Inauguration of the Rev. Benjamin B. Warfield, D.D., as professor of didactic and polemic theology

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INAUGURATION

REV. BENJAMIN B. WARFIELD, D.D.,

PROFESSOR

DIDACTIC AND POLEMIC THEOLOGY.

NEW YORK:

ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH & COMPANY.

i8S8.

COPYRIGHT, lS88, BY

Anson D. F. Randolph & Company.

PRESS OF

EDWARD 0. JENKINS' SONS,

NEW »OSK.

PREFATORY NOTE.

The Rev. Benjamin B. Warfield, D.D., was elected
Professor of Didactic and Polemic Theology in Princeton
Seminary, at a special meeting of the Board of Directors,
held in February, 1887. His formal inauguration was
postponed at his own request, and took place by appoint-
ment, on Tuesday, May 8, 1888, at 11.30 o'clock, in the
First Presbyterian Church of Princeton. The order of
exercises on this occasion was as follows : ""

Hymn.

Prayer, by the Rev. Dr. Philip Schaff, Professor in Union Theo-
logical Seminary, New York.

Administration of the Pledge to the New Professor, by
the Rev. Dr. Gos.man, President of the Board of Directors.

The Charge, by the Rev. Dr. James T. Leftwich, Pastor of the
First Presbyterian Church, Baltimore.

The Inaugural Address, by Professor Warfield.

Benediction,

The Charge and Inaugural Address are here published by order
of the Board of Directors.

THE CHARGE.

BY

THE REV. JAMES T. LEFTWICH, D.D.

CHARGE.

My dear Brother:

It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to the Profes-
sorship in this Seminary to which you have been called. In
doing so, by a very natural train of associations I am re-
minded of the illustrious men who have preceded you here
in the chair of Theology, who, having finished their labors,
have entered into rest. First, in the order of time, was Dr.
Archibald Alexander, in the highest sense of the term, not
involving inspiration, a Seer, whose swift intuitions so often
anticipated the conclusions, which, by rigorous processes of
Logic, he subsequently reached only to verify and confirm
them. Then came Dr. Charles Hodge, the great scholar as
well as thinker, whose vast erudition was digested into
stately volumes, which stand on the shelves of our libraries
side by side with the ponderous works of Augustine, Cal-
vin, Turretin, and Edwards; of them all, perhaps, the most
widely read in our day, at least among English-speaking
peoples. It was every way fitting that such a father as he
should be succeeded, in his labors and in his honors, by
such a son as the late lamented Dr. Archibald Alexander
Hodge ; a man of brilliant genius, in spirit simple as that
little child whom, to illustrate the nature of true greatness,
Jesus once set in the midst of His wondering disciples;
while in intellect he was a giant in the power with which
he grasped and wielded the sword of the Spirit which is the
Word of God. In the power to formulate truth, to draw
with unerring accuracy the fine line that at once includes
all that belongs to its integrity, and excludes all that is for-
eign and extraneous, he had no superior, I had almost

viii Charge.

said he had no peer in the Church in his day. In his " Out-
hnes of Theology" may be found definitions, of which it is
no extravagance to affirm that they have never been sur-
passed, if, indeed, they have ever been equalled, since the
Westminster Divines closed their sessions in Jerusalem
Chamber, It is said that as a young rustic, who himself
afterwards became a celebrated painter, stood gazing with
rapt admiration at one of the splendid creations of Cor-
reggio, the artistic spirit which, till then, had slumbered in
his nature, suddenly awoke ; when, in the joyous conscious-
ness of his new-born powers, he exclaimed : " I, too, shall be
Correggio." And I can desire no better fortune for this
Seminary, at least in the department of Theology, than
that, while preserving entire your personal gifts, you should
at the same time so contemplate the examples of the emi-
nent teachers who have preceded you, as to imbibe all that
was loftiest in their spirit, and reproduce all that was best
in their methods. You will permit me to remind you that
the Board of Directors conferred on you no ordinary' dis-
tinction when, looking abroad over our great Church, they
fixed their eyes on you, as of all her sons the fittest, per-
haps, to inherit the mantle of these ascended Prophets. I
desire to congratulate you ; and I desire to congratulate the
Directors that, in the very free expression of opinion which
your election has elicited, there has been heard, as yet, not
so much as a whisper of dissent in any quarter ; the entire
Church afifixing to the wisdom of your appointment the
seal of its unqualified sanction. The high scholarship which
marked throughout your career as a student in the Semi-
nary, the special studies in which your faculties were dis-
ciplined during the entire term of your residence at Alle-
gheny, together with the valuable contributions already
made by your pen to our current Theological literature, are
construed as so many pledges that, by the blessing of God
on your efforts, you will not disappoint the very high ex-
pectations which your preferment has excited. And yet so
responsible is the ofificc of Professor of Theology in such a

Charge. ix

Seminary as Princeton, and so tremendous are the interests
which swing pivoted on your faithful discharge of its func-
tions, that the Directors are not at Hberty to omit from the
ceremony of your induction the Charge that is customary
on such occasions.

While it will be your office to teach truth, — and truth,
too, of infinite importance, — it will not be your duty to
teach all truth. For truth is coextensive with reality itself,
of which it is always the faithful exponent. God has not
called you, nor indeed has He called any man, to be an
expositor of all truth. Even in the domain of Theology,
the division of labor which obtains here as it does else-
where, and which grows more and more minute as the
world advances in knowledge, will confine your efforts to
a single department, — " The Science of Didactic and Po-
lemic Theology." I say Science ; for if facts, and inferences
from facts logically drawn and systematically arranged,
constitute Science ; and if Science rises in dignity with the
value and importance of its object-matter, then indeed
must Theology, treating as it does of God, of man, and of
their involved relations, be not only a Science, but of all
Sciences the Queen.

The source from which you are to draw the materials of
your Theology is the Scriptures ; constituting, as they do,
the only infallible and all-sufficient Rule of faith and prac-
tice. While it is true that it has pleased God to make a
natural revelation of Himself; partly in the external world
around us, partly in the course of history behind us, and
partly in these living spirits within us, the Scriptures gather
up into themselves all these scattered disclosures and utter
them afresh to mankind ; completing all and crowning all
with a glory that is all their own, — The revelation of saving
grace.

While you are to teach the truths of the Bible, you are
to teach these truths as they are construed and reduced to
system in the Confession and Catechisms of the Westminster
Assembly. The outcry against Creeds and Systems of

X Charge.

Theology was never louder, perhaps, than at this very hour.
The old indictment still bristles all over with the old counts.
It is urged that they impugn the sufficiency of Scripture as
the Rule of faith and practice, stifle the spirit of honest
inquiry, fetter faculties that should be left free in the pur-
suit of truth, and impede, if they do not arrest progress in
the noblest study on which the mind of man can be exer-
cised. Without stopping to consider these specifications
in detail, it is a sufficient reply to the general charge that
system in Theology, as in every branch of inquiry, is abso-
lutely necessary to appease one of the profoundest, one of
the most importunate cravings of the human soul. Man is
never at ease until he has found the one in the many, until
he has reduced the multiform in fact to the uniform in idea.
His ear, if finely strung, suffers torture until the various
sounds, proceeding from the different instruments in a great
orchestra, blend in a stream of perfect harmony. As he
walks abroad among the scenes of nature, the emotion of
beauty refuses to rise to its full height, until he has gathered
up into the unity of his complex view the objects dispersed
in the landscape before him. The scientific mind of the
great Newton could not rest until, rising from the ordinary
phenomena transpiring in the world around him, he reached
at length on the heights of speculation the sublime gener-
alization which holds in its grasp the material universe.
And so, as he goes forth into the field of Revelation, the
Theologian cannot be satisfied until he has gathered up the
disjecta membra of truth that lie strewn around him, and
has articulated them into a body of Divinity that, to his
eye at least, is harmonious, symmetrical, complete.

It is only through system in Theology that we rise to
knowledge in its highest form. A doctrine must be com-
plemented, must be qualified, must be balanced by its cor-
relates, if truth is to appear in its integrity. How beauti-
fully was this illustrated in our Lord's temptation in the
wilderness. It is written, as Satan urged, " He shall give his
angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways ; they

Charge. xi

shall bear thee up in their hands lest at any time thou dash
thy foot against a stone." But it is also written, as our Lord
replied, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." It is
in the complex produced by combining the two half truths
that the truth emerges as a whole.

