The next resource of our ingenious disputant is to affirm, that unless the Church possessed infallibility we could have no certain nor infallible belief of the Scriptures, for which his Church is our authority. To this sophism we can easily reply, by corresponding cases. The copyists and librarians who have preserved to us the Greek and Latin classics are not, on that account, infallible expositors of classical antiquity. Supposing, therefore, that we are exclusively indebted to Romanism for transmitting to us the sacred oracles, it does not follow that Romanists interpret them infallibly. It happens also, (unfortunately for Romanist pretensions,) that we are not indebted to any local tradition, such as that of the Church of Rome, for the preservation of the canonical books of Scripture; but to the universal tradition of Christendom. Perhaps we are more under obligation to the Greek than to the Latin Church; both because the writings of the New Testament were originally in Greek, and because the chief authorities to prove their genuineness and authenticity, as well as the earliest enumerations of them are not Romish, but oriental productions. {8} It thus appears that infallibility is not demonstrable by abstract reasonings and analogies, but must be proved, if it be proved at all, by direct evidence. To evidence of this latter description we readily give attention, and request our Romanist to inform us what he has to offer in the shape of an explicit promise from God to support the claims of the Romish Church. At the same time we give him warning, that before he can satisfy our minds, he must lay before us full and categorical information on the following particulars: namely, 1. By what organ the infallible oracles of Rome are delivered. 2. By what evidence the claim to infallibility, as existing in that organ, is established; and 3. On what security we can rely, that our own fallible reason will not mistake nor misconceive the doctrine propounded for our belief. Our desire of satisfaction on these points is not expressed in any captious spirit, but is suggested by the necessity of the case. For if we cannot infallibly discover in what person or persons infallibility resides; if the Romanist cannot prove to us by infallible arguments, that infallibility belongs to the person or persons for whom he claims it; and if further, we cannot obtain from our instructor in Romanism some infallible security that we shall understand the doctrines proposed to us: it plainly follows that the infallibility he so pertinaciously insists upon, must be to us a matter of indifference, attended with no one practical result. Our doubts and perplexities will continue unresolved, and we shall be compelled to seek some other guide to the peace and certainty we so anxiously desiderate.