sands of "pious Christian folk." Could the views of Arnold and Coleridge, to say nothing of more radical doctrines, be submitted to-day to the vote of collective Protestantism in England and this country, those eminent Christian scholars would be classed among the men "who make the Word of God of none effect" through their speculations.

In view of this state of opinion in the theological world, it is certainly a matter of surprise, that no theologian of the Liberal school has written a work upon this all-important and fundamental subject of inspiration. Our Unitarian armory, it is true, has furnished not a few weapons, wherewith the infallibility of the Scriptures has been most vigorously assailed. Channing, Dewey, Burnap, and others of our older writers, have discussed the question, either directly or incidentally; and the Note in Mr. Norton's "Genuineness of the Gospels remains to this day one of the best expositions of the fallibility and inferiority of the Old-Testament writings. Among recent writers, Dr. Clarke has given us an interesting chapter on the Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, in his "Truths and Errors of Orthodoxy;" while the famous alternative, "The Bible or the Mathematics," presents the conclusion of the whole matter, as briefly discussed by the able author of "Reason in Religion."

But even this cursory glance at our theological literature is enough to show, that there has been an apparent indifference to the needs of religious thought in this direction that is any thing but praiseworthy. While something has been done by our literary theologians to answer the inquiries of thinking men in regard to the inspiration of the Scriptures, much more which ought to have been done has been left for others to do; and the want of a thorough and comprehensive work on this subject is yet to be supplied. It is not a long time since one of the most popular and effective ministers in our denomination was obliged to give a series of Sundayevening lectures on "The Bible, what it is and what it is not; " a topic upon which the members of his own congrega

* Norton's Genuineness of the Gospels, vol. ii., Note D, pp. xlviii-cciv.

tion were as much in need of information as those who came to hear him from Evangelical churches, and the unchurched masses. That men who are called by their special qualifications and their divine commission to practical religious work, and not to speculative theological discussion, should thus be compelled to lecture on Inspiration, because no fit treatise on the subject can be found for their people to read, is certainly a reproach to theology, and hints at a deficiency in our theological literature that ought long since to have been provided for.

How far Dr. Curtis, in the work recently brought out by the Appletons, on "The Human Element in the Inspiration of the Scriptures," meets this want, remains to be seen. The "religious reticence" which he so justly blames in those who hold new and broader views, but withhold them from others, cannot be charged on Dr. Curtis himself. Indeed, the chief value of his work is to be found in its frank and full expression of views and opinions "gained only very slowly, unwillingly, and against every earthly prepossession." After having held for many years the professorship of Theology in the University at Lewisburg, Dr. Curtis at last felt obliged to resign his situation, because of the growing divergence between his own convictions and the opinions of his denomination the Baptist the Baptist on the subject of Inspiration. "It appeared to me," he says, in the preface to his work, " that men in evangelical religious circles were, for the most part, too cautious in speaking with candor, or in making any concessions not absolutely wrung from them by the force of circumstances; and that the tendency of much of the teaching in our theological seminaries is to stifle deep, thorough, and candid inquiry on all these points, and therefore to leave our rising ministry quite unprepared for the work of the age before them." Feeling, therefore, out of sympathy with such conservatism, and being obliged annually to define his position upon the vexed questions in theology, Dr. Curtis decided to "resign his professorship, examine the whole subject of Inspiration more thoroughly and independently, and publish such conclusions as might seem

calculated to assist others tried by the same difficulties and struggles."

The work before us, the result of this independent and careful study, seems admirably adapted both to interest and instruct those for whom it was written. Without aiming at an exhaustive treatment of the subject, or pretending to remove all the philosophical and critical difficulties in which it is involved, Dr. Curtis has given a comprehensive, and in the main impartial, survey of the various theories of Inspiration; has stated with clearness, and without exaggeration, the principal objections which science and criticism have urged against the infallibility of the Bible; and has rendered a valuable service to the cause of rational religion by his able defence of the equal importance of God's other revelations in nature and providence, in history, and the religious experience of all good men. "A stronger faith," he tells us, "in the great principles of universal religion is the chief want of our day." -"The whole Church of the future groweth into a holy temple only by incorporating materials from every dispensation and revelation of the past."-"There are many religious truths progressively revealed by natural religion, by science, and history, which yet cannot be learned from the most diligent study of the Scriptures alone. . . . God's true revelation, as a whole, expands with each age." Such sentences as these have a very unevangelical ring. They remind us, rather, of some of the best passages of Theodore Parker in the chapter on the Bible in his "Discourse of Religion:" "The Bible is one ray out of the sun, one drop from the infinite ocean. . . . Its truths are old as creation, repeated more or less purely in every tongue. . . . Let the Word of God come through conscience, reason, and holy feeling, as light through the windows of morning."*

