formly successful in detecting error or misrepresentation." It must be observed, by the way, that if the Vicar falls short of the writers alluded to in consistency and reasoning, he greatly surpasses them on this and many other occasions in confidence and self-commendation, the grounds for which you will not fail, Dear Sir, to observe. The proposition which the Vicar undertakes to combat, is the following one, contained in The End of Controversy: "Indeed, it is so clear that the Canon of Scripture is built on Tradition, that most learned Protestants, with Luther himself, have been forced to acknowledge it, in terms almost as strong as those of the well-known declaration of St. Augustin. Contra Epist. Fund.* The Protestant authors referred to, in support of this assertion, are Luther in his Commentary on John, c. 16. Hooker, in his Ecclesiastical Politie, c. iii. sec. 8. and Lardner in B. Watson's Collect. vol. ii. p. 20.With respect to the first-mentioned authority, Luther, the Vicar gives him up to me as an upholder of Tradition, when he asks: "What have the errors of Luther, this Apostate monk, to do with the question at issue?" I answer, a great deal, if Luther was a learned man, as he certainly was; and if he was a Protestant, or rather the father of Protestantism, which no one denies. In short, it completely justifies the assertion, which

the Vicar undertakes to disprove.-The second learned Protestant whom the Vicar professes to "detect Dr. M. misrepresenting and erroneously quoting," is the celebrated Hooker; in attempting which, he both misrepresents that author's argument, and misquotes his words. To be brief: Hooker lays it down as a principle that "the Scriptures are the oracles of God;" but he adds: "we cannot say that this, in itself, is evident ;-there must be therefore some former knowledge presupposed. The question being by what means we are taught this: some answer, that to learn it, we have no other way than only tradition. But is this enough? That, which all men's experience teacheth them, may not in any wise be denied. And, by experience, we all know that the first outward motive, leading men to esteem of the Scripture, is the authority of God's Church."* Hooker then goes on to shew how a diligent study of the Scripture confirms the esteem of it, which we had acquired from the authority of the Church. On comparing the Vicar's account of this testimony, and his quotation from it, with the original text of it, as given above, it will be seen how grossly he misrepresents it and misquotes it, especially where he denies that Hooker himself admitted tradition to be the former knowledge, by which we are

* Eccles. Polit., 1. iv. sect. viii. p. 103., edit. 1632.

taught that the Scriptures are the oracles of God," and where he changes the word MOTIVE into NOTICE, in order to make Hooker say that tradition barely gives us NOTICE of such a thing as Scripture, not that it is the first outward motive for believing in it.

The same practice of misrepresenting and falsifying his authorities accompanies the Vicar in his appeal to the text of Dr. Lardner. It is true I said that "the Canon of Holy Scripture was fixed by the tradition and authority of the Church, declared in the third Council of Carthage, and a Decretal of Pope Innocent I." It is likewise true that I said: "It is so true that the Canon of Scripture is built on the tradition of the Church, that most learned Protestants, with Luther himself, have been forced to acknowledge it," for which I quoted Hooker and Lardner as my authorities.* But, you will observe, Dear Sir, I never once intimated that either of those learned Protestants acknowledged the Canon to have been fixed by the above-mentioned Council and Pope. It was enough for my purpose, to shew that they fixed it on tradition. That Lardner did so, no less than Hooker, is clear, by the very words which the Vicar quotes from him. "In fine, the writings of the Apostles and the Evangelists are received as the works of other

* Letter IX., p. 69.

eminent men of antiquity, upon the ground of general consent and testimony." This being so, I proceed to ask: What is general consent and testimony, with respect to the actions and writings of Apostles and Evangelists, except the tradition of the Church? And how can this consent and testimony be so readily and satisfactorily obtained, as by Synods of the Bishops and Declarations of the Pontiffs? That the Bishop of Winchester agrees with me in sentiment, as far as regards synods, appears from his elements of Theology, where, in accounting for the uncertainty of the sacred Canon in the first ages of the Church, he says: "the persecutions under which the professors of Christianity laboured, and the want of a national establishment of Christianity, prevented, for many centuries, any general assembly of of Christians for the purpose of settling the Canon of their Scriptures." In opposition to my above statement, namely, that "the Canon of the Scripture was declared in the third Council of Carthage," the Vicar quotes Lardner as saying: "the third

* Reply, p. 24.

Vol. i. p. 11., c. 1. The Bishop, following the learned foreign Protestant Michaelis, says: "If the Church had not heared from the Apostles that the writings of Mark and Luke were Divine, these would not have been received." Thus Dr. Tomline and Michaelis, like all other sensible Christians, build the Canon of Scripture on tradition.

Council of Carthage ONLY ordains that nothing but Canonical Scripture be read in the Church, under the name of Canonical Scripture." Take notice, Dear Sir, that the important word ONLY is foisted into the text of the author by the Vicar. Lardner does not make use of it.t But the intent of it is clearly seen, by the egregious falsity which follows it, where the Vicar "The Council does not pronounce what books were Canonical, and what not; although it appears that some were considered Canonical at that time." Whereas that Council does positively declare, in its 47th Canon, which are the Canonical Scriptures, under this very name, and enumerates them exactly as the Council of Trent has done, 1149 years since.§

says:

It may be asked why the Vicar has taken no notice of another learned Protestant writer who is referred to for the same purpose, in The End of Controversy; I mean the famous Chillingworth? The latter treats the subject as follows:

* Reply, p. 23. Reply, p. 24.

+ Watson's Collect., v. ii. p. 21.

§ Labbe's Councils. Tom. ii. p. 1177. Binius, Caranza, &c.-The Vicar introduces, p. 25, some irrelative jargon from Selden's Table Talk, written by one Richard Milward, a Puritanical retainer of his, about reconciling the Church with the private spirit. It is not more to the present purpose, than is Luther's Table Talk about Incubi Devils, &c., re-published by that fanatical Parliament, of which Selden was a leading member.

Letter ix. p. 68.