may alike be adduced as authorities for a fact; and the qualities of veracity and credibility may attach in common to their testimony. But here lies the distinction between them. The inspired authority, in addition to the character of a record or historical testimony, has also the force of a rule of faith, a law of moral obligation, attested by miraculous sanctions of its Divine character. Now that Tradition possesses a degree of historical authority,—that the Church may be a credible witness to certain facts, that evidence of high probability may attach to the testimony of ancient fathers,-no one will dispute; and were this all that is implied by the authority of the Church, there would be no ground for vehemently protesting against it. But this authority appeals to every man's private judgement, and invites even a sceptical examination, instead of precluding or over-ruling it. Not so the authority contended for by the Romanists and the Anglican High-churchmen, which is the authority of a rule of faith, but of an uninspired and fallible rule, and therefore a spurious and usurped authority, neither satisfactory to reason nor binding on the conscience,-claiming obedience without faith, or credulity without evidence. Historical records and ecclesiastical documents may establish facts: political authorities may institute laws: but religious truth admits of no other law or proof than the Divine authority and the inspired testimony. The Scriptures, therefore, must be the only rule of faith to a true believer.

The fallacy which lies in the ambiguous meaning of the word authority, is not, however, the only source of error on this subject. Men who have not religious faith, or whose faith, if sincere, is unenlightened by sound scriptural knowledge, unable to discriminate the true evidence from the false, are glad to feel themselves taken by the hand, though it is by a blind guide, who conducts them to a resting-place in the maze of scepticism, which they mistake for the goal of their inquiries. Welcome is the proffered authority of the Church to one who wishes to repose upon a creed, and has not been directed to the Great Teacher who invites all the weary and heavy laden to learn of him, that they may find rest to their souls. The experimental evidence of Christian truth, which is the highest reason of faith to the heart, being undiscerned, the Rule of faith itself becomes involved in so much apparent uncertainty, that the decision of human authority seems preferable to bewildering doubt. Such we believe to be the natural progress by which many individuals have passed over from uninformed scepticism to the extreme of implicit faith; and the Romish Church numbers them among her most zealous and bigoted converts.

We have been less satisfied with the Lecture which has suggested these remarks, than with any of the series, not on account of any thing which the Preacher has advanced, but because, as

we have intimated, it does not meet the difficulties of the subject. In the following lecture, on the Insufficiency of Written Revelation, we meet with an assertion which seems to us much overstrained. The Roman Church, it is remarked, has virtually laid aside the Bible altogether as the standard of faith, in prefering a mere Translation to the inspired Originals. The preference given to the Vulgate is certainly alike unreasonable and presumptuous; but some Protestants have discovered scarcely less obstinate prejudice, in preferring to the genuine Hebrew and Greek text, as ascertained by careful collation, and established by all the evidence of which the case admits, the faulty readings of a received text or authorized version. This affords no excuse for the Papal anathema levied against all who reject the Apocryphal additions imbodied in the Latin Canon. Still, it is going too far to charge the Romanists with rejecting the Scriptures as a standard by adopting a venerable though defective Version as an adequate or authorized representation of the Originals. The main object of the lecture, however, is to expose the fallacious and dangerous dogma respecting Unwritten Traditions; a dogma altogether subversive of the Inspired Standard.

pass over the next lecture, on the Mass, as not calling for any particular observation, in order to extract from the succeeding one, on Justification, some further specimens of the Preacher's able and impressive manner of handling the various topics of religious debate. The following is the exordium.

'It was a common saying of the great German Reformer, which showed how thoroughly he had penetrated the nature of that system which he opposed; that every man carries a Pope within himself. And in truth, the whole strength of Popery, the grand secret of its growth, and of the mighty hold which it has acquired, and which it has retained through so long a course of ages, upon the minds of men, lies here; that it is, throughout, completely adapted to the taste and to the dispositions of our fallen nature. However some may talk of man being naturally a religious being-and we admit the fact to a certain extent it is not the religion of the Bible, not the religion of the cross of Christ, which is in any respect congenial to his natural belief and inclinations. So far from this, between the spirituality of religion and the innate bias of the human heart, there is an opposition the most deep-rooted and inveterate, and which can be overcome by nothing short of an omnipotent agency. Hence the power of a system which, forsaking the simple institutions of God, addresses itself to the eyes and to the ears of men, and captivates the imagination through the medium of the external senses! Hence the power of a system which, in the room of direct intercourse with God, and of the inward worship of the heart, to which the carnal mind is utterly averse, has substituted the pomp and the solemnity of external ceremonies. But the master-stroke of Popery, that which aims at the key-stone of the glorious arch of revealed truth, is when setting aside the humiliating