It is easy to show that Confessions of faith condition the
progress in Theology, which it is complained that they im-
pede. The contents of the Bible have been distributed into
Theology, Anthropology, Soteriology, Ecclesiology, and
Eschatology ; and Klieforth calls attention to the fact that
it has pleased God to assign each of these branches to the
Church in that land and in that age, in which it will be
best qualified to develop it. Accordingly, Theology fell to
the lot of the Greek Church, which embodied the results of
its long and painful researches in the Nicene and Athanasian
Symbols. After garnering the sheaves reaped from the
field of Theology, the reapers were at liberty to enter in
their order the fields that remained, as one after another
they grew white unto the harvest. If they had failed to do
this, it is easy to see that the fruits of the toils of centuries
would have been lost to the Church and the world. On
such a plan, progress in Theology would have been out of
the question. What Macaulay says of the Ancient Philos-
ophy would be equally true of Theology. The " Ancient
Philosophy," says he, was a " tread-mill and not a path.
It was made up of revolving questions, of controversies
that were always returning again. There was no accumu-
lation of truth, no heritage of truth acquired by the labor
of one generation and bequeathed to another, to be trans-
mitted again with large additions to a third. Where this
Philosophy was in the days of Cicero, there it continued to
be in the days of Seneca, and there it continued to be in
the days of Faverinus. There was every trace of intel-
lectual cultivation except a harvest. There was plenty of
ploughing and harrowing and reaping, but the garners con-
tained nothing but smut and stubble."

As to the sense in which our Articles of Faith are sub-

xii Charge.

scribed there arc three distinct views. The extreme posi-
tions never came into sharper conflict, perhaps, than during
the great controversy which, in the year 1741, rent in twain
the original Synod of Philadelphia. The Old Side, with ex-
treme strictness, insisted on an ipsissima verba subscription ;
a yoke which neither they nor their fathers before them had
been able to bear. The New Side, with extreme laxity,
were no less strenuous in maintaining that the Subscription
extends only to substance of Doctrine ; a phrase, which,
like the tent which the fairy presented in a nut-shell to
Prince Ahmed, may be easily expanded until it shall include
all shades of Theological opinion, from the straitest Augus-
tinianism on the one hand to the baldest Pelagianism on the
other. The true view lies at the middle point between
these extremes, and requires subscription to our Symbols as
containing the System of Doctrine taught in the Scriptures.
Subscription in the ipsissima verba sense is bondage. Sub-
scription in the " for substance of doctrine " sense is license.
Subscription in the Systematic sense is freedom regulated
by law, which is the only liberty worthy of the name.

Many present can easily recall the period in our National
history when grave Senators attempted to vindicate their
conduct in retaining their seats in Congress ; and, at the
same time, violating their oath to support the Constitution
of the United States on the ground that it contained pro-
visions which they could not in conscience observe. And
this ethical heresy has crept into the bosom of the Church ;
where. Ministers of Religion, on precisely the same plea,
would fain justify themselves in assailing the very Doctrines
they are under vows to defend. Let the supremacy of con-
science be acknowledged at all times and in all things. At
the same time, no man is at liberty to accept, or accepting,
to retain an oflice, knowing that it will precipitate a conflict
between the mandate of his conscience and the fulfillment
of his oath. Let the Senator be loyal to his conscience,
never faltering for a moment or swerving by a hair, in his
allegiance. But let him at the same time resign his seat in

Charge. xiii

Congress, and so absolve himself from the obligation of his
oath. And if in the Providence of God it should ever fall
out that you can no longer subscribe, and subscribe ex aimno,
the Doctrinal standards of the Presbyterian Church ; then,
at once and on the spot, restore inviolate to the Board of
Directors, the trust they have confided to your honor.

In requiring you to subscribe our Confession, I am per-
suaded that we impose on you no hardship. St. Simon tells
us that, like a pendulum in its arc, the world in its progress
is ever swinging between periods that are organic and periods
that are critical. It is in one of the critical ages that God
has cast our lot. It is an age when, in every department of
speculation and of action, the New is struggling to supplant
the Old. It is an age when the eye is armed with the micro-
scope and the hand with the scalpel. It is an age when
multitudes are refusing to listen to the message which the
Angel brings to us from the skies, because of their disgust
at a few particles of dust which, contracted in his flight, are
detected on his wings. It is an age when hand in hand
with the Schoolmaster, the Reviser is abroad in the land.

And yet, in this the most critical of the critical ages,
the instrument in which the Presbyterian Church confesses
her Faith has stood more than a hundred years as
unmoved, as unchanged as the rock Gibraltar. Aye, so
serenely has the faith of the Church reposed on the bosom
of her noble Confession that only recently has been started
the question as to the mode in which it may be constitution-
ally amended. Indeed, in such perplexity is this whole sub-
ject involved, that two of our most gifted Divines have
entered the arena as the respective champions of the two
opposite views between which the Church is divided. And
now that, like an indulgent mother, the Church has had
compassion on her disconsolate sons; and, Princeton to the
contrary notwithstanding, has licensed them to correct the
error of their earlier years by marrying the sisters of their
deceased wives, is there not good ground for the hope that
in the Articles that are left to us, still like the rock Gibraltar,

xiv Charge.

our venerable Confession will survive unchanged the shocks
of at least another century.

Passing to the manner of your teaching, I can touch only
a few points which my time will not suffer me to expand.

Let your teaching be pronounced in its Calvinism. The
common character of the Reformed Theology in its more
than thirty formularies is the Calvinism with which it is
pervaded. And the specific difference of Calvinism is the
emphasis with which it signalizes grace in all the parts and
at all the stages of a sinner's salvation. Am I mistaken
when I affirm that the doctrines of grace no longer ring from
our pulpits as they once did in the days of our fathers ?
Am I mistaken when I affirm that, in its reaction from the
sharpness with which the Five Points were formerly pressed,
the Church has swung to an extreme that is no less hurtful?
If it is true that "One swallow does not make a Spring," it
is also true that " Straws show how the wind blows." And
is there not some significance in the fact that the committee
charged with the duty of erecting in our national Capital a
suitable memorial to the father of Republicanism, whether
in the sphere of the Church or in the sphere of the State,
after exercising due diligence, and that too for a consider-
able period, was compelled to return and report to the As-
sembly that the temper of the Church would not warrant a
further prosecution of its task. It would be invidious to
attempt, on an occasion like this, to fix the responsibility
for such a state of things. But this I may say, and this.I
will say, that the needed reform must begin in our Semi-
naries. For the voices of the people are only the multitu-
dinous reverberations of the voice that issues from the
Pulpit ; and this, in turn, is only the echo of the voice that
issues from the Chair.

Let your teaching be popular in its form. It is hardly
necessary to remind you that your pupils will reproduce,
and that too in exaggerated forms, all that may be vicious
in your methods. If the bones that you serve out to your
classes are dry bones, rest assured that the bones which they

Charge. xv

in their turn will serve out to the people will be not dry
only, but very dry. I do not forget the distinction drawn
by Dr. Chalmers between the mode in which Theology
should be taught in the Hall, and the mode in which it
should be preached in the Pulpit ; at the same time I re-
member that those lectures delivered to his pupils in the
Hall were so profusely and brilliantly illustrated that close
thinking was made not possible only, but easy and delight-
ful even to the ordinary hearer. In the power to render
popular the abstruse truths of Theology, your late predeces-
sor was without a rival. It was never my fortune to hear
him lecture from his Chair; but the man who could hold,
as with a spell, the large and promiscuous audiences that
assembled in Philadelphia to hear his discussion of such
themes as "Predestination" and "God's Relation to the
World," must have been the very Prince of teachers before
his classes in the Seminary.

Let your teaching be evangelical in its spirit. As I utter
these words, there rises before me the venerable form of the
sainted Dr. Skinner. A close student to the last, the atmos-
phere which he always brought to his classes was more that
of the closet than of the study. In those wonderful prayers,
in which, lifting us in the arms of his faith, he bore us to
the very foot of the throne, how often have I seen him, as
in an ecstasy of devotion, his face shone like that of an
Angel. When the Scriptures would represent in a single
sentence the character of God, they tell us that God is love.
Let love for Christ and for souls so burn in your heart, and
beam from your features, and speak in your words, and
breathe in your spirit, that, as you go in and out before
your classes, you shall be, like the Master before you, your-
self the incarnation of love.

