glorious company," three 
 of these names at least would have been uttered by 
 every tongue ; and besides our desire to be taught 
 by their lips, we should, as disciples of St. Paul, 
 have felt a natural anxiety to know whether "James, 
 Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars," " added 
 nothing to 8," and took nothing from, the substance 
 of the doctrine which we had received through him. 
 It was the wdl of God that this anxiety should be 
 met. We have not been left to conjectures and 
 surmises. We have words from these very Apostles, 
 expressing the mind of their later life, words in 
 which we recognise the mellow tone of age, the 
 settled manner of an old experience, and the long 
 habit of Christian thought. We not only meet the 
 men whom we should wish to hear, but we meet 
 them at the point where we should wish to hear 
 them, now the venerated authorities in the Church 
 which they had long since founded, and fully cog- 
 nizant of its intervening histoiy. 
 
 Thus, if the collection of Epistles be intended to 
 exhibit the fulness and maturity of Christian doc- 
 trine, the selection of its authors corresponds to the 
 <= Galatians ii. 9. 
 
IGG LECTURE VI. 
 
 end in view ; the man who is best fitted to conduct, 
 being associated with the men who are best fitted 
 to confirm, the exposition and development of the 
 Gospel of Christ. 
 
 IV. In the last place I must advert, though it 
 is only possible to do so very slightly, to the relative 
 characters of the several Epistles, as complementary 
 one to another, and constituent parts of one body of 
 teaching. 
 
 I. The Pauline Epistles appear, with veiy small 
 variation, to have been habitually ranged in that 
 order in which we read them now ; and it is one 
 which on the whole, and in a certain measure, pro- 
 duces the effect of a course of doctrine. They faU 
 naturally into groups, which stand, relatively to each 
 other, in the places which they ought to occupy for 
 purposes of progressive instruction. The Epistles to 
 the Romans, Corinthians, and Galatians have a cor- 
 rective and decisive character. They are the voice 
 of the doctor of the Church, expounding with blended 
 argument and authority the meaning and the bearing 
 of the principles of the Gospel, which his hearers 
 had already leceived ; so as to decide the uncer- 
 tainties, and correct the divergences, which wiU 
 always characterise eveiy second stage in the history 
 of truth. When the enjoyment of a new discovery 
 jDasses into leflection upon it, and impressions begin 
 to define themselves in words, and " good tidings " 
 are shaping themselves into doctrines and laws of 
 life, a time of danger and necessity has come. Then 
 the vaguenesp and the incoirectness of ftiany first 
 
LECTURE VI. 167 
 
 impressions come to light ; then old habits of 
 thought are found still to survive, and old principles 
 return to enter into damaging or destructive com- 
 bination with those by vphich they had seemingly 
 been expelled. Then, through treacherous arts, 
 through perverse moral tendencies, and even through 
 logical weakness, the tender system of truth may 
 suffer, in the period of its formation, injuries which 
 vdll be for ever fatal The reader of the first three 
 Epistles finds himself in the presence of such a state 
 of things, and feels that the necessities, which are 
 there met by the word of the Lord, woidd, if not 
 thus provided for, have destroyed all seciu-ity in any 
 further advance of thought. 
 
 Especially in this point of view does the Epistle to 
 the Romans claim the place which it has habitually 
 held as the first step in the epistolary course. The 
 subject on which it gives a full and decisive ex- 
 position is not only vital but fundamental ; namely, 
 the need, the nature, and the effects of the justifica- 
 tion for individual souls which the Gospel preaches 
 and which faith receives. As there can be no repose 
 for a soul wliile that first point of personal anxiety, 
 " How can man be just with Godf is left unsettled ; 
 so there can be no solidity for a system of doctrine 
 till the true answer to that question has been dis- 
 tinctly shaped and firmly deposited. Moreover, if 
 the Gospel of St. Matthew fitly opens the whole 
 evangelical record by connecting it with the former 
 Scriptures, so also for the same reason does this 
 great Epistle fitly open the doctrinal series : for 
 
168 LECTURE VI. 
 
 what the one does m respect of fact, the other 
 does in respect of doctrine, justifying throughout 
 the intimation with which it opens that the Gospel 
 will here be treated as that " wliich God had promised 
 before by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures." In 
 the constant references, and in the whole line of 
 argument, we see the illustrious genealogy and lineal 
 descent of the christian doctrine of justification by 
 faith, traced, like that of Jesus himself, from Abraham 
 and David, and vindicated by the witness of the Law 
 and the Prophets ; so that we enter on the final 
 exposition of the truth with a settled sense, that in 
 all the successive stages of its revelation the truth 
 has still been one. 
 
 In the Epistles to the Corintliians we have passed 
 into another region of thought, conversing now 
 among the Greeks who seek after wisdom. In the 
 presence of a spirit of self-confident freedom, both 
 in thought and conduct, or in other words, in pre- 
 sence of the essential spirit of the world, rising 
 again like a returning tide, the Gospel develops 
 its divine and indefeasible authority, claims the 
 subjection of the mind, and regulates the life of 
 the Church. 
 
 In the Epistle to the Galatians it encounters, not 
 the spirit of a presumptuous freedom, but the spirit 
 of a wilful bondage, which returns after its own 
 stubborn and insensate fashion to the elements of 
 the world and of the flesh. In repelling this ten- 
 dency, the apostolic doctrine asserts more strongly 
 than ever its character as a revelation of Jesus 
 
LECTURE VI. 169 
 
 Christ, and shines out more clearly as a dispensation 
 of spii'it and of hberty. 
 
 Thus in the first three Epistles the first questions 
 have been answered and the first dangers averted ; 
 and the apostolic or Pauline doctrine has esta- 
 bHshed its divine character^ and developed its es- 
 sential features. 
 
 The following Epistles differ from this first group 
 in the comparative absence of the controversial atti- 
 tude and of the judicial tone. As those whose minds 
 are now cleared, settled, and secured, we readily foUow 
 the Apostle to that more calm and lofty stage of 
 thought on which he stands in his Epistles to the 
 Ephesians and Colossians ; when, no longer in col- 
 lision with human error, he expatiates in the view of 
 the eternal purposes of God, and of the ideal per- 
 fections of the Church in Christ. If inspiration was 
 asserted in the other Epistles, here it is felt. We 
 hear, not as before, the doctor of the Church ex- 
 pomiding, confuting, and deciding, but rather a pro- 
 phet of truth speaking as one borne along by the 
 Holy Ghosts. Yet in both Epistles this high strain 
 passes by the most natural transition into the 
 plainest counsels, and in the intervening Epistle to 
 the Philippians the voice is not that of a prophet 
 but of a friend. 
 
 * In the Komans, by connecting itself with the inspiration of the 
 Old Testament ; in the Corinthians and Galatians, by asserting its 
 own, (see especially i Cor. ii. and Gal. i.). 
 
 g irro wveifiaTos dyiov (fxpofj-evos. Who can read Eph. i. and ii. 
 without being reminded of this expression of St. Peter, by the 
 sustained swell and unbroken flow of the thoughts and language ? 
 
170 LECTURE VI. 
 
 Finally, the Thessalonian Epistles complete St. 
 Paul's addresses to seven Churches, and, though first 
 in the date of production, may fitly be read last in 
 the permanent order, as being specially distinguished 
 by the eschatological element, and sustaining the con- 
 flict of faith by the preaching of " that blessed hope " 
 and " the glorious appearing and the coming of the 
 day of Godii." 
 
 To this body of doctrine the Pastoral Epistles 
 add their suggestive words, on the principles and 
 spirit of that ofiice, which is at once a government 
 to order the Church and a ministry to serve it ; 
 so that, in the acknowledged writings of St. Paul, 
 we advance from the first momentous question of 
 justification for individual souls, through a thousand 
 various exigencies and unfoldings of the life of faith, 
 tiU we reach the outer circle of ministerial provision 
 for the care of the Church and the stewardship of 
 the truth. 
 
 2. But, in passmg through this course of teaching, 
 we have been in continual contact with the reminis- 
 cences, the ideas, the imagery, and the language 
 which are natural to one who was by origin and 
 training a Hebrew of the Hebrews. With all his 
 evangelical expansiveness of spirit, and all his an- 
 tagonism to the false theory of the Jewish system, 
 he yet has taught the things of Christ, and pre- 
 sented the universal salvation, under forms of speech 
 
 ii A characteristic made very noticeable in the present division 
 by chapters, each chapter in the first Epistle closing with the 
 mention of this subject. 
 
LECTURE VI. 171 
 
 and in a cast of thought which are derived from the 
 school of the Law. Every moment it becomes a 
 more serious question, whether this language is to 
 be allowed for, as inaccurate in itself but under the 
 circumstances of the case inevitable, or whether it 
 is to be insisted on, as the method prepared in the 
 purpose of God for the most adequate expression of 
 spiritual truth. The question was indeed decided by 
 the two facts, that the old covenant itself was a divine 
 ordinance, and that its historical relations with the 
 new covenant were a divine provision. Still it was 
 of high importance to the clearness and fixedness of 
 the doctrine, that this connection between the two 
 covenants should be deliberately shewn to consist, 
 not in rhetorical illustration, but in a divinely in- 
 tended system of analogies. This is the permanent 
 office of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which, if not 
 St. Paul's, is confessedly Pauluae, and, apparently on 
 accotmt of its uncertified authorship, has usually 
 taken its place in succession to his acknowledged 
 writings. In its origin it evidently belongs to the 
 last hour of transition and decision, when a large 
 niunber of men, who were at once Jews and Chris- 
 tians, stood perplexed, agitated, and almost distracted, 
 as they seemed to feel the ground parting beneath 
 their feet, and hardly knew whether to throw them- 
 selves back on that which was receding, or forward 
 on that to which they were called to cling. In 
 an intense sympathy with this perplexity, and even 
 anguish, prevailing in the Hebrew-Christian mind, 
 and in an intense anxiety as to its issixe, the Epistle 
 
172 LECTURE VI. 
 
 was written ; a living voice of power in a time of 
 change and fear, yet a compretensive exposition of 
 the advancing course of revelation, and of the re- 
 lations between its two great stages. But more par- 
 ticularly is it to be noticed here, that this Epistle 
 throws a stronger light than other writings had done 
 upon the progress of doctrine during the Christian 
 period itself. For, first, it expressly recognises the fact 
 that "the word of the beginning of Christ* " had been 
 enlarged by intervening teaching into a " perfection," 
 which many of those who are here addressed had 
 sinfully and shamefully failed to receive ; the teachers 
 sent from God having wrought out for them full 
 expositions of truth, to which their old prepossessions 
 had closed their hearts. And, secondly, it exhibits 
 the further fact, that this perfecting of the truth, 
 by the full and definite interpretation of the prin- 
 ciples of the Gospel, had been accomplished by means 
 of the true reading of the Old Testament in the 
 light of the knowledge of Christ^^. 
 
 3, From the Pauline writings we pass to the col- 
 lection of the Catholic Epistles. For all internal 
 reasons they are better read in the place which 
 they occupy in our Bibles, than in that which the 
 older manuscripts generally assign them, preceding 
 the Epistles of St. Paul ; for they are in effect the 
 confirmation and the supplement of his doctrine l 
 
 This character cannot here be proved, and it 
 
 i Hel), vi, I. If See Note XI. 
 
 ' See the latter part of Note I. in reference to this arrange- 
 ment. 
 
LECTURE VI. 173 
 
 scarcely needs to be, for it is now in the main 
 acknowledged. The personal characteristics of these 
 writers are unlike those of St. Paul ; the aspects 
 of the truth are diflPerent, but the substance and the 
 features are the same. Each writer, by the strongly 
 distinguished lines of his own individuality, makes 
 still more conspicuous the unity of the common 
 faith. 
 
 The Epistle of St. James alone makes at first 
 sight an opposite impression, and instead of har- 
 monising with the full development of evangelical 
 doctrine, may appear to belong to an earlier, or 
 rather a retrograde stage ; and if taken as an intended 
 exposition of the essential features of christian truth, 
 it might be thought to imply an Ebionite view of 
 the Gospel, and even to betray an Ebionite origin. 
 But the careful and candid student sees that the 
 language employed distinctly pre-supposes the evan- 
 gelical doctrine, and by supplementing other expo- 
 sitions of it does in fact acknowledge and confirm 
 them "". 
 
 The harmony of the Epistles of St. Peter and 
 St. John with the Pauline doctrine is sufficiently 
 obvious, and the former Apostle not only practically 
 (as is the case in an eminent degree), but pointedly 
 and professedly sets his seal to the development 
 which the Gospel had received in the teaching of 
 the Apostle of the Gentiles, assuring those who had 
 accepted the doctrine that "this is the true grace 
 of God wherein ye stand " ;" and again, instructing 
 m See Note XII. " i Peter v. 12. 
 
174 LECTURE VI. 
 
 those to whom the " beloved brother Paul " had 
 written " according to the wisdom given unto him," 
 that they are to regard those writings as on a 
 level with "the other Scriptures o." 
 
 On the Gospel doctrine itself, which is thus con- 
 firmed, a fresh light seems to be thrown by the 
 spirit of these precious Epistles, the faith expounded 
 by St. Paul kindling into fervent hope in the 
 words of St. Peter, and expanding into sublime love 
 in those of St. John. At the same time the reader 
 cannot fail to note how these writings of the original 
 apostles, by express references, by borrowed language, 
 and by their whole spirit, seem to bind the doctrine 
 which the Epistles have developed to the Gospels 
 in which it first began to be opened. Finally, he 
 may observe with admiration the singular fitness 
 of the few words of St. Jude to close the series 
 of writings, through which the faith has been 
 wrought out and consigned to the Church for 
 ever. It only remains for our last instructor to 
 exhort us " earnestly to contend for the faith once 
 for all delivered to the saints ;' to warn us of the 
 dangers of relapse ; to entreat us " to build our- 
 selves up on our holy faith, and praying in the 
 Holy Ghost to keep ourselves in the love of God, 
 looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto 
 eternal life;" and, finally, to commend us "to him 
 who is able to keep us from falling, and to present 
 us faultless before the presence of his glory with 
 exceeding joy." 
 
 ° 2 Peter iii. 1 6. 
 
LECTURE VI. 175 
 
 With such charges, warnings, and commendatory 
 prayers is the didactic portion of the New Testa- 
 ment left in our hands. We have now observed its 
 function in the whole scheme of instruction, as ad- 
 dressed to those who have believed the Gospel, for 
 the furtherance and perfecting of their education in 
 Christ. We have seen that it is adapted to this 
 work by the epistolary form,, which contemplates 
 those who are addressed as partakers in the same 
 life with those who address them, and as brethren 
 in the family of God. Secondly, by the method 
 adopted, in which the teacher, putting forth all the 
 varieties of his own mental energies, exercises and 
 trains the spiritual faculties of those who are taught, 
 while conducting them to definite and ascertained 
 conclusions. Thirdly, by the appointment of the 
 chief author, whose proper work only commences at 
 the point where the testimony of the manifestation 
 of Christ in the flesh is finished, and passes into the 
 testimony of his present relations with men in the 
 spirit. Lastly, by the relative characters of the 
 collected writings, whereby the exigencies of the 
 spiritual life are met at every point and provided 
 for in natural though informal succession. 
 
 In concluding this survey I would suggest two 
 questions which it may well leave upon our minds. 
 First, What is our own experience of the exigencies 
 thus provided for ? The Gospel history accepted as 
 true, some general statements concerning its conse- 
 quences adopted, and a position in the christian com- 
 munity assumed — these things seem to satisfy the 
 
176 LECTURE VI. 
 
 minds of many among us. We see that the word 
 of God does not contemplate so sudden and easy a 
 satisfaction. It supposes that the believer in Jesus 
 has entered on a vast world of life and thought. 
 It supposes the existence of enquiries, anxieties, 
 aspirations. It supposes a mind thoroughly aroused 
 by the importance, the grandeur, and the glory of 
 the truth which has come before it — a mind which 
 purposes with itself "to apprehend the things for 
 which also it is apprehended of Christ Jesus." It 
 supposes the existence of hindrances, difficulties, 
 oppositions — tilings to be struggled tlu-ough, as well 
 as things to be striven after. What do you know 
 of all this ■? Till you do know sometliing of it, the 
 Epistles are not for you. They are not written to 
 suit a cool indifference, or to gratify a taste for 
 discussion. The real condition for their use is the 
 existence of that inward life for the necessities of 
 which they provide. A man must turn the pages 
 of the Epistle to the Romans with a sense of per- 
 plexity and distaste, if his own heart own no serious 
 enquiry after the righteousness of God. The dis- 
 covery in the Epistle to the Hebrews of all that 
 is transacted within the veil, by the effectual minis- 
 try of the eternal Priest, can have for him but the 
 slight interest wliich may attach to ingenious typo- 
 logy, if he feel no daily necessity to come himself 
 to the throne of grace to obtain mercy and find grace 
 to help in time of need ; and the glorious standard 
 of Christian character which every Epistle offers 
 can but repel him, as something overstrained and 
 
LECTURE VI. 177 
 
 inapplicable to actual life, if he have not recognised 
 himself as bought with the precious blood and risen 
 again with Christ. The whole scheme and course 
 of teaching, meant for those who are " called to be 
 saints," loses not only its force but its meaning for 
 those who have no such project as those words 
 imply. 
 
 The second question is this : If the exigencies 
 which are thus supposed are really felt by us, what 
 use do we make of the word which is given to meet 
 them 1 We have seen that that word does not lead 
 us to the entrance of the christian life and then leave 
 us at the threshold. It recognises fully, it warmly 
 enters into, all those anxious questions which arise 
 in your hearts, as to the real nature of the work of 
 Christ in which you are taught to trust, of that 
 salvation which you desire to receive, of that life 
 which you are called to lead, of those relations to 
 God in which you are placed, of those great pros- 
 pects which lie before you. And shall negligence 
 or distrust deprive you of the assistance thus pre- 
 pared, and leave you to encounter the thoughts 
 which crowd upon the awakened soul, as if you 
 had to deal with them only by means of your own 
 resources 1 You are not so left. For those within 
 the Church, those who have received Christ Jesus 
 the Lord, those who own the holy calling, all this 
 teaching is made ready. To them it is expressly 
 addressed, and for their various necessities it is 
 adapted. But it does not yield its true uses to a 
 critical reference or an occasional consultation ; only 
 
 N 
 
178 LECTURE VI. 
 
 through a constant companionship and famihar inter- 
 course does it tell effectually for its destined ends, 
 and accomplish the blessed transformation of the 
 poverty and vanity of this poor human life into the 
 glory and reality of a life that is in Christ. 
 
LECTURE VII. 
 
 THE EPISTLES. 
 
 I CoE. i. 30. 
 
 Of him are ye in Christ Jesus. 
 
 1 TAKE this text, because it appears to me to con- 
 tain the fundamental idea, which underHes the whole 
 range of the Epistles, and gives the specific character 
 to their doctrine. 
 
 The specific character of their doctrine, as com- 
 pared with the preceding parts of the New Testa- 
 ment, is the question which hes before me now. 
 
 Some kind of doctrinal progress must necessarily 
 be attributed to these writings, if their words are 
 taken as words of God ; for everything in them 
 which is not simple repetition must be in some sense 
 addition, either giving information wholly new, or 
 explaining, enlarging, and arranging that which 
 former teachings had imparted. 
 
 It would therefore be fit, at the point which these 
 Lectures have reached, to make some collection of 
 
 N 2 
 
180 LECTURE VII. 
 
 these additions, or rather some selection of the 
 chief instances of them ; unless it should appear 
 that this stage of the progress of doctrine is marked 
 by such distinctive features, as suffice by them- 
 selves to describe the nature of the advance which 
 has been made, and to supersede the accumula- 
 tion of particulars by the peculiarity of a general 
 character. 
 
