No doubt the Archbishop thought he was saying something very clever, but in fact he was saying something very foolish. The leaven of the Sadducees is at work today in the church, no longer secretly, but openly, denying revelation in the Scriptures, denying the resurrection of Christ and opposing itself to all supernatural religion. In opposition to all this Ryle stressed the importance of dogma. Indeed, there is no other way this evil can be countered. If there is no dogma there is no known truth.
Dogmatic theology is the statement of positive truths of religion.
In the former it is presumption, in the latter it is a positive duty. In religion, on the contrary, we start with an infallible Book to guide us. With the Bible in the minister's hands, there ought to be nothing faltering, hesitating and indefinite in his exhibition of the things necessary to salvation. Ryle was already aware in his own day of a growing dislike of all dogma in religion. He regarded it as a sign of the times.