INAUGURAL ADDRESS.

BY

THE REV. BENJAMIN B. WARFIELD, D.D.

THE

IDEA OF SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY

CONSIDERED AS A SCIENCE.

PACE

I. — The Subject -Matter of Systematic The-
ology, 6-8

II. — The Presuppositions of Systematic Theol-
ogy, 8-12

III. — The Definition of Systematic Theology, . 12-15

IV. — The Sources of Systematic Theology, . 15-22

V. — The Place of Systematics in the Theolog-
ical Encyclopaedia, 22-28

VI. — The Place of Theology among the Sciences, 28-31

VII. — Systematic Theology a Progressive Science, 31-36

VIII. — Systematic Theology a Practical Science, 36-40

INAUGURAL ADDRESS.

Fathers and Brethren of the Board of Directors :

The signature which I have just affixed to the
pledge which with great propriety, as I beheve, you
require of those whom you call to the responsible
position of teachers in this Seminary, will have assured
you already of the matter of the doctrinal teaching
which is still to be expected in this institution.
Mourning as you do here to-day, with the renewed
grief which is brought back upon us all by the bus-
iness of the hour, with its teeming memories of those
great men of the past who have shed lustre on the
whole church from the chair into which you are now
inducting a new incumbent, may you not take some
comfort in being assured that, with however dimin-
ished power, the same theology is still to be taught
here that for three-quarters of a century gave to
Princeton Seminary a noble name in the world? It
was not my lot to know him who was called of God
to plant the first seeds in this garden of the Lord.
But it was my inestimable privilege to sit at the feet
of him who tended it and watered it until its fra-
grance went out over the whole earth. And I rejoice
to testify to you to-day that though the power of
Charles Hodge may not be upon me, the theology
of Charles Hodge is within me, and that this is the
theology which, according to my ability, I have it in
my heart to teach to the students of the coming

6 The Idea of Systematic Theology

years. Oh, that the mantle of my EHjah might fall
upon my shoulders ; at least the message that was
given to him is set within my lips.

In casting about for a subject germane to the oc-
casion on which I might address you, I have lighted
upon a line of thought which leads me to cast what I
have to say into the form of some somewhat desultory
remarks directed toward oudining the implications
that arise from our regarding systematic theology as
a science. I venture to state my subject, then, as

THE IDEA OF SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY CONSIDERED AS

A SCIENCE.

I am not sure that we always realize how much we
have already determined about theology, when we
have made the simple assertion concerning it, that it
is a science. In this single predicate is implicitly in-
cluded a whole series of affirmations which, taken
together, will give us a rather clear conception not
only of what theology is, but also of what it deals with,
Vi'hence it obtains its material, and for what purpose
it exists. It will be my object in this address to make
this plain to you.

I. First of all, then, let us observe that to say that
theology is a science is to deny that it is a historical
discipline, and to affirm that it seeks to discover not
what has been or is held to be true, but what is
ideally true ; in other words, it is to declare that it
deals with absolute truth and aims at orcranizinQf into
a concatenated system all the truth in its sphere.
Geology is a science, and on that very account there
cannot be two geologies ; its matter is all the well-

Considered as a Science. 7

authenticated facts in its sphere, and its aim is to
digest all these facts into one all-comprehending- sys-
tem. There may be rival psychologies, which fill the
world with vain jangling ; but they do not strive
together in order that they may obtain the right to
exist side by side in equal validity, but in strenuous
effort to supplant and supersede one another : there
can be but one true science of mind. In like manner,
just because theology is a science there can be but
one theology. This all-embracing system will brook
no rival in its sphere, and there can be two theologies
only at the cost of one or both of them being im-
perfect, incomplete, false. It is because theology is
often looked upon, in accordance with a somewhat
prevalent point of view, as a historical rather than a
scientific discipline, that it is so frequently spoken of
and defined as if it were but one of many similar
schemes of thought. There is no doubt such a thing
as Christian theology, as distinguished from Buddhist
theology or Mohammedan theology ; and men may
study it as the theological implication of Christianity
considered as one of the world's religions. But
when studied from this point of view, it forms a sec-
tion of a historical discipline and furnishes its share
of facts for a history of religions ; on the data sup-
plied by which a science or philosophy of religion
may in turn be based. We may also, no doubt,
speak of the Pelagian and Augustinian theologies, or
of the Calvinistic and Arminian theologies ; but,
again, we are speaking as historians and from a his-
torical point of view. The Pelagian and Augus-
tinian theolofjies are not two co-ordinate sciences
of theology; they are rival theologies. If one is

S The Idea of Systematic Theology

true, just so far the other is false, and there is but
one theolog-y. This we may identify, as an empirical
fact, with either or neither; but it is at all events one,
inclusive of all theological truth and exclusive of all
else as false or not germane to the subject.

In asserting that theology is a science, then, we as-
sert that in its subject-matter, it includes all the facts
belonging to that sphere of truth that we call theolog-
ical ; and w^e deny that it needs or will admit of limi-
tation by a discriminating adjectival definition. We
may speak of it as Christian theology just as we may
speak of it as true theology, if we mean thereby more
fully to describe what, as a matter of fact, theology is
found to be ; but not, if we mean thereby to discrimi-
nate it from some other assumed theology thus erected
to a co-ordinate position with it. We may describe
our method of procedure in attempting to ascertain
and organize the truths that come before us for build-
ing into the system, and so speak of logical or induc-
tive, of speculative or organic theology ; or we may
separate the one body of theology into its members,
and, just as we speak of surface and organic geology
or of physiological and direct psychology, so speak
of the theology of grace and of sin, or of natural and
revealed theology. But all these are but designations
of methods of procedure in dealing with the one
whole, or of the various sections that tooether con-
stitute the one whole, which in its completeness is the
science of theology, and which, as a science, is inclu-
sive of all the truth in its sphere, however ascertained,
however presented, however defended.

II. There is much more than this included, how-

. Considered as a Science. 9

ever, in calling theology a science. For the very ex-
istence of any science, three things are presupposed:
(i) the reality of its subject-matter; (2) the capacity
of the human mind to apprehend, receive into itself,
and rationalize this subject-matter ; and (3) some
medium of communication by which the subject-mat-
ter is brought before the mind and presented to it for
apprehension. There could be no astronomy, for ex-
ample, if there were no heavenly bodies. And though
the heavenly bodies existed, there could still be no
science of them were there no mind to apprehend
them. Facts do not make a science ; even facts as
apprehended do not make a science; they must be
not only apprehended, but also so far comprehended
as to be rationalized and thus combined into a corre-
lated system. The mind brings somewhat to every
science which is not included in the facts considered
in themselves alone, as isolated data, or even as data
perceived in relation to one another. Though they
be thus known, science is not yet ; and is not born
save throuGj^h the efforts of the mind in subsuming the
facts under its own intuitions and forms of thought.
No mind is satisfied with a bare cognition of facts :
its very constitution forces it on to a restless energy
until it succeeds in working these facts not onl)- into
a network of correlated relations among themselves,
but also into a rational body of thought correlated to
itself and its modes of thinking. The condition of
science, then, is that the facts which fall within its
scope shall be such as stand in relation not only to
our faculties, so that they may be apprehended ; but
also to our mental constitution so that they may be so
far understood as to be rationalized and wrought into

lo The Idea of Systematic Theology

a system relative to our thinking-. Thus a science of
aesthetics presupposes an aesthetic faculty, and a
science of morals a moral nature, as truly as a science
of logic presupposes a logical apprehension, and a
science of mathematics a capacity to comprehend the
relations of numbers. But still aixain, thouQ^h the
facts had real existence, and the mind were furnished
with a capacity for their reception and for a sympa-
thetic estimate and embracing of them in their rela-
tions, no science could exist were there no media by
which the facts should be brought before and communi-
cated to the mind. The transmitter and intermediat-
ing wire are as essential for telegraphing as the mes-
sage and the receiving instrument. Subjectively speak-
ing, sense perception is the essential basis of all science
of external things; self- consciousness, of internal
things. But objective media are also necessary. For
example, there could be no astronomy, were there no
trembling ether through whose delicate telegraphy
the facts of light and heat are transmitted to us from
the suns and systems of the heavens. Subjective and
objective conditions of communication must unite, be-
fore the facts that constitute the material of a science
can be placed before the mind that gives it its form.
The sense of sight is essential to astronomy : yet the
sense of sight would be useless for forming an as-
tronomy were there no objective ethereal messengers
to bring us news from the stars. With these an as-
tronomy becomes possible ; but how meagre an as-
tronomy compared with the new possibilities which
have opened out with the discovery of a new medium
of communication in the telescope, followed by still
newer media in the subtile instruments by which our

Conside7'ed as a Science, 1 1

modern investigators not only weigh the spheres in
their courses, but analyze them into their chemical
elements, map out the heavens in a chart, and sepa-
rate the suns into their primary constituents.

