and necessary to each and all of the Faithful. Indeed, without the intervention of some living authority, distinct from Holy Scripture, we should never be able to prove that Scripture is a source of Faith at all. Nevertheless, Protestants reject the Teaching Apostolate, and maintain that the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible, is the sole Source and Rule of Faith. We shall prove in § 21 that Oral Tradition is a substantial part of the Apostolic Deposit, and consequently that Holy Scripture is not the only source of Faith. That it is not the only rule may be seen from the following considerations.
I. The Rule of Faith should be materially complete, that is, it should embrace the entire sphere of revealed truth: formally perfect, that is, it should not need to be supplemented by any other: and universal, that is, applicable to all men, always and everywhere. None of these characteristics can be affirmed of Holy Scripture. There are, as we shall see, a number of revealed truths handed down by Oral Tradition only. Moreover, the Bible, notwithstanding the excellence of its contents, is but a dead letter, wanting in systematic arrangement, often obscure and hard to be understood, and exposed to many false interpretations. Some means must be provided by God to remove these difficulties, otherwise the object of Revelation would be frustrated. And, lastly, some of the very circumstances which constitute the excellence of the Bible—its being a written document of considerable dimensions, full of deep and difficult matter expressed in the metaphorical language of the East—make it unfit for the general use of the people.
Protestants cannot help feeling the force of these arguments. They usually admit more or less explicitly some other rule of Faith; for instance, the mind of the reader guided by a private supernatural revelation, or by its own natural light and inclination. The result has been that the Bible has become the sport of innumerable sectaries and the source of endless divisions. Practically, however, the mischief has been to a great extent prevented by the submission of the people to the guidance of others, or even to “Confessions of Faith and Formularies,” though the latter have no recognized authority.
