to determine all controversies about religion, that every one must abide by its decrees; but, what is of greater importance, to declare and to define what is the word of God; so that, but for this testimony of the church, it is altogether impossible for any person to ascertain the divinity of the Holy Scriptures. The object of these teachers is evident to all. For if they shall but once persuade men-as it is almost the sole aim of all their exertions in the present day to do that their church is this infallible society, they will have no difficulty in convincing them of the truth of their other tenets. It will indeed be altogether preposterous to make use of the Scriptures for the purpose of confuting the dogmas of the Roman church; since we not only do not understand the Scriptures without the interpretation of this church, but do not know, without its infallible testimony, that they are the word of God. And who will venture to assail traditions, when the same church which alone has certified to us that the Scriptures are the written word of God, maintains that traditions are the unwritten word; and if we give credit to it in the one case, it is not less worthy of credit in the other?

We here willingly grant to the doctors of the Romish church that nothing can be more convenient than this plan. To believe that the society in which you have been born is the true and infallible church, and to yield to it a blind assent in all things, is much easier than to examine every doctrine proposed to you as an article of faith. We do not intend at present to prove to them that the authority which they ascribe to their church is unfounded; our object requires us chiefly to inquire whether or not they can justly make use of this authority to demonstrate the divine origin of the Holy Scriptures. As a means of settling this subject of discussion, we desire that the four following questions-to omit many other points which have frequently in this controversy been matters of debate on both sides may be thoroughly examined. 1. How may we know that any society of men is the true church? 2. How may we know what authority should be ascribed to that church? 3. How may the church itself know that the Scriptures are the word of God, so as to be able to furnish an infallible testimony respecting it? 4. How may every person, even the unlearned, know that the whole church bears this testimony?

I. Our first inquiry is, How can we ascertain that any society is the true church? The authority which the doctors of the church of Rome attribute to the testimony of the church

as a proof of the divine origin of the Scriptures, they attribute to it only in so far as it is the testimony of the church of Christ. But any society of men is not the church of Christ; that only can be regarded as such which both professes and practises the religion of Christ-a religion which how it should be known, except from the word of God, the only rule of true religion, I cannot perceive. And how then can I learn from the church what is the word of God, since I cannot ascertain, except by the word of God, what is the true church of Christ? If it should be said that it may be known, not merely by its doctrine and religion-that there are other external marks, obvious to the senses of all, even the dullest, by which any person may ascertain what is the true church, before he can ascertain what is the true doctrine-I ask how is it known that these external things, whatever they may be, are marks of the true church? How should an illiterate person have discovered this?

He has not ascertained it from Scripture, which he has not as yet ascertained to be the word of God, as he must previously be acquainted with the true church from which he learns what is the word of God. Does he then know this from the testimony of that church, whose possession of the marks of a true church is the subject of investigation? Or does he know it as an innate principle which requires no demonstration, or from some special divine revelation? They will not, I suppose, make any of these assertions. Either, therefore their faith respecting the marks of the church is a mere prejudice, or it must be affirmed that it can certainly be inferred by every person from the natural light of reason. If this latter opinion be maintained by the doctors of the church of Rome, we may well wonder that they should ascribe so much in this matter to the reason of those whom, in other things, they wish to deprive almost wholly of the use of reason. When the question is about deciding articles of faith from Scripture, or about the divinity of Scripture itself, the majority of Christians have no right of judgment, not even that of discretion; if they see any thing in these matters, they see it with the eyes of their teachers. But when we come to inquire about these teachers themselves whom, in regard to this subject they call the church, then indeed those who were so biind in regard to every thing else, all at once become lynx-eyed; they have no need of the church, they have no need of the Scriptures as a guide; by the light of natural reason, even the most stupid individuals have truly and infallibly ascertained that those external things, which they perceive in their teachers and in their

own church, are most undoubted marks of the true church, and that it is impossible that they can be found any where else than in the true church of Christ. Either, therefore, the doctors of the church of Rome must affirm that God has given reason to the majority of mankind, for no other purpose than to enable them to discern what is the true church, and that this object being accomplished, it may be dispensed with as to all other matters-which is absurd; or they must maintain that the church, that is to say, their own teachers, possess more evident and illustrious marks of divinity than the religion of Christ, or the word of God itself-which is impious.

