TtJE PHILOSOPHY OF BISHOP BCTLER. 



63 



The majority of Christian writers do not seem to have grasped 

 the fact that the Epistle to the Romans was not written to bring 

 sinners to Christ, but to give saints a true understanding of their 

 position. So, except in regard to the period of time in which they 

 lived, Butler might be said to supplement AVesley, and not vice 

 versa. 



Mr. Theodore Roberts expressed his disappointment that 

 the lecturer had found the seventeenth century the least interesting 

 from a Christian standpoint. He, on the contrary, considered 

 the century that produced Bunyan and Howe, also Pascal, and 

 witnessed the attempt of the Puritans to set up the Eangdom of 

 God by force on earth, to be most interesting. He regarded 

 conscience as that which God had implanted in man as the result 

 of the Fall, and that while man was bound to follow his conscience, 

 that conscience needed to be instructed. God addresses Himself 

 to man's conscience rather than to his intellect, and in this way 

 man was able to attain certainty with regard to di\4ne things. 



Our Lord's miracles were to be regarded at the present time as 

 adjuncts to, rather than proofs of, the Christian revelation. They 

 appeared as the necessary consequence of Who He was, as He 

 could not but use His power to relieve suffering humanity. 



Professor H. Laxghorxe Orchard (in the Chair) was in accord 

 with the author of this important and most interesting Paper as 

 to Bishop Butler's assured position among philosophical defenders 

 of the Truth, and as to the permanent value of his work— permanent 

 as Human Nature. 



Butler's early Hfe being passed amidst Nonconformist surroundings 

 was probably advantageous to his writings. McCosh has pointed 

 out that thought -objects are like many-sided figures, whereof 

 we men see some sides, some men more than others, angels see 

 more than men, whilst all the sides of the polygon are visible to 

 God only. Butler, regarding Christian Truth from the two stand- 

 points, first of Nonconformity, then of the Established Church, 

 would thus obtain a broader and wider \dew. 



Three great quahties — openness, sobriety, reverence for truth — 

 are noted in his mind, to which a common-sense logic may be added 

 as a fourth. The first and second of these have origin from the 



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