5.  A final argument for the inspiration of the books of the New Testament, whether written by apostles or their companions, may be drawn from their general character, as contrasted with that of the writings which remain to us from the age next succeeding that of the apostles.  The more one studies the two classes of writings in connection, the deeper will be his conviction of the distance by which they are separated from each other.  The descent from the majesty and power of the apostolic writings to the best of those which belong to the following age is sudden and very great.  Only by a slow process did Christian literature afterwards rise to a higher position through the leavening influence of the gospel upon Christian society, and especially upon Christian education.  The contrast now under consideration is particularly important in our judgment of those books which, like the second epistle of Peter, are sustained by a less amount of external evidence.  Though we cannot decide on the inspiration of a book simply from the character of its contents, we may be helped in our judgment by comparing these, on the one hand, with writings acknowledged to be apostolic, and on the other, with writings which we know to be of the following age.

6.  The inspiration of the sacred writers was plenary in the sense that they received from the Holy Spirit all the illumination and guidance which they needed to preserve them from error in the work committed to them.  With regard to the degree and mode of this influence in the case of different books, it is not necessary to raise any abstract questions.  That Paul might make to the Galatians a statement of his visits to Jerusalem and the discussions connected with them, Galatians, chaps. 1, 2, or might give an account of his conversion before king Agrippa, Acts, ch. 26, it was not necessary that he should receive the same kind and measure of divine help as when he unfolded to the Corinthians the doctrine of the resurrection, 1 Cor., ch. 15.  And so in regard to the other inspired penmen.  Whatever assistance each of them needed, he received.  If his judgment needed divine illumination for the selection of his materials, it was given him.  If he needed to be raised above narrowness and prejudice, or to have the Saviour’s instructions unfolded to his understanding, or to receive new revelations concerning the way of salvation or the future history of Christ’s kingdom—­whatever divine aid was necessary in all these cases, was granted.  Thus the books of the New Testament, being written under the guidance of the Holy Ghost, become to the Christian church an infallible rule of faith and practice.