Indeed, it would be difficult to distinguish the general position of Dr. Curtis, in respect to the inspiration of the Bible, from that of Mr. Parker. "The influence of the Bible," says Parker, "past and present, rests on its profound re

Parker's Discourse of Religion, pp. 376, 377.

ligious significance. . . . If wisely used, it is still a blessed

teacher." *

The true view of the purpose of the Scriptures, according to Dr. Curtis, is this: "That, when we have faithfully studied them in connection with the whole of what we can obtain from God's other revelations of his will, we may arrive at truth in every point of doctrine, duty, and knowledge, with a precision and certainty proportioned to our necessities." +

"The Word of God!" says Parker, -"no Scripture can hold that. It speaks in a language no honest mind can fail to read."

"The teachings of all history," Dr. Curtis tells us," past and present, contain, as surely as the Bible, lessons from God, to be diligently studied; and the whole form the Scriptures of the true Christian." S

We have given these citations from books written from widely different points of view, with no purpose of raising a prejudice against the work of Dr. Curtis, by thus showing his main position to be the same with that of Mr. Parker. It is the fact alone of this essential identity of views which here concerns us. Indeed, for all practical purposes, there are but two general theories of Inspiration, which divide the theological world to-day: the one, that on which Dr. Curtis and Mr. Parker are in the main agreed; and the other, the accepted Orthodox theory, which both these writers alike assail. Dr. Curtis, it is true, recognizes three classes of views: 1. That which maintains that the inspiration of Scripture secures its absolute infallibility in every part; 2. That which claims this absolute infallibility for the religious portions of Scripture alone; and, 3. That which regards Inspiration as not destroying, but elevating, the human element in man, while conferring no absolute immunity from infirmity and error. But those who hold the first and second of these theories are in reality only different parties in the

* Discourse of Religion, p. 375.
Discourse of Religion, p. 370.

L

† pp. 323-324. § p. 318.

same theological camp. Whatever controversy these may wage against one another, they present an unbroken front to all those who affirm, with Dr. Curtis, that " an infallible revelation is not necessary for man." The three views, therefore, which, according to Dr. Curtis, represent the main and leading opinions on the inspiration of the Bible, are resolvable into two that which affirms, and that which denies, the infallibility, and hence the exceptional inspiration, of the Old and New Testament Scriptures.*

Dr. Clarke, in his "Truths and Errors of Orthodoxy," proposes a very different classification, which we cannot regard as either so clear in statement or so accurate as that which we are reviewing. There are but three views, he tells us, in regard to the inspiration of the Bible. "There may be modifications of these, but nothing essentially different." These three views are, -1. Plenary inspiration, the Orthodox theory; 2. No inspiration, the Naturalistic theory; and, 3. The Mediatorial view, the theory which mediates between the Orthodox and Naturalistic theories. We have already

The position that the Scriptures do not contain an infallible revelation from God is held by many of the most eminent Unitarians of the present day. Thus Dr. Hedge affirms, that there is —

"no infallible oracle out of the breast. . . . However desirable it may seem that infallible guidance from without should have been vouchsafed to our perplexity, however we may covet it and sigh for it, it has not been so ordained.” - Reason in Religion, p. 205. Dr. James Freeman Clarke holds the same view:

"Orthodoxy is right," he says, "in maintaining the supreme excellence and value of the Christian Scriptures, but wrong in claiming for them infallible accuracy. It is right in saying that they were written by inspired men, but wrong in considering this inspiration a guarantee against all possible error and mistake.". Truths and Errors of Orthodoxy, p. 128.

But the strongest as well as clearest statement of this view of the Bible is given by Dr. Noyes, in the Note to the Introduction in the new edition of his "Translation of the Hebrew Prophets :".

"There is limited, yet trustworthy, but no absolute, infallible authority whatever for man.... The human senses, the human intellect, the human memory, oral tradition, and historical records, are all fallible. Yet by their aid we may attain, not only faith, but knowledge. The light which it has pleased God to bestow upon us is amply sufficient to guide us to the blessedness for which we were designed in this world and that which is to come. Whether the necessities or the interests of humanity would be better promoted by an infallible standard of doctrine and duty, either in a written volume, in a church, or a single individual, is a question which it is not worth while to discuss. What God has done, not what it is necessary or useful for him to do, is the important concern for us 99 (p. xci).