V.
CONFESSIONAL SUBSCRIPTION AND REVISION.[1]
The chief reason why I am personally opposed to revision of the Confession of Faith is because I believe its doctrine to be the truth of God, and because I believe its forms of statement of that doctrine to be at once exact and catholic—broad enough to include all soundly Calvinistic thinking, and precise enough to exclude all tampering with the Calvinistic truth. I am confirmed in my conviction that the Confession clothes the true doctrine in admirably chosen language by the straits and inconsistencies to which those are driven who are trying to point out passages in it which need revision. I am sure it is not the Confession that is at fault, for example, when men praise the first section of the third chapter, and then cry out against the third section. This is but denying in detail what is affirmed in the mass. If it be indeed true that God has "freely and unchangeably" ordained "whatsoever comes to pass," then we can be offended by the assertion that He has predestinated some men and angels unto everlasting life, and foreordained others to everlasting death, only if we are prepared to deny that "it comes to pass" that some go to everlasting life and some to everlasting death. The Confession brings to admirable expression the system of doctrine which I find delivered in the "Word of God. And my own personal
- ↑ Printed in The Presbyterian Banner for November 13, 1889.