doctrine of salvation by free grace, she makes the acceptance of man with God to depend, either in whole or in part, on his own holiness and his own works. This is a Popery which grows in rank luxuriance beyond the pale of the Roman Catholic communion; which is to be found, I may venture to assert, within every Protestant church: this is the Popery of the human heart which is born with us, and which grows with our growth, and which leaves something of its taint and of its impress, even upon those who have experienced the renovating influence of the Divine Spirit.' pp. 159–161.

Here again, therefore, the advocate of the Protestant doctrine, of the Article by which the Church must stand or fall, finds himself opposed, not merely to the Romanist, but to a large class of nominal Protestants. Mr. Young has treated the point with great ability, and with conciliatory candour. On the subject of Sanctification, he remarks, Roman Catholics and Protestants are, to a certain extent, in agreement.

that

We do, indeed, object against much of what, in their opinion, constitutes holiness. We attach no value to the fastings, and mortifications, and pilgrimages, and bodily inflictions, which are in high estimation amongst them; and we believe these to originate in superstitious feeling and in ignorance of the true nature of holiness, and to be not only not required by God, but often most offensive in his sight. But we are in so far agreed, that it is the work of God, and of God alone, to sanctify as well as to justify. We are in so far agreed, that God, in the first instance, must impart his grace to the mind, or, as Roman Catholics speak, must communicate inherent holiness,he must altogether renovate the nature, and implant holy principles in the room of the unholy dispositions and affections which alone have sway in the unregenerate mind. We are in so far agreed, that charity, or love, is the principal element and spring of evangelical holiness, and that this charity must be manifested in repentance and hatred of sin, and in all the proper fruits of obedience. We maintain, besides, and it is a point of vital and fundamental importance in this discussion, that justification and sanctification are inseparable, and that the individual whom God justifies, he at the same time sanctifies; and that, unless there be holiness of heart and life, the proper and indispensable fruits and evidences of justification are wanting. But yet withal, we hold that the two processes are essentially and altogether different. In the scriptural meaning of the term, to justify is to acquit, to pardon; whereas, to sanctify is to make holy and it is obvious to every understanding, that no two things can be more perfectly distinct. Sanctification is a real change of nature; justification is a change only of the relative condition-the change from. the situation of a condemned criminal to that of a pardoned criminal. Justification is purely the act of God, in the capacity of a judge, acquitting and pardoning the condemned sinner. Sanctification, on the other hand, whilst it is in one respect purely the work of God, is yet a work in which the sinner necessarily co-operates, and in which his love, and repentance, and obedience hold an important place. And I am strongly persuaded

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that it is here that all the errors of the church of Rome on this momentous subject have originated. Justification and sanctification are inseparably united together; and if it were the salvation of man as a whole that were now under discussion; in other words, if it were asked, How is a condemned, polluted sinner, saved by God? we should unhesitatingly reply, it is not by being justified only, nor yet by being sanctified only, but it is by being both justified and sanctified; in other words, it is not merely by having his sins pardoned, nor yet merely by having his nature made holy, but it is by being at once pardoned and made holy. Justification and sanctification are necessarily combined; and they do, not separately, but together, constitute salvation. Now, looking only to the fact, that the two processes are thus united, and forgetting that they are at the same time widely and essentially distinct; remembering, besides, that human agency holds an important place in sanctification, Roman Catholics seem to have been led to connect human agency in like manner with justification, and to maintain, that the sinner is justified, not wholly on the ground of the obedience and sufferings of Christ, but in part also on the ground of his own satisfactions and righteousness.' pp. 169–171.

