What is Inspiration ? 117 



life; and this conception we call, in common par- 

 lance, the conception of a government of law, and 

 not of caprice. So strong has this habit become 

 that we look with distrust upon any hypothesis 

 which implies a conception of Divine action as in 

 any sense local, or special, or transitory. 



The hypothesis of inspiration has been retained 

 by modern Protestant Christianity, chiefly as a 

 means of accounting for the assumed infallibility 

 or supernatural excellence of the literature gath- 

 ered together in the canonical Scriptures. It is 

 supposed that the writers of these works were in 

 some way instructed by Divine action, so that 

 their works are either entirely true in every state- 

 ment, or at least may claim to be examined in 

 accordance with different canons of criticism from 

 those which we feel bound to apply to all other 

 works. Now, this hypothesis most certainly im- 

 plies a conception of Divine action as local, spe- 

 cial, and transitory ; and, in so far as it does this, 

 it bears the marks of that heathen mode of philos- 

 ophizing which was current when Christian mono- 

 theism arose, and which has incrusted Christianity 

 with many of its conceptions. It is obviously not 

 an hypothesis in accord with the very strict mono- 

 theism towards which modern thought is so mani- 

 festly tending, and it is not likely long to survive 



