as a divine hand, yet a warm and living hand, in the spiritual darkness or twilight, and were ready to be led by it towards the central light of God.

The doctrine

Spirit and

the Holy Trinity.

In this consummation of the doctrine of Christ all else is implied. We find that, following closely on this declaration of the perfect manifestation of God in man, of the Holy came naturally the declaration of the Divine Spirit, inspiring the soul to understand and accept that manifestation, and conforming it to the divine image in the likeness of Christ. The belief in the power of a Divine Spirit is certainly an element in any true belief of God. Without it the sovereignty of God cannot be asserted in the inner life of the soul, and, as that inner life becomes prominent in the more advanced human thought, so the conception of a divine inspiration rises to a chief place in all human religions, co-ordinate with the other two great convictions of the providence of God and of His revelation of Himself to man, which had stood out pre-eminent in the earlier stages of religious consciousness. How strikingly the doctrine was foreshadowed in the Old Testament we have already seen, by the connexion in the prophetic revelation of The Spirit of the Lord was upon me,' with 'The word of the Lord came to me.' But it is in the teaching of Christ Himself, and by the knowledge of Christ as the Word of God to us and in us, that it grows out into completeness, revealing to us in the Holy Spirit not a mere influence or mode of Divine action, but a true Person; till in the central mystery of the Holy Trinity we have the highest of all examples of the true nature of the Gospel, as absolutely supernatural, beyond thought to discover, beyond thought fully to comprehend, yet certainly the ultimate basis of the spiritual truths which we know naturally, in the observation of human life and in the depths of human consciousness. That mystery is (in the words of the Athanasian Creed) brought home to us by the Christian verity,' implied (that is) in the full manifestation of God in Christ. In that implicit form is it generally taught in Holy Scripture, and probably in that form grasped by the thought and faith of ordinary Christians. It is sufficient, therefore, for the purpose here contemplated if, without entering into the consideration of that

mystery of the Trinity in Unity, and of the various foreshadowings of it which Christian teachers have found or fancied in the religions and philosophies of the world, we fix our thoughts simply on the completed development of the manifestation of Christ, as the Alpha and Omega of our Christianity.

morality.

I say of Christianity,' not merely of Christian doctrine. For though Christianity is a life as well as a truth, yet the truth and the life are inextricably blended together. The effect on Nothing is clearer, both to friends and foes, than Christian that Christian morality has a peculiar stamp, dependent upon Christian doctrine, incapable of being retained if that doctrine be given up. For it is at once a 'godly morality' and a true 'human morality.' It is a godly morality; for it finds its basis, not, with one school of moralists, in the sacredness of intuition, nor, with the rival school, in the inherited experience of utilitarian laws, but in the declared will of God; and it holds goodness to be developed by a conscious obedience to that will, growing by love into the likeness of God Himself. Accordingly it recognises profoundly the horror of that moral evil, which unquestionably exists around us and in us, as not only vice against self or crime against man, but as sin against God; and it proclaims, as the source of man's power to conquer sin, God's forgiveness and God's grace in Jesus Christ. Hence it takes up heartily, as the dominant principle of moral life, the old commandment, which is the very creed of Monotheism, Thou shalt love the Lord God with all thy heart, and soul, and strength,' and then only adds, as second to it, and as accordant with it, 'Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' Yet it is a true human morality; for its essence consists not in law, enforcing obedience to the Divine will, perhaps even sinking the human will in an absolute submission, but in free conviction and love of the soul within, accepting that will gladly, and working with God by the energy of a spiritual nature. In the presence, therefore, of evil, whether in the guilt or bondage of sin, it is serious, but not despairing, because it holds that, as unnatural, it can and must be overcome. It looks up to God as really our Father, and therefore it bids man be reverent, but not abject, in the Divine presence. But it

unites these two characteristics-in other systems of morality so often divorced from each other-simply because it rests on the faith of God and man really made one in Christ, and of a power to reproduce the life of Christ in every man. Take away that faith, and the two elements of morality will fly asunder. Neither will prove itself sufficient to maintain that union of firm stability with elasticity of constant progress, on which depends the growth alike of the individual soul and of the human society. Hence for acting, as well as for believing, to learn from Christ and to learn Christ are still the sum and substance of Christianity.

life.

Nor is it otherwise if from moral action we turn to consider the inner principles of the spiritual life itself. Here also we find Our spiritual the same connexion between the Christian knowledge and Christian life. It is, indeed, notable that to the three successive stages of the preaching of Christ, there may be seen to correspond the three great principles of the inner life. The preaching of Christ risen' appeals to the indestructible instinct of Hope, which is the confidence of future perfection, and on which therefore hangs the true human life of freedom, of energy, and of progress. The preaching of the one mediation, on the other hand, calls forth the response of Faith, in which is involved the sense of weakness and sin, but of weakness and sin overcome by dependence on the grace of God, and which is, therefore, the central principle of a godly life. By no mere accident we find, lastly, that the teacher of the final truth of Christ as the Word of God is emphatically the Apostle of Love. For in love is the living sense of unity, first between man and God, and then between man and man; and it is the knowledge of the Divine in man which is the assurance of such unity. There is something very remarkable in this correspondence of the preaching of Christ to the spiritual capacities of man. In it the law, which has been dwelt upon throughout, exemplifies itself again. For that which corresponds to man's nature must be natural, and yet certainly from the mere capacities of that nature could never have been evolved the supernatural conception of the Gospel preaching.

Thus in relation to Christian doctrine, Christian morality, Christian spiritual life, the cycle is completed in the proclamation of the eternal Word of God.' The contemplation of this ultimate truth is full of instruction, as throwing light at once on the unity and the finality of the Scriptural revelation. However we may account for it, it is certainly true, that up to this, in fundamental unity and continuous development, all previous teaching had led, from the Protevangelium of Genesis, through all the various stages of the ancient knowledge of God, in history and law, in psalm and prophecy, and even through the earlier phases of the revelation of Christ Himself. At no previous stage could we vaguely stop for nowhere else could we find any adequate completion of the great pervading ideas of covenant with God. But beyond this we cannot go. For it has to do not with earth, but with heaven-not with time, but with eternity.

CHAPTER X.

CONCLUSION.

It remains now briefly to recapitulate the chief points of the present investigation, and to show its connexion with the enquiry into the direct evidences of Christianity, as such, which will occupy the second part.

The general

ment.

I. My object throughout has been to examine the relation in which the main doctrines of Christianity stand to the two chief conclusions and the one great perplexity line of argu- of Natural Theology. Holding that in a true sense 'Christianity is as old as the creation,' I have thought it best to carry out that examination by studying in the Bible as a whole the actual historical development of the chief doctrines of the Gospel. Since the first glance at the Bible shows that its one great subject is God in covenant with man,' and that this subject has its completion in the full manifestation of Jesus Christ, it follows that the conception of this leading principle determines the chief lines of our investigation.

For it obviously involves three main ideas: first, the belief in a personal and living God, having communion with man; next, the conviction of man's spirituality, and his freedom to be a fellow-worker with God; lastly, the certainty of the conquest of the power of evil, which raises a barrier between God and man. In the first and second of these principles we trace the substance of the teaching of Natural Theology; in the last we are brought face to face with its one great perplexity. The covenant with God, if realised in faith, must necessarily confirm the one and dispel the other. II. The investigation proceeding on these lines of thought carries us on through the various sections of the Scripture history.

The stages of investigation.

We have first the outline of the whole in the great intro