i8 7 o] CHRISTIANITY AND SUPERNATURAL 117 



on all thoughtful men that there is much Christian 

 thought which we may perhaps sympathise with in 

 spite of our theological position, but which our theology 

 refuses to have anything to do with. And this, I suppose, 

 more than anything else, is what is leading educated men 

 to doubt and disparage all theological truth ; to give 

 very little confidence to a Christian teaching that dares 

 not offer recognition to men that only a bigot can call 

 infidels. 



No one can say that our apologetical theology stands 

 on firm ground while these things are so. It is weak, 

 and because weak unjust, and because unjust tends 

 continually to repel from Christianity all who are not 

 drawn to the truth by a moral necessity strong enough 

 to overpower their sense of this weakness and injustice. 



It is absurd to attempt to compensate for this narrow 

 ness of scientific view by cultivating a sentimental breadth 

 of sympathy. It is not unreasoning sympathy but 

 thoughtful recognition, combined if you will with dissent, 

 that is called for. In a word, we must reconsider the 

 whole treatment of the premises of Christianity. Such a 

 reconstruction.the Germans have long seen to be necessary, 

 and have in no small measure succeeded in effecting. I 

 do not therefore speak on my own authority simply, but 

 seek to lay before you what in a land more favourable 

 to theological progress is regarded as an established 

 fact, when I say that the guiding conception in this recon 

 struction must be the notion of the supernatural above 

 laid down. 



The leading thought of our present apologetics is 

 very different. The older orthodoxy held that the 

 foundation of our Christianity is &quot; a knowledge of the 

 religious object communicated to men from without in 

 the form of doctrine.&quot; In the words of our Confession : 

 The light of nature is not sufficient to give the know 

 ledge of God and of His will, which is necessary to salva 

 tion ; therefore it pleased the Lord to reveal Himself 



