MR A. D. JOHNSTON IN REPLY.

Clutha Leader, Volume XVI, Issue 831, 20 June 1890, Page 3

MR A. D. JOHNSTON IN REPLY.

Sf" - TO THE EDITOR. I Bißjr^l feel somewhat at a disad-%-y: vantage in regard to the criticisms of f my pamphlet on * our Confession that H have appeared in, your columns. The p- pamphlet is not accessible to your |x general readers ; the object being to | place a copy in the hands of every it minister and elder in the church, until 5 these are supplied there, are none for % the general public. Therefore few of |r your readers are in a position to judge W of the fairness of the criticisms. But | since the Rev. A. M. Dalrymple has t seen fit to publish Jus review of the t; pamphlet, I have no option but to reply % through the same medium, or leave him '- tuaster of the. situation. I prefer the :i former alternative. •

On the whole, the criticism is as Favourable as I could have expected from his side. For example, he gives me credit for being ' a smart logician ' that ' writes in a style which, if not brilliant, is generally clear, and sometimes neat and effective.' These compliments I accept as not. intended to * damn with faint praise ' ; and thank him accordingly, especially for the adjectives 'clear' and 'effective.' But somehow he manages so to intermix his •compliments with adverse criticism that it is difficult to disentangle them. Nevertheless, I assure him they are duly .appreciated. I now hasten to remark on some points in the review. The rev. gentleman has discovered that my 'reading has been confined within narrow limits.' To say this of one who came to Otago more than 30 years ago, and went out into the wilderness as a pioneer 25 years ago, was surely superfluous. But it has advantages. The man of one book is proverbially a dangerous opponent. The axiom that intension and extension are in inverse ratio is well known ; and is. very like saying that gold-leaf becomes thinner the wider it is spread. I rather like the meaning- given to the word 'read' in the English universities, when, as Professor Moseley once told .us, to read Euclid means to get it up so that no part of it is ever forgotten ' except the fifth book.' Comparing Mr Dalrymple with myself, he may be regarded as a man of wide reading, especially since he has himself claimed to be so regarded. But I fear his reading would not have pleased Professor Moseley. He i"cads f books and immediately forgets -what is in them. This is all well in novel reading ; but awkward when carried into theological reading ; more awkward still when a pamphlet meant to be reviewed is so -read. I shall, have to give several illustrations of th's as 1 proceed.

The first is, 'Mr Johnston would have shown, more wisdom and more •courtesy had he omitted a good many references to the ignorance, the mistakes, and the disingenuousness of a <( party " which includes, <fee.' This is sandwiched between two sentences,— tlie one admitting that ' no great fault is to be found with the spirit in which ifc is written ' ; the other that 'Mr Johnston is sparing in his use of such language.' Where did my reviewer find the ' good many references to the ignorance, &c.' of any such party as he •describes. Certainly they are not in the pamphlet. If he has found them, he will be able to give the pages. I challenge him to give, not a ' good, many,' but even one such reference. Nay, more, I invite him to select the worst that I have either spoken or written since the commencement of these discussions, and he will find it * compare most favorably ' (I do not say with what appeared so lately in your columns, sanctioned by, if not written by, a ' reverend disputant of hisjown school '), but with his own review in which he asks the elders to tell me that I have prodigiously over-rated •my own fitness for dealing with the situation, and in which he tells them that my learned discourse is mere psdantry. Finding that he twice makes this charge, I read the pamphlet again, and failed to find" any ground for it. As Lord. Clive once said — l Considering the circumstances, I am astonished at my own moderation.'

In regard to the position of affairs at last synod with reference to the U.P. Declaratory Act, his statements are misleading! He represents it as if the whole committee were unanimous' in recommending its adoption, whereas.it was. only .those' of them that were present at the last meeting.. - The tniritites-':were produced, and showed that this unanimity did not nearly embrace all the members. Of course those present were quite entitled to enter in their, report that the committee were unanimous. iThen his picture of the professors, ministers, and elders on one side, and, only your humble servant on the other, is superlatively ridiculous. Did the synod set aside the recommendation of two professor?, 11 ministers,and seven elders at the l strenuous i;emopstranc,o ' of ; one elder 1 Surely the reverend gentleman is prodigiously over-rating my ability and influence. It was not so. Mr Will moved that it be sent down to presbyteries and kirk sessions. Mr Einlayson, a member of the committee, moved that it He on the table. Does this look like^ unanimity 1 ? And this! latter motion was cdrried without a vote nok

withstanding the very strenuous re* monstrance of Mr Dalrymple.

