Page:Neatby - A history of the Plymouth Brethren.djvu/317

 they obtained, in the late J. B. Rossier of Vevey, an adherent representing the very origin of Brethrenism abroad. This good man had united himself to Darby in 1840, and had been favourably known as a writer amongst Brethren almost from the first. But even Rossier’s name carried no weight as against Darby’s. Probably he knew, as indeed all his allies knew, that there was nothing but a losing game to play; but it is impossible not to admire the dauntless spirit with which the gallant octogenarian played it.

The claim of plenary authority for the decision of an “assembly” (a claim that was of course not preferred on behalf of “assemblies” that had decided in an opposite sense to Darby) seems to have been even more effectual on the Continent than at home. At Vevey old M. Rossier addressed some remonstrances to the meeting with respect to its support of the Park Street decision, and received a brief reply containing the following words: “The assembly maintains in its integrity the letter it addressed to you, and accepts no kind of discussion on matters settled for the assemblies of God, and so held by every brother who recognises and respects the presence of the Lord in the assembly”.

Rossier had sought to sustain his remonstrance by a liberal use of arguments from Scripture, and there was a terrible pertinence now in the following reference to the apostate Jews of Jeremiah’s day. In his rejoinder he charges his opponents with teaching that “Christ has placed His authority in its entirety in the hands of the Church, whose decisions are thus raised to an equality with the Word of God”; and proceeds, “You say to me, ‘As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the name of the Lord, we will not hearken unto thee; but we will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth out of our own mouth’”.