'TSHOP OF RIPON 
 
tihvary of trhe theological Seminar;? 
 
 PRINCETON . NEW JERSEY 
 
 FROM THE LIBRARY OF 
 ROBERT ELLIOTT SPEER 
 
 Bb530 
 
HEART CHORDS 
 
HEART CHORDS. 
 
 The series of Volumes, of which this is one, 
 has for its object the stimulating, guiding, and 
 strengthening of the Christian life. 
 
 It has been prepared, not to advocate the 
 views of any special school of religious thought, 
 nor to discuss any vexed questions, but rather 
 to minister to all that is true, and strong, and 
 manly in moral character. 
 
 Each Volume will be brief, and will be divided 
 into short Chapters easily read by busy people, 
 suitable for perusal at Morning and Evening 
 Devotion, or for reading in the Family circle, 
 in the SchooJ, or the Bible class. 
 
HEART CHORDS. 
 
 List of Volumes in the Series. 
 
 MY FATHER. Bv the Right Rev. ASHTON OXENDEN, 
 late Bishop of Montreal. 
 
 MY BIBLE. By the Right Rev. W, BOYD CARPENTER, 
 D.D., Lord Bishop of Ripon. 
 
 MY WORK FOR GOD. By the Right Rev. H. 
 COTTERILL, Bishop of Edinburgh. 
 
 MY OBJECT IN LIFE. By the Ven. Archdeacon 
 Farrar, D.D., F.R.S. 
 
 MY SOUL. By the Rev. P. B. POWER, M.A. 
 
 MY AVALK AVITH GOD. By the Very Rev. J. F. 
 MONTGOMERy, Deaii of Edinburgh. 
 
 MY ASPIRATIONS. By the Rev. GEO. MATHESON. 
 D.D., of Innellan, and Baird Lecturer. 
 
 MY BODY. By the Rev. Prof. W. G. BLAIKIE, D.D.. 
 LL.D. 
 
 MY AIDS TO THE DIVINE LIFE, gy the Very 
 Rev. G. D. BOYLE, Dean of Salisbury. 
 
 MY GROWTH IN DIVINE LIFE. By the Rev. 
 Prebendary REYNOLDS, M.A. 
 
 MY EMOTIONAL LIFE. By the Rev. Prehendaiy 
 CHADWICK, D.D. 
 
 MV PLACE IN CREATION. By the Rev. HUGH 
 Macmillan, D.D. 
 
 MY SOURCES OF STRENGTH. By the Rev. E. E. 
 Jenkins, M.A., Secretary ol tlie Wesleyaii Missionary 
 Society, and Ex-President of tlic Conference. 
 
v>^ 
 
 APR 13 19.0 
 
 ^x 
 
 % 
 
 A 
 
 iHj) BiStr: 
 
 Rr. Rev. W. BOYD CARPENTER, D.D., 
 
 LORD BISHOP OF RIJ'ON. 
 
 SIXTEENTH THOUSAND 
 
 CAS SELL & COMPANY, Limited 
 
 LONDON, PARIS 6^ MELBOURNE. 
 [all rights reserved.] 
 
 1890. 
 
C O N T IvN TS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 CHAPri'.R I. 
 Introductory i 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 The Bible a Power 9 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 The Bible and Science • .20 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Concerning Moral Difficulties 36 
 
 CHAP'Tl'R V. 
 The Bible a Library . . 48 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 The Bible a Growth 59 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 The Growth of the Bible 74 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 The Growth of the T.ible (c^/////</a'</) .... 85 
 
viii Contents. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 Bible StuJy. y2 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 Hints on Reading loi 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 Inner Teaching xi2 
 
H E ART Chords 
 
 My Bible. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 It is one of the misfortunes of our age that we 
 have so little leisure. The haste of life brings 
 many disadvantages : it hinders thoroughness 
 of work ; it destroys largely our reverence for 
 life, since we hardly cherish much respect for 
 that which we do hurriedly. The result is that 
 the world is full of hasty judgments : men are 
 driven to decide almost before they have had 
 leisure to deliberate. The spirit of this haste is 
 infectious : people ask for rapid conclusions ; 
 they become impatient of a wise hesitation ; the 
 demand brings the supply. On all sides dog. 
 
2 Heart Chords. 
 
 matic utterances are heard ; a swift survey is 
 made ; a few facts are gathered ; an immature 
 conclusion is reached, and immediately an- 
 nounced ; oracle succeeds oracle, contradicting 
 or confirming ; those who counsel deliberation 
 are elbowed out of the way. In the multitude 
 of oracles there is confusion. Men grow be- 
 wildered ; they drift to one side or the other, 
 having lost their vantage ground of calm obser- 
 vation. Such a state of things is hardly helpful 
 to truth. What is wanted is quiet thought. 
 Out of it may come clearer views, better 
 methods of study, and the reverent spirit 
 which is essential to the discovery of truth. 
 God reveals nothing to the hasty : the calm 
 waters best reflect the stars. 
 
 In this little book I plead for patience in the 
 study of the Bible. No study is likely to result 
 in enduring knowledge which is carried on with 
 an impatient spirit. Yet we a-re tempted, perhaps, 
 to be more recklessly rapid in deciding upon 
 questions affecting the interpretation of the Bible 
 than in any other study. I will not dwell upon 
 
Mv Bible. 3 
 
 the harm that is done by the misinterpretations 
 which are piously adopted and accepted as in- 
 fallible ; these are a souTe of sadness to all 
 thoughtful readers of the Bible. But it is well 
 to remember that there is a reflexive mischief 
 in such hasty methods. The character suffers ; 
 the habit of mind which contents itself with 
 surface interpretations and rapid conclusions 
 undermines the moral tone ; self-opinionated- 
 ness is developed, and the character becomes 
 inflated with egotism and conceit. He who 
 would not merely use the Bible as a book of 
 interesting studies, but as a help to devotion 
 and as a spiritual instrument in the formation 
 of character, will seek to adopt those habits of 
 patience, reverence for truth, and earnest exer- 
 cise of all his intelligent faculties, that he may 
 avoid the snares of that 
 
 " Raw haste, half-sister to delay." 
 
 The natives of India had a saying about Sir 
 Henry Lawrence — " When Sir Henry looked up 
 twice to heaven and once down to earth, and 
 
4 Heart Chords. 
 
 then stroked his beard, he knew what to do.*' 
 If we may utiHse the saying, it seems to express 
 the attitude of mind with which all life's work 
 and study should be done. The reverence 
 which looks up, and the observation which 
 looks around, combined with the judgment that 
 can reflect, become safeguards against the false- 
 hood of extremes. There is an observation 
 which is keen enough, but which, never looking 
 upward, has no reverence ; there is a pious 
 reverence which, in its rapt heavenward gaze, 
 forgets to look earthward, and so loses touch 
 with humanity ; but he who, while regarding 
 heaven, does not forget the world in which he 
 lives, and seeks to know also the man within, 
 will avoid alike the dogmatism which is irreve- 
 rent and the mysticism which is unpractical. 
 
 What, therefore, is needed for true Bible 
 knowledge is clear thinking and reverent feeling, 
 allied with that patience which can wait till the 
 careful, systematic, and intelligent study has 
 brought forth its legitimate fruit of truer (and, 
 because truer, firmer) conceptions of the real 
 
My Bible. 5 
 
 meaning, purpose, and use of the Bible. There 
 is more need of this perhaps than many people 
 think. Christian faith is placed, as it were, 
 between cross-fires. Religious enthusiasm is 
 alive, and the faults which wait upon enthu- 
 siasm — inaccuracy, the violent application of 
 the Bible texts to any idea uppermost m the 
 zealot's mind, the readiness to accuse the more 
 cautious of selfish Laodiceanism— are not far to 
 seek. While on the other side we are told 
 that the Bible as a religious or moral factor is 
 played out ; that criticism and science, advanced 
 knowledge and wider inquiry, have stripped 
 away its glory, and cast the crown of its spiritual 
 supremacy down to the ground. The result is 
 just what might be expected : one-sided men 
 become more and more dogmatic ; thoughtful 
 men grow silent through a creditable timidity ; 
 while the great multitude of those who are 
 neither experts nor fanatics nor trained thinkers 
 drift on with ever -increasing confusion of 
 thought and painful misgiving. Want of know- 
 ledge is one source of doubt ; another is the 
 
6 IJeart Chords. 
 
 difficulty of gettin^^ rid of faulty notions, which 
 unthinking and reckless spirits declare to be 
 inseparable from true and genuine l)elief in the 
 teaching and authority of the Bible. 
 
 If, then, it can be shown that the Bible is not 
 responsible for the faulty notions of men about 
 its nature and contents ; that there are many 
 pious opinions which have their origin in devout 
 fancies and not in any fair and candid inter- 
 pretation of the Bible ; that the wider the survey 
 we take of the range and drift of the Bible, the 
 more does it harmonise with the truest con- 
 ceptions of the world's histoiy, and the more 
 adequately does it meet men's needs, we shall 
 be able to study it with simpler trust in the God 
 who of old time spake unto the fathers in the 
 prophets. 
 
 To do this it seems essential that we should 
 try and lay aside preconceptions and prejudices. 
 We have perhaps expected from the Bible much 
 that we had no right to expect. We have per- 
 haps been selfish, thinking that the Bible was 
 only designed to minister to ourselves, and 
 
J/)' BlDLE. 7 
 
 forgetting that in that treasury there are things 
 old as well as new, and that there are portions 
 v/hich were primarily designed to nourish the 
 spirits of men m other ages and other climes 
 than our own. We have perhaps thought that 
 the full and proportionate Bible as we now have 
 it is the same as the more limited and meagre 
 Bible which was in the hands of Hezekiah 
 and David, of Samuel or Moses. Many of 
 these thoughts must be laid aside. We need 
 to ask afresh— "What is the Bil^le? What 
 is the time range of its growth "i What is 
 the drift of its various portions ? What is the 
 purpose and significance of the whole ? Where 
 did it grow.? How can we trace its formation ? 
 How may we most intelligently study it .'' How 
 may we best meet the difficulties which surround 
 its teaching and its history? 
 
 It will be impossible to answer all these 
 questions ; but it is well to remember that they 
 should be asked, and that, if we are really in 
 earnest in our wish to study this old book, 
 which has rejoiced the hearts of thousands in 
 
8 Heart Chords. 
 
 past centuries, we must not shrink from the 
 labour which the answers to such questions 
 involve, but seriously, candidly, patiently seek 
 for every light upon our path of study. All that 
 can be attempted in these pages will be to con- 
 sider some of the difficulties which may stand 
 in the way, briefly to suggest some of the 
 leading principles which should guide our 
 study, trace out in the simplest way some 
 points in the history of the growth of the 
 Bible, and to suggest some method by which 
 the Bible may be most wisely and intelli- 
 gently studied. If we can but honestly and 
 simply do this, we may trust to be illumined 
 by Him, the breath of whose Spirit has in all 
 ages given men wisdom. 
 
Mv Bible. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE BIBLE A POWER. 
 
 There can be no doubt that many people are 
 greatly perplexed in their thoughts about the 
 Bible. They hardly know why it is, but they 
 are conscious of a confusion in their minds on 
 the subject. If we were to ask them for their 
 views about the Bible, they would probably 
 answer, We have no views at all on the matter. 
 There was a time when we thought of the Bible 
 ver}' differently : we felt quite sure that it was a 
 true and unerring guide to immortality and life ; 
 we read it as we would a travelling companion, 
 seeking from it how to shape our life here, and 
 how to raise our hopes and trust for the here- 
 after. But now we scarcely know what to think. 
 We hardly know whether we ought to trust it at 
 all ; for we hear that its history is not depend- 
 able ; the account it gives of the origin of the 
 world is, we are told, contradicted by science. 
 
lo Heart Chords. 
 
 Then the drift of thought in the present clay 
 seems to make a great deal of the Bible only 
 superfluous. All this makes us doubt how we 
 ought to receive the Bible. But this is not all. 
 We thought, at any rate, that we were quite safe 
 in taking the Bible to be a guide of our life, to 
 show us the best way to rule our conduct, and 
 the best type after which to mould our charac- 
 ter. But even this we are now not sure of ; for 
 there is so much in the Bible that shocks our 
 sense of what is right, and the characters which 
 have been formed in those who have professed 
 to believe in the Bible have been so hard or 
 so flabby, so bitter or so mawkish, so full of 
 cruel bigotry or so wanting in true manliness, 
 that we have lost our faith even in its power 
 to rear a true, high type of manhood. Then, 
 again, we are not at all easy about the teaching of 
 the Bible. Its theology seems in many respects 
 tinged with superstitionism, and there is a 
 strange, malevolent tone about some of the 
 tenets of Christendom. All this we feel, and at 
 the same time we are quite ready to confess 
 
J/y Bible. ii 
 
 that the Bible charms us still. It has a per- 
 suasive force, which has often, like a mothers 
 voice, kept us from doing wrong ; it has an 
 elevated tone, which makes us scorn base and 
 mean ways ; and it certainly searches out 
 our spirits, and causes us to feel ashamed 
 of ourselves ; and it seems to spread over our 
 life the wide-reaching care of One greater than 
 man, and makes us feel happy in the thought 
 that there is some One in the universe who 
 loves us with a pure, honest, and painstaking 
 love. When we think of these things, we can 
 only say that we are confused ; we wish all the 
 doubts would not arise to spoil our enjoyment 
 of the noble and good things that the Bible 
 brings us, and yet we cannot endure to enjoy a 
 comfort which may be ignoble, because resting 
 on what is empty or false. We feel, in fact, 
 towards the Bible as men do towards a friend 
 who is under a cloud. A distrust has been 
 created, but the old tenderness remains. There 
 was a time when we looked up to our friend as 
 an oracle : what he said we unquestioningly 
 
12 Heart Chords. 
 
 believed ; what he counselled we unhesitatingly 
 did. But now it is different. There is a cloud : 
 we cannot give him an undoubting allegiance 
 and rely upon his judgment as before ; yet we 
 are filled with regret, for our fondness for him 
 remains, though now strangely mingled with 
 distrust. So with the Bible. Once we read 
 its words without a doubt or misgiving : it was 
 our oracle ; it was more precious than rubies ; 
 it was sweeter than honey ; it was the light of 
 our feet. But now it is different : a cloud of 
 doubt surrounds it ; our fondness remains, but 
 distrust is mixed with it. 
 
 The remedy is simple. Deal with the Bible 
 as chivalrous friendship would deal with a 
 friend : face the facts ; see what has caused the 
 cloud; ask whether the distrust is justifiable; 
 whether it arises from the actions of our friend, 
 or from our own mistake, and, perhaps, from 
 our having too readily believed what others 
 have told us of him. 
 
