hope (set) on Him, purifieth himself, even as He is pure" (I John 32-3).

The Christian cannot be separated from the body of Christ, the Church; and his complete sanctification depends upon the sanctification of the whole of Christ's body. This makes it necessary for us to look upon the Middle State after death as a great state of sanctification for the Christians who have gone there justified and regenerated, but only partially sanctified.

It is true that the common opinion among American Christians is that at death, that is, in the moment of death, Christians are completely sanctified. But that is an error against the teaching of Scripture and of the Church universal.

It is true the Westminster Shorter Catechism says: "The souls of believers are, at their death, made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory."

But it is probable that the authors meant by "at their death" in the state of death, and not sanctification by an immediate act of God; for that would be contrary to their definition of sanctification as a process, or growth. But in any case such an idea is contrary to the teaching of John Calvin, and many of the greatest and best Protestant theologians. It raises at once the question, if believers can be sanctified by a divine fiat at death, why not at once in this life at regeneration? But in fact, as we have seen, it is the Church as Christ's body, which is in a process of sanctification completed only at the second advent; and it would make a schism in the body, if the dead saints were completely sanctified by successive acts when they die, the living only by the long, hard struggles with sin and evil completed only after two thousand years or more.

We may also say, on the other hand, that unbelievers are not ripe for judgment. Modern Christians rightly rebel at the idea of the great masses of mankind going into ever

lasting punishment in their ignorance and folly, without having any fair chance of salvation.

This originated from the false idea that there is a judgment at death, which consigns men at that time to their final place, and an overlooking of the distinction between the intermediate and the final state.

The Church universal before the Reformation held to the continuance of the processes of redemption in the Middle State, as have many of the best Protestant theologians also. But it has been usual to limit salvation to those who have been baptized, or have had what Roman Catholic theologians call the baptism of desire, that is, those who have sought God sincerely in accordance with their light and knowledge.

But modern theologians, building on a more careful study of the Scriptures, and reasoning from the character of God and the work of Christ, in His descent into Hades, and His reign over Hades, as well as over the earth, are inclined to extend the work of salvation beyond the limits of the earth, and to think of an evangelization of those who have died impenitent; so that no one is really, finally lost who does not deliberately and finally, either in this life or in the next, reject Christ and His salvation: for it is felt that only such a one can justly be condemned by the judgment of the last great Day. Not till that Day can Christians be worthy of their final salvation, or unbelievers worthy of final condemnation.

It is a great merit of the Apostles' Creed that it attaches salvation to Jesus Christ our Saviour, and

considers each stage of it from the point of view of one of the six saving acts of our Lord. This urges the Christian to consider salvation as a whole.

Modern British and American theology has exaggerated the doctrine of the atonement and salvation by the cross, and overlooked the other five saving acts of Christ, and our salvation as dependent thereon. Some modern theologians, like Henry B. Smith, and especially some Anglicans, have reaffirmed the Incarnation as a great act of salvation; and the Premillenarians have emphasized, and indeed exaggerated, the Second Advent. But few have given the Resurrection of Christ, His Enthronement, and His Reign their importance in the work of salvation. It is just in those saving acts of our Lord that we have our hopes for the future; for it is in our study of them that the doctrine and practice of sanctification are to be advanced. The usual Protestant exaggeration of faith in the work of salvation should pass over into a fuller recognition of the importance of hope and love; and all three must be combined, if we would comprehend the salvation of Christ in its fulness. And in this more comprehensive conception and working out of our salvation, Roman Catholics and Protestants are more likely to agree, and so Church Unity will be greatly advanced.

CHAPTER XI

THE HOLY SPIRIT

THE ninth article of the Creed, the first of the third trinitarian section, expresses faith in the Holy Spirit as the third Person of the Holy Trinity.

The received form of this article is: Credo in spiritum sanctum, I believe in the Holy Spirit.

The Creed of the fourth century is without the Credo, thus connecting this article as all the previous ones with the Credo of the first article, by the conjunction and; so Irenæus, Rufinus, Marcellus, and others in the West, and the Nicene and Constantinopolitan Creeds in the East, and those of Eusebius and Jerusalem upon which they depend. Tertullian attaches this article to the Christological articles, and makes the Holy Spirit a mission from Christ.

The original form of the Creed, therefore, cannot be doubtful, except as to the order of the adjective, and as to the use of the article. The received form has been assimilated to the Constantinopolitan.

The article is most probable also, as in all forms of the Greek Creeds, Eastern and Western, of early date, except where the numeral, év, takes its place, which is still more emphatically definite than the article. The only early evidence for the failure of the article is in the first form of Irenæus, who has: εἰς πνεῦμα ἅγιον; but that is immediately followed

by the article Tò, with other attributes; so that it is not really an exception.

It is true that some later forms of the Creed, as in the Psalter of Æthelstan, have εἰς πνεῦμα ἅγιον; but this is very slight evidence. Moreover the order of the baptismal formula of Matthew and the Didache (7) is rò аyιov πvεûμа. As we have seen, the Creed is based on the baptismal formula; and it would naturally follow that formula in the use of the article, and in the place of the adjective.

Dr. McGiffert is wrong here as elsewhere in dealing with the Creed, showing the perils of an a priori theory. He adopts as the original reading, εἰς πνεῦμα ἅγιον; and then on the basis of that supposition argues that this section of the Creed was not based on the baptismal formula of Matthew.

The Holy Spirit is given in the third original article of the Creed as the Third Person of the Trinity, the first article being: I believe in the One God, the Father Almighty; the second: in Jesus Christ, God's Son; the third: in the Holy Spirit; the three being equally objects of personal faith.

The doctrine of the divine Spirit pervades the Bible. In the Old Testament the divine Spirit is the energy, the active power of God: (1) as a spirit stimulating the prophets and directing them in their teaching (Ho. 97; Zc. 712: Is. 4816); (2) as a power taking effective part in the creation of the world (Gn. 12), and in theophanies (Ez. 112, 1017), and in transformations of nature (Is. 3215); (3) as an ethical power in the moral development of the nation of Israel (Is.