 I. In what has been already advanced the existence 
 of such a general character has been implied, and 
 its nature has been in some degree defined. 
 
 We have looked upon the doctrine of the Gospels 
 as the manifestation of Christ to men, giving the 
 conditions and the materials of a spiiitual hfe which 
 was to follow. We have looked upon the doctrine of 
 the Acts of the Apostles, as the preaching of Christ 
 to men, summing up the results of his appearing, 
 proclaiming him with the witness of the Spirit, and 
 gathering those who receive him into the form and 
 the life of a Church. We have observed that the 
 Epistles take up the line of teaching at this point, 
 being a voice within that Church to those who are 
 themselves within it ; that they are appropriated by 
 their superscriptions to those who are already called, 
 separated, and sanctified in Christ ; that they are 
 marked by their form and method as instruments 
 of education to the spiritual life after it has begun ; 
 and that the appointment of their chief author im- 
 plies the purpose of teaching things which followed 
 the completion of the work of Christ on earth, in his 
 offices and ministrations in heaven, and in the dis- 
 
LECTURE VII. 181 
 
 pensation of the Spirit amongst men. If the actual 
 contents of the Epistles correspond with these in- 
 timations, their doctrine must necessarily bear a 
 specific character as compared with that of the Gos- 
 pels and the Acts. As the manifestation of Christ 
 when it was finished made way for the preaching 
 of Christ, so the preaching of Christ when it has 
 been received opens into the life in Christ. The 
 Epistles pre-suppose the existence of this hfe, 
 both in the community and in the individual, and 
 their doctrine is directed to educate and develop it. 
 The fundamental thought in every page is that 
 expressed in my text, "Of him are ye in Christ 
 Jesus." 
 
 They are httle words, but they make an announce- 
 ment of vast significance and boundless consequences. 
 Writer and readers regard themselves and each other 
 as having now entered on an existence, which for 
 spiiitual beings seems the only real one. " Ye are " 
 says the Apostle. After speaking of "things that 
 are not" and of " things that are," he turns to his 
 fellow beUevers, and says, " but ye are." And whence 
 is this existence found 1 From him (e^ avrov), from 
 God himse f, as its immediate origui and still con- 
 tinuous author. And where is it found 1 " In Christ 
 Jesus." 
 
 In Christ Jesus ! As the simple voice of faith 
 this word is ever uttered with joy unspeakable and 
 full of glory. But preacher or commentator, who 
 may attempt to sound the depths or open the trea- 
 sures of its meaning, must feel his tongue falter 
 
182 LECTURE VII. 
 
 under the sense of the inadequacy of every ex- 
 plaining word. Let us, however, at least assert the 
 reality of the fact which it expresses, for it is 
 no symbolical form of speech, but the statement 
 of a fact, as real in regard to the spirit, as the fact 
 of our being in the world is real in regard to the 
 body. 
 
 How does the vivid consciousness of this reality 
 glow in the pages which are before us now ! Christ 
 has been manifested, preached, received ; and what 
 is the state which has ensued, as exhibited in the 
 consciousness of those who have received them 1 
 They are not merely professors of his name, 
 learners of his doctrine, followers of his example, 
 sharers in his gifts. I may go further. They are 
 not merely men ransomed by his death, or destined 
 for his glory. These are all external kinds of con- 
 nection, in which our separate life is related to his 
 life only as one man's life may be related to another's, 
 by the effect of what he teaches, of what he gives, 
 and of what he does. But it is assumed in the 
 Epistles, that believers in Jesus are no longer hving 
 a life that is only external, and, as it were, parallel 
 to his life. They are in Christ Jesus, and he also 
 is in them. 
 
 At the close of his manifestation he foretold a 
 state of consciousness, which his disciples had not 
 attained while he was with them in the flesh, but 
 which would be enjoyed by them under the suc- 
 ceeding dispensation. " At that day ye shall know 
 that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in 
 
LECTURE VII. 183 
 
 you a."- The language of the Epistles is the echo of 
 this promise. It is the voice of those who have 
 entered on the predicted knowledge, and who view 
 all subjects in the light of it. 
 
 They know that the Lord Jesus ""is in the Father;" 
 or, as it is more fully and distinctly expressed by 
 himself, that " he is in the Father, and the Father 
 in him ^ " not indeed with that character of know- 
 ledge which belongs to a later age, when abstract 
 dogmatic statements were fashioned from their warm 
 and living words, but rather with that kind of 
 knowledge, to secure which to the Church for ever 
 those statements were needed and were framed. 
 These writers know the truth, that the Father is 
 in the Son, as constituting the power of the work 
 of Christ on earth ; and the truth, that the Son 
 is in the Father, as constituting the power of his 
 mediation in heaven. On the one side, " God was 
 in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself ° ;" on 
 the other, it is " with Christ in God ^ " that the 
 Christian's present hfe is hid. 
 
 Furthermore, these writers know that believers 
 are in Christ and Christ in them, and shew that 
 knowledge, not only by frequent assertions and a 
 universal supposition of a close and vital union be- 
 tween the members and the head, but by a full 
 development of both the aspects of this union which 
 the words of the Lord present. 
 
 Believers are in Clirist, so as to be partakers in all 
 
 a John xiv. 20. b Ibid. x. 38 ; xiv. 10 ; and xvii. 21. 
 
 " 2 Cor. V. 19. <! Col. iii. 3. 
 
184 LECTURE VII. 
 
 that he does, and has, and is. They died with him, 
 and rose with him, and live with him, and in him 
 are seated in heavenly places. When the eye of 
 God looks on them they are found in Christ, and 
 there is no condemnation to those that are in him, 
 and they are righteous in his righteousness, and 
 loved with the love which rests on him, and are 
 sons of God in his sonship, and heirs with him of 
 his inheritance, and are soon to be glorified with 
 him in his glory. And this standing which they 
 have in Christ, and the present and future portion 
 which it secui'es, are contemplated in eternal coun- 
 sels, and predestined before the foundation of the 
 world. 
 
 As the sense of this fact breathes in every page, 
 so also does the sense of the correlative fact, that 
 Christ is in those who believe : associating his own 
 presence with their whole inward and outward life. 
 They know that Jesus Christ is in them, except 
 they be reprobates" (rejected ones). They live, yet 
 not they, but Christ liveth in them', and the ivSv- 
 vdjuwv Xpla-rog is their strength and their song^. This 
 indweUing of Christ is by the Holy Ghost, so that 
 the same passages speak interchangeably of the 
 Spii'it being in us, and of Christ being in us^i ; or 
 of the Holy Ghost being in us, and our members 
 being the members of Christ ' : and so this word, 
 "/ i'n you," includes the whole life of the Spirit 
 in man, with all its discoveries, impulses, and achieve- 
 
 " 2 Cor. xiii. 5. f Gal. ii. 20. s Phil. iv. 13. 
 
 1' Eom. viii. 9, 10. > 1 Cor. vi. 15, 19. 
 
LECTURE VII. 185 
 
 ments, its victory over the world, its conversation in 
 heaven, and earnest of the final inheritance. 
 
 Thus, through the different but intertwined re- 
 lations represented by the words, " Ye in me, and I 
 in you," human life is constituted a life in Christ ; 
 and, through the stUl higher mystery of the union 
 of the Father and the Son, is thereby revealed as a 
 life in God. " At that day ye shall know that I am 
 in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you." Yes ! as 
 we pass through the Epistles, we see that that day 
 is come, and that the consciousness thus predicted 
 has been attained. It is no flight of mysterious 
 rhetoric, but the brief expression of the settled, • 
 habitual, fundamental view of the state of those 
 who are here addressed, " Of him are ye in Christ 
 Jesus." 
 
 This idea underlies all that is said, gives the point 
 of view from which every subject is regarded, and 
 supphes the standard of character and the rules of 
 conduct. We move in a new world of thought, and 
 are raised to a level of doctrine which we had not 
 reached before, though the Gospels had prepared us 
 for it, and the Acts had led us towards it. In the 
 Gospels we have stood hke men who watch the rising 
 of some great edifice, and who grow familiar with the 
 outlines and the details of its exterior aspect. In 
 the preaching of the Acts we have seen the doors 
 thrown open, and joined the men who flock into 
 it as their refuge and their home. In the Epistles 
 we are acttially within it, sheltered by its roof, 
 encompassed by its walls ; we pass, as it were, from 
 
186 LECTURE VII. 
 
 chamber to chamber, beholding the extent of its 
 internal arrangements and the abundance of all 
 things provided for our use. We are here " in 
 Christ Jesus." That is the account of the difference 
 which we feel, and which lies in the opening out 
 of the whole efi'ect of the Gospel, rather than in ad- 
 ditions made to its particular doctrines. The presence 
 which was lately before our eyes, and drew us 
 towards itself, now absorbs and wraps us round, 
 and has become the ground on which we stand, 
 the air which we breathe, the element in which we 
 live and move and have our beiug. 
 
 The Churches are " in Christ ;" the persons are " in 
 Christ." They are " found in Christ" and " preserved 
 in Christ." They are " saved " and " sanctified in 
 Christ ;" are " rooted, built up," and " made perfect 
 in Christ." Their ways are "ways that be in Christ;" 
 their conversation is "a good conversation" in Christ; 
 their faith, hope, love, joy, their whole life is " in 
 Christ." They think, they speak, they walk "in 
 Christ." They labour and suffer, they sorrow and 
 rejoice, they conquer and triumph " in the Lord." 
 They receive each other and love each other " in 
 the Lord." The fundamental relations, the primal 
 duties of life, have been drawn within the same circle. 
 " The man is not without the woman, nor the woman 
 without the man in the Lord"*." Wives submit them- 
 selves to their husbands "in the Lord;" children obey 
 their parents " in the Lord." The broadest distinc- 
 tions vaiiish in the common bond of this all-embracing 
 i< I Cor. xi. II. 
 
LECTURE VII. 187 
 
 relation. "As many as have been baptised into Christ 
 have put on Christ ; there is neither Greek nor Jew, 
 there is neither bond nor free, there is neither 
 male nor female ; they are all one in Christ Jesus "." 
 The injluence of it extends over the whole field of 
 action, and men " do all in the name of the Lord 
 Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him." 
 The truth which they hold is "the truth as it is in 
 Jesus ;" the will by which they guide themselves 
 is "the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning 
 them." Finally, this character of existence is not 
 changed by that which changes all besides. Those 
 who have entered on it depart, but they " die in 
 the Lord," they " sleep in Jesus," they are " the dead 
 in Christ ;" and " when he shall appear," they will 
 appear ; and when he comes, " God shall bring them 
 with him," and they shall "reign in life by one — 
 Jesus Christ." 
 
 Pardon, my brethren, the necessarily slight and 
 rapid manner in which you have now been reminded 
 of this pervading characteristic of the Apostolic 
 writings. Yet, swiftly as I am compelled to proceed, 
 I must delay a moment ; for there is a question 
 which one who rehearses such words ought not to 
 leave unspoken. What correspondence is there be- 
 tween our own habit of thought and the christian 
 consciousness which speaks in these pages 1 I mean, 
 not in regard to particular doctiines or precepts, 
 but in regard to that one fact which embraces them 
 all — that which the text expresses, " Of him are ye 
 1 Gal. iii. 28. 
 
188 LECTURE VII. 
 
 in Christ Jesus." That is not the statement of a 
 doctrine, but the summary of a life. Surely I must 
 ask — Is it a life which I am living now ? I glance 
 over these pages, and see the holy and beloved name 
 shining in every part of them, and mingling its 
 presence with every thought and feeling, every 
 purpose and hope. I see an ever-present conscious- 
 ness of being in Christ, and a habit of viewing all 
 things in him. Must I not look down into my 
 heart, and ask whether my own inward life bears 
 this character 1 Let me accept nothing in exchange 
 for this. Men bid me live in duty and truth, in 
 purity and love. They do well. But the Gospel 
 does better ; callmg me to live in Christ, and to 
 find in him the enjoyment of all that I would 
 possess and the realisation of aU that I would be- 
 come. In suggesting these personal enquiries, I 
 have scarcely taken a step out of my way, for the 
 very point before us is this, that the progress of 
 doctrine in the Epistles is constituted, not in the 
 first place by the communication of new iaformation, 
 but by the recognition of a spiritual state which 
 has been attained, and by the education of the 
 spiritual life pertaining to it. 
 
 II. It now remains for me to point out that this fun- 
 mental character does of itself constitute a visible ad- 
 vance in the several parts of doctrine, both changing 
 their aspect, and enlarging their bounds ; and for 
 this purpose it is necessary to select some particular 
 subjects in which this change may be studied. 
 
 I . We turn first to the primary doctrine of salvation 
 
LECTURE VII. 189 
 
 by Jesus Christ. In the Gospels this doctrine ap- 
 pears in its most general form. To a great degree 
 it is typically represented, through the bodily heal- 
 ing or saving which points to the like work in the 
 world of spirit. On some occasions that faith, by 
 which men are " made whole " or " saved " (as the 
 one word is variously rendered) in the lower sense, 
 is declared to be the means of the higher blessing, 
 and to have secured for the applicant "forgiveness 
 of sins." To these intimations, definite invitations 
 and assertions are added. He who speaks is " come 
 to save the world ;" " to seek and to save that which 
 is lost ;" men are called to " come to him that they 
 may have life ;" " he that beheveth on him is not 
 condemmed ;" " he shall never perish, but have ever- 
 lasting life :" and from time to time some words are 
 spoken, which suggest the method in which the 
 salvation is wrought— words which tell of " the 
 Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the 
 world ;" of being " lifted up like the serpent in the 
 wilderness," that those who look may live ; of " life 
 given as a ransom for many ;" and of " the blood 
 of a new covenant shed for the remission of sins." 
 But, in reaching the Epistles, who is not struck 
 with the definiteness and development which the 
 whole doctrine, especially this last part of it, has 
 obtained. Here men have already received the great 
 truth in its first aspect, and have beheved on the 
 Lord Jesus for the remission of sins. Their minds, 
 however, must work ; and they search into the real 
 depth and extent of the general assurances, in which 
 
190 LECTURE VII. 
 
 their souls at first found rest and joy. The word 
 of God guides them through its commissioned inter- 
 preters. Thus the grounds of this salvation in the 
 work of Christ, and the means of it in their own 
 faith, are brought cleajly and vividly into view, and 
 the attention is fixed upon the ivay in which men, 
 being sinful, are made the righteousness of God. 
 In every variety of expression the reahty of the 
 atoning work of Christ is made sure ; in every con- 
 nection of thought it is made present. God " has 
 set him forth to be a propitiation for sins through 
 faith in his blood ™ ;" " We are reconciled tmto God 
 by the death of his Son";" "We are justified in 
 his blood " ;" " We have redemption through his 
 blood, even the forgiveness of sins p ;" we, " who 
 were far off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ i ;" 
 " He hath made him to be sin for us who knew no 
 sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God 
 in him'';" " Christ hath redeemed us from the curse 
 of the law, being made a curse for us";" "By his 
 own blood he entered in once into the holy place, 
 having obtained eternal redemption for us * ;" " He 
 was once offered to bear the sins of many " ;" " He 
 put away sin by the sacrifice of himself'' ;" " He 
 bore our sins in his own body on the tree " ;" " Ye 
 are redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, as of 
 a Lamb without blemish and without spot ^ ;" " The 
 blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all 
 
 m Rom. iii. 25. " Ibid. v. 10. Xbid. v. 9. 
 
 I' Eph. i. 7. n Ibid. ii. 13. i' 2 Cor. v. 21. 
 
 s Gal. iii. 13. t Hob. ix. 12. " Ibid. ix. 28. 
 
 ■>" Hcb. ix. 26. -'^ I Peter ii. 24. y Ibid. i. 19. 
 
LECTURE VII. 191 
 
 sin ^ ;" " He is the propitiation for our sins, and 
 not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole 
 world"." 
 
 Such is the constant voice of the apostolic teaching, 
 and such also is the constant voice of that christian 
 consciousness which the apostolic teaching forms and 
 certifies. Those who aie in Christ are already in- 
 mates of that holy " temple," which we see reared in 
 the Gospels and opened in the Acts ; and for them 
 the altar of the cross is the one central object, visible 
 from the remotest precincts, and sanctifying all 
 around it, while the one sacrifice thereon completed 
 is the ever-present condition of all which is celebrated 
 or enjoyed within. No mist invests the object to 
 which all eyes are turned, such as may suggest or 
 excuse the doubt whether that object be tnily an 
 altar, and the act accomplished on it a sacrifice 
 indeed. Not here do we see believers " chnging 
 (as it has been expressed) to the ground of fact " 
 under the feeling that " mystery is the nearest ap- 
 proach that we can make to the truth ; that only 
 by indefiniteness can we avoid putting words in the 
 place of things ; that we know nothing of the ob- 
 jective act on God's part by which he reconciled 
 the world to himself, the very description of it as 
 an act being only a figure of speech ; and that we 
 seem to know that we never can know anything''." 
 Instead of this we find a firm unsparing use of 
 ^-arious but kindred forms of speech, each supple- 
 
 z I Jolm i. 7. ''I John ii. 2. 
 
 b Jowett on the Epistles, vol. ii. p. 482. 
 
192 LECTURE VII. 
 
 menting and confirming the other, and having in the 
 minds of those who use them a recognised and settled 
 force, derived from ordinances which they have always 
 held to be divine, and which they now understand to 
 have been pre-ordained for the very purpose of pre- 
 paring the ideas and the language, in which they are 
 here expressing the things of Christ. 
 
 Mysteries of course remain ; and the truths de- 
 hvered, however distinct and clear in their central 
 parts, have their circumference in regions which 
 the eye cannot reach. I only observe that these 
 central parts of the truth of our salvation do grow 
 more distinct and clear as we advance beyond the 
 threshold of the Gospel : and that in the Epistles, 
 as standing amongst those who are in Christ, we 
 receive a fuller interpretation of the things which 
 he spake with his lips, concerning the salvation 
 which we were to find in him. 
 
 2. Proceed now to another doctrine respecting the 
 christian state — namely, that those who are saved 
 are also sons. 
 
 One chief feature of the teaching in the Gospels is 
 found in the word "Father." Jesus appears amongst 
 men in the character of the Son. His first spoken 
 word utters the consciousness of that relation, " Wist 
 ye not that I must be among the things of my 
 Father"?" His first introduction to men ratifies it : 
 " This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased '' :" 
 and so he goes forth into the world as the Son of 
 the Father. In right of this relation he straightway 
 
 '■ Luke ii. 49. J Matt. iii. 17. 
 
LECTURE VII. 193 
 
 associates in it those who receive him : and when, in 
 his first instructions, he lifts up his eye* on his disci- 
 ples to teach them the principles of the kingdom of 
 God, he bases everything upon this relation between 
 them and their God. " Pray to thy Father© ;" " Thy 
 Father will reward^ ;" "Your Father knoweth what 
 things ye have need of ^ ; " " That ye may glorify your 
 Father'' ;" " That ye may be the children of your 
 Father which is in heaven i ;" " Be ye perfect, as your 
 Father which is in heaven is perfect*^." So the whole 
 course of his teaching tends to that intertwining 
 of his own relation to God with theirs, which is 
 finally expressed on the eve of his departure : — " My 
 Father and your Father, my God and your God'." 
 And this language is not a mere general declaration 
 of the universal fatherhood of God ; for it is always 
 addressed to his disciples as such, to the little flock, 
 whom the world will persecute, and to whom " it is 
 their Father's good pleasure to give the kingdom n^:" 
 and it is further declared that the consciousness of 
 it is only awakened in those who hear his word, 
 for " no man knoweth the Father save the Son, and 
 he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him";" and 
 the right to enjoy and feel this relation is repre- 
 sented by St. John as a gift to those who receive 
 him, and believe in hi7n: "To as many as received 
 him, to them gave he power to become the sons of 
 God, even to them that believe on his name : which 
 
 e Matt. vi. 6. I Ibid. 4. S Ibid. 8. ^ Ibid. v. 16. 
 
 i Matt. V. 45. ^ Ibid. 48. • John xx. 17. "< Luke xii. 32. 
 