 And it may, I think, fairly be pleaded that the 
 Bible is entitled to this straightforward treat- 
 
Mv Bible. 13 
 
 ment. Whatever little shadow seems to rest 
 upon it now, at least in the past it has done 
 good service. Let me suggest that the most 
 superficial survey of the past power and influ- 
 ence of the Bible raises at least a presumption 
 that it is possessed of some deep and strong 
 moral and spiritual force. 
 
 The power of a work may be measured by the 
 length of its life and the width of its influence. 
 The great rivers of the world are valuable in 
 proportion to the mileage and navigability of 
 their course. It is not otherwise with books. 
 A work that lives on and feeds the thoughts of 
 men as the centuries move, attests its greatness 
 by its vitality and its force. Constant and inex- 
 haustible as the Amazon or the Danube, they 
 pour forth their fulness ceaselessly : the ages 
 pass ; generations die ; fresh faces throng on 
 every side ; fresh voices are heard in the world ; 
 but great works still contribute their share of 
 vigour and health to the thought of human 
 kind. 
 
 The comparison is not adequate ; it wrongs 
 
14 J I EAR r Chords. 
 
 the great writings of the world. In one thing 
 they are greater than the water-courses of the 
 earth. They can pour their wealth of influence 
 through every land. While the Arno and the 
 Po carry fertility only through the plains and 
 valleys of Lombardy, the heart-inspiring wisdom 
 of the wise can travel everywhere. " Their 
 sound goes forth into all lands, and their words 
 to the ends of the world." But there are books 
 and books. Some are as a river that flows with 
 ever feebler and scantier course ; others are as 
 the river which Ezekiel saw, which grew deeper 
 and broader in an ever-lengthening course. 
 Out of this springs a test. The ages try the 
 works of men : the wisdom and strength of 
 some grow even more and more apparent as 
 time goes on ; others are popular for a while, 
 and then forgotten. There is the book of a 
 season, but there is also the book of an age ; 
 and there are a few books which are not for an 
 age even, but for all time. The judgment of 
 centuries has measured these ; the verdict of 
 generations has been given ; if experience is 
 
J/)' Bible. 15 
 
 worth anything, there is no appeal from this 
 verdict ; these works have been enthroned; 
 their writers wield a sceptre and rule over an 
 empire which kings might envy. Homer, 
 Dante, Shakespeare sway a realm greater than 
 that of the Pharaohs ; and, to use the language 
 of Victor Hugo, " Tacitus with iron heel treads 
 under foot the twelve dragons whom we call the 
 Caesars." 
 
 Measured by this test of time and place, the 
 Bible is one of the great books of the world. It 
 may be said that the Bible is not a book so 
 much as a collection of works bound together 
 in one volume. We need not object to this 
 description. The Bible, as we call it, is not 
 so much a book as a collection of literature. 
 But in this consists an element of wonder. 
 
 The volume contains the relics of the litera- 
 ture of the Hebrew people. The Holy Land 
 is not larger than the southern counties of 
 England ; its political or commercial import- 
 ance can hardly be said to have been very 
 great or extensive ; it had, indeed, its epoch 
 
1 6 Heart Chords. 
 
 of splendour ; but, in comparison with the first- 
 class empires of the world, it was of no more 
 consequence than Holland or Belgium among 
 the great nations of Europe. Yet its literature 
 is better known than any literature of the world ; 
 and this volume, which contains the history, the 
 poetry, the moral philosophy, and the religious 
 treatises — the prayer-book and hymn-book of 
 its people — is more widely circulated than any 
 other volume. What is more, it is regarded 
 with a reverence and affection almost unique. 
 People who seldom read it, and who never 
 attempted to study it, are happy if they have 
 even a dusty copy of it in the house : they like 
 to carry it about with them ; they enrol the 
 names of their children upon its first blank 
 page. Intelligent and educated people acknow- 
 ledge its charm ; more scholars comment on 
 the significance of its words, or the true readings 
 of its text, than upon the writings of Homer and 
 Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Lucan, and Dante, that 
 learned band of six, the renown of whose great 
 names " echoes through the world." The notion 
 
^fv Bible. 17 
 
 that a valuable MS. of any portion of its text 
 has been found excites the curiosity of the whole 
 civilised world : the pretended discoverer of it 
 values the treasure at a million of money ; a 
 fresh translation of it is awaited with eager and 
 kindling interest ; when it appears, the first day's 
 sale exceeds a million. Millions of children are 
 taught lessons from its pages ; its teachings 
 have entered into the warp and woof of the 
 national life of the greatest of peoples. Men 
 and women on both sides of the Atlantic are 
 unconsciously under the influence of its moral 
 and spiritual suggestions. Portions of it have 
 a charm of inexpressible influence, which sways 
 the art as well as the morals of human life. Its 
 words have been hid in the best hearts of 
 humanity, and have moulded the noblest ex- 
 amples of life and the highest types of human 
 character. 
 
 It is undoubtedly true that the volume has 
 been assailed, as a whole and in detail. Its 
 history has been declared to be faulty : its 
 scientific conceptions crude and beneath con- 
 
1 8 Heart Chords. 
 
 tempt ; its moral ideas harsh and incongruous. 
 Its most reverent admirers need not deny the 
 fact that such accusations have been made. 
 But all this only adds to the interest of the 
 book. In depth and breadth, and in the en- 
 during character of its influence, it is unsur- 
 passed, notwithstanding all that has been said 
 of its inaccuracy and blundering. Our interest 
 rises. The spell which its words have cast 
 round men must be mighty indeed which can 
 endure and triumph after so many conflicts. 
 It is like a splendid minster which the critics 
 find fault with, but which all the world still 
 flocks to see, and within whose walls thousands 
 still love to w'orship, and whose calming and 
 elevating influence lifts tried and tempted souls 
 high above sordid motives and low-thoughted 
 care. 
 
 It is worth while taking up such a book again, 
 and endeavouring to estimate the reasons for the 
 hold it has gained upon the world. We may, 
 for the moment, grant everything that can be 
 said to disparage it ; but the fact still remains 
 
J/r Bible. 19 
 
 that its influence has been deep and far-reaching, 
 that it is one of the few volumes which has won 
 an ascendancy wide as the world and lasting as 
 the centuries. Even were every divine feature 
 to disappear from its pages, it would not be an 
 unworthy study to examine its teachings and 
 try to discover something of the reason for the 
 tenacity of its hold upon the minds of men. 
 But if we take what we may term a higher view, 
 and see in it the unfolding of ever wider and 
 deeper conceptions of God and of God's govern- 
 ment, we may find that its drift and its purpose 
 touch humanity in its breadth and length and 
 depth, ministering some hope to all races, some 
 truth to every age, and finding its way to give 
 comfort and courage to the hearts and spirits of 
 millions. 
 
20 Heart Chords. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE BIBLE AND SCIENCE. 
 
 The uneasy feeling of which we have spoken is 
 felt towards the Bible because it is believed that 
 scientific knowledge has discredited some por- 
 tions of it. The Bible gives, it has been said, 
 an utterly mistaken account of the formation of 
 the world. I do not know what some people 
 may feel, but I firmly believe that thousands are 
 just weary of the perpetual recurrence to this 
 threshed-out subject. Yet it may be that some 
 feel that difficulties exist, and allow the prejudice 
 which results from this feeling still to hinder 
 their taking to the serious study of the Bible. 
 
 For such we may be allowed to illustrate 
 briefly three points : — 
 
 (i) That it the Bible should be ten thousand 
 times more at variance with science than it is 
 believed to be by some, it would not be of the 
 slitjhtest moment. It is one of those confusions 
 
J\fv Bible. 21 
 
 of the mind which have been created by the 
 blunder-headedness of partisans on both sides. 
 
 It is a very simple and fair principle to lay 
 down, that an error incidental is very different 
 from an error essential. Let me illustrate. A 
 judge is summing up a difficult case. In order 
 to make his charge clear to the jury, he makes 
 use, we will suppose, of some chemical or agri- 
 cultural illustration, or he quotes a piece of 
 poetr)'. His quotation, which he says is from 
 Pope, is from Dryden. His illustration from 
 agriculture shows that he has no knowledge of 
 farming ; his language betrays that he is totally 
 ignorant of some remarkable chemical dis- 
 coveries. He has made, in fact, mistakes in 
 literature and science. But these mistakes do 
 not invalidate his forensic argument ; they are 
 completely separable from the drift and scope 
 of his charge; they are incidental, not essential ; 
 they have been used for a purpose, viz., to 
 enliven and to enlighten : they have served this 
 purpose ; the jurymen are able by their means 
 to catch more readily the gist of his argument. 
 
2 2 Heart Chords. 
 
 The judge is not a whit less capable as a judge 
 because he has shown that his scientific know 
 ledge is defective. Or a doctor visits a patient 
 to relieve his visit of its mere technical character 
 he describes the patient's symptoms and treat 
 ment in an illustrative way : he blunders sadly 
 he shows that his knowledge of history is by no 
 means perfect, and in the sphere from which his 
 illustrations are drawn, he exhibits perhaps a 
 dozen inaccuracies. But the faultiness of his 
 illustrations, the feebleness of his historical 
 attainments, does not in the least interfere with 
 the soundness of his views or the patient's con- 
 dition, nor even with the clearness of his account 
 of them. The mind of the listener, unless he 
 be a captious literalist, readily separates between 
 the incidental blunders and the essential drift of 
 the statement. 
 
 Numberless illustrations of the same principle 
 will occur to the mind. The mistakes in astro- 
 nomy which might be found in Herodotus or 
 Thucydides would not be taken of themselves 
 to invalidate the history; geographical errors in 
 
Mv Bible. 23 
 
 Dante do not make the poem less splendid, or 
 deprive it of its vast and deep spiritual teaching ; 
 the purpose of these writers lies outside the 
 incidental errors. Had Thucydides or Herodotus 
 or Dante professed to write on astronomy or 
 geology, the case would have been different ; 
 error there would have been error in the essential 
 intention of the book, but error in the subor- 
 dinate or incidental features does not detract 
 from their essential value or beauty. It is a 
 recognised principle that a passing dictum of a 
 judge on a point not before the court carries no 
 weight, and is not to be quoted as authoritative, 
 however authoritative the form of it may be. 
 This is only reasonable, for the judgment is 
 governed by the case, and is not held to be 
 applicable to any side issue. 
 
 To apply this is simple ; it warns us that 
 scientific error does not deprive of its value a 
 book whose whole purpose and drift is moral 
 and spiritual, not scientific. It warns us that to 
 criticise incidental or real inaccuracies is impos- 
 sible or unfair till we have mastered the purpose 
 
24 Heart Chords. 
 
 of the writer, or the points which he designs to 
 illustrate and enforce. 
 
 But it will be said the Bible is inspired, and 
 we look to its inspiration to be free from all 
 possible mistakes. What is the use of a book 
 which pretends to be inspired if we are to meet 
 in it with blunders and inaccuracies ? It is its 
 very claim to inspiration which makes us expect 
 it to be without flaw or frailty, blemish or blot. 
 Are we quite sure that this is the case ? Are 
 we perfectly certain that a mechanical accuracy 
 of language is essential to true inspiration.? A 
 little reflection will, if I mistake not, convince 
 us that it is not so essential. 
 
 Suppose, for example, that we were to say 
 of some statesman that he was sagacious, would 
 we be understood to mean that he was a fit 
 person to consult if we were suffering from 
 gout .'' Does sagacity in statesmanship carry 
 with it skill in medicine ? All that we mean is 
 that in matters of government and policy such 
 a man is possessed of sound judgment and 
 apt capacity. In other words, when we pre- 
 
My Bible. 25 
 
 dicate sagacity of the statesman, we mean 
 sagacity in the particular line and walk of 
 political attairs. We do not mean that there is 
 not another sagacity for different affairs which 
 the statesman may or may not possess. All that 
 we are speaking of is his sagacity in a certain 
 direction. 
 
 Now, there is no more inclusiveness of sense 
 in the word inspiration than there is in the 
 word sagacity. Just as there may be a sagacity 
 for politics, and a sagacity for commercial 
 matters, and a sagacity for medical treatment, 
 so there may be an inspiration which endows a 
 man with fitness for government, or an inspira- 
 tion which endows a man with the power of 
 argument, or an inspiration which bestows upon 
 a man the gift of song. It is perfectly true that 
 the general- feeling of Christendom has distin- 
 guished between the inspiration of the sacred 
 writers and the inspiration of the poet or the 
 man of scientific genius. This is right enough ; 
 for their inspiration is of a different order, and 
 for different purpose, though from the same 
 C 
 
26 Heart Chords. 
 
 Spirit, who gives to some the word of wisdom, 
 to others the gift of knowledge, to others ti:e 
 gift of faith. But it still remains true that in- 
 spiration to a particular work does not guarantee 
 a kind of universal infallibility. We should no 
 more expect scientific infallibility, for example, 
 in prophets and apostles than we should expect 
 medical sagacity in a man whose gift of sagacity 
 lay in a political sphere. 
 
 To say, then, we have found out that Moses 
 made geological or astronomical blunders is not 
 in the least to discover any flaw in his inspira- 
 tion. To say that an evangelist confused two 
 places together, or that an apostle betrayed 
 ignorance of some point in ancient history, may 
 be true or not true, but it is completely beside 
 the question of their inspiration, which simply 
 seems to me to mean divine spiritual help given 
 in certain direction, the direction in their case 
 being to tell or to enforce moral and spiritual 
 truths among men. 
 
 What we have reached, then, amounts to this 
 — that mistakes and inaccuracies, if such there 
 
A/]- BiRi.E. 27 
 
 be, in matters not within the scope and drift of 
 the sacred writer's intentions, do not invalidate 
 the value or authority of the books. 
 
 (2) But when we take the next point and 
 examine the accusations of inaccuracy, we are 
 surprised to find out how comparatively small 
 they are, and, what is more to the purpose, how 
 many of them are due, not to the sacred writers, 
 but to our misapprehension of the scope and 
 purpose of the writers. For instance, under the 
 tyrannous yoke of the theory of verbal inspira- 
 tion, so-called orthodox theologians were obliged 
 to proclaim the literal accuracy of every word 
 of the first chapter of Genesis. Their theory 
 made them forget that they were Westerns 
 reading an Oriental book ; it made them pain- 
 fully dull-witted, as all men enslaved by a 
 literalist spirit must be ; figure and fact were 
 flung heedlessly together ; the proverbial sur- 
 gical operation would have been needful to get 
 the understanding of a metaphor or poetical 
 idea into their heads; days must be days, or 
 at least equal lengthened periods. If we had 
 
2$ Heart Chords. 
 
 spoken to such people of an Essex lion,* they 
 would never have been satisfied unless they had 
 found his whelps in Epping Forest ; if we had 
 told them that Glasgow magistrates had been 
 fried by hundreds, they would have been anxious 
 for the interference of the police. The idea of 
 a popular (and because popular, poetical) ac- 
 count of the world's origin was far out of their 
 sight. Yet it is surely one of the most patent 
 facts that literal exactitude is in many cases 
 more misleading than popular description. A 
 certain poetry of form, which scientific minds 
 dislike perhaps, is in hundreds of cases abso- 
 lutely needful to popularise knowledge. " There 
 are some things," writes the present Bishop of 
 Carlisle, '' which can only be described poeti- 
 cally, and the written accounts of v/hich can 
 only be recognised when their poetical character 
 is recognised ; and I venture to think that any 
 account of that which took place ' in the begin- 
 
 * Perhaps it is needful to explain that an Essex lion 
 is a vulgarism for a calf, and that a Glasgow magistrate 
 is, like a Norfolk capon, a red herring. 
 