The attempt. to overwhelm me by Authorities, and by what other churches have done is unworthy of him or any other disputant. I esteem all these revei'enri doctors so highly, that I believe they would repudiate the idea that their opinion should be used to shut, the mouth of the least member .of our church. It is the spirit of popery thus to attempt to stifle discussion, — a spirit that, in .another form, went so far. in last-syjiod as, to prevent the oldest and moist respected minister of the church from opening his mouth on the subject of thq Confession.

But this reviewer breaks new ground, — ground untouched by my pamphlet, and beyond the scope of the church's committee^ He calls in question the Scripture warrant of the -doctrine of the Confession. He does .not. deny the Amyraldism o£ the TJ.'P. Declaratory Act; nor that Amyraldism is condemned by the Confession, but appeals from the Confession to Scripture." He gives our elders three' texts. But in fairness, since they have neither ' theological libraries' nor 'large leisure,' he should have told them that in the first (John iii, 16) the word ' world 5 is understood by many commentators to mean both Jews and Gentiles. That the meaning of the sepond (I John ii, 2) has been much disputed,,; and that the third (Mark xvi, 15) has no reference to our subject.

This reference to Scripture texts brings up an objection to the Declaratory Act, an objection not referred to in the pamphlet. It is, that.it attempts to express its doctrines partly in Scriptural language, the meaning of which is disputed. A text in its Bible connection may mean one thing. Placed in another connection it may mean something very different. In the Declai-atory Act the verse (1 Johnii., 2) is not only taken from its natural connection, but is so altered as to give it altogether a different meaning. ' His gift of his son to be,' instead of ' He is,' ' the propitiation for the ' sins of the whole world,' is an unwarrantable liberty with the text. But the best authorities on confession hold that there ought to be no Scripture texts in confessions. Dunlop in his introduction to his collection of con Cessions says, 'A confession in Scripture words would unite Arians, Socinians, Gnostics, Antinoraiahs, Papists, Adamites, Enthusiastics, and their opposites, — light and darkness — God and Belial.' Dr Schaff (' Creeds of Christendom ') says, ' The Bible is of God. The confession is man's answer to God's word. For this reason a creed ought to use language different from that of the Bible. A string of Scripture passages would be no creed at all.'

Before leaving this question of Scripture warrant, I ask your readers to ponder well the words of the Confession, chap, viii., 8, and the proofs, John vi. 37-39, x. 15-16, and contrast with these the inevitable consequences of Amyraldism. Amyraldists say that the source of redemption is God's equal love to all mankind ; and that in sending His Son, His purpose was to save all. If this was Gods pur-pose, then either all men are saved or they are not. If all are saved, we see they are not saved here. They must therefore be saved in the future life. We thus run counter to Scripture, and to the Confession, as well as to the unanimous voice of Christendom in all ages,, and to the church's unanimous pastoral address of 1888, against which Mr Dairy mple entered no dissent. But if all are not saved, then, seeing God purposed their salvation, Satan must have succeeded in nullifying the purpose of God, and men for whom Christ paid a redemption price must have eternally perished (John vi., 39). The thought is blasphemy. The Christian consciousness recoils from it. Yet such is the logical result of a doctrine we are asked to put into our creed to remove difficulties.