Like all other sciences, therefore, theology, for its
very existence as a science, presupposes the objective
reality of the subject-matter with which it deals ; the
subjective capacity of the human mind so far to un-
derstand this subject-matter as to be able to subsume
it under the forms of its thinking and to rationalize it
into not only a comprehensive but also a comprehen-
sible whole ; and the existence of trustworthy media of
communication by which the subject-matter is brought
to the mind and presented before it for perception
and understanding. That is to say: (i). The af-
firmation that theology is a science presupposes the
affirmation that God is, and that He has relation to
His creatures. Were there no God, there could be
no theology ; nor could there be a theology if, though
He existed, He existed out of relation with His
creatures. The whole body of philosophical apolo-
getics is, therefore, presupposed in and underlies the
structure of scientific theology. (2). The affirmation
that theology is a science presupposes the affirmation
that man has a religious nature, i. e., a nature capable
of understanding not only that God is, hut also, to
some extent, what He is ; not only that He stands in
relation with His creatures, but also what those rela-
tions are. Had man no religious nature he might,
indeed, apprehend, certain facts concerning God, but
he could not so understand Him in His relations to
man as to be able to respond to those facts in a true
and sympathetic embrace. The total product of the

1 2 The Idea of Systematic Theology

great science of religion, which investigates the nature
and workings of this element in man's mental consti-
tution, is therefore presupposed in and underlies the
structure of scientific theology. (3). The affirmation
that theology is a science presupposes the affirmation
that there are media of communication by which God
and Divine things are brought before the minds of
men, that they may perceive them, and in perceiving,
understand them. In other words, when we affirm
'that theology is a science, we affirm not only the re-
ality of God's existence and our capacity so far to un-
derstand Him, but we affirm that He has made Him-
self known to us, — we affirm the objective reality of
a revelation. Were there no revelation of God to
men, our capacity to understand Him would lie dor-
mant and unawakened ; and though He really existed
it would be to us as if He were not. There would be
a God to be known and a mind to know Him; but
theology would be as impossible as if there were nei-
ther the one nor the other. Not only, then, philosoph-
ical, but also, if there be a written revelation, the whole
mass of historical apologetics by which the reality of
a written revelation is vindicated, is presupposed in and
underlies the structure of scientific theology.

III. In thus developing the implications of calling
theology a science, we have already gone far toward
determining our exact conception of what theology is.
We have in effect, for example, settled our definition
of theology. A science is defined from its subject-
matter ; and the subject-matter of theology is God in
His nature and in His relations with His creatures.
Theology is therefore that science which treats of

Considered as a Science. 13

God and of the relations between God and the uni-
verse. To this definition most theologians have act-
ually come. And those who define theology as "the
science of God," mean the term God in abroad sense
as inclusive also of His relations ; while others ex-
hibit their sense of the need of this inclusiveness by
calling it " the science of God and of Divine things ";
while still others speak of it more loosely, as " the
science of the supernatural." These definitions fail
rather in precision of language than in correctness of
conception. Others, however, go astray in the con-
ception itself Thus theologians of the school of
Schleiermacher usually derive their definition from
the sources rather than the subject-matter of the
science, — and so speak of theology as "the science
of faith " or the like ; a thoroughly unscientific pro-
cedure, even though our view of the sources be com-
plete and unexceptionable, which is certainly not the
case with this school. Quite as confusing is it to de-
fine theology, as is very currently done and often as
an outgrowth of this same subjective tendency, as
"the science of religion," or even — pressing the his-
torical conception which as often underlies this type
of definition, to its greatest extreme, — as "the
science of the Christian religion." Theology and re-
ligion are parallel products of the same body of facts
in diverse spheres ; the one in the sphere of thought
and the other in the sphere of life. And the definition
of theology as "the science of religion" thus con-
founds the product of the facts concerning God and
His relations with His creatures working through the
hearts and lives of men, with those facts themselves ;
and consequently, whenever strictly understood, bases

14 The Idea of Systematic Theology

theolog-y not on the facts of the divine revelation, but
on the facts of the religious life. This leads ultimate-
ly to a confusion of the two distinct disciplines of the-
ology, the subject-matter of which is objective, and
the science of religion, the subject-matter of which is
subjective ; with the effect of lowering the data of
theology to the level of the aspirations and imagin-
ings of man's own heart. Wherever this definition is
found, either a subjective conception of theology
which reduces it to a branch of psychology, may be
suspected, or else a historical conception of it, a con-
ception of " Christian theology" as one of the many
theologies of the world parallel with, even if unspeak-
ably truer than, the others with which it is classed
and in conjunction with which it furnishes us with a
full account of religion. When so conceived, it is
natural to take a step further and permit the method-
ology of the science, as well as its idea, to be deter-
mined by its distinguishing element : thus theology,
in contradiction to its very name, becomes Christo-
centric. No doubt, " Christian theology," as a his-
torical discipline, is Christo-centric; it is by its doc-
trine of redemption that it is differentiated from all
the other theologies that the world has known. But
theology as a science is and must be Theo-centric.
So soon as we firmly grasp it from the scientific point
of view, we see that there can be but one science of
God and of His relations to His universe, and we no
longer seek a point of discrimination, but rather a cen-
tre of development ; and we quickly see that there
can be but one centre about which so comprehensive
a subject-matter can be organized, — the conception
of God. He that hath seen Christ, has beyond doubt

Considered as a Science. 15

seen the Father ; but it is one thing to make Him
the centre of theolog^y so far as He is one with God,
and another thing to organize all theology around
Him as the theanthropos and in His specifically
theanthropic work.

IV. Not only, however, is our definition of theology
thus set for us : we have also determined in advance
our conception of its sources. We have already made
use of the term " revelation," to designate the medium
by which the facts concerning God and His relations
to His creatures are brought before men's minds, and
so made the subject-matter of a possible science. The
word accurately describes the condition of all knowl-
edge of God. If there be a God, it follows by strin-^
gent necessity, that He can be known only so far as
He reveals Himself And it is but the converse of
this, that if there be no revelation, there can be no
knowledge, and, of course, no systematized knowl-
edge or science of God. Our reaching up to Him in
thought and inference is possible only because He con-
descends to make Himself intelligible to us, to speak
to us through word or work, to reveal Himself We
hazard nothing, therefore, in saying that, as the con-
dition of all theology is a revealed God, so, without
limitation, the sole source of theology is revelation.

In so speaking, however, we have no thought
of doubting that God's revelation of Himself is "in
divers manners." We have no desire to deny that
He has never left man without witness of His eternal
power and Godhead, or that He has multiplied the
manifestations of Himself in nature and providence
and grace, so that every generation has had abiding

1 6 The Idea of Systeniaiie Theology

and unmistakable evidence that He is, that He is the
good God, and that He is a God who marketh iniquity.
Under the broad skirts of the term " revelation," every
method of manifesting Himself which God uses in
communicating knowledge of His being and attributes,
may find shelter for itself — whether it be through those
visible things of nature whereby His invisible things
are clearly seen, or through the constitution of the
human mind with its causal judgment indellibly
stamped upon it, or through that voice of God that
we call conscience, which proclaims His moral law
within us, or through His providence in which He
makes bare His arm for the government of the na-
tions, or through the exercises of His grace, our
experience under the tutelage of the Holy Ghost — or
whether it be through the open visions of His proph-
ets, the divinely-breathed pages of His written Word,
the divine life of the Word Himself. How God re-
veals Himself — in what divers manners He makes
Himself known to His creatures, is thus the subse-
quent question by raising which we distribute the
one source of theology, revelation, into the various
methods of revelation, each of which brings us true
knowledge of God, and all of which must be taken
account of in building- our knowledofe into one all-
comprehending system. It is the accepted method
of theology to infer that the God that made the eye
must Himself see ; that the God who sovereignly
distributes His favors in the secular world may be
sovereign too in grace ; that the heart that condemns
itself but repeats the condemnation of the greater
God ; that the songs of joy in which the Christian's
happy soul voices its sense of God's gratuitous mercy,

Considered as a Science. 17

are valid evidence that God has really dealt graciously
with it. It is with no reserve that we accept all these
sources of knowledge of God — nature, providence,
Christian experience — as true and valid sources, the
well-authenticated data yielded by which are to be
received by us as revelations of God, and as such to
be placed alongside of the revelations in the written
Word and wrought with them into one system. As
a matter of fact, theologians have always so dealt
with them ; and doubtless they always will so deal
with them.