J/r BiBLE> 29 
 
 ning,' which involves the idea of 'creation' of 
 which we have no experience, which refers to 
 the relation between the unseen God and the 
 visible creation, must in the nature of things 
 belong to this class ; if creation as the work of 
 God be described at all, it must be poetically, 
 figuratively, imaginatively, by reference to pro- 
 cesses of which we have experience, and by 
 means of pictures drawn therefrom," The truth, 
 then, is, that more than half the difficulties, as 
 more than half the controversies, of the world 
 have been caused by prosaic-minded men, who 
 turn poetry into prose ; they are like the dog in 
 the fable, who dropped the meat to grasp its 
 shadow ; for they lose not only the truth, but 
 also the sweet symbol which was its constant 
 witness. 
 
 If only, then, we can but allow a little natural- 
 ness in our method of reading the Bible, we shall 
 avoid many troublesome rocks. Indeed, with- 
 out going further into the question of the origin 
 of the world, or the difficulties which are sup- 
 posed to beset the book of Genesis, it is quite 
 
30 He ART Chords. 
 
 in harmony with what we have said to find that 
 tlie Mosaic account has been found to be not so 
 wliolly unscientific as has been imagined. Prof. 
 Haeckel, for example, writes that the extraordi- 
 nary success of the Mosaic history of creation 
 " is explained not only by its close connection 
 with Jewish and Christian doctrines, but also 
 by the simple and natural chain of ideas which 
 runs through it, and which contrasts favourably 
 with, the confused mythology of creation current 
 among most of the other ancient nations." Nor 
 is this all. The same writer recognises that the 
 Mosaic account enshrines in its bosom " two 
 great fundamental ideas, common also to the 
 non-miraculous theory of development." These 
 two ideas, which are accepted by Prof Haeckel 
 in this nineteenth century, are in the old un- 
 scientific Mosaic record. They meet us, he 
 says, in this Mosaic hypothesis of creaition with 
 surprising clearness and simplicity — the idea of 
 separation or differentiation, and the idea of 
 progressive development or perfecting. " In 
 his theory there lies hidden the ruling idea of 
 
Mv Bible. 31 
 
 a progressive development and a differentiation 
 of the orit^inally simple matter." (Haeckel, vol. 
 i., p. 38, quoted by Bishop of Carlisle: vide 
 supra.) 
 
 When we call to mind the poetical form in 
 which the Mosaic narrative is cast, and when 
 we shake off the thraldom of literalism, we may 
 see, from this single example, how very insigni- 
 ficant the much-talked-of inaccuracies become 
 in the light of so much substantial truth. 
 
 (3) There remains another pomt which will 
 best serve to make this clearer. We have seen 
 that incidental errors are not of invalidating 
 f )rce ; we have seen that mistakes and blunders 
 are often the result of misapprehension and 
 misinterpretation. It remains to ask, What is 
 the purpose and drift of the sacred writers ? It 
 seems almost needless to ask this ; but it is only 
 by keeping this vigorously in view that we shall 
 be able to see of what infinitesimal insignificance 
 many of the controverted questions are. The 
 books of the Bible are bound together for one 
 common purpose : they are the records of the 
 
32 Heart Chords. 
 
 moral and spiritual education of men and 
 nations ; they carry with them the story of the 
 way in which God gradually revealed Himself, 
 and sought to educate and develop the moral 
 and spiritual character of His creatures. Over 
 all the ages of men He is seen sitting as the 
 refiner and purifier of silver, watching till His 
 own features are reflected in the precious mass 
 of human life. 
 
 Now to return for a moment to the Mosaic 
 record of creation : it stands to reason that its 
 purpose is to keep before the mind of the reader 
 the divine origin of all things. The methods 
 by which the universe assumed its present form 
 are outside the intention of the writer ; but he 
 knows that a degraded idea of the world's origin 
 brings about a degraded moral type of manhood ; 
 he would rescue the men for whom he wrote 
 from abject superstition. The hugest monsters, 
 the most appalling portents of nature, were 
 from the hand of the Divine Creator, and were 
 under His control. In learning to believe in the 
 God of all, men would escape the slavery of the 
 
Mv Bible. 33 
 
 childish fear which nature, naked and vast, 
 might breed in their minds. He constructs his 
 story to meet their case, and to save them from 
 a dread, unworthy of their manhood and un- 
 worthy their origin as the children of God. 
 Hence his narrative is not only, as it has been 
 said, wholly free from mythological and super- 
 stitious taint, but it is instinct also with the only 
 true and heart-elevating conception of God, a 
 God who is greater than nature, who stands 
 outside it, who is no helpless deity dragged at 
 the wheels of his creation, but a God who made 
 all things, and whose hand, as it had made, so 
 also guides and orders all things. He is not, 
 as many of the greatest gods of all the ancient 
 nations have been described, a mere weather god. 
 He is God, whose lightnings gave shine unto the 
 world, whose voice is in the storm, whose paths 
 are in the great waters, and yet who leads forth 
 His people like sheep through this great and 
 mysterious universe. Now, if we bear in mind 
 the deification of nature which tinged all early 
 creeds, we shall find in the Mosaic record the 
 
34 Heart Chords: 
 
 antidote — God made great lights ; this sun and 
 moon and these stars, which men might be 
 tempted to worship, are God's handiwork. Or, 
 again, consider the tendency to worship 
 animals, especially great monsters, which, 
 either because of their size or mysterious habits, 
 might be invested with supernatural power or 
 sanctity, such as the crocodile worship in Egypt. 
 What more fitting, then, than to write that all 
 great monsters of land and sea, even the hugest 
 and strongest, were still God's creation ? In this 
 light we see the marked significance and appro- 
 priateness of the words — "And God made great 
 whales." 
 
 Our limits prohibit our going farther. The 
 main thought is enough if we will but apply it, 
 and remember that it is only by keeping in 
 mind the purpose and intention of the writer 
 that the relevance and fitness of his words will 
 be made clear to us. Or, in other words, if we 
 turn our thoughts to God, and remember Him 
 as creator and preserver, as teacher and Saviour, 
 we shall begin to see the traces of His guidance 
 
^[Y Bible. 35 
 
 and revelation in tlu progressive pages of the 
 Bible. We shall be like those who, having 
 climbed the mount of God, begin to see the 
 true features of the landscape which puzzled us 
 before. We shall not be afraid of science, for 
 we shall know that all knowledge is of God. 
 We shall not be much perplexed by what looks 
 like scientific or historical mistakes in the Bible, 
 for we shall know that its purpose is higher than 
 these. The Bible, no less than the universe, is 
 a painful and perplexing enigma without God ; 
 but in the Bible, as in the world, it is only in 
 God's light that we shall see any light worthy 
 of the name. 
 
36 JIjiart Cjivkds. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 CONXERNING MORAL DIFFICULTIES. 
 
 The misgiving which many people feel about 
 the Bible is not due to one source only. The 
 scientific difiiculties, as they are called, do not 
 impress the mind so deeply as many think ; for, 
 though we may not be able to put it into words, 
 we have a deep feeling that those matters have 
 little to do with the real purpose of the Bible, 
 which is a book full of life-teaching rather than 
 of literary or scientific information. The diffi- 
 culties which lie only in the intellectual atmo- 
 sphere of the Bible are not by any means so 
 formidable as those which affect moral questions. 
 If the Bible is in any sense a moral and 
 spiritual guide, how is it that we find in it tales 
 of wrong-doing, and examples of what looks 
 ver>' like immorality and cruelty sanctioned in 
 its pages .^ At .the root of these difficulties lie 
 our very wrong thoughts of what the Bible is. 
 
/]/}■ Bible. 37 
 
 It is just here that many good and excellent 
 people have occasioned difficulties which might 
 have been avoided had piety always been allied 
 with good sense. In their zeal, however, to 
 maintain the dignity and authority of the Bible, 
 they introduced methods of unreal interpreta- 
 tion. It was not enough for them to watch the 
 great tide of moral education flowing on from 
 period to period in the Bible stoiy. They 
 thought that every wave, and even every re- 
 coiling wave, was as full of inspired progress as 
 the set of the tide. They would have it, not 
 merely that God was teaching men from age 
 to age to live purer and better lives, but that 
 the morality of the early ages, and often even 
 of individual characters in those ages, left 
 nothing to be desired. In their reverence for 
 all they read, they began to be afraid even of 
 blaming the blameworthy. All this, though the 
 outcome of a motive which was good in its way, 
 led to most disastrous results, for the very edu- 
 cational purpose of the Bible was lost sight of. 
 Here as well as elsewhere we must keep in 
 
38 Heart Chords. 
 
 mind the law of growth : the moral character 
 of men ought to be improving from age to age ; 
 the perfection of one generation ought not to 
 be the standard of the next ; for each should 
 move on after some higher ideal. This is just 
 the law of growth working in the world. It 
 is precisely the same principle which we adopt 
 in the study of the intellectual growth of people 
 and nations. Many a schoolboy now knows 
 more than the great thinkers of the past. The 
 laws of gravity and of the movement of the 
 planets are quite familiar to us, but they were 
 far beyond the reach of the knowledge of Plato 
 or Aristotle. In the same way, there are things 
 which are obvious to our moral sense which 
 were by no means clear to the moral sense of 
 Solomon or Jacob. The laws of morality have 
 not changed any more than have the laws of 
 gravity or motion ; but we must ever distinguish 
 between the unchangeable laws of God and the 
 progressiveness of human knowledge, between 
 eternal principles and man's education in the 
 knowledge of those principles. 
 
J/y Bible. 39 
 
 In the Bible, then, we are reading the story 
 of an education. In part we are watching the 
 training of a nation — Israel ; and all through 
 we are seeing examples of the way God tries 
 to lead men into the consciousness of higher 
 laws and better modes of life. But we are 
 not watching growth like the growth of a tree : 
 it is rather growth as that of a child, where 
 there is not simply a physical advance, but a 
 deepening moral experience arising from a 
 constant conflict going on with the lower and 
 baser impulses of nature, and from the difficulty 
 of bringing instincts, energies, and affections 
 into harmony of action. The tide is coming 
 in, but the waves seem sometimes to rush 
 hack into the deep ocean again, and to lose 
 ihe vantage ground which they had apparently 
 gained. 
 
 It stands to reason that such a progress 
 must be slow, and that it is on the whole 
 better that it should be slow, since rapid ad- 
 vance woukl be more superficial than real ; 
 and if, then, necessarily slow, it follows that 
 
40 Heart Chords. 
 
 all the evil cannot be got rid of at once, but 
 that, step by step, one after another, the evil 
 habits should be conquered. They must not be 
 assailed all at once : some must be tolerated 
 till the race or people is ripe for the next 
 advance. 
 
 An illustration may make this clearer. 
 
 Suppose a teacher who is brought in to edu- 
 cate and superintend a number of children, 
 whose training has been sadly neglected. Such 
 a teacher may be either fussily anxious or calmly 
 judicious. The fussily anxious will be pained 
 and shocked at the many bad habits of her 
 pupils : she will make a dead set at all their 
 faults and all their foibles ; new-broom like, 
 she will endeavour to sweep everything clean, 
 and, being ambitious of immediate improve- 
 ment, she will dash her broom at every cobweb 
 and investigate every dust-hole. Every one 
 knows that new brooms are highly to be esteemed 
 for their zeal's sake, but in nine cases out of ten 
 they are also to be blamed for their stupidity's 
 sake. Their eagerness defeats its own end 
 
My Bible. 4 1 
 
 The man who, introduced into a new sphere,, 
 commences it by a policy of censure, and an 
 irritating inccssancy of new plans and novel 
 rules, has a splendid chance of failure before 
 him.' The wiser method is the method of 
 patience. The teacher who is anxious for 
 reputation or credit begins by dashing wildly 
 at everything which sins against his ideal of 
 what school should be; the teacher who has 
 the good and the ultimate education of the 
 pupil at heart is content to move slowly, and 
 to build up, step by step, the changes and 
 improvements which he wishes to see. Such 
 a teacher is wisely tolerant of much which he 
 secretly disapproves ; he knows that not the 
 spotlessness of external conformity with a series 
 of martinet rules is to be desired, but a spirit 
 which is being educated to the love of better 
 things because they are better. Every one can 
 understand the superiority of the wise reformer 
 who is content to move slowly, and never loses 
 faith in the ultimate progress of the race, though 
 its advance is only won by almost imperceptible 
 D 
 
42 Heart CrroRDS. 
 
 stages, and the mad, frantic revolutionary, who 
 would rather run the risk of killing than wait 
 patiently for the cure. 
 
 But it will be said, " We can quite understand 
 that the education must be progressive, and 
 that the morality of one age must not be set up 
 as the standard of the next ; but what we are 
 puzzled at is that God is said to do or to suggest 
 some of the things which seem immoral in 
 themselves. That men should do them and be 
 gradually taught better is perfectly intelligible ; 
 but that the very God, who is educating them, 
 should inspire or sanction them, is what most 
 troubles us." 
 
 This difficulty springs out of the mixture of 
 good and evil, which is the condition of moral 
 growths. Every one must have noticed how 
 often actions are done in the world which look 
 half like the inspiration of the highest self- 
 sacrifice and half the impulse of mere barbarism. 
 We condemn the violence, for example, but we 
 commend the generosity and heroism of the 
 deed. Many examples occur to our mind. 
 
J/)- Bible. 43 
 
 Contemplated from one side, the leap of Curtius 
 is a homage to ignorance and superstition ; 
 but from another side, it is an act of chivalrous 
 devotion. We can applaud the spirit of such 
 deeds : their brilliant disinterestedness makes 
 us pardon their folly. 
 
