There must be a common source of authority, or there can be no concert of action. The church, as an army, must have a commander in order to co-operation in movement; as a band of pilgrims, it must have a single light to keep it in the narrow way; as a school, it must have the same text-book in order to unity of teaching. What is this source of authority? Is it the voice of God or man? If of God, it is perfect, but if of man, it is imperfect.

      Alexander Campbell, answering this question, says: "The Bible alone must always decide every question involving the nature, the character, or the designs of the Christian institution. Outside of the apostolic records we find ourselves on a sea of uncertainties, without one solid foot of terra firma, and with no [500] haven in our horizon or in our chart." This is true, and it is an echo of the climax of his father's great sermon in the home of Abraham Altars, about the time he wrote the "Declaration and Address," which was the slogan, now so famous--"Where the Bible speaks, we speak, and where the Bible is silent, we are silent." And this slogan is an echo of Paul (2 Tim. 3:16, 17), where the Bible is said to be a "perfect" code of Christian equipment; and this, in turn, is but an echo of Isaiah, seven hundred and fifty years before the cross (8:20), where we are told that our only appeal is to "the law and the testimony."

      Time is the severe, but impartial, tester of all things. Under the gnawings of her hungry tooth, rocks dissolve, mountains crumble and man bows low in death; and under her imperious sway, nations wax and wane, kings rise and fall, and even the shape of the globe is changing; but this Book, amid all this commotion and unrest, like its Author, remains unchanged and unchangeable.

      The coming and going of the nations is the drama of all dramas. The Babylonian, Egyptian, Persian and other great powers have lived their little day and died. Great discoveries and astounding inventions have followed rapidly in the footsteps of each other. Scientific and philosophical theories have been changed and rechanged, and laws have been enacted and remodeled so as to meet the wants of a growing world. But the Bible has kept pace with every onward stride, and is still as perfectly adapted to the wants of the world as it was when first it came from the hand of God. Progress is fatal to a false religion, but to Christianity it is its best tonic.

      David and Homer lived at the same time. When the former, on Judean hills watching his flocks, or in Jerusalem, as its poet-king, ruling his people, was writing his immortal odes, the latter was singing his wonderful songs in the cities of Greece. Many critics then, as now, regard the two as similarly inspired, and so they stood on a common level. But, now that three thousand years have passed, how do they stand? Homer is still with us, but, oh, how changed. He is found in every academic course as a model of epic verse, as a sample of old Ionic Greek, and as an illustration of the customs of that far-away land and people; but he has no rank as a standard of human life and duty. As an ethical code, the world has outgrown Homer. But David was never so widely read, so highly prized and so mighty in his influence as he is to-day, and what is true of David is true of Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah and all Old Testament writers.

      No book was ever subjected to a more severe criticism than that applied to the

M. M. DAVIS.

Bible. Its friends, realizing how much was at stake, have turned on the light from every viewpoint. They would, whatever the cost, know the truth and the whole truth. And now, after the fullest and most impartial investigation, those who believe in it are increasing as never before, and among these believers are found many of the brainiest and best men of the world; among these are Locke, Newton, Faraday, Dana, Agassiz, Milton, Dante, Victoria, Gladstone and Washington. Were these lofty spirits blind dupes unable to find the truth, or incapable of appreciating it when found by others?

      But much of the criticism comes from its enemies and has been of the fiercest and most unrelenting character, and their assaults on the Book have been many and strong. But these onslaughts have been of value to the Christian in more ways than one. They have developed the noblest defense possible and shown that Christianity is true, or such foes would have triumphed. They have been of value also often in the conversion of the assailants. About one hundred years ago, Lord Lyttleton and Gilbert West, English skeptics, agreed each to attack a stronghold of the Bible and try to show it to be false. Lyttleton chose Saul's conversion as his theme. [501] He wrote, as he purposed, but not against the Bible, but in its defense, and his treatise is a masterly work of its kind. Mr. West selected the resurrection of Christ as his point of attack. He was also led into the light and wrote a great argument in defense of this fundamental doctrine.

