The creed may well find illumination in many
different philosophies, which wiU vary with the
temper of the time and with the temperament of the
individual. But it can never be identified with any
one of them without ceasing to be itself.
An illustration of this is an obvious topic to-day.
The recent Papal Encyclical is far more obscur-
antist in what it affirms than in what it denies. If
Modernism means all that that amazing document
declares it to mean, it is as a system non-Christian.
Complete severance between the Christ of fact and
the Christ of faith would, in the long run, be
destructive of belief in either. But when the Pope
goes on to identify the Christian faith with a par-
ticular philosophy, he is giving the case into the
hands of those whom he attacks. Were it true that
Christian faith is an intellectual system reached by
investigation, men can hardly be blamed if they select
their system from the twentieth rather than the
thirteenth century, especially when they have the



A PLEA FOR OTHER- WOBLDLINESS 125

terrific triumphs of modern science for compurgators.
In fact, if the Pope were right in his underlying
theory, the Modernists could hardly he wrong in
their philosophic system. The value of this instance
to us lies in its reminder that Christianity does not
profess to make appeal except to faith, and that we
shall only cover ourselves with ridicule if we ignore
the other-worldly hasis of the creed.
What is true of the basis is also true of the nature
of the faith. As a recent writer of great power, Dr.
BusseU, in his Bampton Lectures, has pointed out,
the appeal of the miracle of redemption is so en-
thralling, just because it comes from the other world.
