the members of the Annual Conferences, present and voting, to alter any of the Six Restrictive Rules, "excepting the First Article."

Judging from these two sections of the "Discipline," the orthodoxical symbols of the Church are unalterable as "the laws of the Medes and Persians." Yet the multitude of contributions to the religious press, and the formal essays entrusted to magazines and reviews, postulate, for the most part, that it is a matter of entire uncertainty what the Methodist doctrinal standards are. Ask one of the writers what the authoritative creed of the Church is, and he replies that he does not know. Another answers that it is contained in the New Testament, and another in the Bible.

*

That the latter statement is true in the sense that the Bible is the depository whence all the materials for the fabrication of the Methodist doctrinal standards have been drawn, is beyond question; and for that reason all candidates for diaconal ordination are obliged "to unfeignedly believe all the canonical Scriptures of the Old and New Testament." For the same reason, candidates for presbyterial and episcopal ordination are required to profess their persuasion "that the Holy Scriptures contain sufficiently all doctrine required of necessity for eternal salvation through faith in Jesus Christ," and they are "determined out of the said Scriptures to instruct the people committed to " their "charge, and to teach nothing as required of necessity to eternal salvation but that which" they "shall be persuaded may be concluded and proved by the Scriptures." + They are also required to pledge themselves to "be ready with all faithful diligence to banish and drive away all erroneous and strange doctrines contrary to God's word," † and further, in the case of bishops, "both privately and openly to call upon and encourage others to do the same." +

These requirements denote the high estimate placed by the Church on the maintenance of sound doctrine, and indicate the zeal with which all its ministers ought to labor for its preservation.

But the reply, that the Methodist doctrinal standards are to be found in the Bible is a mere evasion of the question. All are agreed that they ought to be in harmony with the teach"Discipline," p. 344. Ibid., pp. 319, 334. Ibid., p. 319.

ings of "God's word written," and that the creeds, confessions, and symbols of all branches of the visible Church are binding upon the conscience only to that extent in which they accord with them. "We believe," wrote Wesley in his "Character of a Methodist," "the written word of God to be the only and sufficient rule, both of Christian faith and practice. . . . We believe Christ to be the eternal, supreme God. . . . But as to all opinions which do not strike at the root of Christianity we think and let think."

But what does Methodism in our Church "think" of the doctrinal contents of the Holy Scriptures? "The Bible is of God; the confession is man's answer to God's word. The Bible is the norma normans; the confession the norma normata. The Bible is the rule of faith, (regula filei ;) the confession, the rule of doctrine, (regula doctrinæ.)”* What is the Methodistic confession? What are the symbols regulating the public teaching of ministerial officials? Protestant Episcopalians, Lutherans, Calvinists, have "summaries of the doctrineof the Bible, aids to its sound understanding, bonds of union among their professors, public standards and guards against. false doctrine and practice;" and in these their interpretations of biblical teaching on the great subjects of theology, Christology, anthropology, the Church and the sacraments, soteriology, and eschatology, are more or less precisely defined. Has Methodism similar instruments, and if so, where and what are they?

Dr. Buckley says that "from the beginning till the present day Methodism has had, not indeed a confession, or a systematic ereed, (for the absence of which we thank God and our fathers,) but a general backbone of theology, upon which its sermons, treatises, commentaries, catechisms, hymns, exhortations, and ritual, rest. Every person who becomes a minister among us knows what that spinal column is, and also that the Church claims the right to dispense with the services of those who attempt to break it." +

All of which is historically true; but where shall we find this "general backbone?"

Dr. Curry maintains "that there are no definite and ascer*Schaff's "Creeds of Christendom," vol. i., p. 7.

+ "Christian Advocate," October 20, 1881.

tained set of documents which are to be accepted as embodying the legally protected doctrines of Methodism;" and that the "existing and established standards" recognized by the law of the Church "cannot be identified with "-he does not say in -"any given books or documents, and, therefore, it is left to those to whom the detection and punishment of heresy may be committed to find out and decide what doctrines are, in any case, contrary to the 'standards.'"*

...

