Chapters of Bible Study Part 5

Now the Sacred Scriptures present just such a picture, only larger, more comprehensive, truer, deeper, containing all the fair delineation of G.o.d's own image, the pattern according to which we are to correct the same divine likeness in our souls, spoiled somewhat and blurred by sin.

Let us look at the outline. There are words and a fact. In the words truth is enunciated, in the fact those words are exhibited as being a divine utterance. In their _literal_ meaning the word affects us just as a picture would at first sight. In the one case we have a precept or an incident or a scene in the life of our Lord; in the other case we have an act of prayer or a scene from the daily life of French peasants. But just as in the picture we may, by reason of artistic and spiritual culture, recognize not simply an ordinary scene of peasant life, but a poetic thought, or a practical moral lesson calling for imitation, or, finally, a mystery of religion, so in the Sacred Scriptures we may see below the literal sense one that is internal, hidden, and in its character either simply figurative, or moral, or mystically spiritual. An old ecclesiastical writer has given us a Latin hexameter which suggests these various senses in which the sacred text may at times be understood:

Litera _gesta_ docet, quod credas _allegoria_; _Moralis_ quid agas, quo tendas _anagogia_.

An example of the four different senses (namely, the _literal_, the _allegorical_, which appeals to our faith, the _moral_, and the _mystic_) in which a word or pa.s.sage of Holy Writ may be interpreted is offered in the term "Jerusalem." If we read that "they went up to Jerusalem every year," we understand the word Jerusalem to represent the chief city of the Hebrews, situated on the confines of Judah and Benjamin. If we happen upon the pa.s.sage of St. John where he says: "I, John, saw a holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from G.o.d; ... behold the tabernacle of G.o.d with men, and He will dwell with them," we know that this _new_ Jerusalem on earth can be no other than the Church, where G.o.d has His tabernacle, dwelling with men. The word is used _allegorically_, that is to say, it appeals to our faith; to the internal, not to our external sense. Again, the word "Jerusalem" may be used in the sense which its etymology suggests without reference to any city. Etymologically it consists of two words, signifying _foundation_ and _peace_. A rabbi might, therefore, bid his disciples to strive to build up "Jerusalem," meaning that they should seek to lay solid foundations of peace by conforming their lives to the law of Jehovah. This would give the word Jerusalem simply a _moral_ signification. Finally, the word is used as a synonyme for "heaven," as in Apoc. xxi. 10: "And He took me up in spirit, ... and He showed me the holy city Jerusalem, ... having the glory of G.o.d." Here we have the term in its _anagogical_ sense, that is, referring to the future life.

Without entering into the various figures of speech with which the language of the Hebrews abounds, let me suggest some points which must be observed in order that the true sense of the Sacred Scriptures may not escape us so as to mislead the mind.

For the discovery of the literal sense we must, of course, be guided by the rules of ordinary grammatical construction. Where this proves insufficient we must have recourse to the idiomatic use of language, the habits of speech, which prevailed among the Hebrews or those with whose utterances or history we are concerned. This is very important in order that we may get a right understanding of the expressions employed. As an instance of misconception in this respect may be cited the words of our Lord to His holy Mother at the nuptials of Cana, which literally sound like a reproof, yet are far from conveying such a sense in their original signification. The like is true of the use of certain comparisons which to our sense seem rude and cruel, yet which were not so understood in the language in which they were originally spoken or written. Thus when our Lord said to the Canaanitish woman who followed Him in the regions of Tyre and Sidon that it is not right to give the bread of the children to "dogs," He seemed to spurn the poor mother, who prayed Him for the recovery of her child, as a man spurns a cur. Yet such is not the sense of the expression, which hardly means anything more than what we would convey by "outside of the pale of faith."

Besides the usage of speech peculiar to a people or district or period of time, we must have regard to the individuality of the writer. His subjective state, his temperament, education, personal a.s.sociations, and habits of thought and feeling necessarily influence the style of his writing. Thus in the letters of St. Paul we recognize a spirit which the forms of speech seem wholly inadequate to contain or express.