 " Matt, xi. 27. 
 
 O 
 
194 LECTURE VII. 
 
 were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the fleshy 
 nor of the will of man, but of God°." 
 
 What advance is made in the Epistles upon the 
 doctrine thus announced ? It appears there in a 
 fuller form, and with plainer statements of its 
 ground in the work of Christ, who is the Son sent 
 forth, " made under the law to redeem (buy out, 
 e^ayopacrri) those who Were under the law, in order 
 that (iVa) we might receive the adoption of sonsP :" 
 and with stronger assertions also of the means, on 
 our part, through which the sonship is enjoyed. 
 " Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is 
 born of Godi ;" " Ye are all the children of God 
 by faith in Christ Jesus''." But the substantive 
 addition made to the doctrine lies in the region of 
 co?isciousness, and in the experience of the inward 
 life. Believers are in Christ, and so are sons of 
 God, but, having become so, they find that Christ 
 also is in them, giving them the mind of sons 
 and the sense of their sonship. " Because ye are 
 sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into 
 your hearts, crying, Abba, Father^" "The Spirit 
 itself witnesseth with our spirit, that we are the 
 children of God : and if children, then heirs ; heirs 
 of God, and jomt-heirs with Christ*." " This revela- 
 tion is not only seen in the particular passages which 
 assert it, but its presence is felt in aU parts of the 
 Apostolic writings, and, as we read, we become 
 more and more sensible that Christ in the Spirit 
 
 ° Johu i. 12. r Gal. iv. 5. <i i John v. i. 
 
 '' Gal, iii. 26. ' Ibid. iv. 6. t Rom. viii. 16, 17. 
 
LECTURE VII. 195 
 
 has perfected his teachuig in the flesh, and that 
 those who are in him have now learned all that 
 was meant by his word "Your Father." 
 
 3. Turning now to the department of duties, let 
 us take the first of them — the personal approach 
 to God in worship, prayer, and praise. 
 
 Speaking often on this subject, our Lord instructs 
 us to come to God as a Father, and as one who 
 seeth in secret"; to worship in spirit and in truth^; 
 to pray always, and not to faint"' ; to pray as sinners 
 who need mercy'', as children who are sure to be 
 heard'' ; and whatsoever things we ask to believe 
 that we receive them^. In his last discourse words 
 are dropped, which seem to place the whole subject 
 on a fresh basis : " No man cometh unto the Father 
 hut hy me;" "If ye shall ask anything in my name, 
 I will do it. Hitherto ye have asked nothing in 
 my name : ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy 
 may be full a." 
 
 In the Epistles these (at the time) anticipatory 
 words have found their explanation ; and thereby 
 all the previous instruction is fully realised. Men 
 are in Christ Jesus, and therefore they come to 
 God by him. The whole character of worship and 
 prayer is now derived from the consciousness, that 
 " through him we have access by one Spirit unto 
 the Father ''." God is approached as a Father indeed, 
 because he is the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ 
 
 " Matt. vi. 8. V John iv. 24. "■ Luke xviii. i. 
 
 ^ Luke xviii. 13. y Ibid. xi. 11-13. ^ Mark xi. 24. 
 
 a John xiv. 6, 14, and xvi. 23, 24. ^ Eph. ii. 18. 
 
 O 2 
 
1.96 LECTURE VII. 
 
 in whom the worshipper is found : and therefore 
 the two names are united in every voice and almost 
 every mention of prayer. Through him also we 
 have the access {t^v tt poo-ay wyiiv), or (as it is soon 
 afterwards expressed) " access with confidence by 
 the faith of him*^." The right of entrance is secured, 
 and the means by which it was secured are present 
 to the mind. We have "boldness to enter into the 
 holiest by the blood of Jesus'*." Sacrifice has been 
 offered, the barriers are gone, a new and living 
 way is opened. And yet, further, there is (as the 
 word implies) a present introduction by the living 
 intervention of an eternal Priest, ministering in the 
 true sanctuary, with active mediation and perpetual 
 intercessions for all who come to God by him. 
 Furthermore, this access, which is through the Son, 
 is also " by one Spirit." To those who are in Christ 
 the Holy Ghost is given, as the consequence of their 
 union with him, and thus there is the Divine presence 
 in the soul of the worshipper; and so, in the highest 
 and most perfect sense, he worships the Father in 
 spirit and in truth, and prays in the Holy Ghost, 
 "the Spirit itself helping his infirmities, when he 
 knows not what he should pray for as he ought, 
 and making intercession for him with groanings 
 that cannot be uttered e." Passing into the midst 
 of such discoveries as these, we feel that the doctrine 
 of prayer has attained its perfect form, by combina- 
 tion with the doctrine of the Trinity, and that the 
 highest fulfilment of all which had been enjoined 
 "= Eph. iii. 12. d Heb. x. 19. e Rom. viii. 26. 
 
LECTURE VII. 197 
 
 upon those who were with Jesus has become possible 
 for those who now are in him. 
 
 4. The ethical teaching of the New Testament 
 shall be my last example. There also the like 
 kind of advance appears. I need not recall by any 
 special references the characteristic features of our 
 Lord's moral teaching in the Gospels. They are 
 present to all our minds. That standard of character 
 and riile of conduct have secured the reverential 
 recognition of the common conscience of mankind, 
 and the genuine admiration of unbelief itself. It 
 has been felt, even in unlikely quarters, that in 
 those holy discourses and that perfect example, 
 human character appears in a state of purity and 
 elevation which is nowhere else to be seen : and 
 especially that this moral system shines most brightly 
 in those points where other systems fail, namely, 
 the truthfulness of inward cleansing, the majesty 
 of lowliness, and the glory of love. Can there be 
 advance on such a code as this, given by the Lord 
 himself, when, as a man among men, he shewed 
 and taught what human perfection is 1 
 
 Yet when we pass to the Epistles we are sensible 
 of a momentous change. The standard is the same 
 in its general elevation and in the proportions of 
 its several parts. Where then is the change ^ I 
 answer, in the position of those who are to use it, 
 in the relations of which they are now conscious, 
 and therefore in the motives by which they are to 
 be influenced, and in the powers which they are 
 supposed to possess. " Our duties," as Bishop Butler 
 
198 LECTURE VII. 
 
 observes, "arise out of our relations'"." Therefore 
 every revelation of unknown relations must affect 
 in some way the character of our duties. This truth 
 comes strikingly into view, as we follow the unfold- 
 ing of the spiritual relations of believers to their 
 Lord. 
 
 Observe first the position which the Lord Jesus 
 attributes to those whom he teaches, and the con- 
 sequent motives to which he appeals, in those in- 
 structions in righteousness which he gave in the 
 days of his flesh. He urges the special relations in 
 which those who have joined him stand. They are 
 under peculiar obligations, and a peculiar govern- 
 ment. They are his disciples^ and the children of 
 their Father f; they must "do more than others?." 
 He charges them as being their master, and counsels 
 them as being their friend ; and, as time goes on, 
 uses the power of his example, and at last appeals 
 to the claims of his love : " I have given you an 
 example, that ye should do as I have done to you '' ;" 
 "As I have loved you, that ye love one another i :" 
 then finally opens that deeper relation, from which 
 their future fruitfulness must be derived : "Abide in 
 me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit 
 of itself except it abide in the vine, no more can 
 ye except ye abide in me ''." 
 
 That last saying, which was at the time a parable, 
 they soon knew as a fact. When the redemption 
 
 d Analogy, Part II. ch. i. sect. 2. 
 
 <" Luke xiv. 26, 27, 43. '' Matt, v, 45. t Ibid. 47. 
 
 h John xiii. 15. ' Ibid. ,\v. 12, k Jbld. 4. 
 
LECTURE VII. 199 
 
 was completed, and he was gone from their side, 
 they found themselves in a closer and deeper union 
 with him than they had understood before. Hence- 
 forth it was in the relations with him, on which they 
 had entered in the Spirit, that they found both the 
 motives of duty and the power for its fulfilment. 
 
 The Epistles first unfold the fulness of the grace in 
 Christ, and then beseech us "by the mercies of God" 
 that we " present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, 
 acceptable unto God, which is our reasonable ser- 
 vice 1." They base their practical instructions on the 
 consciousness of being redeemed with the precious 
 blood of Christ™, of being risen with Christ", of 
 having the Spirit of Christ dwelling in us". All 
 goodness, righteousness, and truth are the fruit of 
 the Spirit dwelling in us. We live in the Spirit, 
 therefore we are to walk in the Spirit p ; we have 
 received Christ Jesus the Lord, therefore we are to 
 walk in him i ; we are to flee fornication, because 
 it would defile the members of Christ "■ ; we are to 
 put away corrupt commtmications, because they will 
 grieve the Holy Spirit of God, whereby we are 
 sealed to the day of redemption * ; we are to forgive 
 one another, because God for Christ's sake has for- 
 given us ' ; to receive one another, because Christ 
 received us to the glory of God" ; and to give to 
 others, because we know the grace of our Lord Jesus 
 
 • Kom. xii. i. ™ i Pet. i. i8. » Col. iii. i. 
 
 ° Kom. viii. 9, 13. p Gal. v. 22-25. 1 Col. ii. 6. 
 
 "■ 1 Coi-. vi. 19. » Eph. iv. 29, 30. t Ibid. 32. 
 
 'i Rom. XV. 7. • 
 
200 LECTUBE VII. 
 
 Christ, who, when he was rich, for our sakes became 
 poor, that we through his poverty might be made 
 rich " ; our conversation is to be worthy of God, 
 who has called us to his kingdom and glory ^ ; we 
 are to mortify our members upon the earth, because, 
 when Christ, who is our life, shall appear, we also 
 shall ajipear with him in glory ^. 
 
 This character of ethical teaching is nowhere more 
 conspicuous than in the calm depths of the Epistle 
 of St. John, where the sense of fellowship with God 
 is the ground of walking in the light '^ ; and " he 
 that saith he abideth in Christ ought himself also 
 so to walk, even as he walked '' ;" and every man 
 that hath the hope in Christ purifieth laimself, even 
 as he is pure ^ ; and the love which laid down 
 his life for us is the reason for a willingness to 
 lay down our lives for the brethren "^ ; and the 
 whole spirit of love one to another is the reflection 
 of that love of God, wherewith he first loved us, 
 and sent his Son to be the ^^I'opltiation for our 
 sins^. 
 
 We recognise then the advance of ethical doctrine, 
 not onlj or chiefly in its more various and detailed 
 practical development, but in the fact that the prin- 
 ciples, motives, and conduct of life are habitually 
 drawn from the ever-present consciousness of the 
 great salvation. It is a habit of thought, up to which, 
 but not into which, the moral teaching of Jesus 
 
 >= 2 Cor. viii. 9. v i Thess. ii. 12. z Col. iii. 4, 5. 
 
 ^ I John i. 6. b Ibid. ii. 6. e Ihid. iii, 2, 3, 
 
 '1 ; John 16. e Ibid. iv. 7-10, 
 
LECTURE VII. 201 
 
 had led us ; a habit of thought, which corresponds 
 with those relations towards himself, into which 
 men fully entered only when his voice on earth 
 had ceased. If there is this visible progress of doc- 
 trine in the department of christian ethics ; if, in 
 respect of distinct exhibition of principles and mo- 
 tives, the teaching of the Apostles surpasses that of 
 their Lord ; it is plain that this fact is a necessity 
 from the nature of the case. TUl Jesus was glorified, 
 his spiritual relations with behevers could not be 
 fully unfolded; and till those relations were appre- 
 hended, the motives arising out of them could not 
 be called into action, nor the life resulting from them 
 be clearly brought to light. 
 
 I have now adverted to some principal subjects on 
 which we have received the teaching of God in the 
 New Testament, as illustrations of the change which 
 that teaching exhibits in the latter part of the 
 volvime. If we multiplied these examples to the 
 utmost, our comparison of the aspect which every 
 separate doctrine bears in the Gospels with that 
 which it presents in the Epistles would still have 
 the same result. We should still see that the later 
 doctrine difiers from the earlier, only as being its 
 TrXijpwa-ii, its completion and fulfilment. The Lord 
 himself was perfected and glorified, not in the days 
 of his flesh, but after they were ended. So also was 
 his doctrine ; but as in the later stage he is still 
 the same Lord, so it is still the same doctrine. Its 
 meaning is defined, its extent is disclosed, its con- 
 sequences are deduced. Parable and proverb are 
 
202 LECTURE VII. 
 
 changed into great plainness of speech. What seemed 
 a figure is shewn as a fact. What was intimation 
 of something future is become assertion of something 
 present. Motives are supplied, powers are assured, 
 by which that which was enjoined is realised, and 
 a life which had seemed impossible is now become 
 simply natural. Revelation has only enlarged itself 
 to meet necessities and fill capacities which its former 
 words had purposely created. The earlier teaching 
 contemplated the coming of a day for its disciples, 
 in which many things should be said to them which 
 they could not bear then. In the later teaching that 
 day is come. At first they are taught as those who 
 are with Jesus, afterwards as those who are in Christ. 
 They know now that he is in the Father, and they 
 in him, and he in them. When that consciousness 
 is given, a standing-point is reached from which new 
 worlds of thought may be surveyed. They are sur- 
 veyed in the Epistles, and there the chosen teachers 
 spread before us the unsearchable riches of Christ. 
 They say to us, " Of him are ye in Christ Jesus ;" 
 and they shew us what that state implies, of ca- 
 pacities, possessions, responsibilities, duties, and des- 
 tinies ; of relations to God and man, of connection 
 with things in earth and things in heaven. They 
 shew that to produce and to perfect this state are 
 the ends of the preaching of the word, of the in- 
 stitution of the sacraments, of the ordinance of the 
 ministry, of the life and order of the Church ; yea, 
 of the divine government of the world, and of all 
 that bears on human history. " All things are 
 
LECTURE VII. 203 
 
 for your sakes^ ;" " All are yours, whether Paul, or 
 Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, 
 or things present, or things to come ; all are yours ; 
 and ye are Christ's ; and Christ is God's s." 
 
 And so the great course of divine teaching has 
 reached its highest stage. After slowly moving on, 
 through the simple thoughts of patriarchal piety, 
 through the system and covenant of the Law, and 
 through the higher spirituality of the Prophets, it 
 rose suddenly to a lofty elevation when God spake 
 to us in his Son ; and, even higher yet, when the 
 Son ascended back into glory, and sent down the 
 Holy Ghost to take up his unfinished word, and 
 open the mysteries which had been hid from ages 
 and generations. Each stage of progress based itself 
 on the facts and instructions of that which went 
 before. The Law was given to the children of 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ; the Prophets spake 
 to those who were under the Law ; Jesus Christ 
 came to those who had been taught by the Prophets ; 
 the Holy Ghost instructed those who had received 
 Christ. 
 
 Beyond, and outside this course of teaching, lay, 
 and still lies, the great world of human beings. 
 Lord, and what shall these men do % What is that 
 to thee ? Follow thou tne. 
 
 Oh! let us follow. It is not the object of reve- 
 lation to answer those enquiries, natural as they 
 are. It is its object to lead those to whom it comes 
 into that fulness of knowledge, and up to those 
 
 f 2 Cor. iv. 15. s 1 Cor. iii. 21-23. 
 
204 LECTURE VII. 
 
 heights of blessing, towards which, in its own his- 
 torical progress, it so steadily advanced, and which 
 its final stage attained. 
 
 Let not searchings of heart as to what others shall 
 do, or the sense of the thousand questions which must 
 wait for their solution a few years longer, divert 
 us from now pressing into that inner circle of ex- 
 perience to which the Word of God conducts us. 
 
 There we shall find it true that " he that believeth 
 on the Son of God hath the witness in himself^." 
 There we shall repeat within ourselves the words 
 with which the last Apostle closes his Epistle : 
 " We hioiv that the Son of God is come, and hath 
 given us an understanding, that we may hriotv him 
 that is true, and we are in him that is true, even 
 in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and 
 eternal lifei." There we shall feel that we have 
 reached results for our own inward life answerable 
 to all the preparations which went before — answer- 
 able even to the great facts in which those pre- 
 parations culminated, when the Only-begotten of the 
 Father came down to earth to take us into himself, 
 and returned into glory to unite us to God. 
 
 li I John V. 6. i Ibid. 20, 
 
LECTURE YIII. 
 
 THE APOCALYPSE. 
 
 Rev. XXI. 2. 
 
 I John saiv the holy city, neio Jerusalem, coining down from God 
 out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 
 
 1 HESE words open the last vision of prophecy and 
 the last teaching of Scripture. 
 
 It had been the promise of the Lord to his dis- 
 ciples that the Holy Ghost, whom he would send 
 to them from the Father, shoiild not only lead them 
 into all the truth, but should also shew them things 
 to come : and we find the promise fulfilled in both 
 its parts. The predictions of the great transitional 
 discourse, concerning the coming dispensation of the 
 Spirit, have their permanent justification in the 
 canonical books which follow ; and as the Epistles 
 respond to the assurance, " He shall lead you into 
 all the truth," so does the word, " He shall shew 
 you things to come," find its distinct fulfilment in 
 the Apocalypse. That book continues the line of 
 predictive history running through the New Testa- 
 ment, and is the consummation of the sure word 
 of prophecy which pervades the Bible as a whole. 
 
206 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 I have already had occasion to observe that the 
 words spoken by oui' Lord in the flesh give the 
 substance of all the later doctrine, and prove to be, 
 as it were, the heads and summaries of chapters 
 which were to be written afterwards. As all the 
 great doctrinal features of the Epistles are found 
 in germ in separate sayings of the Lord, so also 
 the main outlines of the Apocalypse are given us 
 in parables and sayings, which trace the futm'e 
 history of his kingdom. And more particularly it 
 is to be noticed, that this book bears the same 
 relation to the last discourse in St. Matthew, which 
 the Epistles bear to the last discourse in St. John. 
 In the upper room where the last Passover and 
 the first Eucharist had been celebrated, and in the 
 midst of the little company which then represented 
 the Christian Church, the Lord spoke the words 
 which opened the mystery of the spiritual life, a 
 mystery afterwards to be fully unfolded by the Holy 
 Ghost, in the day when they would know that he 
 was in the Father, and they in him, and he in them. 
 Sitting on the Mount of Olives with Jerusalem 
 spread before him, and questioned as to the sign 
 of his coming and of the winding up of the age, 
 he gave the outlines of a prophetic history, which 
 contained the substance, bore the character, and 
 must rule the interpretation, of the later and larger 
 revelation. 
 
 Again, as in the case of the doctrinal teaching, 
 so in the case of the prophetical, its unity is assured 
 to us by the testimonies that the teacher is the 
 
LECTURE VIII. 207 
 
 same in the later as in the earlier stage. Not only 
 do we find in the spoken words of the Lord the 
 condensed substance of that which follows ; not 
 only do we hear from him, that this part of his 
 teaching is to be continued by the Holy Ghost, 
 whom he will send to shew us things to come ; 
 but a peculiar care is taken in this last communi- 
 cation from heaven, to bring fully before the mind 
 of the Church the reahty of the presence of the 
 Lord himself in his revealing word. "The revela- 
 tion of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him, to 
 shew unto his servants the thiilgs which must Come 
 to pass," is a repetition, and a particular application, 
 of that assurance on which all the Gospel rests, 
 " / have given unto them the words which thou gavest 
 me." Even the visible discovery of this fact is not 
 withheld. If Paul, as the great expositor of the 
 present spiritual life, had seen Jesus Christ him- 
 self, and received immediately from the Lord that 
 which he had delivered unto men ; so John, as the 
 prophet of the things to come, saw the well-re- 
 membered form again, surrounded with the symbols 
 of majesty and judgment, and looked upon his coun- 
 tenance, now like the sun shining in his strength, 
 and heard his voice as the sound of many waters. 
 