 It is the same with some Bible incidents. 
 Take, for example, the sacrifice of Isaac. The 
 man must have a heart chilled by criticism who 
 does not feel that there is a grandeur in the 
 spirit of the Patriarch when he shows himself 
 willing to surrender what is dearest to him. In 
 his life, he had found God to be all in all to 
 him ; in his dangers and vicissitudes, God had 
 been near to him. Struggle and privation had 
 waited on his earlier years, but prosperity had 
 become his, and his house was enriched by the 
 soft, sweet music of child-laughter. Was it a 
 poor or ignoble impulse which urged him to 
 offer his best-beloved to the God who had 
 never failed him ? Call it superstition ; call it 
 a dark and revolting thought : it is so in our 
 enlightened eyes. But can we not trace in the 
 
44 Heart Chords. 
 
 readiness or even yearning to yield up the sweet- 
 est and brightest thing in his life the very same 
 spirit which, in a more enlightened age, counted 
 not its life dear unto itself? Is it not the deep 
 and pathetic expression of the same love which,' 
 under brighter circumstances, went and sold 
 all that it had to become a disciple in the life 
 of tiue sacrifice ? Devotion, love, high self- 
 surrender are in the act, though the method 
 of expressing it is dark and tinged with igno- 
 rance of God's character. 
 
 But how can God be in any act, or how 
 can He sanction or approve any act, which 
 has fellowship with so dark a thought? God 
 is the author of the best and truest impulses 
 of our nature. His divine spirit breathes the 
 energies of all loftiness, all nobleness, all 
 lovingness into human life ; from Him springs 
 the impulse and instinct that life should be 
 devotion and sacrifice. The root motive which 
 was good in Abraham's act was in this sense 
 of God. Does God approve? He approves 
 the spirit which can face the bitterest sacrifice 
 
My Bible, 45 
 
 out of a sense of duty, even though the sense 
 of duty be a mistaken and a degraded one. 
 But God is educating Abraham. The story 
 does not end with the impulse in Abraham's 
 mind ; it ends with bringing Abraham into a 
 fuller and truer conception of the God whom 
 he worshipped. Gently and firmly, with the 
 fullest approval of the intention and motive 
 of the sacrifice, the sacrifice itself is refused. 
 The patriarch is shown that such sacrifices are 
 not to be ; that, though devotion and love and 
 unselfish service are dear and acceptable to 
 God, He takes no delight in the ruthless or 
 superstitious rending of the sweet ties of life, 
 Abraham can return home with the atmosphere 
 of his religious life cleared. If he, in a moment 
 of dark and mistaken theological feeling, grudged 
 himself the natural joys of love and home life, 
 now he may go back happy ; the cloudy thoughts 
 of God are gone. God rejoices in the gladness 
 of His inheritance, and delights in the felicity 
 of His chosen. 
 
 It is necessary, then, not merely to read the 
 
46 Heart Chords. 
 
 Bible stories as simple tales, but to read them 
 as records of the way in which the impulses and 
 instincts of men were guided, chastened, and 
 elevated. Before we condemn, we must ask 
 what we know of the characters and needs of 
 the men and women whose lives we have been 
 reading, and what bearing the incident or story 
 has upon the education of these people. It is 
 here, as we have seen before, impossible to 
 deal fairly by the Bible without remembering 
 the law of growth. In that law, the platform 
 of each stage must be made good before any 
 advance is made to a higher ; and the apparent 
 toleration of evil, and even its apparent sanction, 
 are only the expression of the unripeness of man- 
 kind for that mode of life from which such evil 
 would be expelled. It is, to use the Bible expres- 
 sion, because ofthe hardness of men's hearts. Nor 
 need we wonder. If man's history be the story 
 of his emergence from a low animalism, can we 
 wonder — who have been made familiar with the 
 millenniums demanded by science for a small 
 physical change — that the moral education of 
 
Mv Bible. 47 
 
 men towards a high type of life and hope 
 should require some thousands of years? Read 
 aright, these Bible stories are full of hope ; 
 they indicate progress, clear and distinct, 
 though necessarily slow; they reveal the guiding 
 hand of a God who is patient and longsuffering, 
 not extreme to mark what is amiss, but earnest 
 and persevering in seeking to raise what is low, 
 and to kindle from age to age the flame of holy 
 desire for all that is noble and true and good. 
 
4 8 Heart Chords. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE BIBLE A LIBRARY. 
 
 There seems to be need to ask the question, 
 " What is the Bible ? " There is, perhaps, also 
 equal need to ascertain "what it is 7tot." Mis- 
 conceptions are easily formed, but not so easily 
 got rid of, and error, as Edmund Burke said, 
 has a perennial source. Now, one of the safest 
 methods of getting rid of misconceptions is to 
 begin, as we say, at the beginning, and lay aside 
 for the moment all that we know upon a subject, 
 or all that we think that we know. 
 
 Acting in this way, let us open our Bibles. 
 The Bible begins with Genesis and ends with 
 Revelation — i.e.^ between the coversof the Bible 
 are contained a number of different books, 
 which range over an immense field of history, 
 and which belong to very different times. In 
 fact, what we perceive is that the Bible is rather 
 a collection of sacred literature than a single 
 
J/i' Bible. 49 
 
 book. Some people may not quite like this 
 description; but on reflection it will be felt that 
 it is not a description which need produce any 
 alarm. All that is meant is that the volume we 
 call the Bible contains a collection of books 
 which were produced at different periods, and 
 written for different people, and with var)ing 
 purposes. In using this language, too, we are 
 hardly doing more than reverting to an old 
 method of describing the Bible when it was 
 called the Divine Library ; and one of our best 
 and most reverent students of the Bible has 
 said, after enumerating the various names by 
 which the Bible was known : " Of all, perhaps, 
 the Library^ the term which seems to have been 
 irrevocably lost, is the most expressive, and 
 includes the idea of ' the Book ' and ' the Books ' 
 with the most felicitous simplicity." (Prof. 
 Westcott.) 
 
 But whether we like the phrase or not, we 
 have to deal with what is true, and we shall do 
 best for ourselves and for the Bible also by 
 rigorously endeavouring to take up just what is 
 
5© Heart Chords. 
 
 true about it and no more. The Bible, then, is 
 a, collection of books, and the literature which 
 is found in them stretches over a period of at 
 least twelve hundred years, and probably much 
 more. Let us endeavour to realise what this 
 means. The literature of England, from Chaucer 
 to Tennyson and Browning, ranges over five or 
 six hundred years ; the literature of the Bible, 
 from Moses to St. John, embraces the same 
 period twice told. All this means history. No 
 sensible man would dream of undertaking the 
 study of English writers without reference to 
 the history of the English people. The obscure 
 pages begin to live in the light of contemporary 
 events ; the dark phrase is illumined with mean- 
 ing ; behind the subtle portraiture of the poet's 
 hand stands some living man. Not only so ; the 
 pages of the writers reflect the growth of the 
 nation ; the history and the literature move side 
 by side ; as in the twin glasses of the stereo- 
 scope, the picture gains in life-likeness when 
 seen through both. 
 
 It is perfectly true that the materials in our 
 
My Bible, 51 
 
 hands are smaller in the case of the Bible ; but 
 this only serves to make our work simpler ; it 
 does not alter the principles of intelligent 
 study. Where the Psalms, for example, can be 
 illustrated from the historyof Israel or the life of 
 the poet, the narrative and the hymn are alike 
 the gainers in clearness and interest. But it is 
 not a question of mere vividness gained : it is a 
 question also of truth ; for in some cases the 
 reference to the history makes all the difference 
 between a true and a false interpretation of a 
 passage. It is, therefore, of the highest moment 
 to remember that the books of the Bible are 
 allied with histor>'. 
 
 And what does history in this connection 
 mean ? Every year we are beginning to learn 
 more clearly the law of the world's growth, and 
 the dependence of one age upon another. For- 
 merly we were content with viewing the world 
 and the nations of ihe world as in practical 
 isolation from each other and the universe. 
 Now the conception of interdependence and what 
 is called solidarity is being more clearly appie- 
 
52 Heart Chords. 
 
 hended. No age, no country, no creed can say 
 to another, " I have no need of thee." In the 
 eye of the thoughtful, it is true of epochs, races, 
 and modes of thought, that the most feeble are 
 necessary. The most meagre historical period 
 has contributed its share to the growing life of 
 human kind. If it has afforded nothing else, it 
 has been at least a platform on which the suc- 
 ceeding age has been able to plant a firm foot, 
 and to advance to something higher and better. 
 The apostolic thought is becoming better under- 
 stood. Men of all ages and all climates are 
 of one blood, and in no age did God "' leave 
 Himself" wholly "without witness." The ages 
 may have changed, but the unchanging purpose 
 runs like a silver thread throughout them ; the 
 plant of human life has passed through its vary- 
 ing phases of rudimentary and then more fully- 
 developed life and form : first the blade, then 
 the ear, after that the full corn in the ear, 
 growing up slowly, silently, we know not how, 
 to perfect beauty and use. The more this is 
 realised, the more clearly are hints and indica- 
 
My Bible. 53 
 
 tions of a superintending purpose visible in the 
 world's story to those who have eyes to see. 
 
 And if we can but shake off our preconcep- 
 tions, we shall see the same law of growth wit- 
 nessed, too, in the Bible, and in it we shall see 
 that parallel to the witness of God's purpose in 
 the world's development is the witness of God's 
 advancing education of mankind in the pages 
 of the Bible. For the moment we remember 
 the word history, and recall as a consequence 
 the story of the growing civilisation and know- 
 ledge among men, we feel that we must be pre- 
 pared to find in the Bible, if it is in any sense 
 a light of men, an adaptation of moral and 
 spiritual teaching to the slow-moving growth of 
 the heart, mind, and conscience of humanity. 
 What are simple and needful religious concep- 
 tions to our minds, would have been difficult, if 
 not unintelligible, to Abraham and Moses, to 
 Elijah and Hezekiah, The principles of religious 
 life never change, any more than the axioms 
 and elementary principles of pure mathematics ; 
 but the power of grasping the more perfect 
 
54 Heart Chords. 
 
 results grow from age to age. Tliis is what 
 criticism and research have combined to show 
 us. Only one obstacle hinders our gaining the 
 advantages which spring from this fresh know-- 
 ledge. The obstacle lies in our fondness for 
 our own notions : we bow down with such 
 idolatrous homage to the systems of our own 
 thoughts that we call the overthrow of these the 
 fall of God's kingdom. Yet we are people who 
 have been taught to believe that the idols God 
 will utterly abolish. If we are honest, we shall 
 wish to know the truth ; if we are humble, we 
 shall be ready to learn it ; if we are devout, we 
 shall know that no change in our notions can 
 make God untrue ; if we are intelligent, we 
 shall easily discriminate between the discovery 
 of our own mistakes and the failure of God's 
 wisdom. 
 
 But we need not be afraid of the eft'ect of- 
 real knowledge. All that we have been taught 
 amounts to this — that that which grows is better 
 than that which is ready-made ; we have been 
 shown the need of perspective in our pictures. 
 
My Bible. 55 
 
 The Bible was read by many as though the 
 ievents of the ages of Noah, Abraham, Moses, 
 Da\id, Jeremiah, and St. Paul stood upon the 
 same horizon ; we flattened our view by this 
 means, and reduced a beautiful landscape to 
 the level of a Chinese picture, destitute of light, 
 shade, distance, and foreground. The effect of 
 this practically was to transform the Bible from 
 a splendid witness of God's superintendence 
 over all ages and forms of human life into a 
 great repertory of oracular utterances, which 
 often confounded history and sinned against 
 facts. To escape from the tyrannous blundering 
 of such methods, it was necessary to begin 
 again ; to shake ourselves loose from our mis- 
 takes, and to ask, not what we thought, but 
 what the Bible taught, and for this purpose we 
 had to ask what the Bible really was. 
 
 And we discover that the Bible is not like a 
 coin, stamped with all its lines and features in a 
 moment ; but it is a thing which has developed : 
 it is not like a dead piece of money ; it is like a 
 living tree, proving its life by its growth : it is 
 
56 Heart Chords, 
 
 not like a row of houses run up hastily by -T 
 speculative and unoriginal-minded builder, in 
 which every house is the counterpart of the 
 ether, and every room reproducing the same 
 monotonous features ; it is rather like a vast 
 cathedral, whose building has been the growth 
 of centuries, and whose grand harmony of effect 
 is heightened by variety of its details and the 
 historical characteristics of its architecture. If 
 we wish to be sure of this in the Bible's own 
 showing, let us remember what the writer of 
 the Epistle to the Hebrews said of the divers 
 portions and divers manners of God's speech to 
 the fathers by the prophets (Heb. i. i). If we 
 wish to see the fitness of this method, and its 
 immeasurable superiority over other methods, 
 let us remember that had a revelation been 
 made, and handed down ready-made to earth, 
 it would have suited a stationary world, and not 
 a progressive one ; whereas, a revelation slowly 
 unfolding itself along the way of life as men 
 were able to bear it, is just what a world of pro- 
 gress demands. In this way the Bible becomes 
 
^fY Bible. 57 
 
 a book of life and a book for life ; it is a revela 
 tion which has kept pace with the growing needs 
 and intelligence of men ; it is the Word which 
 has been a lamp to their advancing footsteps, 
 and a light on the various ways of man's moving 
 histoiy. 
 
 The practical duty which results from this is 
 not far to seek. We must treat the Bible as a 
 book with a history ; we must read it, not in 
 desultory fashion, or interpret it according to 
 our own arbitrary judgments, or even appropriate 
 its consolations to suit our indolent appetite 
 for spiritual comfort ; we must adopt a more 
 scientific treatment ; we must gather up the 
 principles which underlie its teachings by ascer- 
 taining what its words did mean to those wh(j 
 first heard them ; we must rigorously reject all 
 comfortable anachronisms ; we must resolutely 
 sacrifice all pet passages, in whose misinterpre- 
 tation we have been wont to bolster up our 
 slothful faith. If we do this in all honesty, we 
 shall win the reward ; the good things which we 
 seem to lose we shall win again in better and 
 E 
 
58 Heart Chords. 
 
 healthier fashion. For in Bible interpretation, 
 as elsewhere, the principle is true : " He that 
 saveth his life shall lose it, and he that 
 loseth his life shall save it." An untrue ap- 
 plication of a text becomes a source of weak- 
 ness, however happy we may have been in the 
 comfortable misinterpretation of it. On the 
 other hand, if we will but frankly recognise the 
 fact that the Bible is a growth, and that its 
 words and teachings had a primary application 
 for a people who were not ourselves, we shall 
 put ourselves in the way of reaching the truth, 
 which, given to them, has its counterpart for us 
 and for all. We lose, but we gain. We lose 
 the superficial advantages ; we gain the hidden 
 treasure. We break up the surface of the soil, 
 and in doing so many a little flower and eye- 
 refreshing grass is uprooted ; but we get beneath 
 the surface the rich and varied ore, which cen- 
 turies of change and season have buried there. 
 