He writes as he might speak, impatient of words. His thoughts seem often disconnected; he omits things which he had evidently meant to say, and which the hearers might have supplied from the vividness of the image presented, but which become obscure to the reader who only sees the cold form of the written page. There is no end of parenthetical clauses in his discourses; often he begins a period and leaves it unfinished. Sometimes there appears a total absence of logical connection in what he intends for proofs and arguments; then, again, there is a wealth of imagery, which suggests the quick sense and power of comparison peculiar to the Oriental mind, but slow to impress itself on the Western nations. All this makes it necessary to _study_ St. Paul rather than to read him, if one would understand the Apostle.

Of this St. Peter shows himself conscious when he writes that certain things in the Epistles of St. Paul are "_hard to be understood_, which the unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures, to their own destruction" (II. Pet. iii. 16).

Another element which contributes to the right interpretation of the Sacred Text is the knowledge of what may be called the historical background of a pa.s.sage or book. This includes the various relations of time, place, persons addressed, and other circ.u.mstances which exercise an influence upon the material, intellectual, and moral surroundings of the writer. Accordingly, different parts of the Sacred Scriptures require different treatment and different preparation on the part of the reader. Thus to comprehend the full significance of the Book of Exodus we must study the geographical and ethnographical condition of Egypt. For a right understanding of the Book of Daniel we should first have to become acquainted with the history of Chaldea and a.s.syria, especially as lit up by the recent discoveries of monuments in the East. The Canticle of Canticles presupposes for its just interpretation a certain familiarity with the details of Solomon's life during the golden period of his reign. The Letters of St. Paul, in the New Testament, reveal their true bearing only after we have read the life of the Apostle as it is described in the Acts; and so on for other parts of the Sacred History.

Finally, a proper understanding and appreciation of the inspired books depend largely on our realization of the proximate scope and purpose, the character and quality, of the subject treated by the sacred writer.

The Bible is a wondrous combination of historic, didactic, and prophetic elements. Each of these goes to support or emphasize the other, but each of them has its predominant functions in different parts of the grand structure. Hence we may not judge a prophecy as we judge the historical narrative which introduces and supports it; we may not interpret in its literal sense the metaphor which is simply to convey a moral lesson to the mind.

XVII.

"DEUS ILLUMINATIO MEA."

The subject-matter of the Bible obliges us, however, to apply not only the various cautions and methods of interpretation which are required for the understanding of the cla.s.sics generally, but it exacts more.

The Sacred Scriptures, as a grand work of art, have not only a human, but primarily a divine conception for their basis. Hence it does not suffice to have mastered the meaning of the words and the outline of the subject, or the individual genius and human ideal of the writer who acted merely as the instrument executing a higher inspiration. We must enter into the conception of the divine mind. If the princ.i.p.al and all-pervading motive of the great Scriptural composition is a religious one, it stands to reason that it can be comprehended only when judged from a religious point of view.

Now the divine mind is so far above us that we can reach it only if G.o.d Himself brings it down to us. He has to descend, to lift the veil from His immensity, not by opening to us, before the time, those sacred precincts which "eye hath never seen," but by emitting a ray of light to clear up our darkness, to give us a glimpse of the awful splendor which vibrates in those celestial realms where light and sound and warmth of eternal charity mingle in the sweet harmony of the divine Beauty whose tones speak now to our senses in separate forms. G.o.d descends to our humility to interpret His own image. First He came in human form, and told us all the things we were to believe and do. Then He sent the Paraclete, and under His direction men of G.o.d taught the same things. Then they wrote them, or, as St. John tells us, some of them. The Paraclete veils Himself, as our Lord had announced to His Apostles, in the Church, whose divinely const.i.tuted earthly chief was to be Peter--to the end of time. The Church, therefore, founded by Christ, and an ever-living emanation of the incessant activity of the Holy Spirit, although necessarily speaking to men through men, is the first and surest interpreter of the purpose and meaning of each and every part of Holy Writ.

And because G.o.d cannot contradict Himself it follows that every truth of the written word must correspond with every truth of the spoken word. In doubtful cases, therefore, as to the meaning of a word or text in the Sacred Writings, we have recourse to the supreme, divinely-guided judgment of the Church. Her doctrines, defined, are the first and most important criterion of Scriptural truth.

