Page:Three introductory lectures on the study of ecclesiastical history.djvu/71

III] in the mazes of speculation and casuistry; they cut through difficulties which arguments cannot overturn; they overturn theories which will surrender to nothing else. Ecclesiastical History is thus, as it were, the backbone of Theology. It keeps the mind of the theological student in an upright state: often as facts are perverted, and twisted, and bent to meet a purpose, yet they offer a sterner resistance than anything else short of the primary instincts of humanity.

They offer, too, not only the most convincing, but the least irritating, modes of persuasion,—an advantage in theological matters of no mean importance. The wrath which is kindled by an anathema, by an opinion, by an argument, is often turned away by a homely fact. It is like suddenly meeting an enemy face to face, of whom we have known only by report: he is different from what we expected; we cannot resist the pressure of his hand and the glance of his eye; he has ceased to be an abstraction, he has become a person. How many elaborate arguments respecting terms of salvation and terms of communion are shivered to pieces, yet without offence, almost without resistance, as they are "walked through" (if I may use the expression) by such heathens as Socrates, such Nonconformists as Howard, such Quakers as Elizabeth Fiy.

This applies more and more strongly as our range of facts is enlarged. The more numerous