My Bible. 5q 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE BIBLE A GROWTH. 
 
 Some people are a little afraid when they are 
 told that criticism has revealed that there are 
 books in the Bible which are compilations. 
 They have been so accustomed to regard 
 these from a very modern point of view, 
 that they are distressed when they are asked 
 to use a little historical instinct. They have 
 thought that the books of the Bible are 
 like modern books — planned, commenced, and 
 completed by one writer, and at one period. 
 When they are told that some of the books 
 grew up to their present form, and betray the 
 touch of more than one writer, they are troubled, 
 for it seems to them that the whole inspired 
 strength of the book is destroyed by such a 
 supposition. 
 
 Now, it is not my purpose or duty to enter 
 into the results of historical criticism, or even to 
 
6o Heart Chords. 
 
 pronounce an opinion upon any of the interest- 
 ing questions, such as the dates of different 
 parts of the Bible, or the authorship of 
 portions of Isaiah and Daniel. It is enough 
 for us to know that in the judgment of some 
 the sixty-six chapters of Isaiah did not proceed 
 from the same hand, and that there are critics 
 who are persuaded that more than one writer 
 shared in the composition of Daniel. In saying 
 this, we are only calling to mind what is perfectly 
 well known, not only to students, but even to all 
 ordinarily thoughtful readers. But what I am 
 most anxious to show is that there is not the 
 slightest need for alarm or distrust in the matter, 
 and that, even if it should be the case that a great 
 many more hands took part in the building up 
 of our present Bible, we are not in the least 
 degree the losers. No change in the date of 
 one portion of the books or another can disturb 
 the great coherence and harmony of the whole, 
 as a little reflection will show. 
 
 The present Bible is a growth. The books, 
 even on the most old-fashioned supposition. 
 
Mr Bible. 6i 
 
 were written at different times by different 
 people, and under very different circumstances ; 
 yet, wonderful to relate, no Bible student can 
 fail to see that there is a marvellous unity of 
 thought pervading all. With all the variety of 
 light and shade, of poetry and history, of pro- 
 phecy and didactic writing, a great and unchang- 
 ing purpose runs through the Bible. It is, to 
 use the language of Prof. Westcott, " a book 
 vianifold by the variety of times and circum- 
 stances in which its several parts had their 
 rise, one by the inspiring presence of the same 
 spiritual life." Now, it must be quite clear that 
 the greater the variety of sources and circum- 
 stances from which the Bible sprung, the more 
 wonderful is the unity of spirit and result 
 which is maintained. To use again a former 
 illustration, the Bible may be compared to 
 a cathedral whose parts have been built at 
 different successive ages ; the traces of these 
 ages are easily seen in the architectural style, 
 but all are knit together in one holy temple of 
 God. Closer investigation of this cathedral 
 
62 Heart Chords. 
 
 shows that the historical range of its growth is 
 greater and wider than was at first supposed. 
 The stones which have been built in, it seems, 
 were drawn from widely-scattered quarries ; 
 here are marbles which must have been imported 
 from distant lands ; here are great blocks of 
 stone which must have been conveyed from 
 unthought-of hills ; here are richly-carved 
 capitals which show some foreign skill ; but 
 all these have found their fitting place. Each 
 stone, each ornament, drops into the spot 
 prepared for it ; arch, pillar, buttress, mullion, 
 and pinnacle, whatever their greater or their 
 lesser antiquity, are lending support or beauty, 
 and fulfilling their functions as parts of one 
 vast sanctuary, whose purpose is not lost or 
 altered because antiquarians have made its 
 stories doubly interesting and doubly dear by 
 enlarging the bounds of its history and adding 
 new elements to the story of its growth. 
 
 There is another fact which must not be 
 overlooked. Variety of age and variety of 
 authorship carries with it often variety of in- 
 
Mv Bible. 63 
 
 tellcctual type. Men may believe the same 
 truths, but as long as minds differ they will 
 clothe their utterance in language which cor- 
 responds with their mental characteristics. The 
 Bible is not merely a growth and aggregation 
 of books : it is a great treasury of the varying 
 nioods of life ; the voices which ring out from 
 its pages are many, as the voices of human fear 
 and love, and hope and joy ; and yet they are 
 animated by one key-note which is divine. 
 
 It is as though we went into a great hall, 
 where the various wind and stringed instruments 
 were being made ready for the concert. We 
 listen, and hear the deep tones of the bass-viol, 
 the loud and, perhaps because sounding solitary, 
 discordant bray of the trumpet, the shrill note 
 of some lively pipe, the wailing cr)', as of a 
 soul in pain, which breaks from the violin. These 
 sound as the anguished and divergent voices 
 of the world. 
 
 " O earth, so full of weary noises ; 
 O men, with sorrow in your voices." 
 
 But we listen once more. The voices of these 
 
64 ■ Heart Chords. 
 
 instruments arc still heard, but a sweet govern- 
 ment has been introduced. Now their notes, 
 clear and deep, pathetic or triumphant, lend 
 themselves to the progress of one great melody. 
 They do not grate upon us now ; they are 
 welcome ; they carry our spirits with them ; 
 the drama of music is being unfolded to us ; 
 we drink in solo and chorus with an unfailing 
 joy, even when we are moved to tears ; we 
 are touched and transported ; we experience a 
 sweet content and a deep assurance that all 
 these changing tones will blend at last in some 
 great hallelujah chorus. 
 
 So is it with the Bible. It has its various 
 tones. We can trace the ditTcring types of 
 thought ; we can hear the ever-changing cry 
 of the human spirit as it passes through the 
 hours of its agony, its doubt, its despair, its 
 joy, and its confidence ; but we listen again, 
 when we have recognised the one-pervading 
 and educating spirit of God which runs through 
 all, and then we find into what deep harmony 
 all these varying voices and tones of mind have 
 
Mv Bible. 65 
 
 been di-a\vn, and what a rich ministry of strength 
 and comfort lurks in them for the spirits of 
 men. The power of the Bible, we find, lies in 
 a sweet appropriateness to the differing moods 
 of life, joined to a great guiding spirit which 
 carries its music onward to the anthem of re- 
 demption : "Thou hast loved, Thou hast washed 
 us in Thine own blood, and made us kings and 
 priests to God." 
 
 If, then, we find in the Bible that the books 
 which we thought to be single compositions are 
 rather compilations which have slowly taken 
 their present form ; if we should find, moreover, 
 that the writers frequently represent special 
 types of human thought, we need not fear : the 
 divine integrity of the book becomes the m^ore 
 remarkable, the greater and the wider is the 
 human variety. The more completely the 
 forms of intellectual life are represented, the 
 more striking does the single dominant divine 
 thought become ; the greater the length of time 
 through which the evolution has taken place, 
 the more marked is its result. 
 
66 Heart Chords. 
 
 li remains, then, but to remind ourselves that 
 such a thread of unity does run through the 
 Bible. In fact, if we are to understand nature 
 by the law of growth, we must understand the 
 Bible also by the same law — growth, ?>., the 
 slow unfolding of the end or purpose which is 
 aimed at. Such is distinctly traceable in the 
 Bible, and, being traced, becomes a key to its 
 true interpretation, and a help, therefore, in our 
 method of reading. For instance, the reader of 
 the Old Testament must have noticed that in 
 its progress it suggests to us successively the 
 thought of the ideal family, the ideal nation, the 
 ideal king. Time and space will not allow of 
 our doing more than hinting at these ideals. 
 But it is sufficiently evident that the earlier 
 portions of the Old Testament are occupied 
 with the history of the family. We see the 
 constant striving after the ideal family ; we are 
 learning what the family should be, and how 
 the family is under God's care, and is designed 
 to be a nucleus of influence through which God 
 is to be known. The words spoken of Abraham 
 
Mv Bible. 67 
 
 are as a key-note of this thought : " I have 
 known him that he might command his children 
 and his household after him, and that they might 
 keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and 
 judgment." 
 
 The thought of the ideal nation succeeds that 
 of the family. Not families only, but nations, 
 have their part to play in the writer's story, and 
 are responsible for their good and evil influence. 
 These influences are, in Bible language, their 
 angels. An ideal nation, then, becomes the 
 topic of t-he next portion of the Bible. The 
 nation is prepared ; vicissitude and suffering 
 discipline its early years ; in constant trial and 
 affliction it is taught to trust God and to pre- 
 serve its own unity. The ideal is never realised, 
 but it is suggested so strongly that the name 
 Israel becomes the natural one for us to use 
 of any people or Church contemplated from its 
 ideal side. 
 
 To the thought of the ideal nation, and in 
 part rising out of it, is added that of the ideal 
 king. If Israel is a representative idea through 
 
68 He ART Chords. 
 
 which the world is to be tauj^ht, the King of 
 Israel, in whose hands the true and unwavering 
 sceptre of righteousness is placed, is a naturally 
 corresponding one. The people need their 
 sovereign ; their dream is of one who will fulfil 
 all their expectations, and in whose leadership 
 all their best and noblest aspirations may find 
 expression. The conception of what this ideal 
 king must be grows from age to age. As 
 thought climbs upward along the pathway of 
 successive generations, the- idea becomes more 
 clearly defined. This is the external account 
 of the matter, which the very faintest and 
 most superficial study of the Old Testament 
 discloses. It is the growth, we may say, of 
 the Messianic idea in Israel. But it is precisely 
 this growth which indicates the presiding guid- 
 ance of God ; for the idea, as it grows, runs 
 before the development or average level of the 
 nation's thought. It is a thought which shapes 
 itself outside the grossness of the popular life, 
 and, if we may say so, which grows more 
 spiritual as they become more carnal But 
 
My Bible. 69 
 
 yet it is never divorced from the pious and 
 unselfish, or more spiritual among the people. 
 Some there are who, yielding themselves to the 
 teaching and guidance of the growing light, 
 have formed, under those influences, truer and 
 higher expectations, and are ready to recognise 
 the features of that Messiah, though His advent 
 should not be heralded by outward pomp. We 
 catch the utterance of their satisfied hopes : 
 "We have found Him of whom Moses in the 
 Law and the Prophets did write." It breaks 
 out into the song, which is the attestation oi 
 the best Messianic hopes : " Lord, now lettest 
 Thou Thy servant depart in peace, according 
 to Thy word : for mine eyes have seen Thy 
 salvation, which Thou hast prepared before 
 the face of all people ; a light to lighten the 
 Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel." 
 
 In following this Messianic line of thought, 
 which broadens like the light of the sunrise along 
 the pages of the prophets and teachers of Israel, 
 we may perceive the great unity of spirit and 
 hope which pervades the Old Testament. God 
 
70 Heart Chords. 
 
 left not Himself without witness. He spake in 
 time past to the fathers by the prophets. We 
 have thus, in one hand, the thread which guides 
 us safely through the labyrinth of interpretation, 
 This is that hope of Christ which has led to 
 contempt and to bonds, but which yet is an 
 answer to heart questions and world problems. 
 
 There is a double thread, it must be remem- 
 bered, in this line. On the human side, man 
 is working out the problem ; he questions his 
 heart ; he sifts and probes ; he utters his 
 thoughts ; from age to age the utterance be- 
 comes clearer ; the hopes of the race begin to 
 centre, not in a regime., nor in a philosophy, 
 nor in a dynasty, nor in a dogma, but in a 
 Person. Into this line there is the heavenly 
 thread ; these agonising wrestlers and anxious 
 questioners were not left alone ; the breath of 
 the Almighty gave them wisdom ; what they 
 wrought out in suffering became, when uttered, 
 the everlasting song of sacred prophecy : holy 
 men of old spake as they were moved by the 
 Holy Ghost. 
 
Mr Bible. 71 
 
 The law of growth in spiiitual thought is 
 thus unfolded in the Old Testament. It is 
 the same in the New Testament. The per- 
 ceptions of the disciples of our Lord were not 
 at first so clear as they became afterwards. 
 Even in their expressions of unwavering trust 
 in their Master, we can see that they did not 
 clearly see at once all that He w^as. Their 
 notions were not wholly emancipated from the 
 prejudices or preconceptions of their age. But 
 as the light grew, and their eyes grew more 
 and more accustomed to its shining, their 
 thoughts and convictions became clearer. 
 
 Keeping in mind this principle of growth in 
 the education of the disciples, we get again a 
 key to the study of the books of the New 
 Testament ; and as we watch the light pouring 
 in broadening and brighter flood upon the 
 minds of the disciples, we find that we, too, 
 gain more perfect knowledge of that light 
 which shines more and. more to the perfect 
 day. The study of the New Testament, so 
 conducted, carries the conviction of its trust- 
 
72 Heart Chords. 
 
 worthiness more completely to our minds. We 
 see not a ready-made story, repeated with the 
 glibness of primed witnesses ; but we see the 
 truth growing (as it were) in the minds of the 
 Apostles themselves. 
 
 "No exercise," writes Prof. Westcott, "can 
 give a more vivid impression of the historical 
 truth and unity of the writings of the New 
 Testament, than an investigation of the gradual 
 unfolding of the teaching on the Person of Christ 
 which they contain, in connection with the cir- 
 cumstances under which the several statements 
 are given. In the early chapters of the Acts, 
 for example, it is possible to see how the Apostles 
 were enabled, step by step, under the guidance 
 of the Spirit, to apprehend naturally (so to speak) 
 the divine character of Him with whom they had 
 ' companied ' as men with Man. On the other 
 hand, it is impossible to understand how any one 
 writing first, when the belief of the Church was 
 already shaped, could have traced the successive 
 phases through which it passed in the first days. 
 The record is evidently a direct transcript from 
 hfc." 
 
Mr Bible. 73 
 
 The conclusion, then, is ob\ious. Let none 
 ot us be afraid to recognise in all parts of the 
 ]>ible, whether in the formation of its books or in 
 the development of its truths, the law of growth. 
 The best things grow : our best thoughts, our 
 best habits, our best affections, are those which 
 have not leaped into being, but which have grown 
 upon us. Their very growth makes them dearer 
 to us, for growth is a sign of life. Dead things 
 are made ; living things must grow. In finding, 
 then, this law of growth, we find the evidence of 
 the life of the Bible. We find also the witness 
 of the tenderness of God's providence, which 
 slowly unfolded to men the revelation of Him- 
 self and His love as they were able to bear it. 
 
74 Heart Chords. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE GROWTH OF THE BIBLE. 
 
 There is one question which often troubles 
 Bible readers. They ask themselves, " How 
 can I be sure that what I am reading are the 
 true words of the writers.? If I have a letter 
 from a friend, I have the words in his own 
 handwriting, and I am sure that the words I 
 read are just the words he wrote. But the 
 Gospels and Epistles I read out of a printed 
 book ; how can I be sure that I am reading 
 really what St. Mark and St. John and St. Paul 
 wrote .'"' The answer to this question is found 
 in a little bit of history. To go fully into it 
 would require more space than we can spare. 
 But there are plenty of books in which such a 
 question is fully answered. For our purpose it 
 will be enough to give a sketch of the kind of 
 answer which the question needs. 
 