"If it shall be asked what are those standards . . . and where may they be found?" he says that "the only possible answers are that they are the generally accepted doctrines of Methodism, established at its beginning, and perpetuated by the common consent of all concerned; and they are to be found in the memories and convictions of those upon whom the safe keeping of the body is devolved." If this be an accurate statement, then the Methodist Episcopal Church has only an oral theology, and that as diverse as the manifold receptacles to which its keeping is confided. A system more flexible, fluctuating, and intractable of reduction to method could not be devised. But even then, the existence of documentary sources of the tenets held in memory and conviction is necessarily implied, Civilized theological associations have never been destitute of such primitive literature. Theological students need to know where and what it is, and if it take the form of creed, confession, symbol, or serial articles. In these latter forms the Methodist doctrinal standards can easily be studied; and even if they should be embodied in commentaries or sermons, it will be comparatively light labor to define and formulate them. But Dr. Curry denies the existence of any such authoritative fountains. "The Methodist Episcopal Church... is without any definite documentary system of belief by law established."+ And yet he affirms that Methodist theology" recognizes certain great truths, which lie at the root of Christianity,' which must be held sacred." He further asserts that the Church, "according to definite rules of judicature" has power to determine what are these essential Christian doctrines, "and also to remove from the body all who reject them."

He next, as one of those in whose "memories and convictions" the essential doctrines of Methodism are preserved, * "Independent," November 3, 1881. Ibid., December 1, 1881.

enumerates them in the following order: "the nature of sin, and of its results and entailments;" "God's free grace in Christ offering salvation . . . to all who, in penitence and faith, would call on God, through Christ, for pardon and salvation;" "the character and work of Christ, his person and sacrifice; justification by faith;" "the necessity of the new birth;' the certainty that rejecters of the proffered grace "cannot see the kingdom of God;" and "the assurance of the completeness of the work of the soul's practical redemption." "These several points, (themselves an indivisible unity, with their necessary and natural implications,) are the essential doctrines of Methodism-these and no others-which all of its ministers are bound in good faith to cherish and defend; but, beyond these, and if nothing repugnant to them is held or taught, it allows to all the utmost freedom of thinking and speaking." "The exposition and defense of these doctrines in Wesley's Sermons, and in his didactic and controversial writings, have been generally accepted as at once correct in substance and felicitous in manner; and, therefore, they are accepted as, in a secondary sense, "standards of doctrine;" although mingled with these are extraneous matters which nobody is required to believe, and which not a few decidedly and openly reject. For more than a hundred years the Methodist pulpit and press, its public prayers and exhortations, its "experiences," and its hymns have embodied its theology in living forms.” *

These emissions from "memory and conviction," shed some light on the real answer to the question, "What are the Methodist doctrinal standards?" In a secondary sense, at least, we learn that they are to be found in Wesley's writings, in the issues of the Methodist press, and in Methodist hymns-all of which may be thoroughly studied at leisure.

Wise men change their opinions, and the learned critic seems to have changed his since April, 1879, at which epoch he held that the Methodist Episcopal Church had a "definite documentary system of belief, by law established," and "that whatever is contained in the Articles of Religon,' or the Ritual, (as it was in 1808,) is part of the creed of Methodism, which it is presumed that the whole Church agrees to as agreeable to the Word of God, and which every minister engages to teach, as of di

"Independent," December 1, 1881.

vine authority." But he did not then believe, nor does he now, that the "definite documentary system of belief, by law established," comprised in the Articles and Ritual of 1808,"contain all of the commonly accepted and well-ascertained doctrines of the Gospel, as held and taught by the Methodist Episcopal Church; and therefore that the proper guardians of the Church's orthodoxy must care for and protect other articles of faith than those formally legalized by the organic documents of the body." This earlier and more thoroughly considered deliverance in the editorial department of the "National Repository" of April, 1879, p. 363, is historically justifiable.

"Beyond the articles and the ritual, we certainly have no documents of any kind that can be referred to as decisively authoritative in matters of theological beliefs." The Methodist Episcopal Church has, from the beginning, held and taught more than is contained in any of its formally recognized standards."

If we ask whether this surplus may not be found in John Wesley's Sermons and Notes on the New Testament, and whether those are not included among the doctrinal standards of Methodism, Dr. Curry makes answer that "other documents, as the Doctrinal Tracts,' Wesley's Sermons, and his Notes on the New Testament, once had a kind of official recognition as standards of doctrine; but they were never legally accepted as such, nor was there at any time general acceptance of some things taught in them, and they have ceased entirely to be so recognized." +

Wesley's writings are no longer standards of doctrine to American Methodists-" were never legally accepted as such," not even as to the doctrines which are distinctive of that form of evangelical Arminianism of which, under God, he was the founder! How much of historical credibility there is in this statement, we will shortly endeavour to point out. Meanwhile, if "one asks for the standards of Methodist doctrines, what must be the answer?" Dr. Curry answers his own query in the words: "First, we find twenty-five Articles of Religion.' So far all is clear. All parties are agreed that among the Methodist doctrinal standards are:

I. The Articles of Religion. These are first indicated as

"National Repository," April, 1879, p. 360.

+ Ibid.