But to perceive, as all must perceive, that every
method by which God manifests Himself is, so far as
this manifestation can be clearly interpreted, a source
of knowledge of Him, and must, therefore, be taken
account of in framing all our knowledge of Him into
one organic whole, is far from allowing that there are
no differences among these various manifestations, in
the amount of revelation they give, the clearness of
their message; the case and certainty with which they
may be interpreted, or the importance of the special
truths which they are fitted to convey. Far rather is
it a prio7-i likely that if there are "divers manners"
in which God has revealed Himself, He has not re-
vealed precisely the same message through each ;
that these " divers manners " correspond also to divers
messages of divers degrees of importance, delivered
with divers deQfrees of clearness. And the mere fact
that He has included in these "divers manners" a copi-
ous revelation in .a written Word, delivered with an
authenticating accompaniment of signs and miracles,
proved by recorded prophecies with their recorded
fulfilments, and pressed, with the greatest solemnity,

1 8 The Idea of Systematic Theology

upon the attention and consciences of men as the very
Word of the Living God, who has by it made fooHsh-
ness all the wisdom of men ; nay, proclaimed as con-
taining within itself the formulation of His truth, the
proclamation of His law, the discovery of His plan of
salvation : — this mere fact, I say, would itself and prior
to all comparison, raise an overwhelming presump-
tion that all the others of "the divers manners" of
God's revelation were insufficient for the purposes for
which revelation is given, whether on account of de-
fect in the amount of their communication or insuffi-
ciency of attestation or uncertainty of interpretation
or fatal onesidedness in the character of the revelation
they are adapted to give. We need not be surprised,
therefore, that on actual examination, all these imper-
fections are found undeniably to attach to all forms of
what we may, for the sake of discrimination, speak of
as mere manifestations of God ; and that thus the
revelation of God in His written Word — in which are
included the only authentic records of the revelation
of Him through the incarnate Word — is easily shown
not only to be incomparably superior to all other mani-
festations of Him in the fulness, richness, and clear-
ness of its communications, but also to contain the
sole discovery of all that it is most important for the
soul to know as to its state and destiny, and of all
that is most precious in our whole body of theological
knowledge. The superior lucidity of this revelation
makes it the norm of interpretation for what is re-
vealed so much more darkly through the other
methods of manifestation. The glorious character of
the discoveries made in it, drives all other manifesta-
tions back into comparative insignificance. The amaz-

Considered as a Science. 19

ing fulness of its disclosures renders the litde that they
can tell us of small comparative value. And its abso-
lute completeness for the needs of man, taking up and
reiteratingly repeating in the clearest of language all
that can be, only after much difficulty and with much
uncertainty, wrung from their enigmatic indications,
and then adding to this a vast body of still more im-
portant truth undiscoverable through them, all but
supersedes their necessity. With the fullest recog-
nition of the validity of all the knowledge of God and
His ways \\\\\\ men, which can be obtained through
the manifestations of His power and divinity in nature
and history and grace ; and the frankest allowance
that the written Word is given, not to destroy the
manifestations of God, but to fulfill them; the theo-
logian must yet refuse to give these sources of knowl-
edge a place alongside of the written Word, in any
other sense than that he gladly admits that they, alike
with it, but in unspeakably lower measure, do tell us
somewhat of God, And nothing can be a clearer in-
dication of a decadent theology or of a decaying faith,
than a tendency to neglect the Word in favor of some
one or of all of the lesser sources of theological truth,
as fountains from which to draw our knowledofe of
divine things. This were to prefer the flickering rays
of a taper to the blazing light of the sun ; to elect to
draw our w^ater from a muddy run rather than to dip
it from the broad bosom of the pure fountain itself.

Nevertheless, men have often sought to still the
cravings of their souls with a purely natural theology ;
and there are men to-day who prefer to derive their
knowledge of what God is and what He will do for
man from an analysis of the implications of their own

20 The Idea of Systematic Theology

religious feelings : not staying to consider that nature,
" red in tooth and claw with ravin," can but direct
our eyes to the God of law, whose deadly letter
killeth ; or that our feelings must needs point us to
the God of our imperfect apprehensions or of our
unsanctified desires, — not to the God that is, so much
as to the God that we would fain should be. The
natural result of resting on the revelations of nature
is despair ; while the inevitable end of making our
appeal to even the Christian heart is to make for
ourselves refuges of lies in which there is neither
truth nor safety. We may, indeed, admit that it is
valid reasoning to infer from the nature of the Chris-
tian life what are the modes of God's activities toward
His children : to sec, for instance, in conviction of
sin and the sudden peace of the new-born soul, God's
hand in slaying that He may make alive. His almighty
power in raising the spiritually dead. Bufhow easy
to overstep the limits of valid inference ; and, for-
getting that it is the body of Christian truth known
and consciously assimilated that determines the type
of Christian experience, confuse in our inferences
what is from man with what is from God, and con-
dition and limit our theology by the undeveloped
Christian thouQfht of the man or his times. The in-
terpretation of the data included in what we have
learned to call " the Christian consciousness," whether
ot the individual or of the church at large, is a pro-
cess so delicate, so liable to error, so inevitably
swayed to this side or that by the currents that flow up
and down in the soul, that probably few satisfactory
inferences could be drawn from it, had we not the
norm of Christian experience and its dogmatic impli-

Considered as a Scie?tce. 21

cations recorded for us in the perspicuous pages of
the written word. But even were we to suppose that
the interpretation was easy and secure, and that we
had before us in an infalhble formulation, all the im-
plications of the religious experience of all the men
who have ever known Christ, we have no reason
to believe that the whole body of facts thus obtained,
would suffice to give us a complete theology. After
all, we know in part and we fed in part ; it is only
when that which is perfect shall appear that we shall
know or experience all that Christ has in store for
us. With the fullest acceptance, therefore, of the
data of the theology of this feelings, no less than
of natural theology, when their results are validly
obtained and sufficiently authenticated as trustworthy,
as divinely revealed facts which must be wrought
into our system, it remains nevertheless true that
we should be confined to a meagre and doubtful the-
ology were these data not confirmed, reinforced, and
supplemented by the surer and fuller revelations of
Scripture ; and that the Holy Scriptures are the
source of theology in not only a degree, but also a
sense in which nothing else is.

There might be a theology without the Scriptures,
— a theology of nature, gathered by painful, and slow,
and doubtful processes from what man saw around him
in external nature and the course of history, and what
he saw within him of nature and of grace. In like
manner there may be and has been an astronomy of
nature, gathered by man in his natural state without
help from aught but his naked eyes, as he watched
in the fields by night. Hut what is this astronomy
of nature to the astronomy that has become possible

2 2 The Idea of Systematic Theology

through the wonderful appliances of our observa-
tories ? The Word of God is to theology as, but
vastly more than, these instruments are to astronomy.
• It is the instrument which so far increases the possi-
bilities of the science as to revolutionize it and to
place it upon a height from which it can never more
descend. What would be thoueht of the deluded
man, who, discarding the new methods of research,
should insist on acquiring all the astronomy which he
would admit, from the unaided observation of his
own myopic and astigmatic eyes? INIuch more de-
luded is he who, neglecting the instrument of God's
word written, would confine his admissions of theo-
logical truth to what he could discover from the
broken lights that play upon external nature, and the
faint gleams of a dying or even a slowly reviving
light, which arise in his own sinful soul. Ah, no !
the telescope first made a real science of astronomy
possible : and the Scriptures form the only sufficing
and thoroughly infallible source of theology.