After very clearly and explicitly unfolding the Scriptural doctrine, Mr. Young, towards the close of the lecture, combats the objection, we are sorry to say, not merely a Romish one,against the doctrine, as leading to licentious consequences.

The objectors against the Protestant doctrine conceive that for God to bestow a free and gratuitous pardon, would be at once to take away the strongest motive to obedience that men can feel, and almost to throw open to them the course of disobedience. They cannot understand how good works can be performed, unless with a view to our justification before God. Now it is some consolation to us to know, that this is, in truth, the very objection which was brought against the doctrine laid down by the apostle Paul, and that what we maintain is no other than what we take up on the authority of this inspired apostle.

""Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid! yea, we establish the law." Romans iii. 31. In the Divine method of justification, absolutely gratuitous as it is, God has made ample provision against abuse, and secured that not only shall no encouragement to sin be furnished, but that new and more powerful motives to holiness shall be supplied. That faith by which we are justified, is a faith which operates by love, and which purifies the heart; and it is not justifying faith unless it lead to such results. We uphold, with all Scripture, the absolute necessity of good works; but they must be kept in their proper place. They are the consequents, not the antecedents of justification; they are the necessary and indispensable fruit of justifying faith, but they form no part of the ground on which justification is bestowed. And it must be noticed still further, that, in addition to all other influences, the very grace of Jehovah in the method of justification, the amazing extent, the perfectly gratuitous character of this grace, of itself creates a security altogether unexampled. Is there no power in love? Is there no omnipotence in the principle of gratitude?

And has not God, by this wondrous expedient, unsealed the very spring and fountain of all holiness, and laid hold of one of the strongest principles of our nature, and secured its very strongest and most irresistible manifestation? The divinity of the scheme is in nothing so splendidly illustrated as in this, that whilst God is seen bestowing godlike mercy in a way altogether godlike, the interests of holiness are yet infallibly protected, and even advanced. Man is humbled as he ought to be, and stands in the position of a condemned and defenceless and helpless rebel, before his insulted and outraged Sovereign. But God, of his own ineffable grace, bestows a free and unconditional pardon upon the rebel, and reinstates him into his favour, and confers upon him the privileges of his children.

This is the doctrine which in all ages has proved mighty through God, and which has conveyed peace, and holiness, and eternal life, to unnumbered myriads! This is the doctrine which apostles promulgated to the world, and by which they triumphed, and for which they died!-Free, gratuitous justification, through the atonement and righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ! My soul kindles at the thought of such matchless grace, in which is involved, at the same time, so wondrous a manifestation of wisdom and power! If I have any regret in looking back upon the brief period of my labours, as a minister, the chief is this, that I have not given sufficient prominence to the doctrine of free justification, and that I have not been lavish enough in extolling this corner-stone of the system of revelation. Oh! there is a glorious monotony of preaching, which may it be my highest ambition to attain. It is the monotony of the Cross! the monotony of the glad tidings of great joy to a dying world! the monotony of the song of angels, "Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, and good-will towards men!" the monotony of the anthem of the redeemed in heaven, "WORTHY IS THE LAMB TO RECEIVE GLORY, AND HONOUR, AND BLESSING; FOR HE WAS SLAIN FOR US, AND HATH REDEEMED US TO GOD BY HIS BLOOD!" pp. 187–190.

In the lecture on the Supremacy of the Apostle Peter, we were glad to find Mr. Young abandoning the forced and untenable interpretation of Matt. xvi. 18, 19, sometimes contended for by Protestants, and admitting the reference to Peter which a sound exposition demands. He proceeds to shew, nevertheless, that the supremacy ascribed to Peter by the Papists is a vain figment,— that his having been bishop of Rome is an idle legend,—and that consequently, the claim of the Pope to the headship, derived from Peter's supremacy, is altogether untenable. In the eleventh lecture, he combats the notion, that the Church, as a visible society, must have a visible supreme head; denying that the Church of Christ is a visible association. This denial required to be guarded, since the Church is certainly visible in a certain sense, as much as any temporal or political society. The notion of a visible universal head of the Church, he treats as monstrous and absurd. We cannot see that it is more absurd than the notion of a visible national head, or of a head to a national Church.