But the Church has not defined every expression of truth, though she holds the key to all truth. She points to the light which illumines our night; she declares the stars whence that light issues directly or by reflection; but she does not always indicate where the rays of the one body begin to mingle with those of the other, or what precise elements determine the motion or stability of each. Only when there are conflicts or threatened disturbances of the centres of attraction and repulsion she reaches out her anointed hand, informed with the magic power of her Creator and founder, and directs the courses of bodies that otherwise would clash unto mutual destruction. Hence the freedom of investigation allowed the Catholic student of the Scriptures is limited only by the rules of faith taught by the same divine Teacher who watches over the spoken and written revelation alike. And as, in cases where we have not the express command of a superior, we interpret his will by his known desires and views in other respects, so in the interpretation of those parts of Holy Writ regarding the meaning of which we have no definite expression in the doctrinal code of the Church, we follow the _a.n.a.logy of faith_; which is manifest from the general consent of the Christian Fathers and Doctors, and from the teaching of learned and holy commentators. These we may safely follow in all doubtful cases, that is to say, where there is no evidence to show that they were mistaken, either through want of certain sources of information or proofs which we have at our command presently, or because they accepted the views of their time and people, feeling that any departure from the received tradition would make disturbance, and fail of its intended good effect.

It is safe to say that the conditions of one age and the modes of thought and feeling of one generation are not a just standard by which to judge the conditions and views of another age or generation. This is an important fact to remember for those who are inclined to look in every part of the Sacred Scriptures for a verification of the sentiments which they feel, and of the views and opinions of things which they hold.

XVIII.

RUSH-LIGHTS.

There is a method of interpreting the Bible which, although it affords a temporary satisfaction to the heart, is misleading to the mind. I mean private interpretation in the sense in which it is generally practised and defended by our Protestant brethren. To take a good photograph you must have sunlight; candles, gas, even electric lights, unless they be flash-lights, which don't suit all purposes of accurate reproduction, will not accomplish it. For vegetable growth you need sunlight; artificial light will give neither healthy fruit nor even color to the plant. So it is with the divine image traced in the Sacred Scriptures. We cannot reproduce it in our souls by any earthly light. Now human judgment is an earthly light, because it is constantly influenced by feelings, prejudices, attachments, and partial views of things. Some of us accept an opinion because it suits our conditions of life, is agreeable to our sense of ease or vanity, relieves us from certain responsibilities to G.o.d and our neighbor which a severer statement of the case would exact. Others endorse a view because it is held by a person whom they love or respect. Others, again, maintain an opinion because it is contrary to the one held by a person whom they dislike. And there is a vast number of people who take a view simply because it is the first that presents itself to them, and they are as well pleased with it as with others which they don't know. It must be remembered, moreover, that man is not naturally inclined toward the right. The world loves darkness since its eyes were hurt by the wanton effort to see G.o.d and to be like Him in a way which was against His law. Amid this darkness, intellectual and moral, which surrounds man, and which for the moment pleases him because it relieves him of a strain, we need a guide. We must follow a leader who knows all the ways and enjoys the full light of heaven.

The defence in favor of private interpretation of the Bible usually rests in the a.s.sumption of G.o.d's goodness, who must needs furnish an inward light to man lest he go wrong in his search after truth. But G.o.d's goodness gives you a guide, well accredited with testimonials from Himself, against whose efficiency the inward light compares like a rush-light against the sun.

The red cross of the Alpine Club marks the safe pa.s.sage down the rocky mountain paths of Switzerland. We recognize the stones which are landmarks because they bear the conventional sign of an authorized body of mountaineers. They lead our way, and we follow without hesitation.

But if the mark of the red cross of the Alpine Club were not visible, if we had to trust to the inward light or to our instinct to guide us, we should run the risk of losing our way and lives, though the stones which marked the path of former travellers are still there.

Nor does it seem according to the divine wisdom to give man a written law and then to leave him to Himself for its interpretation. No other written law was ever given under such conditions by or to man. It would frustrate the fundamental purpose of any written law to allow the individual to interpret it, because it would lead to contradictions and confusion, which it is the very object of laws to prevent. That the divine Law, in its written form, is no exception to this rule is proved from the effects of the theory of private interpretation, which have grown into a history of many sects, conscientiously protesting one against the other because of the inferences which each draws from the one sacred code of Christian law and doctrine. Thus the written word of G.o.d would frustrate its own manifest purpose, nay, give occasion to a thousand justifications of separation and hostility, which its fundamental canon, charity in the union of Christ, expressly forbids.