 What we really want to find out is, how far 
 
My Bible. 75 
 
 back can we trace these books. Of course, we 
 know very well that we can show that these 
 books existed substantially, as we now have 
 them, five or six hundred years ago. We might 
 take, for example, an English Hexapla (such 
 as that published by the S.P.C.K.), and there 
 we should read, printed in parallel columns 
 the translations of the Bible made by Wycliffe, 
 Tyndale, and Coverdale. This would satisfy 
 us that these books were in existence then. 
 But we can go much farther back. There 
 are three MSS. of great antiquity ; and we 
 should find that these were copies of the 
 Bible, and substantially the same as the Bible 
 we read. These MSS. are fourteen or fifteen 
 hundred years old, and it w^ould be very sur- 
 prising to find them undamaged ; but though 
 some portions have evidently been lost, there 
 remains quite enough to show that the books 
 we value most were read in the Church of God, 
 to all intents and purposes, as we read them 
 now. These three MSS. are full of interest. 
 One of them is called the Alexandrine MS., 
 
70 Heart Chords. 
 
 and is in the British Museum. It is as old as 
 the early part of the fifth century. It contains 
 the Old Testament nearly complete, and all the 
 New Testament, with the exception of a great 
 part of St. Matthew, two chapters of St. John ; 
 and of the Epistles as many as eight chapters 
 of 2 Corinthians are missing. 
 
 The second MS. is called the Vatican MS. 
 This is thought to be still older, and to have 
 been written in the fourth centur}^ Some of 
 Genesis is wanting ; and in the New Testament 
 the pastoral Epistles of St. Paul, the latter part 
 of the Epistle to the Hebrews are missing, and 
 the Book of Revelation. 
 
 The third MS. is called the Sinaitic. Its 
 interest lies in the fact that it was discovered in 
 our own age, and rescued from the fate of being 
 burned. Its probable date is believed to be 
 about the fourth centuiy. The Old Testament 
 is by no means complete ; but the whole of the 
 New Testament is there. 
 
 The three great MSS. remain as monuments 
 of the care and reverence for the Bible in the 
 
My Bible. 77 
 
 fourth and fifth centuries. But this is not all. 
 These MSS. are but copies of the sacred books 
 of the Old and New Testament, which were 
 accepted and studied, reverenced and com- 
 mented on, by the great teachers of that age. 
 We find that the Fathers of the Church, as they 
 are called, had before them the same Bible. 
 Jerome (a.d. 329 — 420), for example, whose life 
 extended from the early part of the fourth cen- 
 tury to the beginning of the fifth, devoted him- 
 self to the study of the Bible. He translated 
 the Old Testament from the original Hebrew 
 into Latin ; he revised also an earlier Latin 
 version of the New Testament, and this laid the 
 foundation of what was commonly called the 
 Vulgate. Here, again, we meet in the pages of 
 Jerome the evidence that the Bible which the 
 Churches of the fourth and fifth centuries read 
 is substantially the same as our own Bible. The 
 same fact would appear in the writings of Augus- 
 tine of Hippo (a.d. 354 — 430). 
 
 If we go to the East, we shall find evidence 
 that there, too, the Bible, substantially the same 
 
78 Heart Chords. 
 
 as our own, was recognised, known, and so 
 widely circulated as to be within the reach of 
 all who were earnest enough to make the effort 
 to obtain copies. Thus, for example, Chrysos- 
 tom (a.d. 347 — 407), who burned with zeal to 
 make the Bible known, reproached his hearers 
 for their apathy. "As many of the poorer 
 classes are constantly making this excuse (z,^., 
 that manuscripts were so expensive) that they 
 have no Bibles, I would like to ask them, can 
 poverty, however great it may be, hinder a man 
 when he does not possess a complete set of the 
 tools required for his trade? What then .'^ Is 
 it not singular that in this case he never thinks 
 of laying the blame on his poverty, but does his 
 best that it may not hinder him ; while, on the 
 other hand, in a case where he is to be so great 
 a gainer, he complains of his poverty." 
 
 The Bible which is spoken of is the Bible 
 which contains the fourteen Epistles of St. 
 Paul, the four Gospels, the Acts, and three of 
 the Catholic Epistles— />., James, i Peter, and 
 I John. 
 
I\fv Bible. ji) 
 
 We may trace back farther. We can go to 
 the beginning of the third century. We find 
 Tertullian (a.d. 190 — 220), whose life extended 
 from the latter half of the second century into 
 the early half of the third century, speaking of the 
 sacred writings of the Church of his day as well 
 known and recognised. His language shows 
 that the same books which form the strength of 
 our Bible were then treasured and appealed to. 
 
 "We lay it down as our first position, that 
 the Evangelical Testament has Apostles for its 
 authors, to whom was assigned by the Lord 
 Himself this office of publishing the Gospel. 
 . . . Of the Apostles, therefore, John and 
 Matthew first instil faith into us ; while of 
 Apostolic men, Luke and Mark renew it after- 
 wards." And again : " Let us see what milk the 
 Corinthians drank from Paul; to what rule the 
 Galatians were recalled by his reproofs ; what 
 is read by the Philippians, the Thessalonians, 
 and the Ephesians ; what is the testimony of 
 the Romans, who are nearest to us, to whom 
 Peter and Paul left the Gospel, and that sealed 
 
8o Heart Chords. 
 
 by their own blood." (Adv. Marcion, iv. c 2 
 and 5.) 
 
 Clement of Alexandiia(A.D. 1 95), who flourished 
 about the same time, quotes fully and copiously 
 from the Bible, as the following calculation will 
 show : — " I find that of the eighty-nine chapters 
 comprised in the four Gospels, there are quota- 
 tions from all except fourteen. Every chapter 
 but two of St. Matthew is quoted ; every chapter 
 but five of St. Mark ; every chapter but three 
 of St. Luke ; and all but four of St. John. His 
 quotations from the Gospels alone number four 
 hundred." — (" Genuineness and Authenticity of 
 the Gospels," by Rev. R. I. Crosthwaite.) 
 
 The books of the Old Testament in the same 
 way were recognised. Melito was Bishop of 
 Sardis in the latter part of the second century 
 (a.D. 172) ; his life was partially contemporary 
 with those of Tcrtullian and Clement of Alex- 
 andria. 
 
 " Onesimus, a Christian of Asia Minor, had 
 frequently expressed a dc ,ire ' to learn the exact 
 truth with regard to the Old Books, how many 
 
Afy Bible. 8i 
 
 they were in number, and their order.' Mehto, 
 Bishop of Sardis — ' who directed the whole 
 conduct of his Hfe in the Holy Spirit ' — after ' a 
 visit to the East, and even to the very spot 
 where [all which we believe] was proclaimed 
 and done, in which he obtained exact knowledge 
 of the Books of the Old Covenant,' sent a list of 
 them to his friend. ' The names of them are,' 
 he says, ' five books of Moses — Genesis, Exodus., 
 Numbers., Leviticus., Deuferono)?ty; Jesus., the 
 son of Xaue ; Judges., Ruth; iour Books of Kings, 
 two of Chronicles, a book of the Psahns of 
 David, the Proverbs of Solomon, which is also 
 called Wisdom, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, 
 Job ; the Books of the Prophets Isaiah, Jere- 
 viiah, the Twelve in a single book ; Daniel, 
 Ezekiel, Esdras {Esra): " ( Prof. Westcott.) 
 
 Let us seek further. We can touch an earlier 
 generation still, and question it. Irenaeus is a 
 well-known name. He was a disciple of Poly- 
 carp, and subsequently became Bishop of Lyons. 
 He was born in 120 a.d. ; he was between 
 thirty and forty when his teacher, Polycarp, 
 
82 Heart Chords. 
 
 was put to death, and his life was prolonged 
 till the opening of the third century. From 
 him we gather evidence of the existence (jf 
 what we may still call the Bible of his day. 
 " Nothing," says Prof. Westcott, " can be clearer 
 than his assertion of the equal dignity of the 
 Old and New Testaments, of the permanent 
 spiritual value of every part of them, of their 
 supreme power as the rule of truth," (" Bible in 
 the Church," p. 122.) He gives an account of 
 the origin of the Gospels, dwelling with fondness 
 for mystical meaning upon the fact that they 
 were four in number. He quotes the Acts, 
 twelve epistles of St. Paul, the Apocalypse, 
 I John, and i Peter. 
 
 There is another interesting piece of evidence 
 belonging to this period. It is drawn from the 
 MS. which is known as the Muratorian frag- 
 ment, as it was published last century by 
 Muratori. The fragment is generally believed 
 to belong to the latter half of the second cen- 
 tury ; the writer claims to have been a contem- 
 porary of Pius, Bishop of Rome. The interest 
 
My Bible. 83 
 
 of the fragment lies mainly in the account which 
 may be gathered from it of the sacred Scrip- 
 tures. The Gospels of Mark, Luke, and John, 
 the Acts of the Apostles, thirteen epistles of St. 
 Paul, the Apocalypse of St. John, are referred 
 to. The writer speaks of the fact that as St. 
 John addressed seven epistles to the seven 
 churches of Asia, so St. Paul also wrote to 
 seven separate churches. This MS. is, as 
 we have said, a fragment, and there seems 
 reason to believe that in its complete and 
 original form other books of the Bible were 
 also spoken of 
 
 To this we may add, before closing this 
 chapter, one thing more. Tatian the Syrian 
 compiled a book, entitled the " Diatesseron, or 
 Fourfold Gospel;" its date was about 170 or 
 180. It seems now to be "definitely ascertained 
 [said Prof. Sanday at the Church Congress] that 
 the Diatesseron did consist of our four canonical 
 Gospels." The] drift of this conclusion is, not 
 merely that the four Gospels were in existence 
 at that date, but that " the line of demarcation 
 
84 Heart Chords. 
 
 which separated the canonical from other 
 Gospels was already drawn " (See pp. 91, 92 of 
 Official Report of Church Congress at Reading, 
 1883.) 
 
 On the whole, then, so far as we have 
 gone, we have seen that, taking up the history 
 of the Scriptures at different epochs, we can 
 trace the existence of what is substantially 
 our New Testament as far back as the middle 
 of the second century, where we find it not 
 merely as a vague and nebulous Gospel, but in 
 distinct and clear form. It must, moreover, be 
 remembered that in tracing it back thus far, we 
 come within reach of those who had spoken 
 with the disciples and pupils of the Apostles 
 themselves. 
 
My Bible. 85 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE GROWTH OF THE BIBLE {cOJltinued). 
 
 We can rest assured, then, that the New Testa- 
 ment substantially as we now have it existed and 
 was recognised, commented on and appealed to, 
 as authoritative in the latter half of the second 
 century. Can we go back any farther.? For- 
 tunately the stream of witnesses does not run 
 dry. We have writers whose lives and testimony 
 can reach even earlier times. In dealing with 
 these, the simplest way will be to let them come 
 before us in succession. Our space will only 
 permit of the very briefest summary of their 
 evidence. 
 
 I. There is Justin Martyr (a. D. 140 — 150). He 
 is one of those whose story is well known. Arch- 
 bishop Trench's poem has made it familiar to us 
 once more. We know how his unsatisfied spirit 
 wandered from philosophy to philosophy, till he 
 met with an aged man by the sea-shore, who 
 
86 Heart Chords. 
 
 told him of a rest which went down to the depths 
 of human nature, and which Christian teachers 
 were proclaiming to mankind. We know the 
 result : the conversion of Justin, his labours 
 afterwards, and his martyrdom at Rome about 
 150 A.D. "Justin's writings, or at least some of 
 them, remain : we can hear him arguing with 
 Trypho, the Jew ; we can listen to his defence 
 of Christianity. It is quite true that we do not 
 now meet with quotations in the same way that 
 we did in the writings of later Christian teachers. 
 Justin's line of argument did not depend upon 
 the quotation of an assemblage of texts. But 
 we can gather from his writings the substance 
 of the Gospel story. It would be possible to 
 re-write from Justin's works a considerable part 
 of the records of Christ's life, as given by the 
 first three Evangelists. By putting together 
 various passages from these, we can collect 
 almost all the details of the history of the birth 
 and infancy of our Lord, of the mission of John, 
 of the Baptism, of the Passion, Resurrection, 
 and Ascension, which are given in the Synoptic 
 
My Bible. 87 
 
 Gospels." (Prof. Westcott.) So far we may see 
 that the general outline of Gospel history was 
 as complete in Justin's days as it is in our own. 
 But this is not all. Justin was evidently ac- 
 quainted with written Gospels ; for he speaks 
 of " memoirs " written by the Apostles : " The 
 Apostles in the memoirs made by them which 
 are called Gospels," &c. These memoirs of the 
 Apostles, he tells, were read in the Christian 
 Church, as were the writings of the Prophets. 
 In speaking more particularly, he alludes to 
 facts related in these memoirs which are identical 
 with those which we read in our Gospels. 
 
 2, There is Papias (a.d. 130). He was Bishop 
 of Hierapolis, in Phrygia ; he was a friend of 
 Polycarp, who was, as we know, a pupil of St. 
 John. The life of Papias touches the early part 
 of the second century. From him we gather 
 that written Gospels existed in his time. 
 " Matthew compiled," he says, " the oracles in 
 Hebrew." He mentions also the way in which 
 the Gospel of St. Mark came to be written. 
 " This also the elder (John) used to say : Mark, 
 
88 Heart Chords. 
 
 having become St. Peter's interpreter, wrote 
 accurately all that he (Peter) mentioned, though 
 he did not (record) in order that which was 
 either said or done by Christ. For he neither 
 heard the Lord nor followed Him ; but he sub- 
 sequently, as I said (attached himself to) Peter, 
 who used to frame his teachings to meet the 
 wants (of his hearers), and not as making a con- 
 nected narrative of the Lord's discourses. So 
 Mark committed no error, as he wrote down 
 some particulars as he (Peter) related them ; for 
 he took heed to one thing — to omit nothing of 
 what he heard, and to state nothing falsely in 
 his record." (Quoted in Westcott, "Bible in the 
 Church," p. 96.) 
 
 3. There is a group of writers of yet earher 
 date. Of these,one is Clement of Rome (A.D.95), 
 who has been identified by some with the Cle- 
 ment mentioned in the Epistle to the Philippians. 
 But be this as it may, Clement of Rome is a 
 writer who brings us to the close of the first 
 century and the opening of the second. From 
 him we have an Epistle addressed to the 
 
J/i- Bible. 89 
 
 Corinthians, probably written before the close 
 of the first century. In this we may find in some 
 cases the very phraseology of the New Testa- 
 ment, and, what is more important still, "traces 
 of the presence of each of the typical forms of 
 doctrine which are contained in the New Testa- 
 ment." 
 
