d principle, soundly constituted. Modern critics reversed the
process. They began where the Church Fathers left off. They tore down
first that which had been last built up. Modern criticism, too, passed
through a period in which points like those of authorship and date of
Gospels and Epistles seemed the only ones to be considered. The results
being here often negative, complete disintegration of the canon seemed
threatened, through discovery of errors in the processes by which the
canon had been outwardly built up. Men realise now that that was a
mistake.

Two things have been gained in this discussion. There is first the
recognition that the canon is a growth. The holy book and the conception
of its holiness, as well, were evolved. Christianity was not primarily a
book-religion save in the sense that almost all Christians revered the
Old Testament. Other writings than those which we esteem canonical were
long used in churches. Some of those afterward canonical were not used
in all the churches. In similar fashion we have learned that identical
statements of faith were not current in the earliest churches. Nor was
there one uniform system of organisation and government. There was a
time concerning which we cannot accurately use the word Church. There
were churches, very simple, worshipping communities. But the Church, as
outward magnitude, as triumphant organisation, grew. So there were many
creeds or, at least, informally accredited and current beginnings of
doctrine. By and by there was a formally accepted creed. So there were
first dearly loved memorials of Jesus and letters of apostolic men. Only
by and by was there a New Testament. The first gain is the recognition
of this state of things. The second follows. It is the recognition that,
despite a sense in which this literature is unique, there is also a
sense in which it is but a part of the whole body of early Christian
literature. From the exact and exhaustive study of the early Christian
literature as a whole, we are to expect a clearer understanding and a
juster estimate of the canonical part of it. It is not easy to say to
whom we have to ascribe the discovery and elaboration of these truths.
The historians of dogma have done much for this body of opinion. The
historians of Christian literature have perhaps done more. Students of
institutions and of the canon law have had their share. Baur had more
than an inkling of the true state of things. But by far the mos