 Thus the continuity of the line of prophecy within 
 the canonical books is made as clear as that of the 
 line of doctrine ; both commencing in the words of 
 Jesus in the flesh, both perfected by the words 
 of Jesus in the Spirit. 
 
 But it may be asked. If the line of prophecy is 
 
208 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 to be distinguished from the line of doctrine, what 
 place can the former subject claim in Lectures which 
 are appropriated to the latter 1 
 
 Taking prophecy as predicted fact (however par- 
 tially discovered or symbolically disguised), it will 
 stand in the same relation to doctrine as is held 
 by history or recorded fact. In the doctrine of 
 the Gospel that relation is the very closest ; for 
 it is a doctrine which rests upon events. Its foun- 
 dation is in facts which have come to pass, and 
 wiU yet come to pass. Jesus died — he ascended — 
 he will come again^ — he will reign in glory. These 
 are external facts. They enter the region of doc- 
 trine (as we commonly use the term) through their 
 consequences to ourselves, through their effect on 
 our own inward consciousness, through the uses 
 and applications which may be made of them. If 
 Jesus died — to bear our sins, if he ascended — to be 
 manifested in the presence of God for us, if he will 
 come again — to judge our state, if he will reign in 
 glory — to perfect our salvation, then these facts, in 
 themselves external to ^^s, are external no longer. 
 They are among the grounds of a whole system of 
 thought and habit of feeling, and, when taught as 
 such, they grow into a scheme of doctrine. But as 
 in history (I mean that which is commonly described 
 as inspired history) all the events have not the same 
 connection with doctrine, but some only an indirect 
 and remote one, so also is it in prophecy; and par- 
 ticular facts, or a whole series of events, may be 
 intimated in the way of prediction for other reasons. 
 
LECTURE VIII. -im 
 
 but not for any immediate bearing which they have 
 upon doctrine. 
 
 It results from these observations that the progress 
 of prophecy, taken as a whole, is so bound up with 
 the progress of doctrine, that the enlargement of 
 the one must in some degree involve the enlarge- 
 ment of the other. It also results that the one is 
 stiU to be distinguished from the other, and there- 
 fore that it does not belong to such an enquiry as 
 I now pursue to trace the details of a predicted course 
 of events. 
 
 I am free then from all necessities of detailed 
 apocalyptic interpretation ; having only to render 
 some account of the general doctrinal bearing of this 
 revelation of things to come, and to point out what 
 additions of that kind are made in the last book, to 
 the treasures which the preceding documents have 
 accumulated for our use. The separate accessions 
 of information it would take long to gather, but their 
 general character is visible at once. 
 
 I. The former Scriptures have revealed the Lord 
 Jesus Christ as the Saviour, not only of individual 
 souls, but also of " the body, the Church." The final 
 result of his appearing is shewn not only in the 
 peace, the holiness, the participation, and inherence 
 in him of each separate person, but in the formation 
 of a corporate existence, a society in which man is 
 perfected, a kingdom in which God is glorified. 
 The parables and sayings of the Gospels present 
 this kingdom of God as having its own life and end, 
 its own history and destiny, in which those of its 
 
210 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 individual members are involved. Soon its visible 
 shape appears. A society is formed, and, if glorious 
 things were spoken of the city of God under the 
 old covenant, still more glorious things are spoken 
 of this, which is " the house of God," " the Church 
 of the living God ^," " the habitation of God through 
 the Spirit^." It is not a mere aggregate of separate 
 parts, but possesses an organic life, as "the body 
 of Christ" "fitly joined together and compacted by 
 that which every joint supplieth, according to the 
 effectual working in the measure of every part, making- 
 increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in 
 love*^." It is endued with a corporate personality, 
 in which the full results of redemption will appear : 
 for it is the spouse of Christ, which he loved, and for 
 which he gave himself, and which he will present 
 unto himself a glorious Church, " not having spot or 
 wrirdcle, or any such thing '^'." In this view, the 
 Church is not so much for the sake of the individual, 
 as the individual for the sake of the Church. Its 
 j)erfection and glory, its full response to the work of 
 Christ, its reahsation of the purposes of God, con- 
 stitute the end to which the existence of each member 
 ministers. This line of thought runs through the 
 Epistles, and forms a distinct advance upon that 
 which works out the development of personal salva- 
 tion. I have now to point out that it is not perfected 
 in the Epistles, but demands such a continuance 
 and such a close as it receives in the Apocalypse. 
 The sense of sharing in a corporate existence, and 
 a I Tim. iii. 15. ^ Eph. ii. 22. •' Ibid. iv. 16. '^ Ibid. v. 27. 
 
LECTURE VIII. 211 
 
 in a history and destinies larger than those which be- 
 long to us as individuals, tends to throw the mind for- 
 ward upon a course of things to come, through which 
 this various history is to run, and these glorious des- 
 tinies are to be reached. More especially is this the 
 case, where there is a strong contrast between the ideal 
 expectations which we have formed and the actual 
 realisation which at any particular time we behold. 
 When present things in a measuie disappoint us, we 
 turn more eagerly to the brighter future, and look 
 beyond the darkened foreground to the light which 
 glows on the horizon. Who does not feel, in reading 
 the Epistles, that some stxch sense of present disap- 
 pointment grows upon him, and that such dark 
 shadows are gathering on the scene ? 
 
 How fair was the morning of the Church ! how 
 swift its progress! what expectations it would have 
 been natural to form of the future history which had 
 begun so well ! Doubtless they were formed in many 
 a sangume heart : but they were clouded soon. It 
 became evident that, when the first conflicts were 
 passed, others would succeed ; and that the long and 
 weaiy.M-ar with the powers of darkness had only just 
 begun. The wrestlings "against principahties and 
 powers and the spiritual forces of wickedness in 
 heavenly places ^ " were yet to be more painfully 
 felt, and believers were prepared to be "partakers 
 of Christ's sufferings," and not to " think it strange 
 concerning the fiery trial which was to try them, 
 as though some strange thing happened to them^ ," 
 <^ Eph. vi. 12. '' I Pet. iv. i2, 13 
 
 P 2 
 
212 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 But worse for the Church than the fightings 
 without were the fears within. Men who had long 
 professed the Gospel "had need to be taught again 
 what were the first principles of the oracles of Gods'." 
 They were " falling from grace," and " turning back 
 to weak and beggarly elements, whereto they desired 
 again to be in bondage '^" " Some had abeady 
 turned aside after Satan'," and, where there was no 
 special prevalence of error, a coldness and worldh- 
 ness of spirit di-ew forth the sad reflection, "All 
 seek their own, not the things which are Jesus 
 Christ's''." Contentions were rife, and schisms were 
 spreading ; and men, in the name of Christ and of 
 truth, were " provoking one another, envying one 
 another." New forms of error began to arise, from 
 the combination of christian ideas with the rudi- 
 ments of the world and the vagaries of oriental plii- 
 losophy. Here were men, like Jannes and Jambres 
 who withstood Moses, "resisting the truth, reprobate 
 concerning the faith V Here were "Hymenjeus and 
 Philetus, who concerning the truth had erred, saying 
 that the resurrection was past already™." Here was 
 the -ylfevSuivviuos yvwa-i?^, teeming with a thousand 
 protean forms of falsehood. While the Apostles 
 wrote, the actual state and the visible tendencies 
 of things shewed too plainly what Church history 
 would be ; and, at the same time, prophetic intima- 
 tions made the prospect still more dark : for " the 
 
 K Heb. V. 12. h Gal. iv. 9 ; v. 4. '1 Tim. v. 15. 
 
 ^ Phil. ii. 21. 1 2 Tim. iii. 8. m Ibid. ii. 17. 
 
 " I Tim. vi. 20. 
 
LECTURE VIII. 213 
 
 Spirit spake expressly, that in the latter times men 
 would depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing 
 spirits and doctrines of devils "," — that " m the last 
 days grievous times should come," marked by a 
 darkness of moral condition which it might have 
 been expected that Gospel influences would have 
 dispelled p, — that " there would be scoffers in the 
 last days, walking after their own lusts, and saying, 
 where is the promise of his coming'' V — that the 
 day of the Lord would not be, " till the apostacy 
 had come first, and the man of sin had been re- 
 vealed, the son of perdition, the adversary who 
 exalts himself above all that is caUed God or an 
 object of worsliip ; so that he sits in the Temple of 
 God, shewing himself that he is God ''." " The 
 mystery of lawlessness was already working, and as 
 antichrist should come, even then were there many 
 antichrists ^" men "denying the Father and the Son," 
 " denying the Lord that bought them '," " turning 
 the grace of God into lasciviousness"," and "bring- 
 ing on themselves swift destruction." 
 
 I know not how any man, in closing the Epistles, 
 could expect to find the subsequent history of the 
 Church essentially different from what it is. In 
 those writings we seem, as it were, not to witness 
 some passing storms which clear the air, but to feel 
 the whole atmosphere charged with the elements 
 of future tempest and death. Every moment the 
 
 " 1 Tim. iv. I. V 2 Tim. iii. 1-5- ''2 Pet. iii. 3. 
 
 I 2 Thes. ii. 4-7. " i John ii. 18, 22. ' 2 Pet. ii. i. 
 
 '1 .Jude 4. 
 
-'14 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 forces of evil shew themselves more plainly. They 
 are encountered, but not dissipated. Or, to change 
 the figure, we see battles fought by the leaders 
 of our band, but no security is promised by their 
 victories. New assaults are being prepared ; new 
 tactics will be tried ; new enemies pour on ; the 
 distant hills are black with gathering multitudes, and 
 the last exhortations of those who fall at their posts 
 call on their successors to " endure hardness as good 
 soldiers of Jesus Christ"," and " earnestly to contend 
 for the faith which was once delivered to the saints''." 
 
 The fact which I observe is not merely that these 
 indications of the future are in the Epistles, but that 
 they increase as we approach the close, and after 
 the doctrines of the Gospel have been fully wrought 
 out, and the fulness of personal salvation and the 
 ideal character of the Church have been placed in 
 the clearest hght, the shadows gather and deepen 
 on the external liistory. The last words of St. Paul 
 in the second Epistle to Timothy, and those of 
 St. Peter in his second Epistle, with the Epistles 
 of St. John and St. Jude, breathe the language of 
 a time in which the tendencies of that history had 
 distinctly shewn themselves ; and in this respect 
 these writings form a prelude and a passage to 
 the Apocalypse. 
 
 Thus we arrive at this book with wants which 
 
 it is meant to supply ; we come to it as men, who 
 
 not only personally are in Christ, and who know 
 
 what as individuals they have in him ; but who 
 
 '^^ 2 Tim. ii. 3. y .Jude 3. 
 
LECTURE VIII. 215 
 
 also, as members of his body, share in a corporate 
 life, in the perfection of which they are to be made 
 perfect, and in the glory of which their Lord is to 
 be glorified. For this perfection and glory we wait 
 in vain, among the confusions of the world and the 
 ever-active, ever changing forms of evil. What is 
 the meaning of this wild scene 1 what is to be its 
 issue i and what prospect is there of the realisation 
 of that which we desire ? To such a state of mind 
 as this, and to the wants which it involves, this last 
 part of the teaching of God is addressed, in accord- 
 ance with that system of progressive doctrine which 
 I have endeavoured to illustrate, wherein each stage 
 of advance ensues in the way of natural sequence 
 from the effect of that which preceded it. 
 
 Brethren, I woiild that this state of mind, these 
 desires and wants, which the last revealing word 
 supposes in those to whom it comes, did exist more 
 extensively and distinctly among us. I tliink we 
 must all feel that the piety of our day encloses 
 itself too much within the limits of individual life. 
 
 That / should be pardoned, saved, and sanctified — 
 that / should serve before God, and be accepted in 
 my service — that / should die in peace and rest in 
 Christ — that / should have confidence and not be 
 ashamed before him at his coming — these are worthy 
 desires for an immortal being, and for these the 
 Gospel provides. But it provides for more than 
 these ; making me the member of a kingdom of 
 Clirist, and the citizen of a city of God. There 
 ought surely to be a consciousness within me 
 
216 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 corresponding to that position ; there ought to be 
 affections, which will associate me in spirit with 
 that larger history, in which my omti is included ; 
 and which will make me long that the kingdom 
 of Christ should come, and the city of God be 
 manifested. The blessedness, ascribed to him that 
 reads, and those who hear, the words of tliis pro- 
 jjhecy, can belong only to those who read it and 
 hear it thus. 
 
 II. Such being the state of mind which the book pre- 
 supposes, and such the wants to which it is addressed, 
 I have now to point out some leading characteristics 
 of its doctrine, in order to shew what are the satis- 
 factions which it provides. These characteristics, 
 though distinguished from each other, will yet all 
 be found to combine into one. The doctrine of the 
 book is a doctrine of consummation. 
 
 I. It is a doctrine of the cause of the consumma- 
 tion. It educes the result from one source — the 
 atoning death of Jesus. Is this an advance in doc- 
 trine ? Has not the nature and efficacy of the great 
 sacrifice been already sufficiently disclosed \ Yes, 
 certainly, in its bearing on personal salvation ; but 
 this book exhibits the connection between the per- 
 sonal and the general salvation, in the identity of 
 their common cause. The personal salvation for 
 each several soul has been expounded in the Epistles 
 as found in Christ Jesus, and more particularly in 
 our redemption to God by his blood. In these 
 writings the sacrifice and propitiation of his death 
 are ever before our eyes, as the cause of our resto- 
 
LECTURE VIII. 217 
 
 ration and the source of all our other blessings. 
 When, in this book, we pass on from the personal 
 to the general life, and are to see the victory secured, 
 and the kingdom brought in, we may perhaps expect 
 that the Lord will now appear only with ensigns 
 and titles of majesty, as the conqueror and the king. 
 It is not so. The opening doxology, " To him that 
 loved us and ivashed us from our sins in his own 
 blood," strikes the note of all which is to follow. 
 When the historic vision begins, one is sought who 
 may open the sealed purposes of God, and conduct 
 them to their end. " Then I beheld, and lo ! in the 
 midst of the throne, and the beasts, and the elders, 
 stood .... a Lamb as it had been slain^" and his 
 appearance wakens the song, " Thou art worthy to 
 take the book, and to open the seals thereof : for thou 
 wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood 
 out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and 
 nation ; and hast made us unto our God kings and 
 priests : and we shall reign on the earth." So the 
 vision proceeds, and from the beginning to the end, 
 through the long conflict, and in the midst of the 
 glorious issue, there is still one title for him who con- 
 quers, and judges, and reigns. It is the Lamb who 
 makes war and overcomes ; and from the wrath of 
 the Lamb, kings and nations flee. It is the Lamb 
 in whose blood his servants also overcome ; in whose 
 blood they have washed their robes ; before whom 
 
 •■' V. 6-1 o. This passage is fundamental, as shewing the ground 
 of the power and the means of the victory, by the intentional con- 
 trast of images. i5 Xt'mi/ mKijo-fi'. . . l&ov apv'wv i>i ea-<payfi4pop. 
 
218 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 they stand in white raiment ; and to whom they 
 ascribe salvation. In the Lamb's Book of Life the 
 names of the saved are written. The Holy City 
 is the bride, the Lamb's wife. The Lord God Al- 
 mighty and the Lamb are the temple of it, and the 
 light of it ; and the river of the water of life flows 
 for ever from the throne of God and the Lamb. In 
 the pecrdiar title, thus studiously employed, and illus- 
 trated by the repeated mention of the slaying and the 
 blood, we read the doctrine, that the gromid of the 
 personal is the ground of the general salvation, that 
 the place, which the sacrifice of the death of Christ 
 holds in the consciousness of the believer, is the 
 same which it also occupies in the history of the 
 Church, and that he conquers for us, and reigns among 
 us, and achieves the restoration of all things, because 
 he has first ofiered himself for us, and is the Lamb 
 of God who takes away the sin of the world. 
 
 No view of the death of Jesus which fuses it with 
 the rest of his example coidd have suggested the 
 title, by which this prophecy so persistently desig- 
 nates the conqueror and the king. 
 
 2. We have here, in the next place, a doctrine of 
 the history of the consummation ; I mean that be- 
 sides a prophetic record of the facts of the history, we 
 have (what is of much higher value) an exposition of 
 the nature of the history. The book is a revelation 
 of the connection between things that are seen and 
 things that are not seen, between things on earth and 
 things in heaven ; a revelation which fuses both into 
 one mighty drama, so that the movements of human 
 
LECTURE VIII. 219 
 
 action and the course of visible fact are half shroud- 
 ed, half disclosed, amid the glory and the terror of 
 the spiritual agencies at work around us, and of the 
 eternal interests which we see involved. We are 
 borne to the courts above, and the temple of God is 
 opened in heaven, and we behold the events on earth 
 as originating in what passes there. There seals are 
 broken, trumj)ets are sounded, and vials are poured 
 ovit, which rule the changes of the Church and of 
 the nations. While we are looking down through 
 the rolling mists on things tjiat pass below, we 
 are all the time before the throne of God and of 
 the Lamb, and among the four and twenty elders, 
 the four living beings, and the innumerable com- 
 pany of angels ; and we hear voices proceeding out 
 of the throne, the cries of disembodied spirits, and 
 hallelujahs that roll through the universe. We see 
 further, that there is cause for this participation of 
 the world above in the events of the world below, 
 for it becomes every moment more plain, that the 
 earth is the battle-field of the kingdoms of light and 
 darkness. There is a far bolder revelation than we 
 have had before of the presence and action of the 
 powers of evil. The old Serpent is on one sMe as 
 the Lamb is on the other, and the same light, which 
 shews the movements of the Head and Redeemer of 
 our race, falls also upon those of the enemy and 
 destroyer. In the sense of this connection between 
 things seen and things not seen, lies the secret of that 
 awe and elevation of mind, which we felt as children 
 Avhen we first turned these pages ; and the assurance 
 
220 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 of it has an ever-increasing value to him, who has 
 painfully sought to test the mingled forms of good 
 and ill, and to discern some plan and purpose in the 
 confused scene around him. 
 
 After noting the instruction given on the cause 
 and the history of the great consummation, I come 
 now to that which is given on its constituent parts, 
 namely, the coming of the Lord, and the attendant 
 facts of victory, judgment, and restoration. 
 
 3. The book is a doctrine of the power and coming 
 of our Lord Jesus Christ. " Behold he cometh 
 with clouds, and every eye shall see him**." That 
 is the first voice, and the keynote of the whole. 
 The Epistles to the seven Churches (symbolical re- 
 presentatives of the whole Church in its various 
 conditions) all take their tone from this thought, and 
 are the voice of a Lord who will " come quickly." 
 The visions which follow draw to the same end, 
 and the last voices of the book respond to the first, 
 and attest its subject and its pui'pose. " He which 
 testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. 
 Amen. Even so come. Lord Jesus «." Whatever 
 else the christian desires is bound up in this pros- 
 pect. • The deliverance of the creation from its present 
 groans and travail, the redemption of our body, the 
 perfection of man in a holy community, and the 
 realisation in ovitward things of the tendencies of 
 the renewed nature, all these hopes wait on the 
 one hope of " Ms appearing." Towards that hope 
 our eyes have been steadily directed in the former 
 
 '' Ut'v. i. 7. c Ibid. xxii. 20. 
 