 In the same group we have Ignatius, who 
 suffered martyrdom in the opening of the second 
 century (a.d. 107). He is the writer of some 
 interesting letters, which breathe his anxiety for 
 the well-being of the Church. In these we can 
 trace lines of thought which seem like the con- 
 tinuance of those commenced in the Epistles of 
 St. Paul. His language is the language of one 
 who is working out the principles which appear 
 to him to be contained in the New Testament. 
 
 Lastly, there is Polycarp (a.d. 100), who was 
 the direct pupil of St. John himself. It is no 
 modern fancy which traces a resemblance be- 
 tween his epistle and the First Epistle of St. Peter, 
 which is in our New Testament. In it, too, we 
 find references to the writings of St. Paul. 
 G 
 
90 Heart Chords. 
 
 Such is the briefest outline of some of the 
 facts which have resulted from a careful scrutiny 
 of early Christian writings. It is to be remem- 
 bered, too, that this scrutiny has not been 
 carried on by those who held a brief for the 
 authority of the New Testament. The investi- 
 gation of all evidence in connection with the 
 genuineness and authenticity of the books of 
 the Bible has been almost always an investiga- 
 tion in the midst of the fiercest blaze of hostile 
 criticism. Whatever other result flows from the 
 great literary and critical warfare which has 
 raged durmg the last three or four generations, 
 one thmg at least is secured by us — the estab- 
 lishing of facts connected with the Bible upon 
 foundations which are strong enough to bear 
 the weight of our faith. It may be safely said 
 that though the conflict is not ended, and though 
 before it ends we may have to surrender some 
 of our earlier notions, those facts on which the 
 life and strength of Christendom is built are 
 found to have been recognised as facts among 
 the earliest Christian writers. We seem, as 
 
Mv Bible. 91 
 
 we carry our invest iL,^1t ion backwards, to pass 
 through the war of critics and the battle of 
 l)ooks, and to find ourselves, as the clouds part 
 asunder and the smoke of battle rolls away, face 
 to face with a Person, on whose life even more 
 than on whose words, on whose character rather 
 than on any philosophy He taught, our confidence 
 may rest. In this search backwards we show as 
 it were a parable to many who seek for truth ; 
 for behind the cloudy thoughts and axigry argu- 
 ments of men, behind the strife of tongues and 
 the exaggerated fancies of teachers and churches, 
 behind even the sweetest and strongest of 
 creeds, we reach Him, who, though the ages 
 have wrangled and passed away, is alive foj- 
 evermore. 
 
92 Heart Chords. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 BIBLE STUDY. 
 
 Some books, said Lord Bacon, are to be tasted, 
 others to be swallowed, and some few to be 
 chewed and digested. The Bible should be 
 among these latter. It is not worthy of ourselves 
 or of it to skim its pages rapidly, or to read 
 with sleepy and lazy mind. The deeper and 
 truer meaning is for the diligent. In this, as in 
 all else, the hand of the diligent maketh rich. 
 Some suggestions for the study of the Bible 
 may not be out of place. 
 
 How should we read it.'' Shall it be a chapter 
 at a time, beginning with Genesis and ending 
 with Revelation ? This has its advantages, and 
 may produce a good surface-knowledge of the 
 Bible, but it labours under the defect of being 
 a disproportionate method ; for all parts of the 
 Bible have not the same value, nor do all parts 
 need the same study. 
 
Afv Bible. 93 
 
 A better plan is to begin with the simpler 
 books, and go on to the more difficult ; and 
 following this plan, it seems best to take one 
 book and to master it, rather than to spread 
 our reading over many books, and to lose 
 strength of knowledge in the endeavour to gain 
 breadth. One book well mastered prepares us 
 for the study of another, and makes every fresh 
 book easier to master. 
 
 "When I speak of mastering a book, let it be 
 understood that I mean mastering it. It is not 
 enough to be familiar with one or two chapters, 
 or to be able to quote some of the more remark- 
 able verses ; we must not rest satisfied till we 
 can give a clear account of the drift and purpose, 
 of the origin and use, of the book. It is only by 
 doing this that we shall be able to appreciate 
 the real teaching to be derived from it, and tne 
 true application of its principles to our age and 
 to ourselves. 
 
 It is always best to illustrate or exemplify our 
 meaning. Let me take one book, and exhibit 
 the method of its study, which may as readily 
 
94 Heart Chords. 
 
 be applied to others. Hosea's prophecy may do 
 as well as any other. 
 
 Here we have a book in which some two or 
 three chapters are fairly familiar to the ordinary 
 Bible reader, and a few special verses are of 
 priceless value to the religious mind. If we 
 were to question these about Hosea, we should 
 find them ready to quote the tender verses : " I 
 will allure her, and bring her into the wilder- 
 ness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I 
 will give her her vineyards from thence, and the 
 valley of Achor for a door of hope : and she 
 shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and 
 as in the day when she came up out of the land 
 of Egypt" (Hosea ii. 14, 15). Or such a solemn 
 warning as — " Ephraim is joined to idols : let 
 him alone" (iv. 17). Or the great spiritual prin- 
 ciple affirmed in the words, "When Ephraim 
 spake trembling, he exalted himself in Israel" 
 (xiii. i). Or the loving invitation and promise, 
 " O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God ; for 
 thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. ... I will heal 
 their backsliding, I will love them freely: for 
 
Mv Bible. 95 
 
 mine anger is turned away from him. I will be 
 as the dew unto Israel : he shall grow as the 
 lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon '" 
 (xiv. 1, 4, 5). 
 
 While none can deny the beauty and force of 
 such words, it is fair to say that a knowledge 
 which is limited to a few such passages as these 
 does not constitute a knowledge of the book 
 itself And more, we may well remember that 
 each portion of a book receives new light and 
 strength when its relation to the whole is per- 
 ceived, as the beauty of a gi-aceful column is 
 best perceived when it is in its relation to 
 the temple of which it forms a part. It is 
 so here. The personal history of Hosea, the 
 condition of Israel at the time of his prophecy, 
 the possibilities of good and evil which were in 
 the grasp of the men of his day — all these lend 
 their share of hght to every portion of the book. 
 Let us look at some facts. When Hosea began 
 his prophecy, the nation was in comparative 
 prosperity ; the dark days had not yet come ; 
 Jeroboam II. was on the throne of Samaria. 
 
96 Heart Chords. 
 
 Material comforts abounded ; wine and new 
 wine were in the feasts. But prosperity is often 
 dangerous ; self- indulgence is always fatal. 
 " Whoredom and wine and new wine take away 
 the heart." Corruption soon followed ; society 
 became disorganised : desperate efforts were 
 made to keep up the appearance of stability and 
 strength, and to hold together the swift crum- 
 bling kingdom. Eagerly every passing help was 
 snatched at : conspiracies, political murders, 
 foreign alliances, were tried as expedients ; but 
 the mischief lay deeper : a change of sovereign 
 can never be a substitute for moral reformation, 
 and can never stay the ruin which falsehood 
 and wrong, godlessness and unrighteousness 
 promote. In the not very far distance the over- 
 throw of the kingdom, the humiliation, the 
 captivity, begin to shape themselves in gloomy 
 form. 
 
 A prophet is needful for a people in such a 
 case. Lost in selfishness and luxuriousness, 
 yet beginning to feel the pulsations of fear, 
 they need, what all need, a true conception 
 
^^v Bible, 97 
 
 of God, as of one near to them and under- 
 standing them, and most ready to help them. 
 All this the prophet must show to the people, 
 speaking to them with a voice tender unto 
 tears. Such a prophet is found in Hosea. The 
 incidents of his own life have been fitting him 
 for his task. " All chance is direction that we 
 cannot see." The sorrows of this saddest and 
 most touching life are not to be lost : out of the 
 heart the mouth must speak ; from a broken 
 heart the sweetest, most pleading words shall 
 pour, full of a tenderness all womanly, and of 
 depth and strength of manhood ; for every word 
 he speaks comes charged with the emphasis of 
 his life's sorrow. Hosea had loved, and had 
 married : slowly, as it seems, the conviction 
 stole upon his mind that lightness and falseness 
 dwelt in the home where he had garnered up his 
 affections ; then doubt, like a cloud, shadowed 
 everything ; he felt no security of love or honour 
 in his house : even his children's faces looked 
 alien. But bruised and broken in heart, the 
 great fountain of his love still flowed towards 
 
gS Heart Chords. 
 
 the wife so unworthy of his trust or affection : 
 he longed to win back her alienated heart ; he 
 devoted himself to the effort to restore her to 
 virtue and duty. Every plan he tried : he tried 
 restraint ; he kept her under his own eye : he 
 tried freedom ; he left her to follow her own 
 wishes, and taste the bitterness of loveless affec- 
 tions ; and all through he was ready to renew 
 the sweet old days of love, and to betroth her to 
 himself once more and for ever. 
 
 In his hfe and sorrow no fitter mouthpiece of 
 the love of God existed then in Israel. In all 
 those pathetic chapters, with their persuasions 
 and expostulations, wath their pleadings and 
 threatenings, with their utterances of exquisite 
 patience and longing, lingering love, the whole 
 soul of the prophet finds voice ; out of the 
 experience of his own sorrow and changeless 
 affection, he catches a glimpse of that deep, 
 tender, and sorrowful love of God which yearns 
 tenderly and jealously over His children. 
 
 Now, does it not become apparent that when 
 we take up the book of Hosea, after having 
 
]\Ty Bible. 99 
 
 gained this knowledge of its primary drift, we 
 are in happier mood of mind for understanding 
 it ? No one single, true, spiritual principle has 
 been lost to us. We may console ourselves for 
 the loss of any mistaken notions which our 
 ignorant study of it may have left to us by the 
 reflection that we have gained more knowledge 
 of the ways of God. We have at least the 
 assurance that the heart of God was always de- 
 siring to devise means by which the self-banished 
 or self-destroyed of His children might be res- 
 cued and brought back.. 
 
 Let anyone read this prophecy in the remem- 
 brance of God, and of the poor heart-broken 
 yet strong loving prophet by whom God spoke, 
 and he will rise from its study with a heart 
 melted by the warmth of the undying love of 
 God, and with a faith in God which will make 
 him readier and stronger to work in the cause 
 of mercy and lovingncss among men. It will 
 give him such a knowledge of the character of 
 God's love, that the miracle life of the Divine 
 Son of God, and the sorrow and forgi\'eness 
 
TOO Heart Chords. 
 
 which His suffering and death proclaimed, will 
 be not only comprehensible, but (if it may be 
 said with reverence) the natural action of sucb 
 deep and enduring love. 
 
My Bible. ioi 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 HINTS ON READING. 
 
 There are two needful helps to true knowledge : 
 they are intelligence and humility. Without 
 humility knowledge is often but a conceit. 
 Humility teaches us reverence for knowledge : 
 she shows that knowledge is for service, not for 
 display ; she fills us with the desire of truth ; 
 she drives out the ambition of ostentation. On 
 the other hand, humility cannot afford to dis- 
 pense with intelligence, which saves humility 
 from mere purposeless drudgery or misdirected 
 energy. True humility teaches us the use of 
 knowledge : intelligence saves us from its mis- 
 use. The reader of the Bible, like the reader 
 of other books, cannot afford to dispense with 
 these two helps. It is often for lack of one or 
 the other that mistakes are made. If we 
 approach study with much briskness of mind 
 and quickness of wit, but with a flippancy or 
 
102 Heart Chords. 
 
 self-opinionatedness, we shall hardly gather up 
 abiding truths or lasting knowledge. A certain 
 devoutness of mind is no loss in any study : it 
 closes the door to egotism or vanity ; it helps 
 towards seriousness and candour. But devout- 
 ness must not be allowed to stupefy the mind 
 or dismiss intelligence. We must know, or try to 
 know, what it is we are reading — what it means, 
 not merely what our devout imagination wishes 
 it to mean. If we take St. Paul as counsellor in 
 this, we shall not only sing or pray with the 
 spirit and the understanding also, but we shall 
 study with the spirit of humility and intelligence. 
 The prevalence of this double spirit would 
 be a gain to the world. There are many in- 
 telligent people who are a little impatient of 
 the slowness of their devout friends ; there 
 are many devout people who are startled and 
 shocked at the quickness and progressiveness 
 of the more thinking. The fact is that the 
 world is made up of two classes — those who feel 
 more than they think, and those agam wno 
 think more than they feel. The former cling 
 
Mv Bible. 103 
 
 with tenacity and tenderness to every truth, and 
 every form and expression of truth, which has 
 been helpful to them, and are pained if they 
 are told that even the language in which they 
 have received the truth is inappropriate or in- 
 adequate. Such are troubled at every change 
 which seems to threaten the quiet nooks of 
 thought which they have found rest-giving and 
 refreshing. The impatience of the more think- 
 ing is perhaps natural, but it is to be deplored. 
 It often makes them speak in a more revolu- 
 tionary way than they really mean ; it tends to 
 divide, and to promote not only misgiving, but 
 misunderstanding. It would be well if those 
 who feel the importance of larger, more in- 
 telligent, methods of Bible study would cherish 
 the deepest reverence for the feelings and 
 convictions of those whose whole inner life has 
 been nourished by principles and truths which, 
 even if unintelligently held, are yet life-giving to 
 the spirits of men. A reverent spirit is slow to 
 cast away the supports of the weak. It would also 
 be well if those who have been accustomed to 
 
I04 Heart Chords. 
 
 look only to the nourishment of their heart hfe 
 and to take no interest in the intellectual life 
 around them would remember that their notions 
 of matters are not complete or final. The world 
 is as a landscape spread before men : some 
 view it from their house-door, and to such the 
 scene from day to day is the same ; others, 
 bolder and more active spirits, move from place 
 to place, and every day catch fresh features of 
 the scenery. The same country is seen by all : 
 its beauty and its shelter are the heritage of all 
 alike ; but the landscape, which has a sweet 
 monotony for some, has wider and more varying 
 delights for others. 
 
