entertain such misgivings with regard to the issue as to i "Can the Old Faith live with the New?" For fully century has this, the central institution of the Reformed in the United States, been familiar with the idea of an tionary process as essential not only to the proper under ing of nature and natural science, but as no less essentia correct conception of history and theology.

The dominant principle of our theological system, vi Christological, has afforded us special advantage in guard against the errors of the purely scientific theory of evol and in providing against the "missing links" which baff investigations of science, and thereby has prevented the d of thought to which all monistic and agnostic theories The main fault to be found with the modern doctrine of e tion, as advocated by its professed champions, is not it. vanced and liberal tendency, but rather its narrowness false limitations.

Tracing the evolutionary process backward, we cannot with the Bathybius of Huxley or the Monera of Haeckel, with the author of the Book of Genesis, we go back infin further, to that from which all protoplasm proceeds: "In beginning, GOD." Following the process of evolution from most incomplete form of life to its supposed highest deve ment in the cerebrum of man, we take an infinite step in vance, and find the culmination of the process in the God-M "crowned with glory and honor" in the heaven of heavens.

In the light of the Christological Principle evolution finds true interpretation. It is not a movement from the highest the lowest plane on earth simply, but a movement from et nity to eternity, as comprehended in Him who is the Alpha a the Omega, the ideal origin of all things and their teleolo All earthly evolution is but a half truth which finds its oth half in the continuous evolution in the supernatural, heaver world; so that the highest development which may be attain on earth is but a preparation for that which is perfect a which is to come.

The scope of the Christological Principle is not, therefore, limited to the science of theology as such. It is the regulative principle of all science; for only in its light can we study aright both the hidden things of nature and the deep things of God. The facts of natural science find their final interpretation in the science of the supernatural, and the philosophy of history can be rightly learned only in the light of the more comprehensive science of the Christology of history. The philosophy taught by St. Paul, viz., that the whole creation is summed up and perfected in the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, contains a germinal truth which is beginning to find its proper place in cosmological and theological science. Jesus Christ is the archetype, the organ and the end of the whole process of creation. All things were formed and all things continue in Him, by Him and for Him. (Col. 1: 16, 17.) As the final cause of the universe, He works in all its kingdoms, in all its genera and species, shaping their development from within toward consummation.*

Accordingly the whole purpose of the natural universe, organic and inorganic, reaches its completion in Jesus the Son of Man. In Himself He fulfills the teleology of nature, and thus is the only key that can unlock its hidden meaning. As the final outcome of the whole process of creation, and the fulfillment of the original intention and all the laws of normal humanity, He is the Light of the world, the One who illumines all realms of existence.

If, then, it is only by the application of the Christological Principle that we can interpret the things of nature, it is evident that only in the light of the same principle can we interpret the facts of revelation as these appear in the history of God's dealings with man, as presented in Sacred Scripture.

The feature of the modern doctrine of evolution which especially commends itself to Christian thought is that of progressive development, with which the Christological Principle is in full harmony. Only as the Christological Principle embodies

* Institutes of the Christian Religion, Gerhart, p. 193.

the idea of progressive development can we apply it to revelation and its interpretation.

In the treatment of the theme,-The Interpretation o ture Progressive, it is not my purpose to compare of the various hermeneutical methods that have been and a employed in the study of the Written Word. Rathe desire to show that no principle of interpretation can be applied which does not have due regard for the idea of tion as related both to revelation and its interpretation.

Progressiveness of interpretation is postulated by the of revelation, and proven by the entire history of Biblica ence. Revelation is the self-impartation and self-disclos God. As such, it presupposes a subject endowed with an tude corresponding to the nature of revelation. Man, c in the image of God and for God, by virtue of his Godlik stitution, is capable of receiving God's self-communication is, however, pre-eminently indispensable as a condition divine self-revelation that there be a process of revel God's truth can become man's truth only as the conten revelation become the contents of human consciousness; as they are wrought out within man by the help of the spi ally quickened cognitive faculties. Furthermore, the nece for growth and a long educative process, such as is exhibite the history of revelation, belongs to the fundamental law human consciousness.

