Let us remember that the Bible is simply a great body of national literature, and that you can prove anything out of it. Then remember that it has been proved over and over again by the facts of the handwriting of God himself to be mistaken and wrong in any number of directions.
God is writing his own book in the heavens, in the earth, in the human heart; and we are reading the story there. No creed, then, particularly if it be infamous and unjust and horrible, can prove itself to us so that we are bound to accept it to-day on the basis of an appeal to any book. But the Catholic Church claims not only that the book is infallible, but that their church tradition is infallible too. Is it? How can a church prove that its declarations are infallible? Is there any way of proving it? Think for a moment. It can make the claim: the only conceivable way of proving it is by never making a mistake. Try the Catholic Church by that test. It has committed itself over and over and over again to things which have been demonstrated beyond question to be mistakes. It has made grave mistakes, not only as to fact, but as to morals as well.
On what, then, shall we base any one of these "infallible" creeds? There is no basis for any such claim; and thank God there is not. For now we are free to study, here, there, everywhere; to read God's word in the stars; to read it in the rocks; to read it in the remains of old-time civilizations; to read it in the development of education, the arts, science; to read it in the light of the love we have for each other, the love for our children, and the growing philanthropy and widening benevolence of mankind.
We have thus perfect freedom to listen when God speaks, to see when he holds a leaf of his ever-growing book for our inspection, and to believe concerning him the grandest and noblest and finest things that the mind can dream or the heart can love.
WHY HAVE UNITARIANS NO CREED?
FOR a Scripture suggestion touching the principle involved in my subject, I refer you to the words found in the fifth chapter of the Gospel according to Matthew, the forty-third and the forty-fourth verses, "Ye have heard that it hath been said; but I say unto you." I take these phrases simply as containing the principle to which I wish to call your earnest attention at the outset.
Jesus here recognizes the fact that the religious beliefs of one age are not necessarily adequate to a succeeding age. So he says over and over in this chapter, Ye have heard that it hath been said by the fathers, by the teachers, the religious leaders in old times, so and so: but I say unto you something else, something in advance, something beyond.
If any one chooses to say that Jesus was infallible, inspired, and therefore had a right to modify the teachings of the fathers, still this does not change the principle at all. In any case he recognized the fact that the beliefs of the old time might not be sufficient to the new time.
And, even if any one should take the position that Jesus was the second person in the Trinity, that he was the one who revealed the old-time truth, and also revealed the new, still the principle is not changed: it is conceded, whatever way we look at it. For, even if he were God, he is represented as giving the people in the time of Moses, the time of David, certain precepts, certain things to believe, certain things to do, and then, recognizing at a later time that they were not adequate, changing those precepts, and giving them something larger, broader, deeper, to accept and to practise.
Because this principle is here involved, I have taken these words as my
Scripture point of departure.