erable even than the Church. But words
are mere chitin. Doctrines may have no more vital contact with the soul
than priest or sacrament, no further influence on life and character
than stone and lime. And yet the apostles of parasitism pick a
blackguard from the streets, pass him through this plausible formula,
and turn him out a convert in the space of as many minutes as it takes
to tell it.

The zeal of these men, assuredly, is not to be questioned: their
instincts are right, and their work is often not in vain. It is
possible, too, up to a certain point, to defend this Salvation by
Formula. Are these not the very words of Scripture? Did not Christ
Himself say, "It is finished?" And is it not written, "By grace are ye
saved through faith," "Not of works, lest any man should boast," and "He
that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life?" To which, however,
one might also answer in the words of Scripture, "The Devils also
believe," and "Except a man be born again he cannot see the Kingdom of
God." But without seeming to make text refute text, let us ask rather
what the supposed convert possesses at the end of the process. That
Christ saves sinners, even blackguards from the streets, is a great
fact; and that the simple words of the street evangelist do sometimes
bring this home to man with convincing power is also a fact. But in
ordinary circumstances, when the inquirer's mind is rapidly urged
through the various stages of the above piece of logic, he is left to
face the future and blot out the past with a formula of words.

To be sure these words may already convey a germ of truth, they may yet
be filled in with a wealth of meaning and become a life-long power. But
we would state the case against Salvation by Formula with ignorant and
unwarranted clemency did we for a moment convey the idea that this is
always the actual result. The doctrine plays too well into the hands of
the parasitic tendency to make it possible that in more than a minority
of cases the result is anything but disastrous. And it is disastrous not
in that, sooner or later, after losing half their lives, those who rely
on the naked syllogism come to see their mistake, but in that thousands
never come to see it all. Are there not men who can prove to you and to
the world, by the irresistible logic of texts, that they are saved, whom
you know to be not only unworthy of the Kingdom of God--which we all
are--but absolutely incapable of entering it? The