LECTURE VIII. 221 
 
 apostolic writings ; but it is here presented, not so 
 mucli in relation to our personal life, as to the 
 kingdom of God and to the world itself upon the 
 whole. It appears here as the a-wTeXela toO alUvo';, 
 towards which all things tend, and which the fuller 
 manifestation of evil and the seeming victories of 
 the enemy are themselves ordained to prepare. 
 Differences and uncertainties of interpretation as to 
 the details of this progressive history still leave us 
 under the sense, that it is a history of the power 
 and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. This as- 
 surance, enjoyed at all times, grows clearer in the 
 days of trouble, rebuke, and blasphemy, and the 
 darkest times which the prophecy forebodes will be 
 those in which its fullest uses will be found. 
 
 4. The doctrine of the coming is in itself a doc- 
 trine of victory ; and that character pre-eminently 
 belongs to the apocalyptic teaching. " In the world 
 ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, 
 I have overcome the world." These were the last 
 words of the Lord's last discourse ; and ever after 
 we feel their power in the actions, the bearing, and 
 the words of his servants. They wrestle against 
 the world, and principalities, and powers, but as 
 men who are upon the conquering side, and who 
 know that their Lord has already overcome these 
 enemies, and triumphed over them in his cross. 
 Therefore they also " are more than conquerors 
 through him that loved them'^'," and they record 
 their conviction, that " whatsoever is born of God 
 '' Rom. viii. 37. 
 
222 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 overcometh the world ; and that this is the victory 
 that overcometh the world, even our faith "5." In the 
 Apocalypse this spirit is still more distinctly felt ; 
 for there the vu'tual victory becomes a visible vic- 
 tory, both for the Lord and for his people. Every 
 promise in the seven Epistles is addressed " to him 
 that overcometh ;" and the last Epistle unites the 
 victory of the servant with the victory of the Lord : 
 " To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with 
 me on my throne ; even as I also overcame, and am 
 set down with my Father on his throne f." When 
 the prophetic visions are to commence, the opening 
 of the book is represented as the result of victory p. 
 The first vision presents one who " goes forth con- 
 quering and to conquer ;" and then, through all the 
 changes of the conflict, we have the anticipations 
 and presages of final victory. We are told of those 
 who " overcome by the blood of the Lamb^ ;" we 
 hear their shout of triumph, and see the palms in 
 their hands ; until in the last crisis the conquering 
 annies of heaven sweep into sight, following the 
 victor who has " on his vesture and on his thigh a 
 name written. King of Kings and Lord of Lords'." 
 
 5. But victoiy for one side is overthrow and con- 
 demnation for the other ; so that we have here also 
 
 e I John V. 4. ^ Rev. iii. 21. 
 
 ^ Key. V. 5. Ihov ivlKr)(Tev 6 \ftx)V 6 &v €K Tjjs (J}v\t}s 'lovda difol^at 
 TO fii^'Klov. The variety of llie words employed in the Authorized 
 Version (overcome, prevail, conquer, victory) to represent the one 
 word in the Greek, has the effect of diminishing the impression which 
 this feature in the language would otherwise make on the reader. 
 
 ^ Rev. xii. ij. ' Ibid. xix. 11-16. 
 
LECTURE VIII. 223 
 
 a doctrine of judgment. " The prince of this world 
 is judged." That saying might stand as the sum- 
 mary of a large part of the book. He is judged — 
 judged as the prince of this world — and this world 
 is involved in his jiidgment. The reality of some 
 possession of this world by the Power of evil, and 
 the certainty of its judicial consequences to him and 
 to it, had been revealed with increasing distinct- 
 ness through the former writings ; till in two of 
 the last Epistles the " terrible voice of most just 
 judgment" had swelled into the full tones, to which 
 our ears had been accustomed in Old Testament 
 prophecy. I need not recall by particular citations 
 the manner in wliich this line of teaching is carried 
 out in the Apocalypse, the various forms of strong 
 development in which the Power of evil is repre- 
 sented as appearing, .or the plagnies, and punishment, 
 and final overthrow, which are its portion from the 
 Lord. The opening proclamation of the coming 
 notifies also its effect on the world : " Every eye 
 shall see him, and they also which pierced him, 
 and all kindreds of the earth shall wall because of 
 him'^." And these sounds continue. Things do not 
 melt quietly into the peace of the kingdom of God. 
 There is a crash of ruin, and a winepress of the 
 wrath of Almighty God, and a lake that burns with 
 fire and brimstone. And this judgment falls, not 
 only on principles and powers of evil, but on nations 
 of men ; and not only on nations, but on separate 
 persons, even on " every one who is not found 
 
 k Rev. i. 7. 
 
224 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 written in the book of life." He who does not 
 accept the reality of the world's rebellion and ruin, 
 and of the wrath and judgment which it brings, 
 must certainly reject this whole book from the 
 canon ; and, with it, must tear away large and 
 living portions of every preceding book of Scripture . 
 
 6. The features of apocalyptic teaching, which have 
 now been noticed, may serve as instances of tlie 
 whole character of the doctrine, which is combined 
 with its predictions ; and which, as a doctrine of 
 consummation, is an evident advance, in that par- 
 ticular direction, on tlie doctrine of the Epistles. 
 But it is when the prophecy carries us beyond the 
 great crisis, that this advance is most clearly seen. 
 The coming of the Lord is not the last thing wliich 
 we laaow. After that event has closed the present 
 age, after the victory has been won, and the judg- 
 ment has dealt with things that are past, the final 
 results appear, and the true life of man begins. The 
 doctrine of the book is ultimately and pre-eminently 
 one of restoration. 
 
 " I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the 
 first heaven and the first earth were passed away, 
 and there was no more sea. And I John saw 
 the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from 
 God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned 
 for her husband." In taking these words for my 
 text I placed myself at the point where the whole 
 teaching of Scripture culminates. Here, at the last 
 stej), we have a definite and satisfactory completion 
 of the former doctrine of tlie future. There is to 
 
LECTURE VIII. 22.3 
 
 be a perfect humanity ; not only perfect individually, 
 but perfect in society. There is to be a city of God. 
 " The Holy City !" — there is the realisation of the 
 true tendencies of man. " New Jerusalem !" — there 
 is the fulfilment of the ancient promises of God. 
 
 Dwell for a moment on the word "city," under 
 the remembrance of what it was to those in whose 
 language the book is written. The city is a con- 
 stitution of society complete in its own local habita- 
 tion ; the visible collection of buildings being a 
 symbol of the organised life within. It is the most 
 perfect reahsation, and the most convenient repre- 
 sentation, of society in its maturity ; in which the 
 variovis relations of men are so combined, as to 
 promote the welfare of the several members, and 
 secure the unity of a common life to the whole. 
 " It is " (as has been said) " the perfecting of the 
 self-provisions of Nature, and the condition of the 
 highest well-being of man." 
 
 There is no need to tell how poorly this idea has 
 been realised in fact, nor are the causes of the failure 
 remote from view. In this fallen world all com- 
 munities have grown up under hard external con- 
 ditions, and with a deep internal disease, sustaining 
 all sorts of shocks and wounds, and often developing 
 what vigour they possess in forms of violence and 
 oppression. History is the record of human society. 
 There we see 
 
 " The giant forms (if empires on their way 
 To ruin : one by one 
 They tower, and they arc gone :" 
 
22(3 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 leaving materials to be combined again, that they 
 may be again dissolved, and forces which renew 
 their eternal struggle at the same time to construct 
 and to destroy. Ever since Cain went forth and 
 builded the first city, the long experiment has con- 
 tinued ; and he who surveys the results, in the 
 communities which have filled, and now fill, the 
 habitable world, will return from his inspection 
 wearied and disheartened, and little able to anti- 
 cipate the perfection of man from the progi'ess of 
 society and the education of the world. 
 
 And yet human nature is to find the realisation 
 of its tendencies and the fulfilment of its hopes. 
 The Bible opens the prospect of which history had 
 led us to despair. It is one long account of the 
 preparation of the city of God. That is one distinct 
 point of view from which the Bible ought to be 
 regarded, and one from which its contents will appear 
 in clearer light. We are accustomed in the present 
 day to read it too exclusively from the individual 
 point of view, as the record for each man of that 
 will of God and that way of salvation with which 
 he is personally concerned. This it is, but it is more 
 than this. It places before us the restoration, not 
 only of the personal, but of the social life ; the 
 creation, not only of the man of God, but of the 
 city of God ; and it presents the society or city, 
 not as a. mere name for the congregation of indi- 
 vidvials, but as having a being and life of its own, 
 in which the Lord finds his satisfaction and man his 
 perfection. The " Jerusalem which is above" is, in 
 
LECTURE VIII. 227 
 
 relation to the Lord, " the Bride, the Lamb's Wife'," 
 and, in relation to man, it is "the Mother of us all™." 
 In its appearance the revealed coiu'se of redemption 
 culminates, and the history of man is closed : and 
 thus the last chapters of the Bible declare the unity 
 of the whole book, by completing the design which 
 has been developed in its pages, and disclosing the 
 result to which all preceding steps have tended". 
 Take from the Bible the final vision of the heavenly 
 Jerusalem, and what will have been losti Not 
 merely a single passage, a sublime description, an 
 important revelation ; but a conclusion by which all 
 that went before is interpreted and justified. We 
 shall have an unfinished plan, ia which human capa- 
 cities have not found their full realisation, or divine 
 preparations their adequate result. To the mind that 
 looks beyond individual life, or that understands what 
 is necessary to the perfection of individual life, a 
 Bible that did not end by building for us a city 
 of God would appear to leave much in man un- 
 provided for, and much in itself unaccounted for. 
 But as it is, neither of these deficiences exists. The 
 great consummation is there, and we are instructed to 
 observe, that, from the first, the desires of men and 
 the preparations of God have been alike directed 
 towards it. 
 
 *1 Rev. xxi. 9. ™ Gal. iv. 26. 
 
 ^ Ila(Ta7ro\is <f>v<Tei €0-t\Vj e'liTep Kal al irpioraL KotvoiifLai' reXos yo.p avTi] 
 
 (Kfivav' 17 Be <f>v<ns reXos iariv oXov yap CKatTTOv i<TTi ttjs yeviaeas 
 
 TeKfdBelwqs, ravrriv <j>a)i€v rfjv <^vcnv elvai exdorou. . . Ka\ wpoTfpov 8^ Trj 
 
 (jivtTfi TToXts rj CKafTTOs r)pa}V cart, to yap oKov irporepov avayKcuov 
 
 elvai Tov itepovs. — Aristot. Polit. lib. i. ch. i. Most true principles 
 of the true history of man ! 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 At the beginning of the sacred story, the Father 
 of the faithful comes forth into view, followed by 
 those who are heirs with him of the same promise ; 
 and they separate themselves to the life of strangers, 
 because they are "looking for a city which hath 
 foundations, whose builder and maker is God"." In 
 due time sohd pledges of the divine purpose follow. 
 We behold a pecuhar people, a divinely-lramed pohty, 
 a holy city, a house of God. It is a wonderful spec- 
 tacle — this system of earthly types, thus consecrated 
 and glorified by miraculous interventions and inspired 
 panegyrics. Do we look on the fulfilment of patri- 
 archal hopes, or on the types of their fulfilment 1 on 
 the final form of human society, or on the figures of 
 the true \ The answer was given by Prophets and 
 Psalmists, and then by the word of the Gospel, finally 
 by the hand of God, which swept the whole system 
 from the earth. It was gone when the words of the 
 text were written, and when the closing scene of the 
 Bible presented the new Jerusalem, not as the resto- 
 ration, but as the antitype of the old. 
 
 This vision teaches us, that the drama of the world 
 must be finished, and its dispensation closed, that the 
 Lord must have come, the dead have been raised, the 
 judgment have sat, the heavens and the earth which 
 are now have passed away, and the new creation have 
 appeared, before the chosen people shall see the city 
 of their habitation. 
 
 Meantime it is the day of preparation. The builder 
 nf the eternal city first "prepares his work without, 
 o Heb. xi. 10. 
 
LECTURE Vni. 229 
 
 and makes it fit for himself in the field, and after- 
 wards builds his house p." There was much to be 
 done, and it takes long to do it. The members of the 
 intended society must be sorted and collected out of 
 the mass of mankind. They must also be tested and 
 trained. The very grounds on which the future work 
 is to rest must themselves be laid. The perfect so- 
 ciety is to be founded on men s relations to God, and 
 is to be compacted by their relations to each other. 
 The true relations were destroyed by sin, and it was 
 necessary that they should be constituted afresh. 
 This is done in Jesus Christ. 
 
 Propitiation and atonement, reconciliation and re- 
 demption, are words which express the restoration of 
 the broken relations with God, as accomphshed by 
 the work of the Mediator. Those who receive Christ 
 Jesus the Lord are thereby in a state of grace. Sin 
 no longer divides and estranges them from God. He 
 has returned to them, and they to him. They have 
 fellowship with the Father and with the Son by the 
 Holy Ghost. God dwells in them, and they in him. 
 Thus in each separate soul are beforehand established 
 those relations with God in Christ, which shall here- 
 after glorify the community of the saints, in the day 
 when " the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be 
 in it," and " God himself shall be with them and be 
 their God." 
 
 To the reconstitution of men's relations to God must 
 also be added that of their relations to each other. 
 To what an extent these have suffered from the fall 
 
 p Prov. xxiv. 27. 
 
230 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 of man a glance at the history of the world or at any 
 section of society is sufficient to convince us. Not 
 only the violations, but the very institutions of law 
 and justice testify to the fact ; for the law is not made 
 for a righteous man. The inherent vice of human 
 society lies in the depravity of human nature. If 
 that were healed, and transmuted into universal 
 righteousness and love, the internal happiness and 
 perfection would be secured. And they are to be 
 secured in that city, where "the people shall be all 
 righteous^'," and where love shall never fail. To the 
 formation of those habits of mind the teaching of God 
 is now visibly directed, and men are trained, on the 
 grounds and motives of the Gospel, to love one 
 another. Love is ever represented as " the end of the 
 commandment," the highest attainment of man, the 
 completion of his education by God. And no wonder 
 it is so represented, since the present prepares the 
 future, and that future is to be a state of society — " a 
 city which is compact together''." The Gospel then, 
 which lays in the hearts of those who receive it the 
 deepest grounds of fellowship, and educates them to 
 the habit of love, is visibly preparing the conditions 
 of the things to come. As if to signahse this con- 
 nection of the present work and the future promise 
 of the Gospel, it is committed to the last Apostle, 
 who closes the Holy Scripture, both to be our chief 
 teacher in the love of the brethren, and to open to 
 our eyes the scene in which it shall be perfected. 
 Thus does the present world give scope for the 
 
 q Isa. Ix. 2 1. r Ps, cxxii. ?. 
 
LECTURE VIII. 231 
 
 preparation of the city of God. Its fundamental 
 principles are being established, its members gathered, 
 trained, and made ready. At the same time all moral 
 tendencies are being wrought out by conflict and ex- 
 perience ; and the vanity of what is vain and the 
 evil of what is evil have space to shew themselves, 
 before the final fires and the eternal judgment remove 
 them for ever from the scene. Then, when Babylon 
 has fallen, the city of God will appear. 
 
 Its fabric and scenery are described in symbolic 
 language glowing with all precious and glorious 
 things ; nor do we desire an interpreter who will 
 teU us what the symbols severally represent, in the 
 future details of the glorified society. Perhaps such 
 an attempt would impair, rather than enhance, the 
 effect of the vision, which now kindles the imagina- 
 tion of expectant faith by the entire assemblage of 
 its glories. I only dwell upon the fact that it is 
 a city which stands before us, as the final home 
 of mankind. If we think only of our individual 
 portion, we miss the completeness of Scripture in its 
 provision for the completeness of man. If individual 
 blessedness were the highest thought of humanity, 
 it mio-ht have been sufficient to have restored the 
 lost garden of Eden, and to have left the inhabitants 
 of the new earth to dwell safely in its wildernesses 
 and sleep in its woods ^ Such dreams of human 
 happiness have haunted the minds of men, who have 
 been wearied with the disorders, corruptions, and 
 miseries of society, till society in itself has seemed 
 
 8 Ezek. xxxiv. 25. 
 
232 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 to them a standing liindrance to perfection, and almost 
 necessarily an organism of evil. Thus the habit of 
 mind which tlies from man to nature, and desires un- 
 constrained freedom, and would simplify to the utmost 
 all social relations, has ever loved to depict a heaven 
 of fields and bowers, and to ask for the life of the first 
 Paradise again. It is worthy of remark that the re- 
 ligions of the world have, for the most part, confessed 
 in this way their despair of hvunan society, and im- 
 consciously acknowledged that in their scheme of 
 things the true foundations of it were wanting. 
 
 Not so does the revelation of God inform the .ex- 
 pectations of those who receive it. Other systems 
 evade the demands of the highest tendencies of man : 
 this provides that they shall be realised. It decrees 
 not only the individual happiness, but the corporate 
 perfection of man ; and closes the book of its prophecy 
 by assuring the children of the living God, that " h 
 hath prepared for them a city" 
 
 The survey which has been made in these Lectures 
 has now carried us from the beginning to the end of 
 the New Testament, from the cradle of Bethlehem to 
 the city of God. We have seen that this collection 
 of various and occasional writings presents to us a 
 gradually progressive scheme, fuUy wrought out in 
 its several stages, and advancing in a natural order of 
 succession. 
 
 First a person is manifested and facts are set forth, 
 in the simplest external aspect, under the clearest 
 light, and with the concvirrence of a fourfold witness. 
 
 e 
 
LECTURE VIII. 233 
 
 This witness also is itself progressive, and in the last 
 gospel the glory of the person has grown more bright, 
 and the meaning of the facts more clear. 
 
 Then, in the Book of Acts, Christ is preached as 
 perfected, and as the refuge and life of the world. 
 The results of his appearing are summed up and 
 settled ; and men are called to believe and be saved. 
 Those who do so find themselves in new relations to 
 each other ; they become one body, and grow into the 
 form and life of a Catholic Church. 
 
 The state which has thus been entered needs to 
 be expounded, and the life which has been begun 
 needs to be educated. The ApostoHc letters perform 
 the work. The questions which universally follow 
 the first submissions of the mind receive their 
 answers, and so tEe faith which was general grows 
 definite. The rising exigencies of the new life are 
 met, both for the man and for the Church : and we 
 learn what is the happy consciousness, and what the 
 holy conversation, which belong to those who are "m 
 Christ Jesus." 
 
 Lastly, as members of the body of Christ, we find 
 ourselves partakers in a corporate life and a history 
 larger than our own. We feel that we are taken up 
 into a scheme of things, which is in conflict with the 
 present, and which cannot realise itself here. There- 
 fore our final teaching is by prophecy, which shews 
 us, not how we are personally saved and victorious, 
 but how the battle goes upon the whole ; and which 
 issues in the appearance of a holy city, in which re- 
 demption reaches its end, and the Redeemer finds his 
 
234 LECTURE VIII. 
 
 joy; in which human tendencies are realised, and 
 divine promises fulfilled ; in which the ideal has be- 
 come the actual, and man is perfected in the presence 
 and glory of God. 
 
