appoint, should declare himself before he lectures, or, simply, further and otherwise than as he lectures. Still it might be convenient did he contrive to let his hearers have some inkling beforehand, generally, of what spirit and drift they might expect from him. Fielding, in one of his novels, tells us that, when we dine with a gentleman who gives a private treat, we must not find fault, but cheerfully accept whatever fare he pleases; whereas, in the case of an ordinary, with a bill of fare in the window, we can see for ourselves, and either enter or turn away as it suits us. This hint, which only bears on physical food, Fielding does not disdain to borrow in respect of food otherwise. Following his example, then, let us prefix, not exactly now a bill of fare (which will come later), but an explanation, so far, in regard to creed. But that amounts to a religious confession, whereas it may seem that Lord Gifford himself deprecates or disapproves all such. It is certain that, according to the terms of the document, all previous declarations are unnecessary; but still it cannot be said that there is any actual prohibition of them, either expressed or understood.

Lord Gifford himself, as I have attempted to show, has made no secret of his own convictions on the general question; and without at all desiring to set up a compulsory precedent for others, we may, without impropriety, follow his example. I am a member of the National Church, and would not willingly run counter to whatever that involves. Again, as is seen at its clearest and most definite in the sister Church farther south, perhaps, there are three main sections of that Church, or rather, as actual speech has it, in that one Church, there are three Churches. There is Broad Church, High Church, Low or Evangelical Church. I daresay it has been by some few or many, I know not supposed that I am Broad, and it is very certain

THE IMMEDIATE LECTURER.

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that it is not with my own will that I shall be narrow. am an utter foe to religious rancour religious intolerance of any kind. In that respect I am absolutely as Lord Gifford himself would appear to have been from his own statements, which are now, I hope, clearly in our minds. Nevertheless, I have to confess that I would quite as soon wish to be considered High as Broad, and that the party to which I do wish to be considered to belong is the Low or Evangelical one. No doubt there is deeply and ineradicably implanted in the human soul an original sentiment which is the religious one; and no doubt also there is as deeply and ineradicably implanted there a religious understanding. We not only feel, we know religion. Religion is not only buoyed up on a sentiment of the heart, it is founded also on ideas of the intellect. So it is that, if for me High Church seems too exclusively devoted to the category of feeling, Broad Church, again, too much accentuates the principle of the understanding. Now, if as much as this be true, as well for the one Church as the other, it will not be incorrect to say that while the Low or Evangelical Church is neither exclusively High nor exclusively Broad, it is in essential idea both; and so it is that it is on its side that I would wish to be considered to rank. I know not at the same time but that all three Churches have a common sin, the sin of absolute intolerance and denial, the one of the other. That I would wish otherwise for them in a mutual regard, and that I would wish otherwise from them in my own regard when I point out this difference between them and me, that what they possess in what is called the Vorstellung, I rely upon in the Begriff. What they have positively in the feeling, or positively in the understanding, or positively in a union of both, I have reflectively, or ideally, or speculatively in reason. What the term positive amounts to will be best understood by a reference to other religions than our own. The very edge and point of the positive may be placed in bare will, the bare will of another. Mormonism is a positive religion. There, says Joseph Smith, holding up the book of Mormon, take that, believe whatever it says, and do what it tells you. That is positive: the religionthe book is just given, and it is just received as given. There is not a shadow of explanation, not a shadow of reasoning, not a shadow of stipulation on the one side or the other. So it is with Mahomet and the Koran. Book in hand, he just steps forward, and there, on the instant, the Mahometan is at his feet, simply repeating the precise words he hears read out to him. It is for the same reason that laws are positive. They rest on authority alone, another will than his who must obey them: as the dictionary has it, They are prescribed by express enactment or institution. Nevertheless, it is implied in laws and law that they as particulars, and it as a whole, are as much the will of him or them who receive, as of him or them who give. Law is but a realization of reason, of the reason common to us all, as much yours as his, as much his as yours. So it is, or so it ought to be, with religion; and there you have the whole matter before you. He whose religion rests only on the Vorstellung possesses it positively - believes it positively only; whereas he with whom religion rests on the Begriff, has placed beneath it a philosophical foundation. You may illustrate this by a reference to the Shorter Catechism. If you get its specifications by heart and, making them your own only so, straightway act upon them, then that is an illustration of what is positive. To dwell on each specification separately by itself again, making it to flow and coalesce, and live into its own inmost meaning that is to transmute it into the Begriff, for the Begriff is but the external material words made inward intellectual notion or idea-thought-some

THE THREE CHURCHES, ETC.

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thing from without converted into one's own substance from within. Not but that the positive has its own rights too. We positively muzzle our dogs, we positively bridle our horses, and we positively install our cattle; and we have right on our side. In the same way, and for the same reason, we positively teach our children; and we have no other resource we positively must. But what we teach them is only their own; they follow only their own true selves when they follow us. We make it only that they are free-that it is absolutely only their own true wills they have, follow, and obey when we give them the wills of maturity and experienced reason. So it is that it has been a custom of a Sunday in Scotland to make our children learn by heart verses of the Bible or the specifications of the Shorter Catechism. They take what they learn only into the Vorstellung; they are unable as yet to convert it into Begriff; but the trust is that they will do so later. Nor is there any reason that they should not do so, at least on the whole. I do not mean to say that earnest reflection will remove every difficulty connected with the various articles of the Book of Articles or of the Larger or Shorter Catechisms; but I do say that many of these articles mean at bottom the very deepest and most essential metaphysical truths.

But it is not with that that we have to do at present, at the same time that it, and what else I have said in this connection, will all serve to realize to you the religious position of the lecturer as what we are concerned with at present. And in that reference I ought to explain that, when I have opposed what is positively held in feeling, or understanding, or a union of both to what is reflectively, ideally, speculatively held in reason, it is not the system of belief technically known as Rationalism that I have in mind, whatever relation there may exist between the two words etymologically. As the sentence itself shows, indeed, the term reason is opposed by me, not only to feeling, but also to understanding; and understanding is the faculty, special, proper, and peculiar, of Rationalism. Rationalism, in fact, meansin its religious application-nothing but Aufklärung, is nothing but the Aufklärung, though claiming a certain affirmative side in its bearing on religion. The prevailing mind of the Aufklärung, namely, as in Hobbes, Spinoza, Hume, Voltaire, is seen to be, in a religious direction, negative, so far at least as Revelation is concerned; whereas the Aufklärung in the form of Rationalism, as in such a writer as the German Reimarus, for example, while planing away much, or perhaps almost all, that is essential in religion, makes believe still to have an affirmative attitude to Revelation. Of course, I need no more than mention the distinction between understanding and reason, as I have no doubt it is now well known and familiar. It is current in Coleridge. I think, then, there will no longer be any possibility of misapprehension or mistake when I oppose religion as in reason to religion as in understanding; while the latter, in the form of Rationalism say, has to do only with what is conditional and finite, the former, in ideal or speculative religion, would attain to converse with the unconditional and the infinite itself.

But though I am thus careful to preclude the danger of a religion in reason being confounded with Rationalism, it seems to me that I must be equally careful to provide against another and opposing danger. There is a great prejudice against old forms now-a-days; and it is not usual for the advocates of them to find themselves listened to. Advanced views, that is, what are called advanced views, are very generally, because advanced, supposed to represent the truth at least the truth in its highest contemporary form. The supporters of them

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