What other conclusion, therefore, remains than to accept the warning of St. Peter, Prince of the Apostles, who, speaking of the reading of the Sacred Scriptures, wishes the converts to understand "_this, first, that no prophecy of Scripture is made by private interpretation_,"[1]

because "_the holy men of G.o.d spoke, inspired by the Holy Ghost_" (II.

Pet. i. 20, 21).

And this disposes, in the mind of the sincere Christian, of all the theories of interpretation advanced by rationalist and naturalist philosophers, who render their arguments a trifle more consistent than Protestants by denying from the outset the divine inspiration of the Sacred Scriptures.

[1] The Protestant (King James) version of this pa.s.sage reads: "That no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation." The late revision of the New Testament omits the word _any_.

XIX.

THE USE AND THE ABUSE OF THE BIBLE.

"Revelation and a Church are practically identical. Revelation and Scripture are not."[1] Though _revelation_ is necessary to guide the human mind, p.r.o.ne to error, and to sustain the human will, weak by reason of an hereditary fall, we have seen that the Bible is but _one_ channel of that revelation, and that a complementary, secondary one.

It neither contains all revealed truth, nor can the truth which it contains be clearly and completely understood without the guidance of an intelligent interpretation. A teacher of any science or art may give a book into the hands of his pupils to serve as a text, as a reminder of his precepts, as a compend of his methods and practice; but no book, no matter how perfectly written, will make us dispense with the teacher. The education, in any direction, which rests upon the sole use of books is essentially defective and misleading.

This is eminently true of the Bible as a text or guide in the acquisition of the highest of arts, the profoundest of sciences, which leads us to the recognition of absolute truth, with an ever-increasing apprehension, because its scope is immeasurable, eternal.

The teacher of revelation, in its first and most important signification, is Christ. He is the central historical figure, announced to man immediately after his fall in Paradise foreshadowed by the prophets in the Jewish Church, and completing His mission in the Christian Church. As the Holy Ghost animated the prophets to foretell Him, and the priests of the synagogue to announce Him in the Old Law, so the Holy Ghost animates the Church to continue His work in the New Law. As books were written by the prophets of old to perpetuate the remembrance of what Jehovah had spoken through them to His people regarding the coming of the Messias, so books were written by the Apostles and disciples of the New Law to perpetuate the remembrance of what that Messias had said and done, and of what He wished us to do.

But as the old written Law was not to be a subst.i.tute for the commission of teaching and guiding the people through the Jewish Synagogue, so neither was the new written Law intended to be a subst.i.tute for the commission of teaching and guiding those who seek salvation through Christ. The Bible alone, as we have already seen, cannot satisfy us in such a way as to supply the full reason for our faith in Christ's teaching. For this we have a Church to whom Christ, as G.o.d, gave a direct commission, without adding a book, or an express command to write a book.

But a book was written, written under the guidance of the divine Spirit, who had been promised to the Church whenever it would speak, whether by word of mouth or by epistle and written gospel. And that book, though not containing all truth, contains truth only. Therefore it is useful, as St. Paul says, II. Tim. iii. 16: "All Scripture inspired of G.o.d is profitable to teach, to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice, that the man of G.o.d may be perfect, furnished to every good work." The use, then, of the Bible is to teach, to instruct in justice, primarily; to make man perfect, furnished to every good work. Mark the twofold term: to _teach_ and to _instruct_; both teaching and instruction to serve the one end--to make a perfect man, "furnished to every good work."

That the princ.i.p.al purpose and scope of Scripture is to teach the truths of religion has been demonstrated in a former chapter. I have here only to add that, as an instrument of Apologetics, and in discussion with Protestants who admit the divinity of Christ and the inspired character of the Sacred Scriptures, reference to the teachings of the Bible plays a very important part. Whether we are defending our faith against misrepresentation, or desirous of convincing other sincere and open minds of the justness of the claims which the Catholic Church makes as the only true representative of Christ's divine mission to teach the nations, the Bible is a safe and commonly recognized meeting-ground for a fair discussion of the subject.

