174 REV. JOHN tuckwp:ll^ m.r.a.s.^ on modern theories 



other human literature, or as the sacred books of other 

 national religions. 

 V. To give up the history taught hy these books as they 

 now stand, and rearrange the events in a new order 

 more in accordance with a progressive or evolutionary 

 theory. 



vi. To give up the belief in the strict truthfulness of the 



records and ndmit the influence of Ijias partisanship 

 and pious inventiveness on the part of the writers. 



vii. To give up belief in the miraculous so far as possible 



and treat all alleged mii-acles as legends, 

 viii. To give up belief in such explanations of Scripture 

 doctrines and of the experiences of the devout, as are 

 not verifiable by the more ordinary intelligence and 

 experience of mankind, 

 ix. And some go so far as to ask that all belief in the 

 operation of the supernatural, whether in the produc- 

 tion of Holy Scripture or in the higher religious 

 experience of the devout, should also be given up. 



In urging these or portions of tliese requests, it is alleged that 

 the older mode of dealing with the difficulties of the human 

 mind placed needless obstacles in its way and created infidelity, 

 while the new method will disarm the infidel and destroy his 

 infidelity. To which it is objected that the new method is not 

 a conquest but a capitulation. 



It will thus be seen that widely divergent views of Scripture 

 distinguish the two methods, and that the crux of the whole 

 question between them lies mainly in the mode of its composi- 

 tion. If composed as the new method affirms, then, speaking 

 generally, the Christian religion for nearly two thousand years 

 was promulgated by false statements of its principles and 

 enfeebled by false interpretations of its doctrines — erroneous 

 modes of speech which eluded the intelligence and moral 

 integrity not only of the great mass of its adherents but of most, 

 if not all, of its most brilliant exponents, and yet in spite of 

 which it achieved its most remarkable triumphs over the human 

 understandmg. It carmot but be therefore of the greatest 

 interest to inquire for the origin of the discovery of these remark- 

 able errors, the credit for which the new method takes to itself. 



The time at our disposal is wholly insufficient to permit an 

 adequate inquiry at first hand, we must be content therefore to 

 accept the explanation given by one of its foremost and most 

 capable exponents. Canon Cheyne, in his Founders of Old 



