This, I think, the Westminster Assembly failed to do. The Confession of Faith was the embodiment of their longer creed; it was their 'symbol' (ovpẞóλacov), their agreement among themselves. Very naturally the members of that assembly were highly pleased that the points of agreement among them, even the minuter points, were so numerous. The longer and more minute the document became, so much the better; for it indicated so much larger an agreement. But the very quality that enhanced its excellence in this respect made it less adapted to be imposed as a term of communion on every office-bearer of the church in all time coming. And if it had been proposed to the Westminster divines to frame a creed, the belief of which, in every article and clause, should be a sine quâ non of office forevermore, which should carry its authority down through the centuries with all their modifications of light and shade, which should claim the homage of the young converts of India and China, the converted cannibals of the South Seas, the Zulu and the Hottentot, and peradventure of every variety of the human race over the surface of the globe, we can hardly doubt that a document far shorter and simpler would have been the result."

The practical alterations, however, proposed by Dr. Blaikie, were few and cautious, and some who agreed with him hesitated in raising so large a question with so small a result. Thus Dr. Marcus Dods, one of the most distinguished of our Scottish theologians, promptly said:

"Were the proposed alterations radical, the church might well afford to be disturbed in such an interest. It were worthy of any church to consider whether creeds, used as terms of office, have not done more harm than good, accentuating peculiarities and perpetuating inconsiderable distinctions; whether freedom of thought and the currents of public opinion are not more likely than the imposition of a creed to bring all Christendom to a common recognition of the truth; whether a church is justified in holding a creed which cannot be expected ever to become the creed of the Church Catholic, thus dooming herself to everlasting sectarianism; whether a church is justified in exacting from her ministry any confession of faith beyond the one article of faith in Christ as the Living Supreme, which she is justified in demanding of her members."

Views varying like these necessarily raised the question of the timeliness of action, and not a few were heard to counsel postponement. To some among others the present writer-postponement of such a question seemed not morally justifiable. And even on the side of expediency it appeared not so much timid as reckless," passiveness, in the admitted presence of explosive forces, being morally undistinguishable from a policy of precipitation and explosion." Great interest attached to the coming General

1

Assembly, because its chair was about to be filled by Principal Rainy, who had for years now exercised alone that Free Church leadership which after 1843 had been divided among men of the highest eminence. Was he to repress the movement or encourage it? He did neither; but in an opening address of great beauty and power he called upon his church to observe that the present age is " one of those times of rapid and remarkable movement which are critical in human history," that the stirring of earnest doubt and debate is by no means mere loss, and that the church must at all times hold the truth and seek for more truth. The Free Church moderator's declared intention to speak also on union with the other churches was perhaps arrested by the proposals now raised in the Church of Scotland to deal with the whole matter of creed. These came to a head in the Established Assembly of 1888. It was proposed then, as formerly, that the Westminster standard should be exchanged for Scripture alone; but the committee recommended that the only practicable change was "to bring the practice of the church into accordance with statute law" in the matter of subscription. Fortunately, in the matter of elders there is no statute, and this enabled lay rulers to be allowed henceforth simply to "subscribe their approbation" of the confession. Even this is a strong step for one who confesses, as the Rev. Dr. Cunningham did in proposing it, that the confession "has put Calvinism in the most offensive possible way." But it is much more serious to retain a clerical subscription which declares the confession thus spoken of to be " the confession of my faith," and sincerely owns "the doctrine therein contained" though no longer the "whole" doctrine as the doctrine to be adhered to. Yet this statutory form was retained by the assembly, the only excuse for it being that it is imposed partly from without, and that the animus towards freedom of the administering church (which is to be referred to in a preamble) does not change the animus imponentis of the enacting state.

The bearing of all this on subscription, as Principal Rainy now pointed out in publishing his addresses of the previous year, made it desirable for the church outside to take up its more responsible duty without much delay. And before winter it was urged that

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1 Dr. Marcus Dods, speaking in Glasgow, in April, 1889, said: "He believed the best-read man in the hall could not pick out any term of twenty-five years in this world's history which had seen so little outward change, and such enormous inward changes, as these last twenty-five years."

