pal Church, and the Methodist Church have nothing whatever of this
theory in their official utterances. These three Churches unite in this
simple, practical, undogmatic statement (the sixth of the thirty-nine
articles):

"Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that
whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be
required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the
faith or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation."

II.

_The Bible nowhere makes any such claim of infallibility for itself._

The prophets did indeed use the habitual formula, "Thus saith the Lord."
So did the false prophets, as well as the true. It was the common formula
of prophetism, indeed, of the Easterns generally when delivering
themselves of messages that burned in their souls. The eastern mind
assigns directly to God actions and influences which we Westerns assign to
secondary causes. We are scientific, they are poetic. We reach truth by
reasonings, they by intuitions. No one can follow the processes of the
intuitions. To the mystic mind they are immediate illuminations from on
high, inspirations of the Spirit of God. In the realm of law we trace the
action of natural forces, and are apt to think there is nothing more. In
the realm of the unknown we feel the supernatural, and are apt to think it
all in all.

The great prophets themselves did not accept this language of other
prophets unquestioningly. They denied the claim unhesitatingly when
satisfied that the messages were not from on high. They distinguished
between those who came in the name of the Lord; and so must we. They tried
the spirits whether they were of God; bidding us therefore do the same.

Tried by the severest scrutiny of successive centuries, of different
races, the great prophets prove to have spoken truly when they declared,
of their ethical and spiritual messages, "Thus saith the Lord." If ever
messages from on high have come to men, if ever the Spirit of God has
spoken in the spirit of man, it was in the minds of these "men of the
spirit." But they made no claim to infallibility, or if they did, took
pains to disprove it. Every prophet who goes beyond ethical and religious
instruction, and ventures into predictions, makes mistakes, and leaves his
errors recorded for our warning. We must try even the inspired men, and
when, overstepping their limitations, they err, we must say, Thu