V. Under such a conception of its nature and
sources, we are driven to consider the place of system-
atic theology among the other theological disciplines as
well as among the other sciences in general. Without
encroaching upon the details of Theological Encyclo-
paedia, we may adopt here the usual fourfold distribu-
tion of the theological disciplines into the Exegetical,
the Historical, the Systematic, and the Practical, with
only the correction of prefixing to them a fifth depart-
ment of Apologetical Theology. The place of System-
atic Theology in this distribution is determined by its
relation to the preceding disciplines, of which it is

Considered as a Science. 23

the crown and head. Apologetical theology prepares
the wa}^ for all theology by establishing its necessary
presuppositions without which no theology is possi-
ble— the existence and essential nature of God, the •
religious nature of man which enables him to receive
a revelation from God, the possibility of a revelation
and its actual realization in the Scriptures. It thus
places the Scriptures in our hands for investigation
and study. Exegetical theology receives these in-
spired writings from the hands of apologetics, and in-
vestigates their meaning ; presenting us with a body
of detailed and substantiated results, culminatino- in
a series of organized systems of biblical history, bibli-
cal ethics, biblical theology, and the like, which pro-
vide material for further use in the more advanced
disciplines. Historical theology investigates the pro-
gressive realization of Christianity in the lives, hearts,
\vorship, and thought of men, issuing not only in a
full account of the history of Christianity, but also in
a body of facts which come into use in the more ad-
vanced disciplines, especially in the way of the sifted
results of the reasoned thinking and deep experience
of Christian truth during the whole past, as well as of
the manifold experiments that have been made during
the ages in Christian organization, worship, living,
and creed-building. Systematic theology does not
fail to strike its roots deeply into this matter furnished
by historical theology ; it knows how to profit by the
experience of all past generations in their efforts to
understand and define, to systematize and defend re-
vealed truth ; and it thinks of nothing so little as
lightly to discard the conquests of so many hard-
fought fields. It therefore gladly utilizes all the ma-

24 TJic Idea of Systematic Theology

terial that historical theology brings it, accounting it,
indeed, the very precipitate of the Christian conscious-
ness of the past ; but it does not use it crudely, or
at first hand for itself, but accepts it as investigated,
explained, and made available by the sister discipline
of historical theology which alone can understand it
or draw from it its true lessons. It certainly does not
find in it its chief or primary source, and its relation
to historical theology is, in consequence, far less close
than that in which it stands to exegetical theology
which is its true and especial handmaid. The inde-
pendence of exegetical theology is seen in the fact that
it does its work wholly without thought or anxiety as
to the use that is to be made of its results ; and that
it furnishes a vastly larger body of data than can be
utilized by any one discipline. It provides a body of
historical, ethical, liturgic, ecclesiastical facts, as well
as a body of theological facts. But so far as its theo-
logical facts are concerned, it provides them chiefly
that they may be used by systematic theology as ma-
terial out of which to build its system. This is not to
forget the claims of biblical theology. It is rather to
emphasize its value, and to afford occasion for ex-
plaining its true place in the encyclopaedia, and its true
relations on the one side to exegetical theology, and
on the other to systematics, — a matter which appears
to be even yet imperfectly understood in some quar-
ters. Biblical theology is not a section of historical
theology, although it must be studied in a historical
spirit, and has a historical face ; it is rather the ripest
fruit of exegetics, and exegetics has not performed its
full task until its scattered results in the way of theo-
logical data are gathered up into a full and articulated

Considered as a Science. 25

system of biblical theology. It is to be hoped that
the time will come when no commentary will be con-
sidered complete until the capstone is placed upon its
fabric by closing chapters gathering up into systema-
tized exhibits, the unsystematized results of the con-
tinuous exegesis of the text, in the spheres of history,
ethics, theology, and the like. The task of biblical
theology, in a word, is the task of co-ordinating the
scattered results of continuous execfesis into a con-
catenated whole, whether with reference to a single
book of Scripture or to a body of related books or to
the whole Scriptural fabric. Its chief object is not to
find differences of conception between the various
writers, though some recent students of the subject
seem to think this is so much their duty, that when
they cannot find differences, they make them. It is
to reproduce the theological thought of each writer
or group of writers in the form in which it lay in their
own minds, so that we may be enabled to look at all
their theological statements at their angle, and to
understand all their deliverances as modified and con-
ditioned by their own point of view. Its exegetical
value lies just in this circumstance, that it is only when
we have thus concatenated an author's theological
statements into a whole, that we can be sure that we
understand them as he understood them in detail. A
light is inevitably thrown back from biblical theology
upon the separate theological deliverances as they
occur in the text, such as subtilely colors ihem, and
often, for the first time, gives them to us in their true
setting, and thus enables us to guard against pervert-
ing them when we adapt them to our use. This is a
noble function, and could students of biblical theology

26 The Idea of Systematic Theology

only firmly grasp it, once for all, as their task, it would
prevent the brino-ing this important science into con-
tempt through a tendency to exaggerate differences in
• form of statement into divergences of view, and so to
force the deliverances of each book into a stranofe
and unnatural combination, in their effort to vindicate
a function for their discipline.

The relation of biblical theoloo^y to systematic the-
ology is based on a true view of its function. Sys-
tematic theology is not founded on the direct and
primary results of the exegetical process ; it is found-
ed on the final and complete results of exegesis as ex-
hibited in biblical theology. Not exegesis itself,
then, but biblical theology, provides the material for
systematics. It is not, then, a rival of systematics ;
it is not even a parallel product of the same body of
facts, provided by exegesis ; it is the basis and source
of systematics. Systematic theology is not a con-
catenation of the scattered theologfical data furnished
by the exegetic process ; it is the combination of the
already concatenated data given to it by biblical the-
ology. It uses the individual data furnished by exe-
gesis, in a word, not crudely, not independently for
itself, but only after these data have been worked up
into biblical theology and have received from it their
final coloring and subtlest shades of meaning — in
other words, only in their true sense, and only after
exegetics has said its last word upon them. Just as
we shall attain our finest and truest conception of the
person and work of Christ, not by crudely trying to
combine the scattered details of His life and teachinor
as given in our four gospels into one patchwork life
and account of His teaching ; but far more rationally

Considered as a Science. 27

and far more successfully by first catching Matthew's
full conception of Jesus, and then Mark's, and then
Luke's, and then John's, and combining these four
conceptions into one rounded whole : — so we gain our
truest systematics not by at once working together
the separate dogmatic statements in the Scriptures,
but by combining them in their due order and propor-
tion as they stand in the various theologies of the
Scriptures. Thus we are enabled to view the future
whole not only in its parts, but in the several combi-
nations of the parts, and, looking at it from every
side, to obtain a true conception of its solidity and
strength, and to avoid all exaggeration or falsification
of the details in giving them place in the completed
structure. And thus we do not make our theology,
according to our own pattern, as a mosaic, out of the
fragments of the biblical teaching; but rather look
out from ourselves upon it as a great prospect, framed
out of the mountains and plains of the theologies of
the Scriptures, and strive to attain a point of view from
which we can bring the whole landscape into our field
of sight. From this point of view, we find no difficulty
in understanding the relation in which the several disci-
plines stand to one another, with respect to their con-
tents. The material that systematics draws from other
than biblical sources may be here left out of account,
seeing that we are now investigating its relations, con-
sidered as a biblical discipline, to its fellow biblical
departments. The actual contents of the theological
results of the exegetic process, of biblical theology,
and of systematics, with this limitation, may be said
to be the same. The immediate work of exegesis may
be compared to the work of a recruiting officer : it

28 The Idea of Systeitiatic Theology

draws out from the mass of mankind the men who are
to constitute the army. BibHcal theology organizes
these men into companies and regiments and corps,
arranged in marching order and accoutred for service.
Systematic theology combines these companies and
regiments and corps into an army drawn up in battle
array against the enemy of the day. It, too, is com-
posed of men — the same men which were recruited by
exegetics ; but it is composed of these men, not as
individuals merely, but in their due relations to the
other men of their companies and regiments and
corps. The simile not only illustrates the mutual re-
lations of the disciplines, but also suggests the histor-
ical element that attaches to biblical theology, and the
polemic or practical element which is inseparable from
systematic theology as distinguished from a merely
biblical dogmatic. It is just this polemico-practical ele-
ment, determining the spirit and therefore the methods
of systematic theology, which, along with its greater
inclusiveness, discriminates it from all forms of biblical
theology the spirit of which is purely historical.

