Excerpt from The Bible and Lord Shaftesbury: An Examination of the Position of His Lordship, Respecting the Holy Scriptures, Delivered at a Public Meeting of the Bible Society at Oxford, on Wednesday, November 27th, 1856; In a Letter to John D. Macbride, Esq., D. C. L., Principal of Magdalen Hall The Catholic doctrine on the subject I am discussing is the following - The Church preceded the Bible, both under Moses and under our Lord. The Church is the divinely-appointed instrument for converting the world the little leaven which is to permeate and influence the whole lump. When men are brought into the Church, then they become amenable to the Holy Scriptures, which form the statute law of the whole community. As the Apostles did not give Bibles to the heathen, but preached to them the kingdom of heaven, so we know of no dispensation granted to modern times to alter that arrangement. The Bible all through pre supposes a society established, having already what we may call a common law, laid down by our Lord and His Apostles; which, however, in all cases of doubt, is sub jected to the written law, indited by the Holy Ghost. It may be said that I have misapplied Lord Shaftes bury's words, or exaggerated his meaning. But if his statements are taken in connexion with the known and acknowledged principles and practices of his party, the charge can hardly be sustained. I feel certain that the impression made upon the Oxford audience was such as I have been combating; and if his Lordship meant to say that the tens of thousands alluded to, although brought up as Christians, were really heathens until the Bible Society had mercy upon them, he will escape the charge of teaching one false doctrine, only by embracing another at once false and uncharitable. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.