 If the stay-at-home student would exercise 
 intelligence, if the more adventurous would use 
 a reverent toleration even for restricted views, 
 some good would result. A mutual understanding 
 of each other's position might arise : the stay-at- 
 home folk might be tempted to scale the neigh- 
 bouring height, and drink in the bracing air, and 
 survey a more extended country ; the strong 
 climber might learn to appreciate the love 
 
My Bible. 105 
 
 wliich believed that the landscape viewed from 
 the old house-door was sweeter than any which 
 the loftiest heights could give. All would be 
 the gainers, for it would then be recognised that 
 identity of view was not needful for unity of faith, 
 and that fresh aspects of old truths could only 
 serve to bring out the old truths into clearer 
 relief and more assured position. The carping, 
 critical spirit, which is fatal alike to truth and 
 charity, might at length be banished ; the ban- 
 quet of knowledge would be enriched, when each 
 placed upon the board the product of his own 
 field. Ever}'' addition would be welcomed; 
 every old and every new gift would be reve- 
 renced as of God ; the hearts and intellects of 
 men would be sustained : it would be wisdom 
 and delight to — 
 
 " Let knowledge grow from more to more, 
 But more of reverence in us dwell, 
 That mind and soul according well 
 May make one music as before, 
 But vaster " 
 
 Intelligence, however, needs to be roused ; 
 H 
 
io6 Heart Chords. 
 
 and perhapr. some suggestions may be helpful 
 to the formation of what I may call habits of 
 intelligence in Bible reading. 
 
 First, then, I would say, cultivate the habit of 
 reading with your pen in your hand. The mere 
 perusing, as it is called, of a chapter or portion 
 of the Bible is often of very little use. It is 
 true that there may be some people with re- 
 markably retentive memories, who can afford to 
 do without the assistance of a pen to note 
 what they read. But in any case, " writing 
 maketh an exact man," and it is the spirit of 
 accurate observation which most readers need 
 that their studies may be useful. 
 
 The supplement to the pen is the manuscript- 
 book, in which to record what is noteworthy, 
 and this should be not merely a record of what 
 strikes us as remarkable, but of the true subject 
 matter of the passage we have been reading. 
 Let the portion be chosen, not too long, and 
 complete as far as possible in itself; make a 
 brief but exact analysis of the portion on the 
 left-hand page (suppose) of your note-book, and 
 
Mv Bible. 107 
 
 enter on the right-hand page opposite the 
 results of your meditations on the passage. 
 The two pages, left and right, of your note- 
 book will give you the double results of your 
 study. The left-hand page will be the sum- 
 mary of what you have read ; this will keep 
 your mind from catching at pious irrelevancies ; 
 it will help the habit of trying to ascertain what 
 the portion really means ; while the right-hand 
 page of the note-book will contain the practical 
 thoughts or teachings which spring from what 
 you have read. 
 
 A book of the Bible read in this way, with 
 our note-book in daily use, will become a source 
 of growing interest and of stronger teaching. 
 The left-hand page of the note-book will give 
 us at a glance the drift or analysis of the 
 prophecy, or epistle, or history we have been 
 studying. On the opposite page we shall find 
 collected the moral or spiritual principles, the 
 divine truths, and the illustrations which have 
 resulted from our meditation. On the one page 
 we have the results of reading ; on the other 
 
io8 Heart Chords. 
 
 the results of thinking over what we have read. 
 And just these two — reading and thinking — are 
 indispensable to true knowledge and true pro- 
 gress in Bible study. The two powers — obser- 
 vation and reflection — receive their due exercise, 
 and prepare the way for wider and more 
 definite prayer ; since the truths, or duties, or 
 principles w^hich we have marked down as the 
 product of our reflection in their turn afford 
 topics of prayer. 
 
 To make this method more plain, let me sup- 
 pose that we have our Bible open ; we have 
 selected our book for study ; we ascertain what 
 we can of the writer, of the occasion when it 
 was written, of the people for whom it was in- 
 tended : we have noted down these points ; we 
 are in a position to learn something immediately, 
 for the drift of the book is in som.e measure 
 made clear to us by what we have found out 
 about the writer, and the occasion of his writ- 
 ing. For instance, suppose we had opened the 
 Epistle to the Colossians, we should have dis- 
 covered that the Apostle wrote with the view of 
 
J/)- Bible. 109 
 
 correcting some misapprehensions, and of guard- 
 ing against false and faulty notions. We should 
 soon see that the way in which he meets error is 
 by the clear statement of what is true ; he does 
 not attack the evil and cast it down, and then 
 retire from the empty field : he builds up the 
 good, so that the people to whom he writes may 
 have shelter for their thoughts. He overcomes 
 the evil by affirming the good. He does not, 
 like the angry polemic, take away food and 
 leave men starving : he supplies the bread of 
 life, which can satisfy the hungry', and which, 
 therefore, removes the desire for the inferior 
 bread. The duty of considering the needs of 
 men is the lesson. Anger with error is often 
 folly and akin to barbarity : we have no right to 
 turn people out of their poor shelter unless we 
 are prepared to give them a better. This is 
 but one thought out of many. 
 
 So far we have only been preparing, as it 
 were, for study. We begin to read the book: 
 we mark off the portion which we propose to 
 read, we ask — What does it mean .^ What is the 
 
1 ro Heart Chords. 
 
 sequence of thought ? What is the drift and 
 scope ? We write down an outHne of its meaning : 
 this gives us a clear idea of the passage. Our 
 left-hand page has been written on. Now comes 
 the duty of meditation or reflection. We ques- 
 tion the passage we have been reading. What 
 does it teach us about God ? What aspect of His 
 character is brought out ? W^hat revelation of 
 Himself is seen } What does it teach about some 
 human character 1 What insight does it give us 
 of the nature we bear ? What principles does it 
 exhibit ? What duty does it enforce ? What bear- 
 ing has it upon the moving history of the world? 
 What teaching about the relationships of men 
 to one another ? What other part of the Bible 
 bears upon the same subject or duty 1 Ques- 
 tions like these will bring out thoughts which 
 will help the mind and the spirit into the 
 knowledge of God and His ways. Some lesson 
 respecting God, or ourselves, or the Church, 
 or the world is sure to spring out of these 
 inquiries. 
 
 Perhaps it is well to be content with some one 
 
My Bible. hi 
 
 lesson at a time, noting it down carefully, and 
 finding illustration and enforcement of it from 
 other parts of the Bible. This one lesson thus 
 gained each day may be woven into our 
 prayers. Each day thus brings its own teach- 
 ings and its own suggestions for prayer : each 
 day brings us into closer intercourse with the 
 God of our life. He reveals Himself to us : we 
 trace His growing light ; we have become more 
 deeply anxious about our needs ; we seek more 
 readily for His help ; a freshness pervades our 
 thoughts of the Bible ; duty and devotion be- 
 come clearer to us ; and our spirits grow into 
 higher and truer unison of thought and feeling 
 with the Father and Guide of the spirits of all 
 flesh. 
 
112 Heart Chords. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 INNER TEACHING. 
 
 One day a mixed company of men of different 
 creeds and opinions were met together : Roman- 
 ists and Protestants, philosophers and material- 
 ists, were there when this question was started 
 — Supposing a man, doomed to imprisonment 
 for life, were allowed to choose one book only 
 as the companion of his solitude, what book 
 should he choose? In reply, all agreed that 
 his choice should be the Bible. The story is 
 told by a French rationalist. It is a singular 
 testimony to the charm of the Bible, and to the 
 confidence which men feel in it as in a com- 
 panion whose friendship would never weary. 
 The truth is that the Bible does supply a great 
 variety of mental and moral nutriment. In so 
 small a compass one can move through scenes 
 which display all sides of life. It reaches our 
 various moods : its maxims on the conduct of 
 
Jlfy Bible. 113 
 
 life, no less than its outbursts as from the depths 
 of the human spirit — its devotional, no less than 
 its intellectual, spirit, meet the wants of our 
 nature. But even the lonely prisoner in his cell 
 must bring a certain aptitude of spirit with him. 
 Beauties are not seen by all the world. Know- 
 ledge, and the strength which comes from 
 knowledge, is not the necessary heritage of all 
 who read. 
 
 A simple principle which all students should 
 be mindful of is this — thijigs are to us ivhat we 
 are to them. When a student at one of our art 
 schools asked how he might gain the power of 
 reading Nature's laws of form, he was answered, 
 " If you look for curves, you will see curves. If 
 you look for straight lines, you will see straight 
 lines." This is most true. There are features in 
 the fields of nature, and among the cities of 
 men, which are only seen by those who have 
 eyes to see them. " He," writes a modern 
 novelist, speaking of one of her characters, a 
 purse-proud ignoramus, " saw everything that 
 was to be seen for his money, tired himself and 
 
114 Heart Chords. 
 
 his companion to death rather than let cicerones 
 cheat him out of a real, and had not the faintest 
 notion that when he saw dry bones only, other 
 people made the dry bones live." To some the 
 sky above us is a dreary and silent expanse : to 
 others it is a never-ending psalm — 
 
 " L'immense hymne etoil^ qu'on appelle le ciel." 
 
 But the voices and the sights around need the 
 ear and eye fitted to perceive them. This is the 
 truth, which perhaps more than any other men 
 need to remember. Our impatience, our conceit, 
 our self-opinionatedness are so strong: they 
 deafen us with their clamour, and we cannot 
 hear the still small voice, which no tempest can 
 drown, in the ears of the humble ; they blind us 
 to the traces and tokens of God's love and faith- 
 fulness, which are written large on all things to 
 those whose eyes are opened by the spirit of 
 loving reverence. 
 
 We see what we look for. If our minds are 
 intent on a controversial victory, everything 
 lends itself to our view. If our egotism is awake, 
 
My Bible. 115 
 
 ever)'thing flatters. If we are despondent, the 
 merriest bells arc melancholy and ominous in 
 their sound. " He that hath, to him shall be 
 given." " With the pure, thou shalt be pure : 
 with the froward thou shalt learn frowardness." 
 "The world does not more surely provide 
 ditTerent foods for diftcrent animals than it 
 furnishes doubts to the sceptics, and hopes to 
 the believer, as he takes it." The Bible also, it 
 may be said, does not more surely provide 
 grounds of debate to the captious than it 
 furnishes argum^ents to the controversialist, and 
 guidance and nourishment to the true-hearted. 
 What is needed, then, is the honest and good 
 heart. This is not the sleepy mind which does 
 not understand, or care to understand, what it 
 reads ; but it is the meek and humble spirit 
 which seeks to be taught of God, and to have 
 the light of the helping spirit of God shining 
 upon all his studies. It is this which we must 
 seek. He who reads the most sacred pages 
 without the prayer, " Open Thou mine eyes," 
 may see words, and furnish his mind with ideas, 
 
ii6 Heart Chords. 
 
 but he will not furnish his heart with truths ; but 
 he who prays, upon him the light will shine, 
 and the words will become spirit and life to 
 him : they will become incorporated into his 
 very being ; they will work the spiritual invigo- 
 ration of his character ; they will be to him 
 more than his necessary food ; they will be 
 sweeter than honey, and, like the honey which 
 Jonathan tasted, they will enlighten his eyes. 
 
 If it be, then, true that mysteries are thus 
 " revealed to the meek," it becomes of primary 
 importance that we should read the Bible, not 
 in haste, nor with irreverence, but with minds 
 and hearts earnest and vigilant. Far higher 
 than the debates about inspiration and in- 
 fallibility, is the question of the moral and 
 spiritual good which we may win for ourselves 
 from the Bible. We have little idea how 
 much we are losing in squandering our days 
 on preliminary inquiries, and asking to be 
 satisfied on this point or that, before we begin 
 to study the Bible at all. If we would but try 
 it, leaving all debated points for the moment in 
 
My Bibj.e. 117 
 
 abeyance, we should find, in the silent and gra- 
 dual good wrought upon ourselves, a testimony to 
 the reality of those divine influences which are 
 not the heritage of past ages only, but of our own 
 also, and which are not denied to the weakest and 
 most distressed who seek them from God. For if 
 the Bible witnesses nothing else, it witnesses this, 
 that He has never left men alone. Its pages 
 show us God in the life of all. The faith of 
 Noah and Abraham, the bitter discipline of the 
 life of Jacob, the noble heroism of Moses, the 
 chivalry of Joshua, the triumph and the humilia- 
 tion of David, are but varying witnesses to the 
 same truth — that God is in the lives of men, to 
 rouse their energy, to check their impatience, to 
 educate their characters, to visit their offences 
 with the rod, but never to forsake them, nor 
 take away His mercy from them utterly for 
 evermore. 
 
 It is no vain or goody counsel, then, that urges 
 us to approach the study of the Bible with rever- 
 ence and with faith. It is no spirit which seeks 
 to evade difficulties by sealing up the under- 
 
ii8 Heart Chords. 
 
 standing, or silencing the natural or reasonable 
 expression of difficulties. These must always be 
 felt : they need never be stifled. But what is 
 ever of importance is, that we should not allow 
 our criticism of the gateway or the vestibule to 
 keep us lingering in the porch or the corridors : 
 there may be much left that needs explaining, 
 but it is not necessary that everything should be 
 explained before we pass on to the winning of 
 the moral and spiritual help which the Bible 
 can undoubtedly afford. Suppose that we are 
 doubtful whether the sun stood still, or whether 
 Balaam's ass spoke, or the great fish swallowed 
 Jonah — these points do not stay the teaching 
 power of a book, which reveals the pity of God 
 over Nineveh in contrast with the pitilessness 
 of the prophet, and which shows the hand 
 of God stretched out to thwart the wilfulness 
 of Balaam's ambition. The deep, spiritual 
 lessons remain : these surely are worth the seek- 
 ing ; and these once won help our minds up to 
 those heights of moral and spiritual advance 
 from whence we can view, not, indeed, with 
 
My Bible. 1 19 
 
 indifTcrence, but still without misgiving, the 
 c[ucstions which looked so formidable before, 
 but which are now seen to be below the level of 
 the true highway which leads heavenward. 
 
 To win these lessons we need sincere hearts. 
 It is when the eye is single that the whole body 
 is full of light. But here, too, is the difficulty; 
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 how much vanity, and conceit, and self-will 
 thrust themselves in, and mar our best intentions. 
 A regenerating spirit is needed to make impar- 
 tial and unclouded thought possible. 
 
 The same thought is given by Dean Goulburn: 
 The Scripture resembles a sun-dial, which is in 
 itself perfect and complete, graven with all the 
 hours, and with a gnomon which casts an exact 
 shadow. But the indispensable condition of the 
 sun-dial's usefulness is light. 
 
 The practical duty which results from this 
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 and ye shall receive," said Jesus Christ. The 
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 but it is a gift which He gives freely, as a father 
 
I20 Heart Chords. 
 
 gives bread to his hungry child. It is a gift 
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 purging the motives, clears the judgment, and 
 awakens the truest and holiest desires of our 
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 Justin Martyr — "Pray, before all things, that 
 the gates of light be opened to you, for the 
 truths for which you seek are not comprehensible 
 by the eye or mind of man, unless God and 
 His Christ give him understanding." 
 
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BS530.C295 
 
 I My Bible... 
 
 Princeton Theological Seminary-Speer Library