VI. The place that theology claims for itself, as
the scientific presentation of all the facts that are
known concerning God and His relations, within the
circle of the sciences, is an equally high one. Whether
we consider the topics which it treats, in their dignity,
their excellence, their grandeur ; or the certainty
with which its data can be determined ; or the com-
pleteness with which its principles have been ascer-
tained and its details classified ; or the usefulness and
importance of its discoveries : it is as far out of all
comparison above all other sciences as the eternal

Considered as a Science. 29

health and destiny of the soul are of more value than
this fleeting life in this world. It is not so above
them, however, as not to be also within them. There
is no one of them all which is not in some measure
touched and affected by it, or, we may even say,
which is not in some measure included in it. As all
nature, whether mental or material, may be conceived
of as only the mode in which God manifests Himself,
every science which investigates nature and ascer-
tains its laws, is occupied with the discovery of the
modes of the Divine action, and as such might be
considered a branch of theology. Its closest rela-
tions are, no doubt, with the highest of the other
sciences, ethics. Any discussion of our duty to God
must rest on a knowledge of our relation to Him ;
and much of our duty to man Is undlscoverable, save
through knowledge of our common relation to the
one God and Father of all, and one Lord the Re-
deemer of all, and one Spirit the sanctifier of all, — all
of which it is the function of theology to supply. This
is not Inconsistent with the existence of a natural
ethics ; but an ethics independent of theological con-
ceptions would be a meagre thing indeed, while the
theology of the Scriptural revelation for the first time
affords a basis for ethical investigation at once broad
enough and sure enough to raise that science to its
true dignity. Neither must we on the ground of this
intimacy of relation confound the two sciences of
theology and ethics. Something like it in kind and
approaching it in degree exists between theology and
every other science, no one of which is so Independ-
ent of it as not to touch and be touched by it. Much
of theology is presupposed in all metaphysics and

30 The Idea of Systematic Theology

physics alike. It alone can determine the origin of
either matter or mind, or of the mystic powers that
have been granted to them. It alone can explain the
nature of second causes and set the boundaries to
their efficiency. It alone is competent to declare the
meaning of the ineradicable persuasion of the human
mind that its reason is right reason, its processes
trustworthy, its intuitions true. All science without
God is mutilated science, and no account of a single
branch of knowledge can ever be complete until it is
pushed back to find its completion and ground in
Him. It is as true of sciences as it is of creatures, that
in Him they all live and move and have their being.
The science of Him and His relations is thus the
necessary ground of all science. All speculation
takes us back to Him; all inquiry presupposes Him;
and every phase of science consciously or uncon-
sciously rests at every step on the science that makes
Him known. Theology, thus, both lies at the root of
all sciences, and brings to each its capstone and crown.
Each could, indeed, exist without it, in a sense and
in some degree ; but through it alone can any one
of them reach its true dignity. Herein we see
not only the proof of its greatness, but also the as-
surance of its permanence. " What so permeates all
sections and subjects of human thought, has a deep
root in human nature and an immense hold on it.
What so possesses man's mind that he cannot think
at all without thinking of it, is so bound up with the
very being of intelligence that ere it can perish, in-
tellect must cease to be." *

Principal Fairbairn.

Considered as a Science. 31

VII. The interpretation of a written document, in-
tended to convey a plain message, is infinitely easier
than the interpretation of the teaching embodied in
facts themselves. It is therefore that systematic
treatises on the several sciences are written. The-
ology has, therefore, an immense advantage over all
other sciences, inasmuch as it is more an inductive
study of facts conveyed in a written revelation, than an
inductive study of facts as conveyed in life. It was,
consequently, the first-born of the sciences. It was
the first to reach relative completeness. And it is to-
day in a state far nearer perfection than any other
science. This is not, however, to deny that it is a
progressive science. In exactly the same sense
(though not in equal degree) in which any other
science is progressive, this is progressive. It is not
meant that new revelations are to be expected, or
new discoveries made, of truth which has not been
before within the reach of man. There is a vast dif-
ference between the progress of a science and increase
in its material. All the facts of psychology, for in-
stance, have been in existence so long as mind itself
has existed ; and the progress of this science has
been dependent on the progressive discovery, under-
standing, and systematization of these facts. All the
facts of theology have, in like manner, been within
the reach of man for nearly two millenniums ; and
the progress of theology is dependent on men's prog-
ress in gathering, defining, mentally assimilating,
and organizing these facts into a correlated system.
So long as revelation was not completed, the pro-
gressive character of theology was secured by the
progress in revelation itself. And since the close of

32 The Idea of Systematic Theology

the canon of Scripture, the intellectual realization and
definition of the doctrines revealed in it, in relation
to one another, have been, as a mere matter of fact, a
slow but ever advancing process. The affirmation
that theology has been a progressive science is no
more, then, than to assert that it is a science that has
had a history, — and a history which can be and should
be genetically traced and presented. First, the ob-
jective side of Christian truth was developed : pressed
on the one side by the crass monotheism of the Jews
and on the other by the coarse polytheism of the hea-
then, and urged on by its own internal need of under-
standing the sources of its life, Christian theology
first searched the Scriptures that it might understand
the nature and modes of existence of its God and the
person of its divine redeemer. Then, more and niore
conscious of itself, it more and more fully wrought out
from those same Scriptures a guarded expression of
the subjective side of its faith ; until through throes
and conflicts it has built up the system which we all
inherit. Thus the body of Christian truth has come
down to us in the form of an organic growth ; and
we can conceive of the completed structure as the
ripened fruit of the ages, as truly as we can think of
it as the perfected result of the exegetical discipline.
As it has come into our possession by this historic
process, there is no reason that we can assign why
it should not continue to make for itself a history.
We do not expect the history of theology to close in
our own day. However nearly completed our real-
ization of the body of truth may seem to us to be ;
however certain it is that the great outlines are al-
ready securely laid and most of the details soundly

Considered as a Science. 33

discovered and arranged ; no one will assert that
every detail is as yet perfected, and we are all living
in the confidence so admirably expressed by old John
Robinson, " that God hath more truth yet to break
forth from His holy word." Just because God gives
us the truth in single threads which we must weave
into the reticulated texture, all the threads are always
within our reach, but the finished texture is ever and
will ever continue to be before us until we dare affirm
that there is no truth in the word which we have not
perfectly apprehended, and no relation of these truths
as revealed which we have not perfectly understood,
and no possibility in clearness of presentation which
we have not attained.

The conditions of progress in theology are clearly
discernible from its nature as a science. The pro-
gressive men in any science are the men who stand
firmly on the basis of the already ascertained truth.
The condition of progress in building the structures
of those great cathedrals whose splendid piles glorify
the history of art in the middle ages, was that each
succeeding generation should build upon the founda-
tions laid by its predecessor. If each architect had
begun by destroying what had been accomplished by
his forerunners, no cathedral would ever have been
raised. The railroad is pushed across the continent
by the simple process of laying each rail at the end
of the line already laid. The prerequisite of all prog-
ress is a clear discrimination which as frankly ac-
cepts the limitations set by the truth already dis-
covered, as it rejects the false and bad. Construc-
tion is not destruction ; neither is it the outcome of
destruction. There are abuses no doubt to be re-

34 ^/^^ /<^r^ of Systematic Theology

formed ; errors to correct ; falsehoods to cut away.
But the history of progress in every science and no
less in theology, is a story of impulses given, corrected
and assimilated. And when they have been once cor-
rected and assimilated, these truths are to remain ac-
cepted. It is then time for another impulse, and the
condition of all further progress is to place ourselves
in this well-marked line of growth. Astronomy, for
example, has had such a history ; and there are now
some indisputable truths in astronomy, as, for in-
stance, the rotundity of the earth and the central
place of the sun in our system. I do not say that
these truths are undisputed ; probably nothing is any
more undisputed in astronomy, or any other science,
than in theology. At all events he who wishes, may
read the elaborate arguments of the "Zetetic" phi-
losophers, as they love to call themselves, who in this
year of grace are striving to prove that the earth is
flat and occupies the centre of our system. Quite in
the same spirit, there are " Zetetic " theologians who
strive with similar zeal and acuteness to overturn the
established basal truths of theology, — which, how-
ever, can -never more be shaken ; and we should
give about as much ear to them in the one science
as in the other. It is utter folly to suppose that prog-
ress can be made otherwise than by placing our-
selves in the line of progress ; and if the temple of
God's truth is ever to be completely built, we must
not spend our efforts in digging at the foundations
which have been securely laid in the distant past, but
must rather give our best efforts to rounding the
arches, carving the capitals, and fitting in the fretted
roof. What if it is not ours to lay foundations ? Let

