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    MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS.

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• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    Miscellaneous Communications.

    MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS .

    The Nonconformist . No . XIII .

    On the Controverted Clause in the Twentieth Article of the Church of Eng ' land .

    IN the common editions of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion , subscribed by the Clergy of the Church of England , the Twentieth Article reads thus : ** The Church hath power to decree rites and ceremonies , and authority in matters of faith : aad yet , it is not lawful for the Church to

    ordain any thing that is contrary to God's word written , neither may it so expound one place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another . Wherefore , although the Church be a witness and a keeper of holy wri £ , yet as it ought not to decree any thing against the same , so besides the

    same , ought it not to enforce any thing to be believed for necessity of salvation . " The genuineness is disputed of the first clause of this Article : " The Church hath power to decree rites or ceremonies , and authority in controversies of faith , and yet ' —and of the corresponding words in the Latin editions : " Habet Ec ~

    clesia ritus statuendi jus , et in fidei controversiis autoritatem , quamvis "The following facts are stated , not as sufficient to decide the controversy , but to direct the attention of the

    members of this society to the subject , which is not altogether destitute of importance or interest , and to call forth the information which they may possess for its elucidation .

    Few things are more directly influenced by our characters , prejudices and habitual triodes of thinking , than the estimates which we form of internal evidence . It is with some the most

    convincing , aiid with others the least satisfactory , kind of proof winch can bceinployedw Some cannot perceive a particle of it , where others find it * n abundance , even so as to amount to moral demonstration . The contents of the New Testament have

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    been deemed so extraordinary as to require a greater body of external evidence than any other book in the

    world ; and it has also been contended , that they " afford good reason to believe the persons and transactions to have been real , the letters genuine , and the narration in the main to be

    true , even on the supposition of its being now first discovered in some antiquarian library , and coming to our hands ** destitute of any extrinsic or collateral evidence whatever . " Thus Bengelius found the interna 1 ! evidence in favour of the text relative

    to the three heavenly witnesses resistless , notwithstanding the total absence of external authority ; and the Editors of the Improved Version find it equally resistless against the initial chapters of Matthew and Luke , which exist in every known

    manuscript and version whatever . Alleged facts must be met by facts ; but to a display of internal proof , however clear to the writer * the simple words " I don't see it , " are an incontrovertible reply by his reader . That the

    clause in question looks like a forgery ; that it is clumsily dovetailed into the remaining part of the Article ; that the whole is rendered by it inconsistent and contradictory , &c , are , therefore , considerations which it is

    not worth while to dwell upon . A perception of them depends so much upon the constitution and training of the minds of individuals , that it can rarely be communicated . Arid even

    if they be well-founded , the inconsistency of creed makers is not altogether an impossible supposition ; though it must be allowed that they have rarely manifested it , when aiming at tyranny

    over co . Without venturing to advance a decided opinion , I shall mention a few facts bearing upon the genuineness of the controverted clause , and affording materials for the discussion ,

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    THE

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    No . CLXIV . j AUGUST , 1819 . [ Vol . XIV .

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    voi .. xiv . 3 < j

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1819, page unpag, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1775/page/1/