simple theory, like enthusiasts, to dispense with the external.

This abstract difficulty, however, is small compared with that attendant on the seat of the Infallibility claimed by Romanism. Little room as there is in the Roman controversy for novelty or surprise, yet it does raise fresh and fresh amazement, the more we think of it, that Romanists should not have been able to agree among themselves where that Infallibility is lodged which is the keystone of their system. Archbishop Bramhall' reckons no less than six distinct opinions on the subject; some Romanists lodging the gift in the Pope speaking ex Cathedrá, others in the Pope in Council of Cardinals, others in the Pope in General or Provincial Council, or in the General Council without the Pope, or in the Church Diffusive, that is, the whole company of believers throughout the world. Bellarmine 2 observes, by way of meeting this difficulty, that all Romanists are agreed on two points; first, that wherever the Infallibility lies, at least that all Romanists agree that the Pope in General Council is infallible; next, that even out of Council when he speaks ex Cathedrá, he is to be obeyed (for safety's sake,) whether really infallible or not. And no English theologian can quarrel with so wise and practical mode of settling the difficulty; but then let it be observed, that so to settle it is to deviate from

Works, p. 39. Vide Leslie, iii. p. 396. 2 De Rom. Pont. iv. 2.

the high infallible line which Rome professes to walk upon in religious questions, and to descend to Bishop Butler's level, to be content to proceed not by an unerring rule, but by those probabilities which guide us in the conduct of life. After all then the baptismal illumination does not secure the very benefit which occasions Romanists to refer to it. They claim for it a power which in truth, according to their own confession, does nothing at all for them.

Nor is this all: granting that Infallibility resides in the Pope in Council, yet it is not a matter of faith, that is, it has not been formally determined what Popes have been true Popes; which of the many de facto, or rival Popes, are to be acknowledged; nor again which of the many professed General Councils are really so. A Romanist might at this moment deny the existing Pope to be St Peter's successor without offending against any article of the Creed. The Gallican Church receives the Councils of Basil and Constance wholly, the Roman Church rejects both in part. last Council of Lateran condemns the Council of Basil. The Council of Pisa is, according to Bellarmine, neither clearly approved nor clearly rejected. The Acts of other Councils are adulterated without any attempt being made to amend them. Now I repeat, such uncertainty as to the limits of Divine Revelation, is no antecedent objection to the truth of the Roman system; it might be the

The

appointed trial of our faith and earnestness.

But

it is a great inconsistency in it, being what it is, that is, engaging as it does to furnish us with infallible teaching and to supersede inquiry.

Unless it seemed like presumption to interpret the history of religion by a private rule, one might call the circumstance under consideration even providential. Nothing could be better adapted than it to defeat the counsels of human wisdom, or to show to thoughtful inquirers the hollowness of even the most specious counterfeit of divine truth. The theologians of Romanism have been able dexterously to smoothe over a thousand inconsistencies, and to array the heterogeneous precedents of a course of centuries in the semblance of design and harmony. But they cannot complete their system in its most important and essential point. They can determine in theory the nature, degree, extent, and object of the Infallibility which they claim; they cannot agree among themselves where it resides. As in the building of Babel, the Lord hath confounded their language; and the structure stands half finished, a monument at once of human daring and its failure.

But, whether we dare call it providential or not, except so far as all things must be so accounted, it at least serves to expose the pretensions of Romanism. The case stands as follows; Romanism first professes a common ground with ourselves, a readiness to stand or fall by Antiquity. When

we appeal to Antiquity accordingly, it shifts its ground, substituting for Ancient Testimony abstract arguments. If we question its abstract arguments, it falls back upon its Infallibility. If we ask for the proof of its Infallibility, it can but attempt to overpower the imagination by its attempt at system, the boldness, decision, consistency, and completeness with which it urges and acts upon its claim. Yet in this very system, thus ambitious of completeness, we are able to detect one or two serious flaws in the theory of the very doctrine which that system seems intended to sustain.

Such are some of the outlines of the theology by which Rome supersedes the teaching of the early Church. Her excuse, it seems, lies in this, that the Church now has lost the strength and persuasiveness it once had. Unanimity, uniformity, mutual intercourse, strict discipline, the freshness of Tradition, and the reminiscences of the Apostles are no more; and she would fain create by an artificial process what was natural in Antiquity. This is what can be said for her at best; and there is confessedly a difficulty in the theory of the Church's present authority; though no difficulty of course can excuse fraud and falsehood. How we meet the difficulty, comes next into consideration.

LECTURE V.

ON THE USE OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT.

By the right of Private Judgment in matters of religious belief and practice, is meant the prerogative, considered to belong to each individual Christian, of ascertaining and deciding for himself from Scripture what is Gospel truth, and what is not. This is the principle maintained in theory, as a sort of sacred possession or palladium, by the Protestantism of this day. Romanism, as is equally clear, takes the opposite extreme, and maintains that nothing is left to individual judgment; that is, that there is no subject in religious faith and conduct on which the Church may not pronounce a decision, such as to supersede the private judgment, and compel the assent, of every one of her members. The English Church takes a middle course between these two. It considers that on certain definite subjects private judgment upon the text of Scripture has been superseded, but not by the mere