 If this doctrine is not of the world, every step that 
 it takes in advance must make that fact more plain. 
 The world feels that it is so. The manifestation of 
 Christ it wiU admire and interpret for itself. The 
 preaching of Christ it can hear and accept in its 
 generahty. The life in Christ through the Spirit 
 it cannot receive. The kingdom of Christ in its anta- 
 gonism to itself it cannot suffer. Yes, the world is 
 right. In following the advancing line of doctrine 
 in the Scriptures, we diverge further and further 
 from its paths and habits of thought. But is 
 that a subject of regret 1 What has been the 
 progress of doctrine achieved by the spirit which 
 is of the world 1 Into what can it ever lead our 
 souls ? Into vague desires to which nothing corre- 
 sponds, into great ideas wliich remain ideas stni, into 
 uncertainty and perplexity, into vanity and vexation 
 of spirit. Only the written word of God, confidingly 
 followed in the progressive steps of its advance, can 
 lead the weakest or the wisest into the deep blessed- 
 ness of the hfe that is in Christ, and into the final 
 glory of the city of God. 
 
 Perhaps in some minds this needful confidence may 
 be strengthened, by a review of the books of the 
 New Testament in the light in which they have now 
 been placed. When it is felt that these narratives, 
 letters, and visions do in fact fulfil the several func- 
 
LECTURE VIII. 235 
 
 tions, and sustain the mutual relations, which would 
 belong to the parts of one design, coalescing into a 
 doctrinal scheme, which is orderly, progressive, and 
 complete, then is the mind of the reader in conscious 
 contact with the mind of God ; then the superficial 
 diversity of the parts is lost in the essential unity of 
 the whole : the many writings have become one 
 Book ; the many writers have become one Author. 
 From the position of students, who address them- 
 selves with critical interest to the works of Matthew, 
 of Patil, or of John, we have risen to the higher 
 level of behevers, who open with holy joy " the 
 New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ," and, while we receive from his own hand 
 the book of life eternal, we hear him saying still, 
 " I have given unto them the words which thou 
 gavest me." 
 
NOTES. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 NOTE I. Pkepacb. 
 
 X OR the customary order of the books of the New Testament 
 in ancient times we may refer to Manuscripts, Catalogues, 
 and Old Versions. 
 
 The testimony of Manuscripts will be at once exhibited 
 and certified by the following extract from Mr. Scrivener's 
 Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament. 
 
 " It is right to bear in mind that comparatively few copies 
 of the whole [Greek] New Testament remain j the usual 
 practice being to write the four Gospels in one volume, the 
 Acts and Epistles in another : manuscripts of the Apocalypse, 
 which was little used for public worship, being much rarer 
 than those of the other books. Occasionally the Gospels, 
 Acts, and Epistles form a single volume ; sometimes the 
 
 Apocalypse is added to other books The Codex 
 
 Sinaiticus of Tischendorf is the more precious, that it happily 
 exhibits the whole New Testament complete : so would the 
 Codices Alexandrinus and Ephraemi, but that they are sadly 
 mutilated. No other uncial copies have this advantage, and 
 very few cursives. In England, only four such are known. 
 .... Besides these Scholz enumerates only nineteen foreign 
 copies of the whole New Testament ; but twenty-seven in all 
 out of the whole mass of extant documents. 
 
 " Whether copies contain the whole or a part of the sacred 
 volume, the general order of the books is the following : Gospels, 
 
240 NOTE I. [Preface. 
 
 Acts, Catholic Epistles, Pauline E2nstles, Apocalypse. A soli- 
 tary manuscript of the fifteenth century (Venet. lo. Evan. 
 309) places the Gospels between the Pauline Epistles and 
 the Apocalypse : in the Codices Sinaiticus, Leicestrensis, 
 Fabri (Evan. 90), and MontfortianuSj as in the Bodleian 
 Canonici 34, the Pauline Epistles precede the Actsj the 
 Codes Basiliensis (No. 4 of the Epistles) ^ and Lambeth 1182^ 
 7183^ have the Pauline Epistles immediately after the Acts 
 and before the Catholic EpistleS; as in our present Bibles ; 
 Scholz's Evan. 368 stands thus, St. John''s Gospel, Apoca- 
 lypse, then all the Epistles ; in Havniens. I. No. 334 of the 
 Gospels (A.D. 1378), the order appears to be. Acts, Pau- 
 line Epistles, Catholic Epistles, Gospels ; in Basil. B. vi. 37 
 or Cod. I, the Gospels now follow the Acts and the Epistles ; 
 while in Evan. 51 the hinder has set the Gospels last; these 
 however are mere accidental exceptions to the prevailing rule. 
 The four Gospels are almost invariably found in their familiar 
 order, although in the Codex Bezse they stand, Matthew, 
 John, Luke, Mark; in the Codex Monaeensis (X), John, 
 Luke, Matthew, Mark; in the Curetonian Syriac version, 
 Matthew, Mark, John, Luke. In the Pauline Epistles, that 
 to the Hebrews precedes the four Pastoral Epistles, and 
 immediately follows the second to the Thessalonians in the 
 four great Codices, Sinaiticus, Alexandrinus, Vaticanus, and 
 Ephraem : in the copy from which the Cod. Vatican, was 
 taken, the Hebrews followed the Galatians. The Codex 
 Claromontanus, the document next in importance to these 
 four, sets the Colossians appropriately enough next to its 
 kindred and contemporaneous Epistle to the Ephesians, but 
 postpones that to the Hebrews to Philemon, as in our present 
 Bibles ; an arrangement which at first, no doubt, originated 
 in the early scruples prevailing in the western church with 
 respect to the authorship and canonical authority of that 
 divine epistle ^." 
 
 From extant Mannscripits I turn to the earliest Catalogues 
 of the sacred books which occur in the writings of Christian 
 
 * Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament, pp. 60-62. 
 
PuEFACE.] NOTE I. 241 
 
 antiquity, and these, perliaps, are more real indications of 
 habit in the Church than particular manuscripts can be. It 
 will only be necessary to advert to a few of the most im- 
 portant of these Catalogues, and in so doing I refer the 
 reader to the Kev. B. F. Westeott-'s History of the Canon of 
 the New Testament, or his shorter and more popular volume. 
 The Bible in the Church, books which deal with a subject 
 lying close to the foundations of our faith, in a spirit not less 
 i-everential than critical, and which place within the reach of 
 ordinary readers, an exact, lucid, and succinct account of a 
 history which was before the propertj' of the learned. 
 
 The Muratorian Fragment, " of which the date may be 
 fixed with tolerable certainty, A. D. 160-170," and which "may 
 be regarded on the whole as a summarj^ of the opinion of the 
 Western Church on the canon shortly after the middle of 
 the second century, commences with the last words of a sen- 
 tence which evidently referred to the Gospel of St. Mark :" 
 the Gospel of St. Luke is then expressly mentioned as " the 
 third," and the Gospel of St. John as "the fourth." The 
 Book of Acts is mentioned next, and then thirteen Epistles of 
 St. Paul, enumerated in the following order: — Corinthians I, 
 II, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Galatians, Thessalonians 
 I, II, Romans, epistles (it is observed) written (like those in 
 the Apocalypse) to seven churches ; then Philemon, Titus, 
 Timothy I, II. After observations on these books, the 
 Fragment diverges to spurious or disputed books, and the 
 assertion that the Epistle of Jude and two Epistles of John 
 are reckoned among the Catholic (Epistles) is the only 
 notice of the remaining books which its corrupt and ap- 
 parently mutilated state has left. 
 
 The Catalogue given by Eusebius (H. E. iii. 25), c. A.D. 
 340, claims a special importance on account of his having 
 been employed by Constantine to prepare the first edition of 
 the Bible which had the seal of a central or sovereign autho- 
 rity. The order is the same as our own, except in as far as it 
 appears disarranged by the principle on which the catalogue 
 is formed, namely, that of distinguishing the acknowledged 
 from the controverted books. 
 
242 NOTE I. [PiiEFACE. 
 
 " First, then, we i)lace the holy quaternion of the Gospels, 
 which are followed liy the account of the Acts of the Apostles. 
 After this we must reckon the Epistles of St. Paul ; and next 
 to them we must maintain as genuine the Epistle circulated 
 as the former of John, and in like manner that of Peter. In 
 addition to these books, if possibly such a view seem correct, 
 we must place the Revelation of John, the judgments on 
 which we shall set forth in due course, and these are regarded 
 as generally received. Among the controverted books, which 
 are nevertheless well known and recognised by most, we class 
 the Epistle circulated under the name of James, and that of 
 Jude, as well as the Second of Peter, and the so-called Second 
 and Third of John, whether they really belong to that Evan- 
 gelist or possibly to another of the same name '°." 
 
 The Catalogue of Athanasius (Ep. Alex. 326), A.D. 373, 
 given in a style of authoritative decision, is as follows : — 
 " The Books of the New Testament are these, — Four Gospels, 
 according to Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. Then after these, 
 the Acts of the Apostles, and the so-called Catholic Epistles 
 of Apostles, seven in number ; thus, of James, one ; of Peter, 
 two; of John, three; and after these, of Jude, one. In 
 addition to these there are fourteen Epistles of the Apostle 
 Paul, in their order written thus ; Romans, Corinthians I, II, 
 Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians I, 
 II, and that to the Hel)rews ; and in succession, Timothy 
 I, II, Titus, Philemon ; and again the Apocalypse of John '^." 
 
 The testimonies of Eusebius and Athanasius are in eifeet 
 those of the Greek and Alexandrine Churches. One other 
 list promulgated a few years later (A.D. 397) by the voice 
 of a whole province, is on that account worthy to be specified, 
 since it is the first (certain] synodical decision on the canon 
 of Scripture. It is found in the proceedings of the third 
 Council of Carthage, at which Augustine was present. The 
 order is as follows : — " Four books of the Gospels, one book 
 of the Acts of the Apostles, thirteen Epistles of the Apostle 
 Paul, one Epistle of the same to the Hebrews, two Epistles of 
 the apostle Peter, three of John, one of James, one of Jude, 
 
 '> History of Canon, 4S1-2, c Ibid. 574. 
 
Preface.] NOTE I. 243 
 
 one book of the Apocalypse of John '^ ;" precisely cor- 
 responding to our own order, except in the place given 
 to the Epistle of James. Lastly, as the best witness of 
 Italian custom we may take the Catalogue of Ruffinus (c. A. D. 
 410), in which the order is identical with that of the decree 
 of Carthage, and therefore with our own, save that the 
 Catholic Epistles stand as follows : — " Two of the apostle 
 Peter ; one of James, the Lord^s brother and apostle ; one of 
 Jude ; three of John." 
 
 But perhaps the most important evidence to the custom 
 of the Church is not that of manuscripts or catalogues, but 
 rather that of the two venerable versions of Syria and North 
 Africa^ which are almost coeval with the first general recog- 
 nition of a collected New Testament. The Peshito was popu- 
 larly and practically the Bible of the Syrian Church. The 
 Old Latin was, as it were, the parent of the Vulgate, which 
 became the common Bible of the West. The order of the 
 Peshito is the same as that of the best Greek manuscripts, 
 the four Gospels, the Acts, the Catholic Epistles (i. e. those 
 which it admitted), the Epistles of St. Paul (the Apocalypse 
 being absent) . The order of the Vulgate is that which our 
 modern Bibles exhibit; the Old Latin order of the Gospels, 
 Matthew, John, Mark, and Luke (which was ruled no doubt 
 by the apostolic rank of the authors), being changed by 
 Jerome in accordance with the Greek order, which was 
 derived not merely from chronological considerations, but 
 from a finer doctrinal instinct. 
 
 This glance at the various testimonies which survive, of 
 the ancient custom of the Church, is sufficient to shew that the 
 order with which we are familiar has substantially prevailed 
 from the first recognition of the separate books as forming 
 one collection or instrument. The great divisions, the Gos- 
 pels, the Acts, the Epistles, and the Apocalypse, occur 
 habitually in their natural order, and though there are many 
 variations (most frequently in regard to the position of the 
 Acts), yet they are exceptions to the genei-al rule. The 
 books which compose these several divisions likewise assume 
 
 <1 History of Canon, 509. 
 R 3 
 
244 NOTE 1. [Preface. 
 
 habitually the same arrangement as at present. It is so with 
 the four Gospels, and with the Pauline Epistles, the order of 
 which is seldom varied except in respect of the place given to 
 the Hebrews. The only important variation, which obtains 
 extensively, is in the relative positions of the Pauline and 
 Catholic Epistles. The Manuscripts for the most part place 
 the Catholic Epistles next to the Acts, and before the Pauline 
 Epistles. In the Catalogues the opposite order is more fre- 
 quent, and becomes increasingly so the farther we advance. 
 Of five-and-twenty Catalogues which are collected in the 
 Appendix to Mr. Westcott^s History of the Canon, ranging 
 from c. A.D. 170 to A.D. 636, I find that seven give the first 
 place to the Catholic, and eighteen to the Pauline Epistles. 
 
 This last point is one of minor importance, yet as connected 
 with the conformation of the New Testament it has its 
 interest; and as some little stress is laid upon it in one of 
 these Lectures (the Vlth), it may be well to point out the 
 following reasons for the greater fitness of the arrangement 
 which has upon the whole prevailed. 
 
 1. There is the closest possible relation between the Book 
 of Acts and St. PauPs Epistles, the latter part of the Book 
 forming as it were the historical introduction to his writings, 
 so that we pass from one to the other by a natural — it might 
 almost seem a necessary — transition. 
 
 2. The unity and mass of St. Paulas writings properly 
 claim for them precedence over the fewer, shorter, and less 
 connected writings. 
 
 3. The course of doctrinal instruction pleads for the same 
 arrangement, in order that the more thorough and systematic 
 treatment of fundamental subjects may precede that which is 
 more supplementary. 
 
 4. In the heart of the Catholic Epistles there is a note 
 which seems to appoint their position, namely, in the reference 
 (2 Pet. iii. 15, 16) to St. Paul's writings as previously known, 
 and in the express intimation of an intention to confirm their 
 doctrine. 
 
 These considerations obviously outweigh the one reason 
 for the opposite order, which is found in the relative historical 
 
Lect. I.] NOTE II. 245 
 
 positions of the authors, and which, taken by itself, would 
 certainly postpone the productions of the later Apostle, born 
 out of due time, to those which bear the names of chief 
 members of the original college. 
 
 NOTE II. Lecture I. p. 17. 
 
 In his recently published Apologia, Dr. Newman has shewn 
 into what form he has found it necessary to recast his doctrine 
 of Development, though the subject is touched in a shy and 
 uneasy manner. 
 
 " It (i.e. the Infallible Power which imposes doctrine) must 
 ever profess to be guided by Scripture and tradition. It must 
 refer to the particular Apostolic truth which it is enforcing or 
 (what is called) defining. Nothing, then, can be presented to 
 me in time to come as part of the faith, but what I ought 
 already to have received, and have not actually received, (if 
 not) merely because it had not been told me. ... It 
 must be what I may even have guessed or wished to be in- 
 cluded in the Apostolic revelation Perhaps I and 
 
 others actually have always believed it, and the only question 
 which is now decided in my behalf is that I am henceforth 
 to believe that I am only holding what the Apostles held 
 before me'^." 
 
 These statements are then expressly applied to "the doc- 
 trine which Protestants consider our greatest difficulty, that of 
 the Immaculate Conception ;" and, after assuring us that the 
 imposition of this doctrine is no burden to himself or others, 
 and that he " sincerely thinks that St. Bernard and St. Thomas, 
 who scrupled at it in their day, had they lived into this would 
 have rejoiced to accept it for its own sake," he adds the remark 
 that " the number of those (so-called) new doctrines will not 
 oppress us, if it takes eight centuries to promulgate even one 
 of them. Such is about the length of time through which the 
 preparation has been carried on for the definition of the Imma- 
 culate Conception <^." 
 
 ■1 Part vii. p. 393. " V- .^96- 
 
246 NOTE II. [Lect. 
 
 These expressions occur incidentally while the author is 
 shewing that " the (so-called) new doctrines " are " no 
 burden" to priests under the Roman obedience, which of 
 course is true, if the doctrines be such as they " have guessed 
 and wished to be included in the Apostolic revelation/^ But 
 the expressions themselves are remarkable as shewing how 
 awkwardlj' Dr. Newman^s own doctrine of Development has 
 assumed the garb and style of his Church's doctrine of Tradi- 
 tion ; his true account of a development which historically took 
 place veiling itself, as by command, under its fiction of a tra- 
 dition which did not reallj' exist. 
 
 A doctrine is for the first time promulgated by the Infallible 
 Authority, and imposed as an article of the faith. " The pre- 
 paration for it has been carried on for eight hundred years." 
 Eight hundred years ago is the most distant point at which 
 any " j^jreparation " for it can be discerned, that " preparation ■" 
 being found in the first suggestion of the opinion, and in the 
 rejection of it by the leading authorities of the time as new 
 and false ; but as time goes on it gains influence and acceptance. 
 It is acknowledged, then, that iti the thousand' years preceding 
 it loas not even in jjrejja ration, that there is no trace of it what- 
 ever until its mediaeval dawn. According to the doctrine of 
 Development, the infallible authority would decree its truth as 
 having been gradually wrought out during those eight hundred 
 years, and at last adequately recognised by the instinct of the 
 Church. According to the doctrine of Tradition, it must 
 decree the truth of the opinion on the ground of its having 
 been a part of the original revelation handed down from the 
 beginning. In the one case it would affirm that the doctrine 
 loould have been held by the Apostles if they had known of it. 
 In the other ease it must affirm that the doctrine loas made 
 known to the Apostles and that they did hold it. To this 
 latter theory Dr. Newman has now seen it necessary to con- 
 form his language. " The onl?/ question notv decided is that 
 he is holding what the Apostles held before him." The Infallible 
 Authority is thus recognised, not as deciding on the truth of an 
 opinion, but as certifying a fact , i.e. that the Apostles held 
 such and such an opinion as part of the revelation given to 
 
I.] NOTE II. 247 
 
 them. If no evidence of this fact survives^ if no tradition has 
 handed it down, if the doctrine is one vvliich only heyan to be 
 prepared eight hundred years ago, it is evident that the Infal- 
 lible Authority can only have known the fact which it certifies 
 by a direct revelation. 
 
 To one who considers the exigencies of the Romish position 
 so glaringly exemplified in connection with the doctrine here 
 alluded to, it must appear that this issue of an attempt to 
 provide for those exigencies, by a theiiry in some measure 
 accordant with facts, is the strongest testimony to the inera- 
 dicable sense of Christendom, that the divine communication 
 of truth was limited to the Apostolic age. 
 
 The method of the perpetuation and transmission of the 
 truths then communicated is of course an entirely separate 
 question. But whether that question l)e determined as it is 
 by Rome, or as it is by us, the kind of development of doctrine 
 which legitimately belongs to the Church must be, on either 
 hypothesis, theoretically the same. It must consist in a fuller 
 and more systematic apprehension of the truths which were 
 communicated at first, not in the addition of truths communi- 
 cated afterwards. Practically, the Cluuvh of Rome has acted 
 (as Dr. Newman so distinctly felt) on the latter, and not on 
 the former, of these principles : first adding new doctrines on 
 the most flimsy pretences of a tradition, and then superadding 
 one for which not the slenderest thread of a tradition could 
 be shewn. 
 
U8 
 
 NOTE III. 
 
 [Lect. 
 
 NOTE III. Lecture II. p. 41. 
 
 No more interesting and sug-gestive summary of the com- 
 parative character and scope of the several Gospels could be 
 given^ than that which is produced by simply placing their 
 respective conclusions side by side. 
 
 Matt, xxviii. 
 
 1 8-20. 
 
 Jeans came and 
 spake unto them, 
 saying. All power 
 is given unto me 
 in heaven and in 
 earth. 
 
