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PREFACE.
THE following Lectures, with the exception of
the last, were delivered in the course of my
residence at Peterborough in the Summer of 1880.
They are now published in fulfilment of a promise
made to some who heard them. It was my object
to shew the direct bearing of the different articles
of our Historic Faith upon our view of the world
and of life. For this purpose the form of devo-
tional instruction has many advantages. In this
kind of teaching it is impossible to forget the
practical issues of belief. The loftiest thoughts
necessarily assume the character of motives or
guides to action. There is no fear lest the Creed
should appear to be merely a collection of proposi-
tions leading to certain intellectual consequences.
It is felt to be the inspiration of duty. The facts
of the Divine Life reach with a present force to
all life : they reach to our life.
I have assumed as the basis of my exposition
that the Creed is accepted as true in the full form
W. H.
F.
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vi
Preface.
which is current in the Western Church. These
things, I presuppose, we believe; it remains to
consider the present meaning and effects of our
belief. Starting therefore from the familiar text
I have endeavoured to determine the relations of
the different sections of the Creed to one another,
and the significance of the separate clauses. In
doing this I have sought to meet the wants of
those who without technical knowledge are will-
ing to give to the great problems of life which
the Creed illuminates that careful and sustained
thought which their paramount importance de-
mands. To settle them by a peremptory effort
is to sacrifice the blessing of mental discipline
and the growing strength which comes from the
realised consciousness that the first Gospel has
an answer to our latest questionings.
But while I have had in view a popular treat-
ment of the subject I trust that anyone who wishes
to follow out in detail the topics which are touched
upon will find that the arrangement which has
been followed will give a convenient outline for
study. For the sake of such readers I have added
a few notes which deal with some points more
fully than the limits of the Lectures allowed,
and also suggest some lines of inquiry which my
experience has shewn me to be fruitful.
There can be little doubt that the Apostles'
Preface.
vii
Creed in its main substance represents the Baptis-
mal Confession of the middle of the second century.
But as such it assumes the fact of communion
with the Christian Body. It does not therefore
contain any articles in regard to the Institutions
through which the divine facts set forth in it are
brought home to men. The doctrine of the Sacra-
ments and the doctrine of Church organization
are implied as matters of experience, and not
formulated. The fulness of the life of the Society
is recognised as flowing from the Holy Spirit, but
nothing is defined as to the exact modes of His
operation.
There is an equal absence from the Creed of
all statements of abstract dogma. Nothing that
is-subjective finds a place in it. It is silent on
the theory of justification. It has not even
received as an addition the key-word of the
Council of Nicća, 'of one substance (essence) with
the Father,' which later controversies made neces-
sary for the interpretation of the Faith.
On both grounds it is impossible that the
Apostles' Creed should supersede the special Con-
fessions of particular Christian societies, while it
underlies them. But though it cannot be taken
in itself as a complete expression of what we hold
in regard to the facts of our Faith, it brings be-
fore us those facts in their simple majesty, and
b2
viii
Preface.
encourages us day by day to bring our interpre-
tations of them to the test of the whole historic
Gospel for the guidance of our own lives. The
same abstract statements cannot always convey
the same meaning.
Each age, each Church, each believer, will
indeed read in the record of the historic Creed of
Christendom a peculiar message. We learn its
power by listening to its message to ourselves.
The voice which we can hear now has been made
audible to us first; and answering to this is the
special work which is committed to our accom-
plishment.
It has been my desire to indicate what seem
to me to be our obligations in asserting and ex-
tending the claims of the Faith, as calling to its
service not one class of virtues or one type of
character or one type of work, but all virtues, all
characters and all works in the fulness of their
distinctive energies, and according to the forms of
their most effective operation. Looking with open
eyes upon the facts which we believe and upon
the manifold life in which they have been em-
bodied through the ages, with due regard to the
authority of the Society and the adequate fulfil-
ment, by the Spirit's help, of his personal duty,
'let each man be fully convinced in his own mind'
and bring the offering of himself to God. Mean-
Preface.
ix
while if any thought which is suggested here is
allowed to make more clear the living force with
which our Faith deals with the doubts, the
difficulties, the speculations, the hopes of to-day;
to inspire one fellow-worker with a new confidence
in maintaining a conflict where each victory must
disclose fresh fields to conquer; to suggest that
more than one controversy which troubles and
divides us turns on topics which we have no
faculties to discuss: that will be a full reward
for anxious reflection. No one, I think, would
venture to speak on such things, unless he looked
back to the charge which has been committed to
him.
If our prayers need the purifying grace of
the Spirit, what shall we say of our attempts to
set forth the mysteries—the revelations—of the
Gospel? Brethren, pray for us.
B. F. W.
BRAEMAR,
Sept. 23, 1882.
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