church with which he was connected, by incessant preaching, and with unbroken assiduity in oral instruction; his epistles were decidedly occasional, and called for by circumstances as they arose; but to all communications, whether written or oral, he requires the same implicit faith to be given. Hence St. Irenæus, whose martyrdom took place in 2021, judiciously exclaims, Should a dispute arise on the slightest question, would it not become a duty to recur to the most ancient churches, where the apostles lived? and if the apostles had left no written Scripture, would it not be a matter of conscientious obligation to follow the tradition, which they left to those to whom they confided the care of the churches?" But no father of the church has spoken on the subject with more accuracy and greater decision, than the illustrious St. John Chrysostom, who, in his commentaries on this passage of St. Paul, has the following words, which I wish to be deeply engraven on every mind. After the words before cited, the illustrious doctor says, "Hence it is manifest, that they (the apostles) did not deliver all things by means of epistles, but that they made many communications without writing; and that both are equally entitled to credence: It is a tradition, ask no farther.”

1 Lib. iii. 4.

St. Chrysos. Hom. iv. on the 2d Epist. Thess. ii. 15, tom. iv. p. 237, edit. Sav. and tom. xi. p. 510, edit. Ben.

If the catechist can produce arguments equally clear from the Scripture and the ancient fathers, to show that the sacred volume, without note or comment, is to be deemed the sole rule of faith, for that is the question between the two churches, let him manfully step forward without disguise, and perform this essential service for the Protestant world. “Et erit mihi magnus Apollo.”

In addition to the decisive declaration of St. Paul here given, I request the attention of the reader to the following passages: Rom. vi. 17; 1 Cor. xi. 2; 1 Tim. vi. 20; 2 Tim. i. 13. In all these passages, the apostle alludes not to what was written, but to what had been delivered by oral instruction; and in all these instances he requires acquiescence, docility, and firmness, on the part of his disciples.

As to the observations, that some traditions are false or at least uncertain—that they have not always been admitted—that some are rejected by the Catholic church herself-and that therefore none are to be received-nothing can be more futile than this mode of reasoning. Who does not know, that traditions may regard different subjects, and that they may be more or less valuable, according to their nature, description, and the antiquity they may boast? In all these cases, who is so proper a judge of what is to be rejected or admitted, as the tribunal established by Christ? Various customs, forming the com

C

mon, or unwritten law of England, may have grown obsolete; others may be of a trifling nature, and undeserving of serious attention. But this by no means alters the nature of those customs, which are valuable, nor impairs the authority of the supreme power, by which they are retained.

But the grand point that annoys the catechist, in fact, the main hinge on which the whole discussion turns, is, the authority of the Catholic church. "If," says this gentle controvertist, "traditions (not bottomed on the written word) must be received with divine faith, then our faith must be built on the testimony of the church, as divine and infallible, which is absurd." Here let me ask, what is this but to impute absurdity to our Redeemer himself, to arraign his proceedings, and to treat them as marked with weakness and folly? For before any part of the written word, contained in the New Testament, was published, the pastors of his church, by his authority, preached, taught, and diffused, the faith over the Christian world, without the aid of written Scriptures, and by oral instruction only; and the faithful placed unlimited confidence in the testimony of that church, which, agreeably to the promises of Christ, was to teach all truth. St. Paul is an unexceptionable voucher of this fact; for in the year 58 of the Christian era, when he wrote his Epistle to the Romans,

he testifies that their faith was spoken of over the whole world. It appears then, that the faith of Christ was diffused far and near, before the canon of the new Scriptures had any existence. When at length the Scriptures were written, they consisted, as I have already stated, of occasional compositions, arising from adventitious circumstances, without any visible design of conveying to the faithful in written records any regular system of faith, morality, and discipline. Christians had still to depend on the testimony and the authority of the Catholic church, which is pronounced by St. Paul to be the pillar and foundation of truth. In those days of primitive fervour, the votaries of religion asked not what was written, but what was taught and delivered. The system, therefore, here termed absurd, is precisely that which divine Providence pursued in favouring the world with the inestimable benefit of Christianity.

But let us for a moment suppose the sacred volume to be consigned to individuals of all classes, for the purpose of discovering a regular system of faith, morality, and discipline. Will this desirable consequence ensue? or rather will not the confusion of Babel be a picture of the discordant sentiments of men on every religious subject? Will not the uncontrolled liberty of reading and interpreting the word of God, by

the unauthorized fancies of each individual, finally lead to horrors of the most alarming nature? to errors of every description? to unrestrained licentiousness in thought and action, to blasphemy, to infidelity? For a satisfactory answer to these questions, I refer the reader to the events, which have marked the progress of Protestantism in every country under the sun; and to transactions which have been daily passing before our eyes. To what cause are we to ascribe the marked diversity of thinking on every point, which distinguished the first reformers? How are we to account for the consequent extravagance of religious sentiments, and the general corruption of morals, which excited horror even in the breast of Luther? To what source are we to trace the unparalleled excesses of the Anabaptists of Germany-the violence of the Calvinists of France-the phrensy of the Presbyterians of Scotland-the ungovernable fury of the Puritans of England, but to the unlimited license of rejecting all religious subordination, and of sanctioning their excesses by their own interpretations of the written word? The countless variety of sects, exhibiting a dark catalogue of the most extravagant opinions, from the era termed the Reformation, to the present melancholy period, when we are doomed to witness the visionary and impious fancies of Joanna Southcott, and the blasphemies of Car