the infidel without endangering a single article of the Catholic
Faith."--If to an unlearned but earnest and thoughtful neighbour I
give the advice;--"Use the Old Testament to express the affections
excited, and to confirm the faith and morals taught you, in the New,
and leave all the rest to the students and professors of theology and
Church history! You profess only to be a Christian:"--am I
misleading my brother in Christ?

This I believe by my own dear experience--that the more tranquilly an
inquirer takes up the Bible as he would any other body of ancient
writings, the livelier and steadier will be his impressions of its
superiority to all other books, till at length all other books and
all other knowledge will be valuable in his eyes in proportion as
they help him to a better understanding of his Bible. Difficulty
after difficulty has been overcome from the time that I began to
study the Scriptures with free and unboding spirit, under the
conviction that my faith in the Incarnate Word and His Gospel was
secure, whatever the result might be;--the difficulties that still
remain being so few and insignificant in my own estimation, that I
have less personal interest in the question than many of those who
will most dogmatically condemn me for presuming to make a question of
it.

So much for scholars--for men of like education and pursuits as
myself. With respect to Christians generally, I object to the
consequence drawn from the doctrine rather than to the doctrine
itself;--a consequence not only deducible from the premises, but
actually and imperiously deduced; according to which every man that
can but read is to sit down to the consecutive and connected perusal
of the Bible under the expectation and assurance that the whole is