But granting to our Romanist adviser that his representations were as sound as they are fallacious; still they could only lead us to a probable, and never to an infallible conclusion. The strength of the building must be proportionate to the solidity of its foundation. If our faith in the supposed infallible arbiter is to be founded on the validity and force of the arguments and conjectures which have been stated; our faith in the decisions of that arbiter cannot be greater than our faith in the arguments and conjectures which support his infallibility. Since these proofs, at the very utmost, are any thing but demonstrations, and are only probabilities, we cannot under any circumstances have more than probability to guide us: and we therefore end as we began, and our disquietude even on our admission of an unerring judge, remains exactly as before. Our Romish advocate, however, is not discomfited. He proceeds to affirm that the pretensions of his Church are supported by analogy. He reminds us that the Church of God, under the Jewish dispensation, was directed by an infallible human authority; and that the same high privilege, being equally wanted, might be equally expected in the Christian œconomy. He quotes for this purpose those magnificent assurances of God’s peculiar favour and protection, to be found throughout the books of Moses and of the prophets; and relies especially on the remarkable rule established by the legislator of Israel to this effect: “If there arise a matter too hard for thee in judgment, thou shalt come unto the Priests, the Levites, and unto the Judge that shall be in those days, and inquire, and they shall show thee the sentence of judgment. And the man that will do presumptuously, and will not hearken unto the Priest, or unto the Judge, even that man shall die.” {6} To this argument from analogy we may reply, that the alleged fact on which the analogy depends, is unfounded. The Jewish Church was not infallible. The evidence adduced to prove it so is totally inadequate; and unanswerable evidence may be brought forward to prove it otherwise. With respect to the text in question, it has not the remotest connexion with matters of faith: it relates entirely to matters of civil government. The introductory words of the passage, if quoted fairly, and at full length, must satisfy every reader, that they apply only to secular litigation: that what is here enjoined by the Mosaic law is submission to the legal magistrate, not assent to any article of Faith: that the contumacy here forbidden under penalty of death, was not heresy but rebellion; not obstinate error, but obstinate disobedience. “If there arise a matter too hard for thee in judgment, _between blood and blood_, _between plea and plea_, _and between stroke and stroke_, _&c._” {7a}—an evident reference this to civil litigation.