Even when we have to speak of religion with practical infidels, who read the Bible, or have some knowledge of its contents, that book will serve us as a powerful weapon of defence and persuasion. Few intelligent men or women of to-day, especially if they are earnest, and have a real regard for virtue and truth, though they may consider them as mere gifts of the natural order, fail to recognize that Christianity is a power for good, and that Christ, its Author, is and ever will be the great teacher of mankind, in whose true following man becomes better, n.o.bler, and happier. To ill.u.s.trate this fact, we may be permitted to quote at some length from an article by Baron Von Hugel in a recent number of the _Dublin Review_ (April, 1895). Speaking of Christ, he cites from various writers, as follows:

Thus "Ernest Renan, sceptical even to his own scepticism, addresses him and says: 'A thousand times more living, a thousand times more loved, since thy death than during thy pa.s.sage upon earth, thou wilt become the corner-stone of humanity, to such a point, that to blot out thy name out of the world would be in very truth to shake its very foundations.'[2] John Stuart Mill, who tells us of himself: 'I never lost faith, for I never had it,' proclaims at the end of his long life's labors: 'Whatever else may be taken from us by rational criticism, Christ is still left; a unique figure, not more unlike all his predecessors than all his followers, even those who had the direct benefit of his personal teaching. It is no use to say that Christ in the Gospels is not historical, and that we know not how much of what is admirable has been superadded by the tradition of his followers. For who among his disciples or their proselytes was capable of inventing the sayings ascribed to Jesus, or of imagining the life and character revealed in the Gospels? Certainly not the fishermen of Galilee, as certainly not St. Paul, whose character and idiosyncrasy were of a totally different sort; still less the early Christian writers, in whom nothing is more evident than that the good which was in them was all derived, as they always professed that it was derived, from the higher source.'[3] Even so purely Deistic a critic as Abraham Kuenen declares: 'The international religion which we call Christianity was founded, not by the Apostle Paul, but by Jesus of Nazareth, that Jesus whose person and whose teaching are sketched in the Synoptic Gospels with the closest approximation of truth.' 'The need of Christianity is as keen as ever. It is not for less but for more Christianity that the age cries out. Even those many who do not identify Christianity with the ecclesiastical form in which they themselves profess it, and who have no confidence that the world will necessarily conform to them--even these may be at peace. The universalism of Christianity is the sheet-anchor of their hope. A history of eighteen centuries bears mighty witness to it; and the contents of its evidence and the high significance they possess are brought into the clearest light by the comparison with other religions. We have good courage then.'[4] So advanced a critic and sensitively loyal a Jew as Mr. Claud Montefiore tells us: 'Some of the sayings ascribed to Jesus have sunk too deep into the human heart, or shall I say into the spiritual consciousness of civilized mankind, to make it probable that any religion which ignores or omits them will exercise a considerable influence outside its own borders. It may be that those who dream of a prophetic Judaism, which shall be as spiritual as the religion of Jesus, and even more universal than the religion of Paul, are the victims of a delusion.'[5] So largely naturalistic a critic as Julius Wellhausen writes of our Lord's teaching and person: 'The miraculous is impossible with man, but with G.o.d it is possible. Jesus has not only a.s.sured us of this, but he has proved it in his own person. He had indeed lost his life and saved it, he could do as he would. He had escaped the bonds of human kind and the sufferings of self-seeking nature. There is in him no trace of that eagerness for action which seeks for peace in the restlessness of its own activity. The completely super-worldly standpoint in which Jesus finds strength and love to devote himself to the world has nothing extravagant about it. He is the first to know himself, not simply in moments of emotion, but in completest restfulness, the child of G.o.d; before him no one so felt or so described himself.' 'Jesus not only prophesies the kingdom of G.o.d, but brings it out of its transcendence on to earth; he plants at least its germ. The new times already begin with him: the blind see, the deaf hear, the dead arise. Everywhere he found s.p.a.ciousness for his soul, nowhere was he cramped by the little, much as he put forward the value of the great; this we should do, and not leave that undone. He was more than a prophet; in him the word had become flesh. The historic overweightedness, to which the Jews were succ.u.mbing, does not even touch him. A unit arises in the dreary ma.s.s, a man from among the rubbish which the dwarfs, the rabbis, had heaped up. He upsets the accidental, the caricature, the dead, and collects the eternally valid, the human divine, in the focus of His individuality. "Ecce h.o.m.o," a divine wonder in this time and this environment.'"

