26 PROLOGUE I 



still asserted with all the vigour inspired by 

 conscious safety from attack. Though the pro- 

 posal to treat the Bible " like any other book " 

 which caused so much scandal, forty years ago, 

 may not yet be generally accepted, and though 

 Bishop Colenso's criticisms may still lie, formally, 

 under ecclesiastical ban, yet the Church has not 

 wholly turned a deaf ear to the voice of the 

 scientific tempter ; and many a coy divine, while 

 " crying I will ne'er consent," has consented to 

 the proposals of that scientific criticism which the 

 memorialists renounce and denounce. 



A humble layman, to whom it would seem the 

 height of presumption to assume even the uncon- 

 sidered dignity of a " steward of science," may 

 well find this conflict of apparently equal ecclesi- 

 astical authorities perplexing suggestive, indeed, 

 of the wisdom of postponing attention to either, 

 until the question of precedence between them is 

 settled. And this course will probably appear 

 the more advisable, the more closely the funda- 

 mental position of the memorialists is examined. 



"No opinion of the fact or form of Divine 

 Revelation, founded on literary criticism [and I 

 suppose I may add historical, or physical, critic- 

 ism] of the Scriptures themselves, can be admitted 

 to interfere with the traditionary testimony of the 

 Church, when that has been once ascertained and 

 verified by appeal to antiquity." 1 

 1 Declaration Article 10. 