 Go ye there- 
 fore, and teach all 
 nations, baptizing 
 them in the name 
 of the Father, and 
 of the Son, and of 
 the Holy Ghost ; 
 
 Teaching them 
 to observe all 
 things whatsoever 
 I have command- 
 ed you : and, lo, 
 I am with you 
 alway, even unto 
 the end of the 
 world. Amen. 
 
 Mark xvi. 
 15-20. 
 
 And he said 
 unto them, Go ye 
 into all the world, 
 and preach the 
 gospel to every 
 creature. 
 
 He that believ- 
 ethand is baptized 
 shall be saved ; 
 but he that be- 
 lieveth not shall 
 be damned. 
 
 And these signs 
 shall follow them 
 that beheve ; In 
 my name shall 
 they cast out de- 
 vils ; they shall 
 speak with new 
 tongues. 
 
 They shall take 
 up serpents ; and 
 if they drink any 
 deadly thing, it 
 shall not hurt 
 them ; they shall 
 lay hands on the 
 sick, and they 
 shall recover. 
 
 So then after 
 the Lord had 
 spoken unto them, 
 he was received up 
 into heaven, and 
 sat on the right 
 hand of God. 
 
 And they went 
 forth, and preach- 
 ed every where, 
 the Lord working 
 with them, and 
 confirming the 
 ivord with signs 
 following. Amen, 
 
 Luke xxiv. 
 50-53- 
 
 And he led them 
 out as far as to 
 Bethany, and he 
 lifted up his hands, 
 and blessed them. 
 
 And it came to 
 pass, while he 
 blessed them, he 
 was parted from 
 them, and carried 
 up into heaven. 
 
 And they wor- 
 shipped him, and 
 returned to Jeru- 
 salem with great 
 
 joy: 
 
 And were con- 
 tinually in the 
 temple, praising 
 and blessing God. 
 Amen. 
 
 John xx. 
 28-31. 
 And Thomas 
 answered and said 
 unto him. My 
 Lord and my 
 God. 
 
 Jesus saith unto 
 him, Thomas, be- 
 cause thou hast 
 seen me, thou hast 
 believed ; blessed 
 are they that have 
 not seen, and yet 
 have believed. 
 
 And many other 
 signs truly did 
 Jesus in the pre- 
 sence of his disci- 
 ples, which are not 
 written in this 
 book : 
 
 But these are 
 wiitten, that ye 
 might believe that 
 Jesus is the Christ, 
 the Son of God ; 
 and that beUeving 
 ye might have life 
 through his name. 
 
II.] NOTE III. 249 
 
 Here we see, i. In St. Matthew, the Royal Lawgiver, or King 
 and Teacher of men, endued with all authority {e^ovaia), found- 
 ing a kingdom for all nations, with its ordinance of admission 
 (baptism) and its permanent laws (" Whatsoever I have com- 
 manded you") : and still the kingdom is (as it were) a school, 
 in which his commissioners are charged to continue the work 
 of teaching which he had begun (f^aflrjrewo-aTe^SiBao-Korres). 
 
 2. In St. Mark, the Mighty Worker, who leaves the energy 
 of his action in his Church. Not here is represented the slower 
 process of forming and training communities, but the bold and 
 world-wide proclamation, with the sure execution of its sanc- 
 tion. (Compare the ixadrjTevaare nAvra ra idv-q with the Kripv^are 
 ■naarj ry ktiith.) Then the signs of living power are to follow 
 those that believe, beginning with the casting out of devils in 
 his name. Finally, the scene is changed in a moment, and the 
 command and promise are seen in their fulfilment — the Lord 
 in heaven, the disciples on earth — they going forth and 
 preaching everywhere, and the Lord still working with them 
 and confirming the word by the signs of power. 
 
 3. In St. Luke, the Friend of Man, sending to all nations 
 the message of repentance and remission of sins, and ensuring 
 to his messengers the promise of his Father ; while the reality 
 of kind companionship is preserved to the end, in the mention 
 of localities, movements, and gestures (" He led them out as 
 far as to Bethany," " He lifted up His hands and blessed 
 them,'^ " He was parted from them "), the parting itself 
 being one of love (while He blessed them), and one which 
 leaves behind it a state of worship and joy. 
 
 4. In St. John, the Son of God, receiving from the lately 
 doubting disciple the highest acknowledgment which had yet 
 come from human lips (6 Kvpio's fxoi; koX 6 ©eos jxav), and then, as 
 it were, lifting up his eyes beyond the little company who had 
 seen him, and pronouncing for all ages and nations a blessing 
 on those who, not having seen, should yet have believed. Yet 
 farther, the Evangelist speaks from himself, thus characteris- 
 tically closing the only gospel in which the thoughts of the 
 writer have been mingled with his narrative. He tells us that 
 he has given us incidents intentionally selected for a certain 
 
250 NOTE IV. [Lect. 
 
 definite purpose, namely, to present the great object of faith 
 in his highest character as the Son of God, and so to secure 
 the result of faith in its deepest essence, " life through his 
 name." 
 
 NOTE IV. Lectuee II. p. 48. 
 
 This effect of the opening of St. Matthevs^s Gospel, and so 
 of the whole Gospel record, is well described by Lange : — 
 
 " The genealogy, &c., with which the Gospel according to 
 Matthew opens, is of the greatest importance. The first 
 Gospel connects the New Testament with the Old, not by 
 giving an index of the writings of the Old Testament^ but by 
 delineating the Old Testament genealogy of Jesus. This 
 serves not merely as evidence of the indissoluble connection 
 between the Old and the New Testament, which continued in 
 the secret recesses of Jewish life even during the age of the 
 Apocrypha, but expresses the important truth that God revealed 
 himself and carried on his covenant purposes, not only by the 
 spoken and written word, but also and chiefly in and by the 
 seed of Abraham, until he came in whom both impersonation 
 and revelation had reached their climax. 
 
 " In the Gospel by Matthew the life of Jesus is jiresented as 
 forming part of the history and life of the Jewish nation ; and 
 hence as the historical fulfilment of the blessing promised to 
 Abraham and to his seed. Jesus is here set before us as the 
 new-born King of the Jews, as the promised Messiah, and the 
 aim and goal of every progressive stage of the theocracy. He 
 is the great Antitype of Old Testament history, in whom every 
 thing has been fulfilled — the types in the law, in worship, in 
 liistorical events, and in gracious interpositions — in short, the 
 fulfilment of the theocracy. In and with him the old cove- 
 nant passes into the new, the theocracy into the kingdom of 
 heaven, the demands of the law into the beatitudes, Sinai into 
 tlie Mount of Beatitudes, the prophetic into the teaching office, 
 the priesthood into redemption l)y suffering, and the kingship 
 into the triumph of almighty grace, restoring, helping, and 
 delivering a fallen worlds" 
 
 f Lauge, Commentary on St. Matthew, pp. 49, 50. 
 
II.] NOTE V. 251 
 
 Again, in his other work, the same thoughts occur : — 
 " He (St. Matthew) exhibits the Gospel in its historical 
 relation as the completion, the spiritual fruit of the Christolo- 
 gical growth in the Old Testament. It was his task to prove 
 to his own nation that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of 
 David, the Son of Abraham. (Chap. i. i.) But just because 
 Christ was, in his eyes, the true and spiritual King of the 
 Jews, and His kingdom the true theocratic kingdom of God, 
 did Matthew from the verj^ first give prominence to the great 
 contrast between the spiritual Israel and the worldly and 
 hardened Israel. Thence it was that from the beginning 
 new conflicts were ever arising, thence that we continually 
 n)eet with fresh sufferings of the holy Heir of the ancient 
 tbec)cracy till His death upon the cross, new triumphs till 
 the manifestation of His glory. The series of the Messiah's 
 sufferings runs through the whole of this gospel as its pre- 
 vailing thought*." 
 
 NOTE V. Lectuee II. p. 54. 
 
 The essential identity of the synoptist view of the person of 
 Christ with that given by St. John is ably asserted by Dorner. 
 It may be well to cite a part of his argument : — 
 
 " Taking the notices of the Synoptists together, it thus 
 appears that for all eternity, also for the (ari aldtvios in heaven, 
 the Person of Christ, the Son of God and the Son of Man, 
 forms the centre point of the Christian religion, in the trials 
 and in the triumphs of individuals and of the Church. He is 
 the perfect Lawgiver. He not merely reveals, but he realizes 
 as well, the holy and j ust as the gracious will of God ; hence 
 is He also the Judge of the world. He has and exercises 
 power over the whole world, even as he does over the spiritual ; 
 He communicates here the forgiveness of sins and the Holy 
 Ghost, there eternal felicity ; and the summit of the latter is 
 ever formed by perfect fellowship with His Person 
 
 " It may be boldly affirmed that the entire representation of 
 
 e Life of Christ, vol. i. 2^9. 
 
252 NOTE VI. [Lect. 
 
 Christ given by the Synoptists may be placed by the side of 
 the Johannine as perfectly identical^ inasmuch as faith, moulded 
 by means of the synoptic tradition, must have essentially the 
 same features in its conception of Christ as the Christ of 
 John has. 
 
 " The passages in John which speak the most loftily of 
 Christ are those to which the Synoptists supply exactly the 
 closest parallels, whilst some of the strongest traits in the latter 
 find no parallel in John ; comp. Matt. ix. 2 — 6 with John v. 
 41 (viii. 11), Matt, xxviii. 18 — 20 with John iii. ^^. But as 
 these latter synoptic traits are assuredly capable of being with- 
 out difficulty incorporated with John's representation of Christ, 
 so, on the other hand, may what John, with Paul and the 
 Epistle to the Hebrews, advances, that goes beyond the Synop- 
 tists — that, namely, which has relation to the element of pre- 
 existence — be brought into relation to them. The Christ of 
 the Synoptists stands already so high above the Ebionitic 
 Christ ; He is especially through His eschatologieal aspect so 
 linked with the world-idea, that to the synoptic faith there 
 needs to be added not so much a new object as simply a 
 stronger interest of gnosis ; and so also it is that this faith 
 can find satisfaction in no narrower utterance concerning 
 Christ than in such a one as the dogma of His pre-existence 
 will enunciate. 
 
 " In point of fact there are not wanting in the Synoptists 
 themselves the beginning of such : comp. Luke vii. 37, Matt, 
 xi. 19, where Christ calls himself the Wisdom, with Prov. viii.. 
 Matt. xi. 27 ; especially, however, Luke xi. 49 with Matt, 
 xxiii. 34; Matt. xiii. 17, Luke x. 23 — 24, with John viii. 
 56 ffV 
 
 NOTE VI. Lectuee III. p. 83. 
 
 This hindrance is strongly put in some words of Draseke 
 ([uoted by Stier : — ■ 
 
 " The old Messiah in the flesh is with them ; therefore tlie 
 new Comforter, the Spirit, is far from them. What hindered 
 thi'ir being comforted ? Jesus himself, who, comforting, stood 
 
 ^' Dorner. On the Person of Christ, Introduction, pp. 60, 61. 
 
Ill, IV.] NOTE VII. 25a 
 
 before tliem, was the hindrance ! As long as he, this Messiah, 
 bearing all the prophetic marks upon him, stood before them 
 in person, this his person continued to be a foundation and 
 prop to that system of vanities which bewitched their heads 
 and hearts. The Form must pass away from their eyes before 
 the Spirit could enter their souls. It was good for them 
 that Jesus should go away. Before he, the Christ after the 
 flesh, went away, the Christ after the Spirit could not come. 
 When the former vanished, the latter appeared K" 
 
 NOTE VII. Lecture IV. 
 
 Baumgarten's Apostolic History starts at once from the right 
 point of view ; and the effect of this is felt through the whole 
 work. I subjoin a part of his criticism on the cardinal expres- 
 sion, which indicates the relation between the two histories 
 treated by St. Luke, in support of that view of it which is 
 briefly given in the text of the lecture : — 
 
 " From the words, Z^v ^p^aro 6 ^Irjaovs -noiiiv t€ koi htMaKeiv, 
 we perceive that, through the Gospel, St. Luke intends Jesus 
 to be regarded as the acting subject of this history. Con- 
 sequently, whatever else the Gospel narrates, whether the 
 actions of other persons or the sufierings of the Saviour himself, 
 his labours, either in doing or in teaching, are to be considered 
 as the central point from which the whole is determined. But 
 now it is of especial significance that in this passage there 
 occurs a word which, corresponding to the term -np&Tov, refers 
 us with equal precision, as well to what follows, as to what 
 precedes. It is the word ijp^aTo. With good reason has 
 Meyer maintained that this word has a peculiar emphasis, and 
 has therefore rightly rejected all such expositions of it as would 
 explain away its force. But the explanation which he himself 
 proposes is equally fatal to the emphatic character which he 
 claims for it. He sees in it, for instance, an antithesis of this 
 hind, ' Jesus began — the Apostles carried on."" But the 
 peculiar force, which Meyer has just claimed for TJp^aro, de- 
 
 i Wurds of the Lord Jesus, vol. vi. p. 337. 
 
254 NOTE VII. [Lect. 
 
 peudsj so far as I can see^, on its jjosHion, standing as it does 
 before the name, which, in itself, comprises the whole subject- 
 matter of the Gospel 
 
 " The impressive force of the word TJpiaro will, therefore, be 
 duly appreciated as soon as, with Olshausen (in loc.) and 
 Schneckenburger, we regard it as characterising and referring 
 to the whole of Jesus' labours during his existence on earth 
 — in other words, as describing the whole course of his 
 labours up to the time of his ascension as initiatorif Mid 
 'preparatory . 
 
 " If, therefore, at the commencement of a second book, all 
 that had been narrated in the first is characterised as the 
 work of the initiatory labours of Jesus, is not this a plain 
 intimation that in the second book we are to look for an 
 account of the further continuance of those labours i ? " 
 
 NOTE VII. (2.)t' LectuebIV. p. loa. 
 
 The view, which is given in the text, of St. Paul's testi- 
 monies, concerning the sources from which he had derived his 
 gospel, and particularly of his assertion, i Cor. xi. 23, was not 
 reached without some hesitation. It had once seemed to me 
 (as probably it does to most readers) that the interpretation of 
 the words eyw TTapikajSov diro rov Kvpiov, was decided by the 
 more definite language of Gal. i. 12 : and also that the express 
 mention both of the ey&S and the KvpLos was more natural, on 
 the supj)osition that the Apostle meant to intimate an imme- 
 diate personal communication from the Lord to himself. The 
 first of these reasons is removed, if the expressions in the 
 Corinthians on the one hand, and those in the Galatians and 
 Ephesians on the other, contemplate the gospel (as they 
 obviously do) from the two different sides of history and 
 doctrine. The second reason was merely a confirmation of 
 an interpretation accepted upon other grounds, and has no 
 great force by itself. It is an argument of the same kind, but 
 
 i Baumgarten's Apostolic History (Clarke's Tr.), sect, i, pp. 10, 11. 
 k So numbered on account of error in the reference, which should have been 
 "Note VIII." 
 
IV.] NOTE VII. 255 
 
 perhaps of scarcely as much weight, as that which is adduced 
 on the other side from the use of ano instead of irapa. Dean 
 Alford's decision (the opposite of that which is adopted in 
 the lecture) seems to me too hastily given in regard to a 
 point of so much interest; and he treats the question of 
 the preposition too slightingly : — 
 
 " Foe I (no emphasis on eyto as Meyer, al., see ch. vii. 28 
 compared with 32; Gal. vi. 17; Phil. iv. 11) uecbived from 
 THE Loud {by special revelation, see Gal. i. 12). Meyer attempts 
 to deny that this revelation was made to Paul himself, on the 
 strength of otto meaning indireci, -napi. direct reception from 
 any one : but this distinction is fallacious : e. g. i John i. 5, 
 avTr\ (arlv 17 iiTayyekCa rjv UK-qKoajjifV air' avTov. He supposes 
 that it was made to Ananias or some other, and communicated 
 to Paul. But the sole reason for this somewhat clumsy 
 hypothesis is the supposed force of the preposition, which has 
 no existence. If the Apostle had referred only to the Evange- 
 lical tradition or writings (?) he would not have used the first 
 person singular, but 7rapeA(i/3oju€i» !.■'■' 
 
 " The supposed force of the preposition, which has no ex- 
 istence,^^ is an over-confident expression. Against this decision 
 must be weighed the opinion given by others, e. g. by Winer, 
 "After verbs of receiving, &c., 0770 has merely the general 
 meaning of whence : Matt. xvii. 25^ o.it6 rCixav Xa/x/Sdyoucrt tcAtj ; 
 it is AinffS who are the \a)j.^&vovTis; napa would have indi- 
 cated the immediate gathering of the taxes, and vs^ould have 
 been employed in this passage had the tax-gatherers been 
 spoken of as the \aixl3avovTes. In the expression Xap-jiavovri^ 
 Tiapa Tivoi, the tis denotes the person actually delivering or 
 tendering : in kap.^avovTis ano tivos it denotes merely the 
 
 proprietor Paul, in i Cor. xi. 23, writes -napiXa^ov 
 
 a-no Tov KvpCov, ' 1 received of the Lord,^ not, the Lord 
 himself has directly, personally, in an anoKaXv^is, communi- 
 cated it to me ™." 
 
 Winer-'s judgment is adopted by Bishop Ellicott. On Gal. 
 i. 12, ovhe yap eyo) ■napa avOpd-nov Trapikafiov, he says, " Trapa 
 avdpdTTov ' from man,' not synonymous with diro avdpdirov, 
 ' Alford in loc. m Grammar of N. T. Diction, p. 388. 
 
256 NOTE VII. [Lect. 
 
 the distinction between these prepositions after verbs of 
 receiving, &e. (-napa more immediate, ai:b more remote source) 
 being apparently regularljr maintained in St. PauFs Epistles. 
 Compare l Cor. xi. 23, -napeKa^ov cmo rod KvpCov, on which 
 Winer {Be Verb. Com/j. Fasc. ii. p. 7) rightly observes, 'non 
 ■napa tov KvpCov, propterea quod non ipse Christus prsesentem 
 docuit.' " 
 
 The example given by Alford on the other side appears of 
 little value, as the iirayyiXia fjv aKr^Koap-ev air aiiTov is not a 
 saying cited by St. John as uttered to him personally by the 
 mouth of Christ, but a general summary of the message with 
 which the teachers of the Church were entrusted by their 
 Lord. On the whole, the force of the preposition may be 
 stated thus : it does not compel us to adopt either interpreta- 
 tion, but it is more accurate, more natural, and more in ac- 
 cordance with the usage of Scripture, when interpreted not in 
 the sense of an immediate, but of a more remote reception. 
 If we should probably conclude that the general facts of the 
 Gospel history (e. g. those mentioned i Cor. xv. 3 — 7) were 
 not communicated to St. Paul by direct revelation, we should 
 have no reason to suppose an exception in regard to the facts 
 of the institution of the Lord's Supper ; unless the language 
 employed in regard to that subject obliged us to do so. Ap- 
 parently that is not the case, the prejjosition used agreeing 
 rather with the opposite opinion, and certainly not being that 
 which would seem likely to have been chosen, if it had been 
 the purpose of the writer to assert the exceptional nature of 
 this particular communication. Thus, the addition of aTro 
 70V KvpCov to -napikajiov will only indicate the importance 
 of the acts and words of the institution, as handed down 
 by the known will, and (probably) by the express charge, of 
 the Lord. 
 
 In regard to the whole question of the sources of St. Paul's 
 doctrine, it seems to me that his own expressions lead us to 
 class them as follows : (i) the report of others, conveying to 
 him the historical facts of the manifestation of Christ; (2) 
 direct and definite revelations from the Lord Jesus, ascertain- 
 ing' to him the main features of the doctrine which it was his 
 
IV.] NOTE YIII. 257 
 
 special work to deliver ; (3) a general inspiration or guidance 
 of the Holy Ghost, present in his experience, in the workings 
 of his own mind, and more particularly in his study of the 
 Old Testament Scriptures. 
 
