infallibility, which we do not question, but
which is not proved, demands our belief. Very likely
the Bible is thus infallible. Unless it is, there can be
no moral obligation to accept the facts which it records:
and though there may be intellectual error in denying
them, there can be no moral sin. Facts may be better
or worse authenticated; but all the proofs in the world
of the genuineness and authenticity of the human handiwork
cannot establish a claim upon the conscience. It
might be foolish to question Thucydides' account of
Pericles, but no one would call it sinful. Men part with
all sobriety of judgment when they come on ground of
this kind. When Sir Henry Rawlinson read the name
of Sennacherib on the Assyrian marbles, and found
allusions there to the Israelites in Palestine, we were told
that a triumphant answer had been found to the cavils
of sceptics, and a convincing proof of the inspired truth
of the Divine Oracles. Bad arguments in a good cause
are a sure way to bring distrust upon it. The Divine
Oracles may be true, and may be inspired; but the
discoveries at Nineveh certainly do not prove them so.
No one supposes that the Books of Kings or the
prophesies of Isaiah and Ezekiel were the work of men
who had no knowledge of Assyria or the Assyrian
Princes. It is possible that in the excavations at
Carthage some Punic inscription may be found
confirming Livy's account of the battle of Cannae; but
we shall not be obliged to believe therefore in the
inspiration of Livy, or rather (for the argument
comes to that) in the inspiration of the whole Latin
literature.

We are not questioning the fact that the Bible is
infallible; we desire only to be told on what evidence
that great and awful fact concerning it properly rests.
It would seem, indeed, as if instinct had been wiser
than argument--as if it had been felt that nothing
short of this literal and close inspiration could preserve
the facts on which Christianity depends. The history
of the early world is a history everywhere of marvels.
The legendary literature of every nation upon earth
tells the same stories of prodigies and wonders, of the
appearances of the gods upon earth, and of their intercourse
with men. The lives of the saints of the
Catholic Church, from the time of the Apostles till the
present day, are a complete tissue of miracles
resembling and rivalling those of the Gospels. Some of
these stories are romantic and imaginative; some clear,