      The battle is still on. The last century dawned in the midst of conflict. In France the Reign of Terror was at its height, and it looked as if it would be irresistible and universal. God was dethroned and his holy day was erased from the statute books, and his enemies, bold and blatant, were rejoicing in the prospect of the early downfall of Christianity. Voltaire, their greatest leader, said: "I am going through the forest of your Christian doctrines and will girdle every tree, so that presently not a sapling shall be left you." (Little did he think that the very house used by him in which to print his prophecy would soon become a depository for the Bible and other Christian literature.) All Europe was enveloped in an atmosphere of unbelief, and religion was at a low ebb. Infidelity was not confined to Europe; it also swept across the Atlantic and invaded our beloved land. Tom Paine published his "Age of Reason," and the effect was terrible. He showed the manuscript to Benjamin Franklin, who urged him not to "unloose this tiger," saying, "If our people are what they are with the Bible, what would they be without it?" But he did unloose it, and it seemed that the day of death had come for the cause of Christ.

      The present century finds the battle as furious as ever, but the method of warfare entirely changed. The attack from without has given place to one from within. The great leaders of open infidelity are gone; Bradlaugh, in England, and Ingersoll, in America, closed the fight on that line.

      Our citadel is the Bible. Take this away and we have nothing left. Nobody knows this better than the enemy; and when his open attacks had failed, with the beginning of the new century, he resorted to strategy. The Trojan horse, filled with foes, many of them robed in the garbs of teachers and preachers of the gospel of Christ, has entered the walls. They are striving to open the gates of our great stronghold. Let the reader be not shocked at this figure until he has asked and answered two questions: 1. Is it not true that there is scarcely a fundamental doctrine connected with our holy religion which has not been assailed recently by these men? 2. Did Paine and Ingersoll utter ranker infidelity than Eliot and Foster and those who echo them?

      The Lord still reigns and our citadel is safe. The heart of the world, once estranged, is turning again in love and loyalty to God's word. With the eloquent Burrell, we may canvass the battlefield and note the points where the attack has been hardest and hottest, and no signs of weakness appear. The old Book stands! It stands like Gibraltar with the wreck of hostile fleets floating at its base. The assaults from the open foe have not breached its walls from without, nor have its bolts been drawn by treachery within.

      In the patent offices of the world are multitudes of models of ingenious, but worthless, machinery. As models, they are beautiful to look upon, and the theory upon which they are constructed seems philosophical, but when subjected to the severest of all tests, the test of utility, they are like Belshazzar, weighed in the balance and found wanting. Either they do not do good work, or they work too slowly; or they are too costly, and so are of no value to the inventor or to mankind at large. But in no way does the Bible more fully establish its divine claims than by meeting and supplying all the wants of an exacting world. Here, perhaps, is its highest proof of heavenly origin. That which always ennobles and elevates and purifies must be of God. "Where there is no vision, the people perish, but he that keepeth the law, happy is he" (Prov. 29:18). We see vice changed to virtue; savages to saints; and barbarism to civilization. It touches every phase of life and blesses everything it touches. In its wake we find the noblest men, the purest women, the largest liberty, the highest civilization, and the best government.

      In the realm of law, perhaps, reason reaches its highest development, and [502] here the Bible is the basis. Men like Blackstone, Marshall, Story and Kent, giants in their calling, are witnesses to this claim.

      In the realm of government, the same is true. The nation that receives it, feels at once the flush of health and the vigor of life. Japan was unknown among the nations until the Book was opened in her midst. Webster said, "If we abide by the principles taught in the Bible, our country will go on prospering and to prosper; but if we and our posterity neglect its instructions and authority, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us and bury all our glory in profound obscurity."

      In literature, it makes and moulds the best. This is not strange, for mind sharpens mind in all human relations; and when the mind of man comes in contact with the mind of God, every human faculty is aroused and strengthened to the utmost. When old, blind Bunyan was locked up for twelve years in Bedford jail, his library consisted of the Bible and Fox's "Book of Martyrs," and he produced "Pilgrim's Progress," the book which reigns without a peer in its realm. It has been well said that "the Bible was Bunyan's teacher, text-book and college." And Shakespeare, that wonderful prodigy, who, like the sun, belongs alike to all men, would not have been Shakespeare but for the Bible. His works contain more than five hundred Biblical quotations and sentiments. He quotes from or refers to fifty-four of its sixty-six books; and in every one of his thirty-seven plays there are Scriptural references. These two masterpieces in literature, like most of the best things in it, are saturated with the word of God.

