that this summary was one and the same in all the early churches, having descended to them by tradition from apostolic authority, may well be doubted; and further, that any summary of the kind ever was made the basis or compendium of apostolic preaching, is a proposition which, though maintained by many who have given up as indefensible the notion of one uniform "6 Apostles' Creed" in all the early churches, will be found, on examination of the character of all inspired teaching, whether oral or written, to be utterly untenable.

If we are to be guided by our preconceived notions of order and systematic arrangement, there can be no question that a summary or 'symbol' of doctrine, as the standing text of evangelic preaching, appears to be an indispensable concomitant of the apostolic labours; and that the existence of such a summary throughout the churches founded by the Apostles seems the only way of escaping from the insuperable difficulties which, with those preconceived notions, the unsystematic character

m

m It should not, however, be lost sight of by those who contend for the existence of such a summary, that in this supposition the want of agreement in the formularies of different churches, which is traceable to the remotest antiquity, presents another equally insuperable difficulty; and as a proof of the insecurity of an oral deposit, is altogether fatal to the doctrine of "apostolic tradition."

of the apostolic writings presents. But those who reason in this manner seem to forget, that the divine Spirit, under whose direct influence those writings were penned, may form a very different judgment from that of our weak and finite minds, as to the best mode of disposing the different portions of a body of truth to be promulgated; and that what we should consider the most perfectly appointed system of enunciation, may, nay indeed does, bear no more resemblance to the divine method of utterance, than do the stiff and formal shapes wrought out with rule and compass by the hand of human artificers, to the boundless variety of loveliness and beauty displayed in apparent disorder, and yet in real harmony throughout the works of nature. That the perfect order which reigns throughout the universe, presents to the finite vision of each individual beholder no more than a mass of confusion, is acknowledged by every observer of the starry heavens and the verdant earth; and he who is most deeply imbued with the spirit and the love of nature, will feel most offended by the clumsy attempts which science makes in her herbaries and museums, to arrange and to classify, to distinguish and to comprehend all the wonders of creation. True it is, that to know nature's works accurately, the aid of science cannot be dispensed with; but he who

knows them only, as science sets them forth, though there be no genus and no species that he has not reduced under its proper head, must yet be wholly ignorant of the life and harmony of nature. Even so can divine truth not be thoroughly known and understood without the aid of summaries of its principal features, and systematic arrangements of its parts, or in other words, without the science of theology, of which the creeds of the early church may be called the ABC; but he who knows God's truth only as a theologian, however comprehensively he may embrace the whole body, however skilfully define each single point, of doctrine, is, with all his knowledge, still an utter stranger to the life and peace of religion in the heart. As the most illiterate ploughboy often excels the most learned philosopher in the knowledge of nature, so often does the most deeply read divine come far behind the plainest Christian in real apprehension of divine truth. The fact is, that systematic theology, of which a creed is the shortest, and a body of Christian institutes the most elaborate form, bears the same relation to the truth of God, as science does to nature; and that as it were absurd to expect, that God should set forth his works in nature according to the Linnæan or any other system, so it is not a whit less absurd to argue, that the truth of revelation as

set forth by God, must have been presented in a systematic form; and that, therefore, if such a systematic form is not discoverable in the Scriptures of truth, the deficiency must have been supplied by a tradition of inspired origin, and therefore of an authority equal to, and concurrent with, the authority of Scripture.

Legitimate, however, as is this reasoning by analogy from the method of the God of nature upon the method of the God of revelation, we are not confined to this presumptive evidence of the form in which we may expect that God would be pleased to set forth his truth. It is not denied by the most zealous advocates of tradition, that Scripture does contain an accurate record of the events. which are narrated in it, and we may therefore freely draw upon it for exemplifications of the divine method of teaching. To begin with that portion of revelation which seems to us most naturally to fall into form and system, viz. the law of the old covenant, what a want of order and arrangement does it not exhibit! how unlike the Institutes of Justinian, or his Digest! The first enactment of the ceremonial law, for example, the law of the Passover, was promulgated, but only in part, on the occasion of the Exodus now it cannot be argued that no more of it was then set forth than the occasion required; for in addition

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to the directions given for the conduct of the Israelites in preparation for the great night of their deliverance from the yoke of the Egyptians," we find introduced in this first enactment the commencement of the ecclesiastical year, the continuance of the ordinance as a memorial for ever throughout their generations," the feast of unleavened bread, which as a stated feast could not be kept at all by the generation which came out of Egypt, but was first kept forty years after by the generation next following, the exclusion of the uncircumcised stranger, and the conditions on which he might be admitted to participation in it,' and other matters which having no immediate connexion with the slaying of the passover lamb upon that particular night, must, according to every principle of systematic arrangement, have been postponed till the enactment of the law from mount Sinai, or the introduction of Israel into the land of Canaan: nor can it be argued on the other hand, that the whole of the passover statutes were enacted at one and the same time on the occasion of the first passover; for we find various subsidiary enactments introduced afterwards, and upon different occasions, such as the commandment of

Exod. xii. 3—13; 21–23.

P Exod. xii. 14, 24-27.

• Exod. xii. 2.

Exod. xii. 15-20. cf. Josh. v. 11, 12. Exod. xii. 43-49.