II. Our second inquiry on this subject is, How may we ascertain the degree of authority which is to be attributed to the church? The doctors of the church of Rome agree with us in asserting that human testimony is not sufficient to produce a divine faith in the Scriptures as the word of God; that to this, a divine and infallible testimony is requisite. But such, they say, is the testimony of the church, not as consisting of men, who may all individually deceive and be deceived; but as under the direction of the Holy Spirit, who can neither deceive nor be deceived. But no one, I imagine, will affirm that the proposition that the church is so under the direction of the Holy Spirit as to be infallible in its testimony, is a selfevident axiom which needs no demonstration; we may therefore justly demand a proof of it. They adduce various inconveniences which would result from a refusal to acknowledge this infallibility of the church. Men, they say, and particularly the common people, who can neither discern the marks of divinity in the Scriptures, nor judge of articles of faith by Scripture, much less demonstrate them, would be perpetually wavering in religion, if they had not an infallible church in whose decisions they might with safety rest. We have elsewhere seen how a Christian may obtain a firm conviction respecting his faith, and that without the testimony of this infallible church. It is certain that the reasoning, by which the truth of any opinion is proved, from the inconveniences which its falsehood would occasion, is altogether without force. For it is not that which appears to be most suitable that is always most true, nor does that which seems to us to be attended with incon-veniences appear in this light to God also, who in governing his church stands in no need of our advice. "For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor."*

Rom. xi. 34.

We wish, therefore, to know, not what the doctors of the church of Rome suppose that God should have done, in order to avoid the inconvenience that might arise in the church, but what has been his determination in this matter-what he has in reality done-whether he has given to the church that infallibility for which they are so solicitous. Has he not done so? they exclaim. We can produce explicit passages of Scripture. The church is "the pillar and ground of the truth." "If he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man and a publican."* The church proclaims its decisions in this form:" It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us." It was promised to the church that Christ should be with it always, even to the end of the world, and the Holy Spirit was promised to lead it into all truth. In a word, Christ said to Peter, and in Peter to the Pope, who is, as often as it suits the object of these doctors, the whole church, "I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not."§ That these passages of Scripture either do not refer at all to the church, or do not refer to that church to which the doctors of the church of Rome apply them, or do not ascribe infallibility to this church, has already been proved a thousand times by our divines. But, in this matter, it is altogether preposterous that the church should desire to employ its privilege of infallibility, which it can prove only from Scripture, if indeed it can do so, to secure a divine authority to these Scriptures, and that, too, in the minds of those to whom it has demonstrated its infallibility from Scripture. The church thus seems to me like an ambassador, who should first prove his commission by the letters written by his sovereign to the commonwealth to which he has been sent, and who should afterwards, when the genuineness of these letters was disputed, employ the authority of an ambassador to evince that they were genuine, and in reality written by his sovereign. Or, if you prefer it, it may be compared to one who, having obtained the office of a magistrate in a province, by the exhibition of a royal commission, should afterwards, when a dispute had arisen about the author of the commission, wish to use the authority of the magistracy, obtained by means of this very commission, to prove that it has been given him by the king.

If, therefore, the doctors of the church of Rome would be consistent with themselves, they must prove, by the most indubitable arguments, apart from Scripture, and all revelation

* 1 Tim. iii. 15; Matt. xviii, 17.
Matt. xxviii. 20; Johm xvi. 13.

+ Acts xv. 28.
§ Luke xxii. 32.

from God, that their church is infallible; and they must prove this in such a manner that any of the laity, to whom the knowledge of this is assuredly a matter of the deepest interest, may feel satisfied in their conscience respecting it, before they have ascertained what is the word of God. Nor should they stop here. They must, moreover, show to them that it is more obvious, and easy to prove that their church is infallible in all its decrees, than that the Scriptures are the word of God; that it is easier to prove that God is speaking by their teachers, than that God, in times past, spake by the prophets and apostles. I know not if any of them will affirm this; certainly the better informed among them do not think so; for, if such was their persuasion, why, when they would demonstrate the truth of Christianity, in opposition to the profane, or the undecided in religion, should they not begin by proving, as a matter more obvious and easy of proof, the infallibility of their church, which, being accomplished, they would have nothing more to do; as the divinity of Scripture, of their traditions, of all their doctrines, and of their whole system of worship, would follow as a matter of course? Why do they waste time in proving the divinity of the gospel, when, after this has been accomplished, more still remains to be done; as they must also prove that there is an unwritten word, and from both the written and unwritten word must establish their system of doctrine and worship? Why do they follow the more difficult path to secure the less object, when, by following the easier road, they might secure the greater? *

Some one, perhaps, may reply from Huet, "We demonstrate the truth of the gospel in opposition to the enemies of Christianity, because the authority of the church, and the argument deduced from it, have no weight with them." I grant this. The infallible authority of the church has no weight, except with those who acknowledge it. But this has nothing to do with the subject of discussion. The enemies of Christianity acknowledge the authority neither of Scripture nor of the church; when, therefore, we wish to convert them, where must we begin? Should we begin by proving the authority of the church, or the authority of Scripture? Unquestionably we should commence with that which is most obvious, and which can most easily be demonstrated; and so much the more,

See Ludovici Vivis Dialog. de veritate religionis; Huetii Demonstratio Evangelii; Pascal's Thoughts; and other books written by the learned of the church of Rome in defence of Christianity.

† Alnetan. Quæst. lib. i. cap. 8.