Page:Tracts for the Times Vol 2.djvu/72

6, which is the very life of the world:—"The heretics," says he, "themselves plead Scripture. How are we to know whether their's is the true sense or our's? The natural way is to look and see whether either of the two can be traced back to the time of the Apostles. What Christ revealed to them they preached; what they preached, must be known by the testimony of those Churches which they themselves founded. If there be any heresies claiming Apostolical antiquity, let them give account of the first beginning of their Churches; let them unfold the roll of their Bishops, so continued by succession from the beginning, as that their first Bishop shall have received ordination from some Apostle or disciple of the Apostles; such a disciple, I mean, as went out from them. For thus do the Churches which are truly Apostolical make out, as it were, their genealogical tables: the Church of Smyrna vouching as her first Prelate Polycarp, there established by St. John; the Church of Rome, Clement, in like manner, ordained by St. Peter; and the other Churches no less have each some person to name, fixed by the Apostles, as Bishops, in each respectively; through whom each derives the seed of Apostolical communion." Now, as Tertullian goes on to argue, "this unbroken connexion with the Apostles was a strong pledge of their inheriting sound Apostolical doctrine too, except it could be proved that their doctrine had varied at any time. For, as the Apostles must have agreed with each other in their teaching, so neither could Apostolical men have put forth doctrines contrary to the Apostles; except they were such as had revolted from the Apostles, and might be detected by the diversity of their doctrine." And this would hold in each following age, till some actual variation took place. And if it held in respect of any one Church, how much more in respect of the combined evidence of the independent Churches in all parts of the world, each producing their several lines of succession, terminating in several Apostles or Apostolical men, and each agreeing (for all material points) in the same traditionary doctrine and interpretation of the Scriptures! For instance, when on some occasion, as the same Tertullian relates, the Churches of Rome and Africa "interchanged the watchword," or, as we might say, "compared notes;" what an encouragement and confirmation must it not have proved to both, to