neither more nor less than a full acknowledgment, which acknowledgment he makes indeed even in so many words, that the unscriptural practice of invoking the saints is totally unsupported by any ancient historical testimony.

CHAPTER VII.

CONCLUSION.

TAKING in regular succession the most prominent and marked peculiarities of Romanism, Infallibility, Papal Supremacy, Transubstantiation, Purgatory, Saint-worship, Image-worship, Relic-worship, and Cross-worship, I have now shewn, that, even according to the evidence produced by the latin advocates themselves, those peculiarities, whether in regard to their abstract truth, or in regard to the alleged fact of their universal reception by the primitive Church, rest upon no testimony either of Holy Scripture or of the writers of the three first centuries. Whence the conclusion is that such peculiarities cannot reasonably be obtruded upon us, under the aspect of a constituent portion of Christianity.

I. This very natural and very obvious mode of conducting the investigation, even when barely hinted at as indispensably requisite to the development of the truth, has produced no small measure of soreness and irritation on the part of a modern defender of Romanism.

Mr. Husenbeth is angry, because I am unable to see the glaring absurdity of the mode of conducting the inquiry, which, as I had imagined, plain common sense instinctively led me to adopt : for, by some mental process which transcends my own comprehension, he pronounces the requisition of distinct evidence, from the writers of the three first centuries, for the establishment of the alleged historical FACT, that, Quite up to the apostolic age the peculiarities of Romanism were universally received by the primitive Church on the professed authority of Christ and his Apostles themselves, to be nothing better than A GLARING ABSURDITY1.

The question of the apostolicity of our doctrines, says Mr. Husenbeth in his last pamphlet, is A QUESTION OF HISTORY. Hence Mr. Faber argues, that the whole vitals of the matter lie in the writings of the Fathers anterior to the first General Council at Nice in 325; and that we shall effect nothing in the way of testimony, unless, with specified dates, we mount step by step until we reach the age of the approving Apostles themselves. This, he contends, we have not done, and cannot do : for he has Ferused all the Antenicene Fathers; and there exists a lack of materials, which renders the proposed task impossible. This has been Mr. Faber's eternal statement: and the man will not see its glaring absurdity. p. 9, 10.

Mr. Husenbeth is grievously inaccurate in making me say, that I have perused all the Antenicene Fathers. Such an assertion was never made by me. I have indeed perused the greater part of their writings: and, in most instances, I have perused them severally from beginning to end: but I never said, what Mr. Husenbeth very inaccurately exhibits me as saying. Yet, though I have not read all their writings, I have

If, for the establishment of a certain system of doctrine, and for the substantiation of a certain alleged primeval fact, it be a glaring absurdity to resort to the evidence of Scripture and to the testimony of the writers of the three first centuries: we shall naturally be led to ask; What that better and more satisfactory mode can be, which is recommended by Mr. Husenbeth.

His remarks on this point arrange themselves under two several statements.

With much general sound judgment, though certainly with a grievous want of distinct particular application to the present case, he observes:

read quite sufficient to warrant my perfectly safe remark concerning the peculiarities of Romanism. I stated, and I again state, that The doctrinal and practical peculiarities of the Latin Church cannot be established, as of apostolical origination, by the historical testimony of the Fathers of the three first centuries. If Mr. Husenbeth can confute this very plain statement by the adduction of distinct evidence from those early Fathers, let him by all means come forward and put me to open shame. With respect to the alleged glaring absurdity, of my requiring a PROOF of an asserted early fact, through the medium of early, rather than of later, testimony: I really am not able to discern it, even with all the aid afforded me by Mr. Husenbeth's remarks on the subject. Whatever may be the amount of my folly, the whole matter will still finally resolve itself into the following question: CAN THE APOSTOLICAL ORIGINATION OF

ROMISH PECULIARITIES BE HISTORICALLY SUBSTANTIATED FROM THE FATHERS OF THE THREE FIRST CENTURIES? If this can be done; let Mr. Husenbeth do it: if it cannot be done; let him, in all equity, transfer, from my head, to his own utterly unsupported scheme of belief and practice, the well-deserved charge of glaring absurdity.

that It will amply suffice to every reasonable mind, when we find the Fathers of the second, third, fourth, and subsequent ages, teaching doctrines, which, in their time, were universally believed to have descended from the Apostles; for, on the principle of Tertullian's excellent argument from prescription, such doctrines must be true, and cannot be erroneous 1.

To please Mr. Faber, says Mr. Husenbeth in the same last pamphlet, we must find every one of our doctrines clearly and fully expressed, step by step, with regular dates, through the broken and imperfect stepping stones of the three first centuries! And, if, in the scattered remains of the early Fathers, we cannot, at this remote period, find every point of our faith as plainly defined as it has been by the Council of Trent: this extraordinary controvertist will not admit, that our doctrines can be proved apostolical. To us, however, and to every reasonable mind, it will amply suffice, when we find the Fathers of the second, third, fourth, and subsequent ages, teaching doctrines, which in their time were universally believed to have descended from the Apostles; when we find the very earliest Fathers designating the apostolic Churches, and principally that of Rome, as the sacred deposits of apostolic doctrine, to which all others must recur without fear of error; when we find Tertullian, a Father of the second century, exclaiming in his Book of Prescriptions, Is it at all likely that so many and such great Churches should have erred in their uniform faith? p. 11, 12.

In this passage, Mr. Husenbeth, so far as I can understand his vagueness of wordy declamation, first intimates, that it is unreasonable to expect any historical proof of the apostolicity of romish peculiarities from the Fathers of the three first centuries; inasmuch as their extant writings are mere broken and imperfect stepping-stones: next teaches us, that these peculiarities were plainly defined by the Council of Trent, which had

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