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    the spiritual ; notwithstanding that he speaks of spiritual interpretation tinder three different names . Whenever grammatical interpretation produced a sense which in his opinion was irrational or impossible , he then departed from the literal sense . At the same time , he admitted that historical or grammatical interpretation applies in many more instances than mere spiritual interpretation .

    In a note to this part of his Lectures the Bishop of Peterborough suggests that the celebrated exclamation of Tertullian , ' Certum estquia impossibile ! ' * may have reference to an impossibility resulting from a test which Tertullian disregarded—to an imagined , riot an actual impossibility . So , in the opinion of Dr . Neander , j * this language is " only an exaggerated mode of declaring that a Christian readily admits , on the authority of revelation , what men who rely solely on the conclusions of their own reason , pronounce impossible . " The conjecture is ingenious , and has even an air of probability . J

    Cyprian professed to follow Tertullian , but was much more inclined than his master § to depart from the literal sense of Scripture . "Witness his famous exposition of the clause , et hi tres unum sunt , which follows the words spiritus , aqua , et sanguis , in 1 John v . 8 ; a comment , which , it seems , Facundus adopted on his authority , |) Proceeding to the fourth century , we find that the influence of Clement and Origen on the Greek fathers Eusebius , Athanasius , Cyril of Jerusalem , Epiphanius , Apollinarius , Basil of Csesarea , Gregory of Nazianzum ,

    Araphilochius , Gregory of Nyssa , Theodore of Mopsuestia , Chrysostom , and Cyril of Alexandria , disposed them all , with the exception of Theodore , to recommend or use allegorical interpretation . Another kind of interpretation prevailed together with it ; that called kout omopopiav , the interpretation of management ^ of accommodation , the practice of expounding , perhaps we should say explaining away , Scripture , by making it bend to human creeds and speculations . Thus , it having been objected to the term a ^ go-ios , that our Saviour had declared his ignorance of the day of judgment , ^ t he answer was , that his words are to be understood / car' oiKovouiav or oikovo / xikus . **

    Among the Latin fathers of this period , Arnobius was a decided adversary of allegorical interpretation . However , it was not rejected by Lactantius , who found a proof of the Millennium in the first chapter of Genesis . Ambrose of Milan and Hilary were powerfully attached to mystical meanings . Jerom , too , though highly gifted as an interpreter of Scripture , has not unfrequently fallen into the error , which he condemns in Origen . Of Augustine ' s rules

    for expounding the Scriptures , that which relates to grammatical and allegorical ( or as he terms it , figurative ) interpretation , is the following : Iste omnino modus est , ut quidquid in sermone divino neque ad morum honestatein neque ad fidei veritatem proprie referri potest , figuratum esse cognoscas . Yet Augustine , like Tertullian , appeals also to a regula fidei . The will of God , according to Augustine , must be sought in Holy Scripture : and when he speaks about the authority of the church , he means only an authority to

    * D < s Carne Christi , § 5 . t Bishop Kaye ' s Eccles . Hist ., &c , [ ed . 2 , ] Pref . pp . xxix . xxx . t Pp . 18—23 . § Cyprian was accustomed to speak of Tertullian as his master . Bishop Kaye '*> Ecc . Hist . &c . p . 6 . H Porson's Letters to Travis . No . V . « f Mark xiii . 32 . ** See a famous passage in Tertull . adv , Prax . ^ 3 .

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    248 Bishop Marsh ' s Lectures .

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  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1829, page 248, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2571/page/24/