depths of infinite wisdom. To this objection we answer: In the natural world God has certainly shown concern for what seem to be, and, relatively speaking, are minor affairs, but of which a careful examination reveals the fact that they are indispensable parts of one stupendous whole. In the Holy Spirit's relation to human conduct, individual experience testifies that it does not concern itself alone with what may be termed the more important affairs of life, but with the lesser as well. The wisdom and the goodness of God manifested in this fidelity of His Spirit, is the more apparent when we remember that our life-course is largely determined by the things of apparent minor importance. Character is shaped and destiny fixed in large part by what seem to be the little things in life; but character and destiny, as the resultant of all life, are certainly not unimportant. God incarnate would never have been the faith of manifold millions who to-day confess Him, but for the fidelity of the human Christ to human nature in the details of His earthly life; and, at the same time, the manifestation of a perfect consistency between the human and the divine nature as revealed in one and the same person. The teachings of our Lord must, from the very nature of their Author, be inspired. He was very God and very man. Yet we find Jesus entering into all the minutiae of life in setting forth and enforcing the great doctrines enunciated by Him. Certainly He did not esteem such a course unnecessary nor beneath Him. It is alleged that the language is different in different portions of the Bible. The Scripture doctrine is, that God is immutable; therefore we should expect that the very language of the Bible, if the whole book is inspired of God, should be unchanged and unchangeable. We answer, that the human element is part and parcel of the Scriptures. The Book itself is a mirror of the age, the peoples, and the customs of which it speaks. As a history it would not be accurate were it less than this; as a revelation it would hardly accomplish the end designed without this adaptation. It is urged that there is great variation in the different accounts of incident or event, or discourse or the setting forth of the same doctrine; whereas, on the theory of a plenary inspiration, we should expect a uniform presentation. This theory, however plausible, is contrary to human usage and experience. All know that there is often a marked variation in the narrative accounts of the same events by the same person. And yet each and all are correct in so far as they set forth that which the writer undertakes to express. The thought is illustrated in the verbal or structural setting of principles or doctrines, in which, though there may be differences in the language and forms adopted, there is no substantial variation in essence. Familiarity with the New Testament makes clear the fact that our Saviour's teachings have all the qualities of variation indicated as characteristic of human teaching. And yet the inspiration of Jesus is unquestioned. If Jesus the Son, in His divine nature, chose to exercise this latitude, why fix the metes and bounds of God the Father in a stereotyped form, and then deny His authorship, unless He appears in such form as we consider He should? It is alleged, on the part of those who deny plenary inspiration, that God did inspire the matter, but that He left to man the important work of setting it in speech. Is it not reasonable to suppose that if knowledge of the substance was of sufficient importance to be imparted under divine inspiration, that it would be so guarded in the method of impartation that there might be no serious mistakes? All understand how the substitution of one word for another alters, or may alter, the meaning intended to be conveyed. Profound and exhaustive arguments have been founded on single words. Indeed, the distinguishing characteristics of the peculiar faith of a sect may depend in its root-doctrine on a single phrase, and it might almost be said on a single word. The inspired writers in the New Testament, as we see time and again, "rest positive doctrines and frame elaborate arguments on the authenticity of single sentences and single words of Old Testament Scriptures." Many who seem quite willing to concede inspiration to the New Testament Scriptures are disposed to deny it to very much of the Old. In answer to this, we aver that the writers in the Old Testament repeatedly declare that they spoke under the Spirit's inspiration, or that they voiced that which was given them to speak. David says: "The Spirit of the Lord spoke by me, and His word was in my tongue."* Jeremiah asserts: "These are the words. that the Lord spake."+ Isaiah testifies, moreover, “the Lord spake thus to Ahaz, saying." According to Ezekiel, "Speak my words unto them." Amos says: "Hear this word which the Lord hath spoken against you." Indeed, as an able writer T well says: "The direct messages from God constitute a very considerable proportion of the whole. It includes the latter part of the book of Exodus; the entire book of Leviticus; many chapters in Deuteronomy and Numbers; the greater part of the prophecy of Isaiah; the later chapters, from xli. to lxiii. expressly, and in form bearing this character; thirty chapters out of the fifty-two comprising the prophecy of Jeremiah; thirty-five out of the forty-eight of the prophet Ezekiel, with some slight occasional exceptions where the words of the prophet are professedly intermingled with the immediate words of *2 Samuel xxiii. 2. Isaiah vii. 10. | Amos iii. 1. + Jeremiah xxx. 4. § Ezekiel iii. 4. Garbett, "God's Word Written," p. 291. God; twelve of the fourteen chapters of Hosea; almost the whole of the prophecy of Joel; six chapters of Amos out of nine; six chapters of Micah; the whole of the prophet Zephaniah and of Haggai; nine chapters of Zechariah, and the entire book of Habakkuk." These writers, as others, introduced Jehovah as the speaker by such words as "said," "saying," "thus saith the Lord," and closing with "the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." Not only is there this internal testimony to the inspiration of the Old Testament, but we find the New Testament writers constantly quoting from the Old Testament as the inspired word of God, and weaving into their argument for the acceptance of the new, threads drawn from the old. When proof was wanted that our Lord was the fulfillment of prophecy, we find Matthew saying: "He came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, 'He shall be called a Nazarene.'"* When Jesus was in the struggle with the tempter He declared, to the discomfiture of the adversary, "It is written," followed each time by a weapon for the soul's defense in a quotation from the Old Testament Scriptures. In the Acts of the Apostles we find the great leaders in the founding of the Church repeatedly quoting from the Old Testament in the argument to establish the truth set forth in the New. Peter, in his Pentecostal sermon,† asserts the resurrection. of our Lord as foretold in Psalm xvi. and Psalm ciii. Again, when the fires of persecution were kindling about the feet of the disciples, they quote from the Old Testament: "Lord, Thou art God, who by the mouth of Thy servant David hath said." Certainly if language means anything, it means in these and many other instances that Christ and His Apostles believed that the Old Testament *Matt. ii. 23. Acts ii. 14-29. + Psalm ii. Scriptures were of God. The evidence is certainly not less convincing as to the New Testament. In this we find Jesus saying to His disciples,* having in view the ordeals through which they were to pass: "When they bring you unto the synagogues, and unto magistrates and powers, take ye no thought how or what thing ye shall answer, or what ye shall say: for the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say." "Whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost." We have here the direct and positive affirmation that the Holy Spirit does speak through men. If in making a personal de fense before magistrates and persecutors God sent His Spirit to speak through and for them, how much more should He voice by the agency used that which was to abide through many centuries and instruct and guide unnumbered millions of immortal beings in that which is of greatest moment to the individual welfare and happiness of each and of incalculable good to mankind? Still another objection is that based on the variations of readings found in the manuscript copies of the Scriptures. The Authorized Version has long been subjected to severe criticism by men of acknowledged learning and of unimpeached piety and orthodoxy; not only on the ground of imperfect and questioned original texts, but also, from the standpoint of modern scholarship, of faulty translation. Bishop Marsh, one of the most acute and learned of scholars in the Church of England, said of the Authorized Version, that it "was made by some of the most distinguished scholars in the age of James I. It is probable that our Authorized Version is as faithful a representation of the original Scriptures as could have been made at that period. *Acts iv. 25. + Mark xi. 13. + Luke xii. 11, 12. |