Such being the view of religiously disposed persons outside of the Catholic Church regarding the New Testament teaching of Christ, it would seem easy at first sight to convince them of the Catholic doctrine by reference to the words of Christ and the Gospels, which contain explicit, if not complete testimony in behalf of the Catholic teaching. There is one difficulty in the way of this, and that is that Protestants themselves distrust the meaning of the New Testament words except in so far as it expresses their own feelings. The principle of private interpretation necessarily leads to this one-sided view. A hundred persons appeal to the one Book as an infallible expression of G.o.d's will and truth. Now, some of these infallible expressions manifestly contradict one another as Protestants interpret them. Yet the consequences of such contradictions are vital, and involve eternal life or death. Take the doctrine of baptism by water as essential to salvation, according to the reading of some Protestants; yet the Quaker, no less sincere than his Baptist neighbor, and claiming a special inward light, consciously neglects baptism, holding that the teaching of the New Testament is only meant in a spiritual sense.

Equally awful in their consequences are the two contrary doctrines regarding the Eucharistic presence of Christ as declared in the New Testament, one believer drawing the conclusion that he must adore G.o.d under the veil of bread, the other equally convinced from the same Scriptures that such a view is sheer idolatry, and that there is nothing divine under the appearance of bread. This appeal to private judgment makes most Protestants sceptical if you attempt to prove to them Catholic doctrine from the New Testament; and unless you can first convince them that the Church has a greater claim to declare the sense of the Bible than any private individual, they will consider their opinion of its meaning and purpose just as good as yours.

But it is different if you appeal to the Old Testament for a confirmation of Catholic doctrine. And I would strongly urge this method for various reasons. Every Protestant will admit that the Old Testament is not only inspired and divine in its origin, but that in its historic expression, even the deutero-canonical portion, contains the application of its meaning and purpose. In other words, that G.o.d not merely gave the Israelites a law, but also shows us how He meant them to interpret that law in their lives--domestic, social, and religious. Here, therefore, we have little need, or even opportunity, for private interpretation as to G.o.d's meaning. That meaning becomes clear from the action of His people.

At the same time it is also clear and generally admitted that the Old Testament is a foreshadowing of the New Law, hence that the doctrines and practices of the Christian Church have their counterpart in the Old Law. Protestants readily agree to this, in proof of which fact I may be allowed to quote Prof. Robertson Smith:

"Christianity can never separate itself from its historical basis, or the religion of Israel; the revelation of G.o.d in Christ cannot be divorced from the earlier revelation on which our Lord built. Indeed, the history of Israel, when rightly studied, is the most real and vivid of all histories; and the proofs of G.o.d's working among His people of old may still be made, what they were in time past, one of the strongest evidences of Christianity."[6]

Dr. A. B. Bruce in his _Apologetics_, 1892, p. 325, says: "The Bible, instead of being a dead rule, to be used mechanically, with equal value set on all its parts, is rather a living organism, which, like the b.u.t.terfly, pa.s.ses through various transformations before arriving at its highest and final form. We should find Christ in the Old Testament as we find the b.u.t.terfly in the caterpillar."[7]

Hence if you can show to the average intelligent Protestant that a doctrine or practice distinctively of the Catholic Church prevailed in the Jewish Church, you have established an _a priori_ argument for its reasonableness. This applies particularly to such doctrines and practices as Protestants condemn or censure in the Catholic Church from a mere habit of not finding them in their own churches, or from some prejudice nourished by bigotry of early teachers, or by the popular literature of the anti-Catholic type. I only mention such topics as Indulgences, Confession, the Infallibility of the Pope, Celibacy of the clergy and religious, and such like. Now all these things existed in the Old Law, not so completely developed as in the Christian Church, but sufficiently p.r.o.nounced to establish a motive of credibility for their existence in the Church of Christ. Thus we have the reasonableness of the practice of Confession plainly indicated in the Mosaic times: "And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Say to the children of Israel, when a man or woman shall have committed any of all the sins that men are wont to commit, and by negligence shall have transgressed the commandment of the Lord, and offended, they shall confess their sin, and shall restore the princ.i.p.al itself, and the fifth part over and above, to him against whom they have sinned" (Num. v. 6-7; also 13-14). The Infallibility of the Pope finds its perfect counterpart in the oracular responses given by the Jewish high-priest when he wore the Urim and Thummim in his breastplate, which covers the precise ground of Papal decisions regarding faith and morals, the breastplate being called "the rational of judgment, doctrine, and truth" (See Exod.

xxviii. 30; Levit. viii. 8; Num. xxvii. 21; Deut. x.x.xiii. 8, etc.).