Neither the individual nor the race could receive all truth at once, nor any one truth in all its relations. Only a continuous process, with differing stages and degrees, can thoughts of God be wrought into the mind of man.

As "the natural man receiveth not the things of the Sp of God," the faculty of spiritual discernment had to be impar and enlarged, had to be made gradually capable of more more clear apprehension from age to age. Therefore when come to study this living movement of revelation, as presen in Sacred Scripture, we should not be surprised to find that was in accordance with the conditions of society at each part

ular step of its course, and that the messengers of revelation, who were of the people, were limited by their condition, and bound under the burdens of their own generation.

What some are so ready to discover as faults in the Old Testament are only evidences of the unavoidable limitations of a partial and progressive revelation. "These very limitations, imperfections and moral deficiencies of the particular stages of revelation, so often alleged against the Bible, are among the signs which cannot be counterfeited of God's handwriting in it."* Throughout the whole process there was from age to age an adaptation to the limits of the powers and to the moral necessities of mankind. In the Old Testament the progress is protracted, interrupted, and sometimes the movement seems to be that of retrogression. Revelation takes place in sundry parts and divers manners, and at times under disguises of earthly forms which suggest their incomplete and preparatory character. Yet, through it all, truth receives an enlarged interpretation as revelation draws near to the great disclosure.

Of the sacred books of the chosen nation, the Messianic idea is the all-controlling principle. From the first obscure promise in the garden down through the centuries, it is the Messianic idea which takes hold of the consciousness of the chosen people, and grows into clearer and fuller apprehension. There is no doubt as to what constitutes the centre of things in history. All prophecies, all institutions, all ages, look in one direction, and find in the advent of Jesus Christ the central fact in the world's history.

The Old Testament, with all its marks of human imperfection, is a substantially authentic record of that preparatory history, and a storehouse of those religious ideas, typical laws and ceremonies, and predictions of inspired prophets, which all looked forward to the time when the Word should become Flesh and tabernacle among men in the person of Jesus Christ. For a time there seems to be a suspension of divine

* Old Faiths in New Lights. Smyth, p. 119.

†The Doctrine of Sacred Scripture. Ladd, Vol. II., p. 567.

communications. For four hundred years there is an sive silence, when all voices of prophecy are hushed. Spirit of God is not at rest. Throughout the long an period He breathes upon the hearts of men, and at l breathings find utterance in the loud voice in the wild "Prepare ye the way of the Lord; the Kingdom of He at hand."

From out of the Old Testament we enter into the New of the fulness of the times is unfolded the fulness of reve The root and stem of Jesse, which grew slowly through th turies of the Old Dispensation, in a day buds and expan the flower. How swift the course of events! One day thousand years. The period of one human life compr germinally all the Gospel that we need to know under out ent dispensation, all that we shall ever know till the fina pearance of our Lord.

In the New Testament Scriptures are presented not onl facts of revelation and redemption as these appeared in the sonal ministry of our Lord, but also a record of the appr sion and interpretation of these facts and of the teachin Christ, by the apostles and evangelists.

The order of arrangement of the New Testament Scrip is very significant as indicating the line of progress in the prehension and interpretation of revelation. First, the pels, the Acts and Words of our Lord; then the Acts Epistles of His disciples. At first view this may seem retrogression, a descent to a lower level, in that truths ta by the lips of the Incarnate Word are remitted to the courses and writings of men. But this is just that progres the knowledge of truth which the Lord Himself had dicted. Under the dispensation of the Spirit, the works words of Jesus which men understood not while He was them, are now expanded into larger meaning and clearer prehension.

Moreover, the order of the several books is no less ratio than historical. Christian doctrine must ground itself not