"As different ages have been distinguished by different sorts of particular errors and vices, the deplorable distinction of ours," (he said,) "is an avowed scorn of Religion in some, and a growing disregard to it in the generality." "It is impossible for me, my brethren,"—(Butler is still addressing the clergy of his Diocese, 1761,)—"to forbear lamenting with you the general decay of Religion in this nation; which is now observed by every one, and has been for some time the complaint of all serious persons. The influence of it is more and more wearing out of the minds of men;" while "the number of those who profess themselves unbelievers, increases, and with their number their zeal. Zeal, it is natural to ask,—for what? Why truly for nothing, but against everything that is sacred and good among us[143]." And yet, in days dark as those, Piety could suggest that "no Christian should possibly despair;" and Faith could assign as the reason of this blessed confidence,—"For He who hath all power in Heaven and Earth, hath promised that He will be with us to the end of the world."
It is time to dismiss Mr. Pattison's Essay. In doing so, I will not waste my time and yours by carping at the many errors of detail into which he has (not inexcusably) fallen. These are the accidents,—not the essence of his paper. The root of bitterness with the Author is, clearly enough, the Theory of Religious Belief in the Church of England. His concluding words shew this plainly. The sting of the Essay is in the tail:—
"In the Catholic theory the feebleness of Reason is met half-way, and made good by the authority of the Church. When the Protestants threw off this authority, they did not assign to Reason what they took from the Church, but to Scripture. Calvin did not shrink from saying that Scripture 'shone sufficiently by its own light.' As long as this could be kept to, the Protestant theory of belief was whole and sound. At least it was as sound as the Catholic. In both, Reason, aided by spiritual illumination, performs the subordinate function of recognising the supreme authority of the Church, and of the Bible, respectively. Time, learned controversy, and abatement of zeal, drove the Protestants generally from the hardy but irrational assertion of Calvin. Every foot of ground that Scripture lost was gained by one or other of the three substitutes: Church-authority, the Spirit, or Reason. Church-authority was essayed by the Laudian divines, but was soon found untenable, for on that footing it was found impossible to justify the Reformation and the breach with Rome." [O shame!] "The Spirit then came into favour along with Independency. But it was still more quickly discovered that on such a basis only discord and disunion could be reared. There remained to be tried Common Reason, carefully distinguished from recondite learning, and not based on metaphysical assumptions. To apply this instrument to the contents of Revelation was the occupation of the early half of the eighteenth century; with what success has been seen. In the latter part of the century the same Common Reason was applied to the external evidences. But here the method fails in a first requisite,—universality; for even the shallowest array of historical proof requires some book-learning to apprehend."—(pp. 328-9.)
Now all this is discreditable to Mr. Pattison as a Philosopher and as a Divine. When did Protestant England "throw off the authority" of the Church?—What are Calvin's opinions to her?—How does 'Independency,' 'Rationalism,' or any other unsound principle, affect us? Look at our Prayer-Book. Is it not the same which it was from the beginning? The Sarum Use, reformed and revised, has been our unbroken heritage as Christian men, from the first. Essentially remodelled in the days of Edward VI., the recension of our "Laudian Divines" is, (by God's great mercy!) still ours. What other teaching but that of the Book of Common Prayer, is, to this hour, the authoritative teaching of the Church of England? Why insinuate there has been vicissitude of Theory, where notoriously there has been none? Why imply that the storms which periodically sweep over the citadel of our Zion are effectual to remove the old foundations and to substitute new? What but a hollow heartless Scepticism can be the result of such an abominable passage as the foregoing?
"Whoever will take the religious literature of the present day as a whole, and endeavour to make out clearly on what basis Revelation is supposed by it to rest, whether on Authority, on the Inward Light, on Reason, on self-evidencing Scripture, or on the combination of the four, or some of them, and in what proportions; would probably find that he had undertaken a perplexing but not altogether profitless inquiry."—(p. 329.) And so the Essay ends.
With a short comment on the proposed problem, I also shall conclude.
No one but a fool would set about the task which Mr. Pattison here proposes. The current "religious literature of the day" cannot be supposed, for an instant, to be an adequate exponent of the mind of the Church of England,—or of any other Church. Revelation rests, at this hour, on exactly the same basis on which it has always rested, and on which it will rest, to the end of time; let the age be faithful, or faithless,—learned or unlearned,—rationalizing or scientific,—sceptical or superstitious,—or whatever else you will. And if I am asked to explain myself, I would humbly say,—(always submitting my own statements in such a matter to the judgment of the Bishops and Doctors of the Church of England,)—that we receive the Bible on the authority of the Church. The Church teaches us by the concurrent voices of many Fathers, Doctors, Saints, how to interpret the Bible; and convinces us that the three Creeds which she delivers to us as her own independent tradition, may be proved thereby; being in entire conformity with Holy Scripture, though not originally deduced from it. "Self-evidencing" is hardly a correct epithet to bestow upon Scripture. And yet, from the evidence which the New Testament supplies to the Old, and from the interpretation which it puts upon its teaching, we should not despair of proving the Truth of Revelation, to one who had neither darkened the inward Light, nor perverted his Reason.
In truth, however, it is idle thus to speculate. We have been born into the world during the nineteenth Century, whether we wish it or not. We have been nourished, (God be thanked!) in the bosom of the Christian Church, whether we would or no. The glory of the Gospel has informed our natural reason, and we cannot undo the blessed process, strive we as much as we will. The "inward Light," (as we call it,) is the lingering twilight of the Day of Creation, in the case of the heathen,—the reflected ray of the noontide of the Gospel, even in the case of the modern unbeliever. We cannot escape from these conditions of our being, although we may affect to ignore them, or pretend to turn our eyes the other way. No help however is to be rejected. No faculty of the soul need be denied the privilege of assisting to convince the doubting heart. The inward Light may not be disparagingly spoken of: for what if it should prove to be a ray sent down from the Father of Lights, to illumine the dark places of the soul? The aid of Reason is not to be excluded; for what is Faith but the highest dictate of the Reason? Faith, (let us ever remember,) being opposed not to Reason, but to Sight!... And who for a moment supposes that we disparage the office of Reason, because we speak of the authority of the Church, in controversies of Faith? We simply proclaim the Church to be the appointed witness and keeper of Holy Writ; and when we are invited "to make out clearly on what basis Revelation is supposed to rest," (p. 329,) we point,—where else should we point?—unhesitatingly to her unwavering witness from the beginning.
VII. The Essay which brings up the rear in this very guilty volume is from the pen of the "Rev. Benjamin Jowett, M.A., [Fellow and Tutor of Balliol College, and] Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Oxford,"—"a gentleman whose high personal character and general respectability seem to give a weight to his words, which assuredly they do not carry of themselves[144]." His performance is entitled "On the Interpretation of Scripture:" being, in reality, nothing else but a laborious denial of its Inspiration.