      And what would the world of painting be without the Bible? There would be no Raphael's "Transfiguration"; no Angelo's "Last Judgment"; no Murillo's "Moses Striking the Rock"; no Rubens' "Descent from the Cross"; and no Da Vinci's "Last Supper."

      In sculpture, a sister to the art of painting, the loss would be equally great. We would miss Angelo's "Moses"; Canova's "Penitent Magdalen"; and Thorwaldsen's "Christ and the Apostles."

      Without the Bible, the world of music would be poor indeed. We would not have Handel's "Sampson," "Saul" and "Messiah"; nor Hayden's "Creation"; nor Beethoven's "Mount of Olives"; nor Mendelssohn's "Elijah" and "Paul."

      And what would woman be without this blessed Book? Before its gracious beams shone upon her way, she was the toy or plaything of man, or a beast of burden, yoked with the ox of the field. Even in the classic glory of Greece, the most honored symbol on her tomb was a muzzle, suggesting that she should not speak; or a pair of reins, showing that she should be driven by her husband. But, with its aid, she has risen to the high and holy and tender place which twentieth-century civilization gives to mother, wife, sister and daughter.

      But what need I say further? What it has done in these spheres, it has done in all spheres. It blesses all ranks and conditions--the rich and the poor; the weak and the strong; the wise and the ignorant; the master and the slave; the prince and the peasant. It builds schoolhouses, colleges and universities; hospitals, almshouses and orphanages; railroads, telegraphs and steamships. In a word, it gives to us our best civilization, and ever rests, as the benediction of Heaven, on all the world.

      A single great witness must be heard, and one whose bias was against the Book--Charles Darwin. While on a scientific voyage, he touched at Terre del Fuego. The inhabitants were so degraded that he was horrified, and doubted whether they belonged to the human race. Science noted the awful fact, but made no effort to change it; the church heard the sad news and rushed to the rescue. Two noble fellows led the way and were murdered by the bloodthirsty savages; but again and again the missionary stations were replenished until the victory of the cross was won; and when Mr. Darwin saw what the Bible had done for them, he became a regular contributor to the South American Missionary Society. The old Book stands the test of utility.

      Whence, then, this wonderful Book? How came it with a vitality which ignores the passage of time, and, though old in years, like its Lord, still retains the dew of youth? Whence its power to meet and foil all foes? Why is it that it comes forth from the furnace of [503] criticism, though heated seven times hot, without the smell of fire on its garments, or the loss of a single vital doctrine? Why is it that it continues to shout its challenge in the face of all men: "Supplant me; supersede me; supplement me, if you can!" And why is it that, like God the Father, it passes through the world only to beautify and bless? Is it not because it came not from the earth, but from heaven, and was written, not by man, but by God? Columbus never explored South America, but touched only a few places on the northern coast, and yet he unhesitatingly pronounced it a continent. As he gazed on the vast volume of fresh water rushing through the wide-mouthed Orinoco into the sea, he said, "That stream, comrades, never came from an island; be sure it gathered its vast waters from a continent." And when we contemplate the streams of influence flowing from this Book, we instinctively exclaim, "This Book, so mighty and matchless in its power, never came from man, but from man's Maker, and its contents betoken, not the finite, but the infinite!" Our fathers were right, therefore, when they exalted it to the place of supreme authority and made it their only rule of faith and practice.

      Let me close with two words, one of history and one of prophecy. Our pioneers in this great Restoration movement may not always have measured up to the full standard of duty on all things spiritual; but at this point they were never found wanting. They believed the Bible came from God and they reverenced it accordingly. They wrote the name with a capital B. They had no fear of Bibliolatry, and here, in a much larger degree than many suppose, is the key to their wonderful success.

      And now for a word of prophecy: If we, their children, will follow in their footsteps, a future of constantly increasing usefulness and glory awaits us; but the day we abandon their position on the Bible, we are doomed, and ought to be doomed, to the miserable fate of "a disappearing brotherhood."

[CCR 500-504]