The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-05-16

"Finally. my brethren, De suone III
the Lord, and in the power Oh his
neutrality-suspicious. vi:".
st do not ask that flowers shouio al
ways spring
r know too we'll the poison and the
OF things too sweet.
For one thing only, Lord, lear Lord
I plead:
Lead me Alright,
Though strength should faIter anu
though heart should bleed,
Through peace to light"
Adelaide Proctor, English Poetess.
We have made no special ommen
lately on the attitude of the Rev. DIR.
C. A. Briggs, late of the Presbyterian
church. as to the Bible. We have criti-
cized him in the past several times and
have classed him with the sappers ana
miners and the destructives. he IS
surely and clearly no friend to the
Word Of God, and therefore, no real
friend to suffering humanity. He rs
one of those ~pestilential higher critics
who hold on to the profession of a re-
1lRlOn Willie UuSy III ui56AAS
very foundations of the Christian verl-
ties. 1t is no wonder that he got out
-of the Presbyterian church, so repup-
1ican and democratic in its church poll
ty, and so stapnch a defender OF re-
vea1ed truth as found in the unerring
Holy Scriptures of Inspiration. DR..
Briggs has a quite recent volume on
ETu~ lE,,lx If thn IIn1u SPrinfIJrpC il"
which we nave not seen. The New
York Sun, a secular paper, has made
an examination of it's contents. 1t
catalogues all "the myths, legends,
fctions and narratives of Imagination
which the professor has discovered In
its pages. Generally speaking, DR..
Briggs finds that many of the books of
the Bible are anonymous, others are
pseudonymous, while still others, like
the Pentateuch, are but compilations of
historical and traditional legends" DR..
Briggs is nothing short of a destruc-
tive. He does not hesitate to trample
ruthlessly upon cherished beliefs of
Christians, but he sets to work to
make the Bible a bundle of inventions
XIII dDSuIuII4GS. l. SIICdSO 1LOoAiC
eve have not seen the original article
! in the Sum takes the article in The
Sun and thus summarizes what the en-
envy of the Holy Bible a to say:
Coming to particulars, DR.. Briggs
declares that the intermarriage of the
daughters of men with the angels, and
%the adventures of Samson, are pure
Iaiyths. The stories of Ruth. Jonah,
Esther and Daniel are works OF the.
imagination. The reported repentance
of Nineveh, he says, is incredible, and
the whole book Of Daniel was written
as historic fiction of 1876 b. G., with
the use of various earlier
The deluge, he says, is an ancient le-
gend describing a prehistoric event., Tor
there is no indication that since men
appeared upon the earth any universal
and simultaneous i~nundation of so ex-
ytra d a character as to over
whelm the highest peaks mas
ever occurred, and so vast an accumu
lation of water over all the terrestrial
globe would be in itself a. physical i'm
possibility DR.. Briggs, in fact, look
ing upon Biblical history as a whole,
describes it's primitive sources as
|mythoqogies, legends, poems, laws ana
historical imagination.
Is such a student and teacher really
fit to b. a professor in any Christian.
college, or to belong to any church
based on the Bible revelation and the
Son of Cod? He even assaults the
very foundations of all Christian be-
lief, for he say and the language is
his own:
1.-The virgin birth of our Lord, and
the story of the incarnation as cited
in the gospel of the infancy in Matthew
and Luke, are more exposed to the
mythical hypothesis than any others
in the gospels. 1t is represented that the
virgin birth is unknown to the primi-
tive gospels of st. Mark and the logia
of st. Matthew; or to the epistles, even
when they urge he doctrine of the in-
'carnatiOn; or to the gospel of John;
that the sources used by our Matthew
and Luke are poetic in form and in
content, and of origin; that
athe description of the virgin birth as
given by then conflicts with physical
science and psychology; and that their
story resembles the myths Of other an
+. cient religions"
What a blessing fell upon the Pres
byterians When this destroyer evanish-
ed from their church. He is a far more
dangerous, enemy to the world than Bob
IngersolI or a hundred like him. Briggs
seems ito have stolen the livery of
Heaven to serve the devil in" We are
reminded of a saying in Shakespeare's
Comedy of Errors" that 'she must
have a long spoon that must eat with
the DEVIL"
In our last brief study we completed
the 10th chapter of st. Johns most i'm
. portant and precious Gospel. Possibly
: half of the Gospel contains matter en-
tirely new and not to be found in the
other three Gospels. This makes it
specially unique M of singular inter-
est and value. In this study we go
back to the fifth chapter, and take it
up in order to hope to make a survey
of it as we did of the chapter so re-
Gently ended. Christ's Divinity is in
daad Ia sic to anu Saha.aA