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Show CbeXwo Brothers. y,o Controversial Dialogue Between a Presbyterian and His j Catholic Brother, Leading Up to Former's Conversion. j IJames Milwood, Presbyterian, in reply re-ply to his brother John, Catholic, acknowledged ac-knowledged the force of the other's reasoning by admitting that God can make his ministers infallible, but it i does not. therefore, follow that he , does. "I have shown you." continued John, "that Gcd must, because he cannot can-not authorize either the teaching of error, without contracting his own nature, na-ture, which is infinitely and essentially true; and that he does, to the full extent of their commission to teach, you yourself do and must hold or give up all belief in external revelation." "Not at ail." "Why do you believe our Lord was a son of God 7"' "Because hp himself so declared." "Why do you believe his declarations?" declara-tions?" "Because he was the Son of God and could not lie." "A good reason, after it is proved that he was the Son of God: none at all before." "Be , it so." John Milwood begins the dialogue, to I prove the infallibility of God's minis-I minis-I ters, holding the divine commission to teach the word of God. F.d I. M. C XXI "The miracles, then, simply proved his divine commission, that is, accredited accred-ited him as a teacher sent from God. But how from the fact of 'his commission com-mission conclude the truth of what he said, if the divine commission be not the warrant of infallibility? If one who is divinely commissioned to teach, notwithstanding his commission, may err, how can you say that our Lord himself did not err, and that you do not err in believing him to be the Son of God? indeed, it is only on tne ground tnat the divine commission is the warrant of infallibility that your profession of faith in the Bible as the infallible word of God is not ridiculous and absurd." "The sacred w rs were inspired, but the divinely coi. nissioned teachers you speak of are not. Being inspired, they could know the truth of what they :afurmed; and being honest and godly men, they would not arhrm what they did not know." "That is nothing to your purpose. The inspiration was nothing more nor less than God simply telling or communicating com-municating to them what they were to teach, and they have in this respect no advantage over the church, in case she be fully instructed as to what she j is to propose as the word of God. If instructed, it matters not, as to her ability to teach, whether instructed by immediate inspiration to herself, or only mediately through that of the prophets and apostles. She claims to : have been fully instructed, for the 1 commission under which she professes ! to act was, 'Going, teach all nations teaching them to observe all i things whatsoever I have commanded ; you.' (St. Matt, xxviil. 19.) The al-i al-i leged defect of immediate inspiration in her case, or its presence in the case I of the sacred writers, can, therefore, ' of itself, be jio reason for believing one In preference to the other. The real reason for believing the. sacred writers is that God authorized them to teach; and you have the same reason for believing be-lieving the church, if you have equal reason for believing her authorized by God to teach his word. The commission commis-sion is a warrant of infallibility in her case, as much as it was In theirs." "But you forget that I gave as my reason for believing the sacred writers that they were honest and godly men, and would not afRrm what they did not know." "You, then, consider the personal character oi the teacher better authority au-thority than the divine commission? This is a common Protestant blunder, and hence the worthlessness of the greater part of your treatises on the evidences of Christianity. God's authority au-thority for believing is not sufficient til! man indorses it! .The best men are fallible, and may be deceived. If we had nothing but the personal characters charac-ters of the writers on which to rely. honest and godly as they certainly were, we should have no sufficient reason rea-son for believing what they wrote to be the word of God. Their personal character may be important when the question turns on their credibility as witnesses to the facts they record, but does not enter into the account when the question is on their authority as teachers of revealed truth. No man's personal character is a sufficient warrant war-rant for believing that anything he asserts as-serts to be a doctrine of revelation is really and truly a doctrine of revelation. revela-tion. If it were, we should be obliged to believe whatever any man, whose character, so far as we know, is honest and irreproachable, chooses to teach us as the word of God. How, then, can you maintain that the personal character char-acter of the teacher is a surer warrant of infallibility than the divine commission?'" commis-sion?'" "The simple fact that the writers were honest and godly men may not I be alone a sufficient reason for believing believ-ing them, yet if they had been bad men. that would alone have been a sufficient suf-ficient reason for not believing them. For God does not and will not speak by bad men." "That is not so certain. Balaam, the son of Peor, was a bad man; yet God spoke by him, and caused him to utter a glorious prophecy. Do ybu believe his prophecy on his personal character, or because divinely commissioned teachers have told you that ic was not he who spoke from himself, but the Lord who spoke by him?" "I believe the sacred writers because God authorized them to teach his word, and the Holy Ghost was with them to .-nauic iueiii( m leiicu u, ana to preserve them from error in teaching it." "Is not the assistance of the ' Holy Ghost, so far as needed, necessarily implied in the commission or authority to teach?" "If the commission were the warrant of infallibility, it would be so implied; but that is precisely what I deny." "No man can teach infallibility without, with-out, it?" "No." "But with it any man can teach infallibly?" in-fallibly?" "Perhaps so." "No perhaps about it. It must be so positively, or you cannot assert the infallibility of the sacred penmen." "God leaves the will free; any one who has the assistance may teach in- ia limy, n ne cnooses: Dut it noes not, therefore, follow- hat he must and will so teach." . "In what concerns personal morality, moral-ity, natural or Christian, the will is I free: but in teaching at the command of God, it is not. The individual speaks not as moved by his own wiil, but as moved by the Holy Ghost. Thus Balaam Ba-laam was forced against his will to bless Israel, and to utter a prophecy he did not intend, and which he was unwilling to utter; for it was against his interest, and he loved the wages of iniquity. Thus, too, the. prophet Jonas sought to run away from the Lord, and not to preach as commanded to the Nlnevites, but the Lord brought him back by a miracle, and forced him to utter his word. Moreover, if the matter mat-ter depended on the human will, the teachings of no human teacher, however how-ever authorized and assisted by the Holy Ghost, could ever know whether th teacher spoke as moved by th" Holy Ghost, or merely from his own proper motion. In vain, then, would you claim to have, the Bible the infallible infalli-ble word of God. Nay, you have your- ,....l,. . Ill HI.. I,.,,!!!!. ...!.. ,1.,.,.!,....,. M.I,. .,, ,, .H,MM, self just said, the Holy cihost enable! the teachers to teach the word, and I preserves them from error in teaching ' it." "In the case of the sacred writers, not of all men." "For all men have not the assistance I of the Holy Ghost to fach the wor.l of God. nor are all commissioned to teach it: but if it bo what you define it. any one who has it must be able to : teach, and be preserved from error in I teaching, and therefore must teach the word infallibly." j "Be it so." 'But the divine commission does not necessarily imply this assistance?" "No. it docs not; therefore, I admit the Infallibility of the sacred writers specially, and not of divinely commissioned commis-sioned teachers in general." "What is the significance of the divine di-vine commission to teach the word of God?" J "It authorizes the one who receives it to he a teacher of Clod's word, but j does not necessarily enable him to teach it infallibly." "So one may have authority from God to teach his word, anil yet not have the ability to teach it in the oniv sense in which God can authorize it to be taught! What. then, means the authority?" au-thority?" "Why. it is authority to teach." "Unquestionably, but what is that?" "He who has it is authorized to speak or tearh in the name of God." "That is, to propound the word of God. not in his own name and on his own authority, but in the name and on the authority of God?" "Yv?s. it means that he is empowered to teach with divine authority." "Can anything but truth be taught with divine authority?" "No." "God cannot authorize the teaching of error?" "No: for that would be the same as to teach it." "Then no one not able to teach th truth, and not preserved from error 'n teaching it, can be said to teach by divine authority?" "So it would seem." "You. say that for God to authorize the teaching of error would be the same as for him to teach it?" "I do." (To be continued.) |