Passing over for, a little some matters that require attention, I come to his last paragraph, which, in the concentrated essence of bitterness and unfairness T have seldom seen surpassed. In the first page of the pamphlet, I point out that our Confession is not used as a condition of privilege but as a test of office. The whole scope of the passage' is to show the ample range given to the communion of saints ; while, on the other hand, . our church rightly exacts a rigid adherence to the Confession by her officebearers. To show tho former in its widest sweep I adduced the imaginary case of Cardinal Newman — a name suggested by discussions to which I need .not here refer. Wilfully blind to the scope of the paragraph, my critic makes the naming of the Cardinal the occasion for a remarkable display of rhetoric.'. He piles up the heresies of the Papist Cardinal in a grand Ciceronian, climax,, the highest step of which is, thab I expect to sup with this minister of anti-Christ in the courts above.. He finishes by contrast-; ing with this my intolerance and disagreeableness in seeking to exclude certain . parties from office in . my own church. . Now 1 , wljen I said I expected to sup with the cardinal in tho kingdom above, it may- have seemed strange to one who is waiting patiently for some future, .final, and ; moi'e . satisfactory formulation of the doctrine of the last tilings. But to me it seems equally strange that the; worship, of the. Virgin

Mary and all the saints, and the denial of the great reformation doctrine of justification by faith, should be thus thrown in the face of Cardinal Newman by one who] only a few months ago told his hearers, that they must have faith in God, faith in Christ, and faith in man ! But his whole pile falls to the ground, like a child's house of cards, when I tell him that / do riot seek to exclude from office in my own church the parties whom he describes ; and that he cannot point to a page where I say so. He' puts it this way. • He pleads for the repudiation of Amyraldism by our Confession, and consequently for the exclusion of Amyraldists from the ministry and eldership.' There are two inaccuracies here. (1)

I do not plead &c, I affirm, and nobody denies, that the doctrine is repudiated in the Confession (yiii, 8) ; and 1 show cause why it should, in this respect, be kept as it is. (2) The consequence of exclusion is his and not mine ; and does not necessarily follow. For Calamy who, in the Westminster i Assembly, advocated the doctrine almost acquiesced in the deliverance when drawn up on the lines suggested by George Gillespie. He neither protested nor dissented, but "continued to sit and act as before. And both he and Baxter exercised their pastorate under the Confession as it noio standsy so far as that doctrine is concerned. Again, there are about 450 ministers and elders in our church. Mr Dalrymple thinks it would be difficult to find sice anti-Amyraldists among them. According to him there must, be at least 444 Amyraldists. If our Confession keeps out men like Baxter (Amyraldists), and must be altered to let them in, I ask my reverend reviewer fairly to face this simple question : How did those 444 ministers and elders get in *? The whole plea is transparently thin. The change is not wanted to secure men like Baxter, but in the interest of views less harmless that necessarily flow from Amyraldism. As to exclusion, Mr Dalrymple seems incapable of distinguishing between a creed and the individuals who hold that creed. A minister of this church said in my hearing that he was prepared to libel any minister in his presbytery who preached Amyralrlism. With via, sufficient for the day is the duty thereof. In the pamphlet I confine myself to contending that the doctrine should bo kept out of our church's creed.

He represents me as ' virtually maintaining that the Confession, needs no revision.' There is nothing in the pamphlet to warrant this. The ques tion of revision is not' yet before our church, and is not treated of in the pamphlet. Does he call this Declaratory Act revision 1 Dr Taylor Innes describes it better as £ a patch.' Just suppose it to go out to the world that a committee of 20, from a church of 70 congregations, undertook to revise the Westminster Confession in two short meetings. The Presbyterian world would regard it as a joke, and laugh till they held their sides or ' burst their gallows buttons.' It reminds one of Punch saying that Sir Charles Napier was going to the Baltic to blow up Cronstadt — after dinner !

An esteemed minister informs me that Principal Cunningham, shortly before his death, said to his students : ' Gentlemen, the matter of the revision of the Confession is corning up soon ; not perhaps in my day, but certainly in yours. If it came up in my day, and if I were counted worthy to be one of the number who should have to consider the mattter, it would be a

task from which I should shrink.' And then he added, ' But if it should come up in our day, where are the theologians competent to deal with the work of the Westminster divines V

In regard to revision our church's present duty is to wait and watch. Her present safety is to stand still. — I am, &c,

Adam D. Johnston.