of the means whereby Christ is to continue His action in men’s souls.  For there must continue a direct action of Christ or the Gospel will sink to the condition of a twice-told tale:  it will be the constant repetition of the story of Jesus of Nazareth Who went about doing good:  and it will have less and less power to be of any help to men as it receeds into the past.  Without the means which are called into existence to produce continual contact between the Redeemer and the Redeemed we cannot conceive of the Gospel continuing to exist as power.

This is not a matter of pure theory:  it is a thing that we have seen happen.  We have seen the growth of a theory of Christianity which dispenses wholly or nearly wholly with the means of grace, and reduces the presentation of the Gospel to the presentation of the ideal of a good life as an object of imitation.  When one asks:  “Why should I imitate this life which, however good in an abstract way, is not very harmonious with the ideals of society at present?” one is told that it is the best life ever lived, the life that best interprets God, our heavenly Father to us.  If one asks:  “What is likely to happen if one does not imitate this life, but prefers some more modern type of usefulness?” the answer seems to be:  “Nothing in particular will happen.”  In other words, the preaching of the Gospel divorced from the means of grace tends more and more to decline to the presentation of a humanitarian ideal of life which has little, and constantly less, driving power.

We see then as we study the history of the early days of the Church the constant presence and action of the Holy Spirit in the mode and means by which the Gospel is presented.  We see it particularly in the development of the ministry and the growth of the sacramental system.  It seems to me not very important to find a detailed justification of all the things that were done or established in explicit words or acts in the New Testament.  If we are dealing, as we believe that we are, with an organism of which the life is God the Holy Ghost Who is the Vicar of Christ in the building and administration of His Kingdom, I do not see why we should not find in the action of the Kingdom as much of inspiration as we find in its writings.  I do not see why we should accept certain things on the authority of the action of the early Christian community, as the baptism of infants and the communion of women, and reject others, as the reservation of the Blessed Sacraments and prayers for the dead.  Nor do I see why we should draw some sort of an artificial line through the history of the Church and declare all the things on one side of it primitive and desirable, and all on the other late and suspect!  Especially as no one seems to be able to explain why the line should be drawn in one place rather than in another.