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from prejudice, earnest search after truth, have found the key 
to many a riddle which has baffled previous ages. And where 
the man of “ culture ” only sees a set of enthusiasts who are 
putting their own interpretations upon language which is 
“ fluid, passing, literary/'’ utterly and entirely indefinite, the 
“ spiritual man,” to use St. Paul’s words, sees only a band of 
earnest labourers, busy in digging out from an inexhaustible 
mine, fresh stores of precious material wherewith to build 
or to adorn the Palace of Truth. 
12. I proceed to consider Mr. Arnold’s mode of dealing with 
the Bible. I have already treated of two of the subjects on 
which he remarks, namely. Miracles and the Fourth Gospel, 
in two volumes, which are in the possession of the Institute.* 
I need not, therefore, take up the time of the meeting in 
repeating what I have there said. But I may be allowed 
briefly to refer to his mode of dealing with those subjects. 
He says, and we have already admitted it, that in the Jewish 
and Christian Churches alike there has been a tendency to 
V 
what he calls Aberglaube, or extra-belief ; that is, that there 
has been a tendency to mingle the human with the divine, 
the conclusions of reason with the truths of Revelation. 
But when he proceeds to tell us what this extra-belief is, 
we are forcibly struck with the fact, that not only does he 
sweep away at once the greater part of New and Old 
Testament alike, but he supplies us with no definite 
principles by which we can separate the real original reve- 
lation or belief from the human accretions wherewith it has 
been overlaid. Thus he dismisses with equal contempt the 
first disciples of Christ, whom He chose to disseminate 
His doctrines, and the theologians of mediasval and modern 
times. He eliminates by a stroke of the pen all Miracles, 
Prophecy, belief in the Fatherhood of God, Messianic ideas 
from the Old Testament ; all Miracles, fulfilment of prophecy, 
creeds, eschatology, and even the Resurrection of Christ, from 
the New. Yet when we come to inquire how this extremely 
difficult task of separating the true from the false, the extra- 
belief from the original revelation, is accomplished, there 
is not a single word to guide us. Mr. Arnold’s method is 
charmingly, it is refreshingly simple. That is original 
Christianity, or original Judaism, which Mr. Arnold thinks 
is so ; that is Aberglaube, or extra-belief, which it pleases 
* The Rector and his Friends, Dialogue C, Miracles and Special Provi- 
dences, and the Doctrinal System of St. John. 
