Indeed, the only
superhuman and infallible authority on earth recognised by them is the
Bible; and that, alas! has proved a block of stumbling and not a bond
of union, since, in the hands of unscrupulous men, it may be made to
prove absolutely anything. The most sacred and fundamental truths,
even such as the sublime doctrine of the Blessed Trinity, the Divinity
of Christ, and the Atonement, have all, at one time or another, been
vehemently denied _on the authority of the Bible_! The Anglican Bishop
Colenso, in writing to the _Times_, could quote eleven texts of
Scripture to prove that prayer ought not to be offered to Our Divine
Lord! yet, it made no difference. He was allowed to go on teaching
just as before! No one seemed to care. What is "pure Gospel" to Mr.
Brown is "deadly error" to Mr. Green; while "the fundamental verities"
of Mr. Thompson are "the satanical delusions" of Mr. Johnson. In fact,
there is really less dispute among men as to the interpretation of the
Vedas, of Chinese chronology, or of Egyptian archaeology, than of the
Bible, which, to the eternal dishonour of Protestant commentators, has
now almost ceased to have any definite meaning whatever, because every
imaginable meaning has been defended by some and denied by others.
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