 The last mentioned method of illumination is evidently 
 of a progressive character. In reference to this subject 
 EUicott^s observation, in his comment on Gal. i. 12, is 
 fair and reasonable : — 
 
 " It is a subject of continual discussion, whether the teach- 
 ing of St. Paul was the result of one single illumination, or of 
 progressive development. The most natural opinion would 
 certainly seem to be this : that as, on the one hand, we may 
 reverently presume that all the fundamental truths of the 
 Gospel would be fully revealed to St. Paul, before he com- 
 menced preaching ; so, on the other, it might have been or- 
 dained, that, in accordance with the laws of our spiritual 
 nature, its deepest mysteries and profoundest harmonies should 
 be seen and felt through the practical experiences of his apo- 
 stolical labours. ^^ 
 
 I would only wish to add to this statement of the ease a 
 distinct mention of that continuous ministration of the Old 
 Testament Scriptures to his mind, which is perceptible in all 
 his writings, and to which attention is called in Note XI. 
 
 NOTE VIII. Lecture IV. p. iii. 
 
 EvEEY day we become more familiar with that view of the 
 Apostolic writings, which distinguishes between the narrator 
 and the commentator, assigning a commanding authority to 
 the bare witness of facts, of sayings of the Lord, and of reve- 
 lations distinctly asserted, and denying such authority to the 
 expositions of the doctrine involved in those facts, sayings, 
 and revelations. In the one department of their work they 
 are true witnesses, delivering to us the words of God. In the 
 other they are fallible men, theorising or theologising under 
 the mingled advantages and disadvantages which might result 
 from their historical position. This bisection (if I may use 
 
 s 
 
258 NOTE VIII. [Lect. 
 
 the word) of the testimony of our appointed teachers, leaves 
 us the divine foundations of a theology, hut sweeps away the 
 divine theology itself, which they were laid to support. We 
 are at full liberty to raise other edifices in its stead, or, which 
 will he better still, we may leave the materials unused and the 
 ground unoccujiied. The intimations of this view of the in- 
 spired writings are often hurtful, only because thej^ are dis- 
 guised ; the theory not being avowed, while the language 
 appropriate to it is ased. It will be well to keep the theory 
 itself distinctly in sight, as it will explain the meaning and 
 expose the tendency of many arguments and insinuations 
 which might else make injurious impressions on unestablished 
 faith. Perhaps this theory cannot be better exhibited than in 
 the following words of one of its leading advocates : — 
 
 " As to what especially concerns the religious doctrines 
 contained in the Bible, it is clear from the very nature of the 
 ease, that we are only bound to notice those doctrines which 
 can be directly referred to inspiration. We therefore need 
 pay no regard to those doctrines, which lay no claim to be 
 considered as inspired, and do not come before us as forming 
 part of a Divine revelation. Such, for instance, are the doc- 
 trines of the Mosaic cosmogony, the simple historical narra- 
 tives in both the Testaments, &c. Above all, those parts of 
 the Bible which cannot be directly derived from inspiration, 
 consequently everj'thing in the writings of the projilieU (and, 
 taking the word in a wide sense, of the apostles also) which is 
 in any degree of a scientific character, the result of reflexion, 
 and in any sense whatever the worlv of science, true and im- 
 portant as it may be, these, one and all, have not a binding 
 authority upon us. But further, </// developments of doctrine, 
 which were in point of fact the commencement of a theology, 
 have a large margin belonging to them. Take, for instance, 
 the theological theories and j^iecidiar views of Paul and John, 
 although in another regard they have an especial value for us, 
 yet 2-)er se they are not revelation. Their authors worked them 
 out with much painful tliought, and their thought we also 
 truly regard, when striving like them to master the subject ; 
 yet they never claim for their theological deductions a bind- 
 
IV.] NOTE IX. 259 
 
 ing authority upon others. On the otlier hand, all the direct 
 declarations in Holy Scripture about our salvation, all the 
 great historical facts of the great drama of revelation, especi- 
 ally the contents of the Gospels, these have all z. binding 
 authority upon us. These are the points on which Paul and 
 John theologise. 
 
 " It is this assertion of the coinparatire authority of the 
 Holy Scriptures which is the only means of securing them 
 from forced and violent interpretations ^." It would be more 
 true to say — of exposing them to such interjjretations. 
 
 NOTE IX. Lecture IV. p. ii8. 
 
 " If such a Spirit did not dwell in the Church, the Bible 
 would not be inspired ; for the Bible is, before all things, the 
 iiiritten voice of the congregation. Bold as such a theory of in- 
 spiration may sound, it was the earliest creed of the Chui'ch, and 
 it is the only one to which the facts of Scripture answer. The 
 Sacred Writers acknowledge themselves men of like passions 
 with ourselves, and we are promised illumination from the 
 Sjiirit which dwelt in them ^." 
 
 These words of Dr. Williams give a distinct statement of 
 a view of the Holy Scriptures, which is often presented in 
 more ambiguous language. The Bible is the voice of the 
 congregation, in the sense of being a voice adopted by the 
 congregation, as the expression of its mind for ever ; and 
 assertions may be made concerning the Scriptures, which are 
 true in this sense, while they are false in the sense which 
 they are meant to bear : but this sense is here disclaimed by 
 the words " before all things," which deny that the Scrip- 
 tures have any character antecedent to this. This denial 
 flatly contradicts the real voice of the congregation, which 
 has always acknowledged and adopted the Scriptures, in the 
 character of a voice which came to it, not in that of a voice 
 which proceeded from it. Nothing is more certain than that 
 
 h K. Kothe, in an article in Studien und Kritiken, i860. 
 1 Easaya and Eeviews, p. 78. 
 
 S 2 
 
260 NOTE IX. [Lect. 
 
 the Church has alwaj^s considered and avowed, that she was 
 called into existence by the Apostolic agency : and that the 
 teaching of the Apostles was f//e cause and not the product of 
 her faith. It is no less certain, that she has from the first 
 acknowledged and received the canonical books, as being 
 themselves a part, the written part, of that Apostolic teach- 
 ing, that is to say, as being the permanent form of the word 
 by which her faith was first created. 
 
 This acknowledgment of the Catholic Church, concerning 
 her own origin and the relation of the Scriptures to it, does 
 in fact dispose of the questions which we often hear debated 
 — whether the Church is before the Bible, or the Bible before 
 the Church — whether the New Testament Scriptures stand 
 upon Christianity, or Christianity upon the New Testament 
 Scriptures. It is certain that the Church existed before the 
 Bible, and Christianity before the New Testament Scriptures ; 
 but it is also certain that the Church and Christianity derived 
 their own existence from the word which those Scriptures 
 contain. The word was antecedent to the existence of the 
 Church, as the cause is to the effect ; the writing of that 
 word, and its reception when written, were subsequent to 
 the formation of the Church, but the writing only made 
 permanent for future time the word by which the Church 
 had been created ; and the reception of the writings only 
 recognised them as the same word in its form of permanence. 
 Thus wMle the Church is chronologically before the Bible, 
 the Bible is potentially/ before the Church ; since the written 
 word, which is the ground of faith to later generations of 
 Christians, is one in origin, authority, and substance with the 
 oral word, which was the ground of faith to the first genera- 
 tion of Christians. Any one who pleases may deny this unity 
 of the written and the oral word. I only observe, that, if he 
 does so, he contradicts " the voice of the congregation." 
 
 It may further be said, that there is a sense in which some 
 of the New Testament Scriptures are, as ivritings, anterior to 
 Christianity, not only potentially but chronologically. If the 
 ministry of St. Paul was divinely ordained, and used, to de- 
 velop the Christian doctrine, then that ministry was anterior 
 
VI.] NOTE XI. 261 
 
 to the full development of Christianity. But his Epistles 
 were part of his ministry, as much a part of it as his spoken 
 word : may we not say a more important part, as being, by 
 their character of writing, more deliberate and thorough. It 
 follows that his Epistles are, as really as his oral teaching, 
 chronologically anterior to Christianity as a perfected system. 
 Christianity therefore stands upon the New Testament Scrip- 
 tures ; not the New Testament Scriptures upon Christianity. 
 
 NOTE X. Lecture VI. p. 154. 
 
 " Epistolicam formam prae libris V. T. habent Scripta N. T. 
 et in his non solum Pauli, Petri, Jacobi, Judse, sed etiam 
 uterque Lucse, et omnes Johannis libri. Plus etiam est, quod 
 ipse Dominies Jesus Christus suo nomine septem epistolas 
 dedit, Johannis manu, Apoc. ii. 3, ac tota Apocalypsis instar 
 est epistolee ab Ipso datse. Non ad servos, sed ad liberos, 
 eosque emancipates potissimum, epistolse mitti sunt solitse : 
 epistolicumque scribendi genus prse quovis alio accommodatum 
 est ad regnum Dei quam latissime propagandum, et ad animas 
 quam locupletissime sedificandas. Plus in hoc quoque genere 
 unus laboravit Paulus quam ceteri omnes '<^." 
 
 NOTE XI. Lecture VI. p. 173. 
 
 The principle intimated in the text is that the "perfection" 
 (reKeioTris) of Christian doctrine was attained by the reading 
 of the Old Testament in the light of the (elementary) know- 
 ledge of Christ ; in other words, that the complete exposition of 
 the Gospel was the result of a combination of the facts and the 
 words of the old dispensation with the facts and the words of 
 the new, a combination effected in the minds of the Apostles 
 under the teaching of the Holy Ghost, who thus brought to 
 light the meaning and the scope of his own earlier inspirations, 
 preserved in the Law and the Prophets. This method of divine 
 teaching is exhibited in action, and exemphfied at length, in 
 
 '^ Bengelii, Gnomon, in Rom. i. i. 
 
262 NOTE XI. [Lect. 
 
 the Epistles to the Romans and to the Hebrews. It does in 
 fact constitute and create those two precious writings ; which, 
 while they are arguments addressed to others, appear to be 
 also records of the course of thought and formation of opinion 
 in the minds of the writers themselves. They use for the 
 education of other minds the same means and materials which 
 the Holy Ghost had first prepared, and then used, for the 
 education of their own. 
 
 E. g. The mind of St. Paul having received the fundamental 
 principle of justification b}' grace through faith in Christ, seems 
 to have defined and systematised his doctrine on that subject, 
 by reflection on his own experience of what the Law could do 
 and of what it could not do, on the principle enunciated by 
 Hababkuk, that " the just shall live by his faith," on the fact 
 that Abraham, "^^ being yet uncircumcised, believed God, and 
 it was counted unto him for righteousness," on David's de- 
 scription of " the man to whom the Lord imputeth righteous- 
 ness without works," &e., &c. The writer to the Hebrews, 
 again, in his penetrating and profound treatment of a multi- 
 tude of Old Testament texts and of the whole system of the 
 first covenant, not only instructs the disciples whom he 
 addresses, but also incidentally shews in what way their 
 teachers had themselves been taught, namely, by means of 
 the former Scriptures, read in connection with the Gospel 
 facts, and under the teaching of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 I no not mean that precisely the same passages which they 
 think fittest for instructing others had been effectual to their 
 own enlightenment, but that they had gained their own perfect 
 light from these and others like them, and that they had them- 
 selves been taught through the same medium which they 
 employ. St. Paul's manner of using the Old Testament seems 
 continually to imply his own personal obligations to it. 
 
 Some may think that this view of the manner in which the 
 truth was cleared to the minds of its first teachers is incon- 
 sistent with, or at least derogatory to, their inspiration ; since 
 it implies the processes of study, reflection, comparison, deduc- 
 tion, a gradual increase in the fulness and proportions of their 
 knowledge, and a progress of doctrine in their own minds. 
 
VI.] NOTE XI. 263 
 
 Certainly it implies all this^ and that is a reason not against, 
 but for its truth ; for the Apostolic writings appear to bear 
 witness to such processes and such progress in the minds of 
 their authors. Had it been the purpose of these Lectures to 
 consider the Progress of Doctrine in tlm sense^ the view taken 
 of it would have been in accordance with the observation of 
 Bengel, that when the Pauline discourses and writings 
 are placed in chronological order, " incrementum Apostoli 
 spirituale cognoscitur '." Such a view has no kindred 
 with that which has been hazarded by Professor Jowett 
 and others, and which treats the later teaching, not as an 
 expansion, but as a reversal of the earlier; not as a more 
 full and definite, but as an absolutely different doctrine. The 
 doctrine was always one, its full development being implied in 
 its first elements, but, like any other large system of thought, 
 taking time to unfold itself, first in the minds of the teachers, 
 and then in the Church which they taught. The instrument 
 used for this purpose was the Scriptures of the Old Testament. 
 It was so from the very first. When their Lord taught them 
 personally after his resurrection it was through this medium. 
 " He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things 
 concerning himself ; " " Then opened he their understandings, 
 that they might understand the Scriptures, and said unto 
 them. Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suifer, 
 and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance 
 and remission of sins should be preached in his name among 
 all nations." (Luke xxiv. 27, 45-47.) It is scarcely less 
 evident that the same method was pursued in their subsequent 
 illumination by the Holy Ghost, and that the light which 
 they enjoyed was a light which was reflected from the Scrip- 
 tures. That which the Lord, before his departure, did by 
 word of mouth, is precisely that which, after his departure, 
 he did by the Holy Ghost ; " Then opened he their under- 
 standings that they might understand the Scriptures." 
 
 There is nothing in this view of the case derogatory to the 
 fulness of their inspiration, for the inspiration in which we 
 
 I Gnomon, Eom. i. i. 
 
264 NOTE XI. [Lect. 
 
 believe is not one which in its general action supersedes the 
 natural processes of the mindj but one which mingles itself 
 with them, and insures the truth of their results. In making 
 the former Scriptures the means of enlightening the authors 
 of the later Scriptures, the Holy Spirit established the con- 
 tinuity of his own teaching, and built the Church " upon the 
 foundation of the Apostles and Prophets," amalgamating the 
 two foundations into one. It is from his own experience that 
 St. Paul says to Timothy (albeit not impowered by the 
 Apostolic inspiration), "The Holy Scriptures (of the Old 
 Testament) are able to make thee wise unto salvation (ae 
 (Tocpiaai els (Tbnr}piav) through faith which is in Jesus Christ.''^ 
 (3 Tim. iii. 15.) The force of the expression lies in the 
 aocpCaai. The Gospel Timothy has already received ; the faith 
 in Christ Jesus he already has; and therefore he is actually in 
 possession of the salvation : but the wisdom {a6(f>ia) apper- 
 taining to this salvation he is to seek by means of the Scrip- 
 tures {to, hwafxiva ao(pi(yai) . This crocpLa corresponds to the 
 reKewTrjs (of doctrine) spoken of in Heb. vi. I, which is there 
 illustrated by the exquisite example of spiritual exegesis, on 
 the passage " Thou art a priest for ever after the order of 
 Melchizedek." Elsewhere, again, the Apostle adverts to this 
 character of his doctrine, " Howbeit we speak wisdom among 
 them that are perfect" (cro(piav ev rots TeKeCois, i Cor. ii. 6) ; and 
 there the method of its exposition is described by the remark- 
 able expression (of somewhat doubtful meaning), h SiSaKTois 
 TTvevixaros ayiov, ■nviVjj.aTiKols TivfviJ.aTiKa (TvyKplvovTiS (ver. 13). 
 It seems to me that the interjaretation of these words is best 
 derived from the fact, everywhere apparent in the Apostle's 
 writings, namely, his habit of working out all the more 
 recondite and (if I may use the word) scientific parts of the 
 Evangelical doctrine by the aid of the Old Testament, the 
 types, images, and sentences of which were, we know, in his 
 sight TTvevixaTLKa. Dean Alford's objection to this interpreta- 
 tion, as given by Chrysostom, is founded upon his treatment 
 of the word avyKpiviiv, as if it meant barely to prove or inter- 
 pret. I think that Chrysostom's illustrations, in the passage 
 referred to, suggest a larger meaning than this ; but even 
 
VI.] NOTE XII. 265 
 
 the latter of these words, taken in its full sense, would 
 be a more adequate and exact rendering than that which 
 is adopted in its place, " putting together spirituals with 
 spirituals,^' i. e. attaching spiritual words to spiritual things. 
 The (TvyKpCveiv will more properly represent a process of 
 thought and judgment than a mere method of expression : 
 it does in fact most aptly represent that process which we 
 actually see in the Epistles, in which the irvev^xaTtKa of the 
 old covenant are combined with those of the new in order to 
 establish and elucidate the doctrine which is delivered. The 
 appropriation of the Old Testament words to express the New 
 Testament doctrines is a part of this elucidation : e. g. the 
 application of the old terms of sacrifice and lustration, to 
 describe the nature of the death and the effect of the blood 
 of Christ. 
 
 NOTE XII. Lecture VI. p. 173. 
 
 "As Luther complained of the Epistle of James, that it 
 was not occupied with Christ, so in more recent times an 
 inclination has been exhibited to regard James, as he appears 
 to us in his Epistle, as the representative of the faith of the 
 earliest Christians ; and hence it has been deduced that the 
 Ebionitic doctrine was the primitive; a conclusion in every 
 respect over-precipitate ! For, first, the design of James is 
 such, that it does not fall to him to set forth in order 
 the faith and its contents, but to maintain the Tr^orts rather 
 according to its ethical signifieancy, and to contend against 
 all antinomianism. The ttCo-tls he pre-supposes ; he does 
 not seek to plant it for the first time; and hence it 
 is incompetent, nay, unjust to him, to treat his Epistle 
 as if he began with the beginning, and meant to set forth 
 the fundamental principles of Christianity, which as yet 
 were not in dispute. But, secondly, it would be still more 
 hazardous from this short Epistle— which, according to its 
 avowed design, aims to unfold the ethical and not the dog- 
 matical aspect of Christian truth — to form an estimate of 
 James universally; of whom we have no right, since in other 
 
266 NOTE XII. [Lect. VI. 
 
 respects he is at one with tlie synoptic tradition, to assume 
 that in respect to Christological ideas he stands opposed to 
 it. Thirdly, utterly untrue is the assumption that James is 
 to be viewed as the representative of the faith of the earliest 
 Christianity. Rather is his letter, with its polemic against a 
 one-sided faith, an evidence that there jWas another tendency 
 in the Church, which laid chief stress on faith, not in its 
 ethical purifying power, hut viewed principally as an object of 
 knowledge, a6<j}ia ; consequently, more in respect of its dog- 
 matic import, and that in a fruitless way, and which held 
 participation in Christianity in this sense for justifying. Over 
 against this theoretical faith he places that which is practical. 
 Still more weighty is what we would adduce fourthly, viz., 
 that it cannot be denied that to the individuality of James 
 the ethical was the most congenial, and hence drew him to 
 give especial effect to the refutation of this false tendency l." 
 
 Dorner goes on to shew that the ethic of St. James is a 
 Christian ethic, and then to point out the actual Christo- 
 logical features of the Epistle. The result is, "' that James 
 had before Jiim the Christian presupposition in anthropological 
 and soteriological form"- — a sufficiently alarming sentence, 
 which, however, I print in italics, because it gives the precise 
 point to which I have wished to speak in the text, namely, 
 that a considerate examination of the Epistle shews, that 
 the whole doctrine of the manifestation of Christ in the flesh, 
 and of the mystery of redemption and salvation, is presup- 
 posed as already known and accepted both by the writer and by 
 those to whom he writes. It is this pre-supposition which 
 justifies the place which is assigned to the Epistle in the 
 course of divine instruction. 
 
 ni Dorner, On tbe Person of Christ, Introduction, pp. 62, 63. 
 
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