THE ATHANASIAN CREED

Thames Guardian and Mining Record, Volume I, Issue 216, 18 June 1872, Page 3

THE ATHANASIAN CREED

In the files of the Times received by last mail, then are numerous letters upon the Athanasiau Creed. We make a lew extracts from one of the letters:— The fact is, it is not our Creed, and wc want to be asked to believe no more than it contains,and to pin our faith to no other document whatsoever. Now, ecclesiastics may tell us that every word of the Atnana -sinn Creed may be provided by most certain warrant of Holy Scripture; they may, in order to support this assertion, string together a certain number of i-are-fully-soJceted proof-texts, and placing t hem in ingenious justapositio ,demand our credence in the conclusion arriv.d at; but this inferential method of proof does not get over our objection. Our position is this—that the greater portion of Divine truth wc have is contained in the Bible to contain it, and that it has taken a Bilile to contain it, and that it cannot ho compressed into a smaller or more definite compass. Our objection is thus cardinal to the Creed itself, and not to the damnatory clauses itself. If we say, with Chillingworth, that these clauses arc ‘ most false,’ it is because we hold with him that ‘ tho Bilile and the Bible alone contains the religion of Protestants.’ To take an illustration from your correspondence of today. It is vain for the saying of Bishop Horsley to be quoted in order to prove that the ‘ three persons’ or the Trinity ‘ are co-equal ’ is not inconsistent with the declaration ‘ the Farther is grater than I.’ It is not the same statement, and in plain English, the one flatly contradicts the other. The introduction of this flat contradiction is a theological burden to us, which we are not willing to hear.”