2 Theological Review, Edinburgh, 1888.

the Free Church Presbyteries should move without any delay. Accordingly before April a large number of them had sent up "overtures" on the subject to the Assembly of this year, and the reception of these made it nearly certain that a committee would be appointed. In that month the proposal of Dr. Marcus Dods to fill the suddenly vacant chair of New Testament Exegesis in Edinburgh raised a sharper question. His eminence was undeniable; but at the Presbyterian Council in the previous year he had read a paper, amid the protests of some not very well known Americans, that the church made a great mistake when it perilled the central faith upon the accuracy or infallibility of all parts and details of Scripture. On 29th May last, two days before the confessional question came up in General Assembly, Dr. Dods, strongly protested against on this ground, was elected by a majority of more than a hundred over the votes of two other candidates combined. And the significance of the vote was, that his appointment was proposed on the very ground on which it had been at first objected to; the mover broadly asserting that no professor should be trusted who did not put Christianity first, and the documents of Christianity unmistakably second. After this vote on Tuesday, there was no doubt about the result of Thursday. The first motion, indeed, protested against change either of creed or subscription. But Principal Brown, the venerable head of the Free Church College at Aberdeen, then rose and moved that, while the church must adhere to its great doctrines, it recognizes "a present call to deal with" the confession, and appoints a committee to inquire as to the advisable mode of action. The Westminster divines, he said, had made two great mistakes. They put too many things into their confession, and they reversed the order in which Scripture had put them. The centre of gravity, as he had expressed it to his Presbytery, was not now where the framers of the confession had put it. He had signed that document, but it was fiftysix years ago, as a young man ; and the document, like Mr. Gladstone's Bill, was "dead." Dr. Adam, who seconded, preferred amending by means of a Declaratory Act. Dr. Bruce, of Glasgow, leaned rather to a new, shorter, and working confession, going straight for the things that pertained to the essence of the Gospel ; and a young minister, seconding him, declared for himself and his Hegelian friends that they adhered to no system of theology at present in existence. The assembly groaned a little, but Professor Thomas Smith, while speaking against any movement, covered the statement by confessing that, if he had to frame a

theology, he certainly should not frame it on the lines of the confession. Dr. Walter Smith, poet and preacher, denied that the movement was to be at all revolutionary, but maintained with Dr. Brown that the centre of gravity of the system should be no longer the sovereignty of God, but the love of God. The discussion throughout was full of kindly feeling, though burdened with a sense of its historic gravity; and at its close, in a very crowded house, the motion for a committee was carried by 413 to 130, or more than three to one! Such a vote only a few have been astonishing and revolutionary. But this year the great majority of the dissentients have, after the vote, withdrawn their opposition so far as to serve upon the committee. It has thus become thoroughly representative, and its work in the future, built upon such a development in the past, will be watched from both sides of the Atlantic.

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND.

years ago would

A. Taylor Innes.

THE HALF-BREED INDIANS OF NORTH AMERICA.

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Ir was a long trail before us a hundred and thirty miles; a buckboard called a mail stage; much of the way over the sageplains on a cattle trail; the Green River to be forded six times; ranch houses about ten miles apart; ours the last one far up north; and between it and the Yellowstone Park, one hundred and fifty miles farther due north, no cabin-smoke of white man. We were to be three days on the route through those great ranches of Wyoming, and see some of the 3,000,000 steers in that territory.

Of course we were inquisitive about our resting-place for the night, for I had not then learned that in our dim border-land any cabin is a public-house for a traveler late in the afternoon of any day. The driver assured us of Smith's Hotel an hour before sunset, but we did not realize his solemn joke till we left all traces of wheels, turned a bend in the river, and in a witching poplar grove, carpeted with rich grass, saw two tents. A generous campfire was in front of the larger, and the landlady was busy in preparing dinner, aided by two men-waiters. Passing over to them some ducks, rabbits, and sage-hens, wayside spoils from the buckboard, we were at home. Throwing our blankets

into the smaller tent, empty of everything but some fresh hay, we registered for our apartments, and were soon summoned to the dining-hall. Between the main tent and the campfire a fourfoot square of canvas was spread on the ground, and a good dinner covered it. This was the table d'hôte of the establishment. The dishes were varied, abundant, and well prepared, and one seldom finds better bread, butter, tea, and coffee, even where he has change of courses and finger-bowls. A pet antelope kid would reach his nose over our shoulder for the tempting biscuit, and his foot was careless of our teacup. Fortunately a beautiful Angora goat, half grown, was not so bold. A large cottonwood stood near by, overhanging the "hotel" and grounds. Its foreshortened limbs afforded natural hooks and pegs for all the loose miscellany of a kitchen, sitting-room, and sleeping-room. A coarse box standing against it was a good washstand, and the limb-pegs held water-bucket and towels above the long-reaching neck and nose of the beautiful, impertinent antelope.

Back of us, screened by the poplar grove, flowed and rippled the Green River (well so called from its marine color), two gunshots wide. On both its banks, and here and there, and from one to ten miles off, were the stock of this ranchman, steers, sheep, and Angora goats, all counting up strongly into the thousands. In front and to the east the illimitable sage-plains ran off into the horizon, broken some with mesa and butte; and far beyond, one, two, and three hundred miles, one could discern the low, blue line of mountains, extending up north from the South Pass to the Wind River Mountains. Over the whole tumbled panorama Fremont's Peak, high lifted, keeps watch, and for hundreds of miles in all directions from our hotel you cannot escape the eye of that watchful sentinel for any long time.

The nearest human shelter, unless a wigwam, was probably ten miles off. Into such a "rural district" our host had moved for a summer rest, and in Abrahamic style, with his flocks and herds, and men-servants, that is, cowboys. In doing it he had escaped the hum and bustle of his home life, fifty miles up the river, where he had a log cabin, and not three houses more, for neighbors, within twenty-five miles! How he must have enjoyed his quiet vacation in this flight to the country! No pavements for rattling wheels on those square miles of lawn; no tablet warnings to "keep off the grass"; no newsboy cry of some third edition of an awful accident; no importunate offer of a wide-awake boy to "shine" his moccasins!