Considered as a Science. 35

us rejoice that that work has been done ! Happy are
Ave if our God will permit us to bring- a single cap-
stone into place. This fabric is not a house of cards
to be built and blown down again an hundred times a
day, as the amusement of our idle hours : it is a
miracle of art to which all ao^es and lands brine their
various tribute. The subtile Greek laid the founda-
tions ; the law-loving Roman raised high the walls ;
and all the perspicuity of France and ideality of Ger-
many and systematization of Holland and deep so-
briety of Britain have been expended in perfecting
the structure ; and so it grows. We have heard
much in these last days of the phrase, " Progressive
orthodoxy," and in somewhat strange connections.
Nevertheless, the phrase itself is not an inapt descrip-
tion of the buildinor of this theolog-ical house. Let
us assert that the history of theology has been and
ever must be a progressive orthodoxy. But let us
equally loudly assert that progressive orthodoxy and
retrogressive heterodoxy can scarcely be convertible
terms. Progressive orthodoxy implies that first of
all we are orthodox, and secondly that we are pro-
gressively orthodox, i. e., that we are ever growing
more and more orthodox as more and more truth
is being established. This has been and must
be the history of the advance of every science, and
not less, among them, of the science of theology.
Justin Martyr, champion of the orthodoxy of his
day, held a theory of the intertrinitarian relationship
which became heterodoxy after the Council of Nice ;
the ever-struesflinsf Christoloeics of the earlier a^es
were forever set aside by the Chalcedon fathers ;
Augustine determined for all time the doctrine ^of

o

6 The Idea of Systematic Theology

grace, Anselm the doctrine of the atonement, Luther
the doctrine of forensic justification. In any pro-
gressive science, the amount of departure from ac-
cepted truth which is possible to the sound thinker
becomes thus ever less and less, in proportion as in-
vestigation and study result in the progressive estab-
lishment of an ever increasing number of facts. The
physician who would bring back to-day the medicine
of Galen would be no more mad than the theologian
who would revive the theology of Clement of Alex-
andria. Both were men of lio-ht and leadinof in their
time ; but their time is past, and it is the privilege of the
child of to-day to know a sounder physic and a sounder
theology than the giants of that far past yesterday
could attain. It is of the very essence of our position
at the end of the ages that we are ever more and more
hedged around with ascertained facts, the discovery
and establishment of which constitute the very es-
sence of progress. Progress brings progressive limi-
tation, just because it brings progressive knowledge.
And as the orthodox man is he that teaches no other
doctrine than that which has been established as true ;
the progressively orthodox man is he who is quick to
perceive, admit, and condition all his reasoning by all
the truth down to the latest, which has been estab-
lished as true.

VIII. When we speak of progress our eyes are set
upon a goal. And in calling theology a progressive
science we unavoidably raise the inquiry, what the
end and purpose is toward an ever-increasing fitness
to secure which it is continually growing. When we
consider the surpassing glory of the subject-matter

Considered as a Science. 2>7

with which it deals, it would appear that if ever sci-
ence existed for its own sake, this might surely be true
of this science. The truths concerning God and His
relations are, above all comparison, in themselves the
most worthy of all truths of study and examination.
Yet we must vindicate for theology rather that it is
an eminently practical science. The contemplation
and exhibition of Christianity as truth, is far from the
end of the matter. This truth is specially communi-
cated by God for a purpose, for which it is admirably
adapted. That purpose is to save and sanctify the
soul. And the discovery, study, and systematization
of the truth is in order that, firmly grasping it and
thoroughly comprehending it in all its reciprocal rela-
tions, we may be able to make the most efficient use
of it for its holy purpose. Well worth our most labori-
ous study, then, as it is, for its own sake as mere
truth ; it becomes not only absorbingly interesting, but
inexpressibly precious to us when we bear in mind
that the truth with which we thus deal constitutes, as
a whole, the engrafted Word that is able to save our
souls. The task of thoroughly exploring the pages
of revelation, soundly gathering from them their treas-
ures of theological teaching and carefully fitting these
into their due places in a system whereby they may
be preserved from misunderstanding, perversion, and
misuse, and given a new power to convince the under-
standing, move the heart, and quicken the will, be-
comes thus a holy duty to our own and our brothers'
souls as well as our eager pleasure of our intellectual
nature. That the knowledge of the truth is an essen-
tial prerequisite to the production of those graces and
the building up of those elements of a sanctilied char-

o

8 The Idea of Systematic Theology

acter for the production of which each truth is especi-
ally aaapted, probably no one denies : but surely it is
equally true that the clearer, fuller, and more dis-
criminating this knowledge is, the more certainly and
richly will it produce its appropriate effect ; and in this
is found a most complete vindication of the duty of
systematizing the separate elements of truth into a
single soundly concatenated whole, by which the
essential nature of each is made as clear as it can be
made to human apprehension. It is not a matter of
indifference, then, how we apprehend and systematize
this truth. On the contrary, if we misconceive it in
its parts or in its relations, not only do our views of
truth become confused and erroneous, but also our
religious life becomes dwarfed or contorted. The
character of our religion is, in a word, determined by
the character of our theology : and thus the task of
the systematic theologian is to see that the relations
in which the separate truths actually stand are rightly
conceived, in order that they may exert their rightful
influence on the development of the religious life. As
no truth is so insignificant as to have no place in the
development of our religious life, so no truth is so un-
important that we dare neglect it or deal deceitfully
with it in adjusting it into our system. We are smitten
with a deadly fear on the one side, lest by fitting them
into a system of our own devising, we cut from them
just the angles by which they were intended to lay
hold of the hearts of men : but on the other side, we
are filled with a holy confidence that, by allowing them
to frame themselves into their own system as indicated
by their own natures, — as the stones in Solomon's tem-
ple were cut each for its place, — we shall make each

Co7isidered as a Science. 39

available for all men, for just the place in the saving
process for which it was divinely framed and divinely
given.

From this point of view the systematic theologian
is pre-eminently a preacher of the Gospel ; and the
end of his work is not merely the logical arrangement
of the truths which come under his hand, but the
moving of men through their power to love God with
all their hearts, and their neighbors as themselves ; to
choose their portion with the Saviour of their souls ;
to find and hold Him precious ; and to recognize and
yield to the sweet influences of the Holy Spirit whom
He has sent. With such truth as this he will not dare
to deal in a cold and merely scientific spirit, but will
justly and necessarily permit its preciousness and its
practical destination to determine the spirit in which
he handles it, and to awaken the reverential love with
which alone he should investigate its reciprocal rela-
tions. For this he needs to be suffused at all times
with a sense of the unspeakable worth of the revela-
tion which lies before him as the source of his ma-
terial, and with the personal bearings of its separate
truths on his own heart and life ; he needs to have
had and to be having a full, rich, and deep religious
experience of the great doctrines with which he deals ;
he needs to be living close to his God, to be resting
always on the bosom of his Redeemer, to be filled at
all times with the manifest influences of the Holy
Spirit. The teacher of systematic theology needs a
very sensitive religious nature, a most thoroughly
consecrated heart, and an outpouring of the Holy
Ghost upon him, such as will fill him with that spirit-
ual discernment, without which all native intellect is

40 The Idea of Systematic Theology.

in vain. He needs to be not merely a student, not
merely a thinker, not merely a systematizer, not merely
a teacher, — he needs to be like the beloved disciple
himself in the highest, truest and holiest sense, a
divine.

Fathers and Brethren, as I speak these words,
my heart fails me in a deadly anxiety. " Who is
sufficient for these things ? " it cries to me in a true
dismay. We all remember how but a short decade
ago one stood in this place where I now stand, who,
in the estimation of us all, was richly provided by
nature and grace for the great task which now lies
before me, but which then lay before him. " Alas !
sirs," said he, with a humility which was character-
istic of his chastened and noble soul, — " Alas ! sirs,
when I think of myself, I often cry, ' Woe is me, that
such an one as I, should be called to inherit the re-
sponsibilities descending in such a line.' And when
I think of the Church, I cry with a far sorer wonder,
' What times are these, when such a man as I should
be made to stand in such a place ? ' " With far more
reason may I be allowed to echo these words to-day.
With far more need may I demand now, as he de-
manded then, your prayers for me, that in "the ser-
vice to-day inaugurated, God's strength may be made
perfect in my weakness."

v^ii*

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