But there is a fallacy or a falsity at every step of this argument. For _when_ did the Gospel ever "centre in attachment?" or _when_ was "the whole of Christianity contained" in one short sentence? Supposing too that "a world of the understanding" _does_ come in between the first century and the sixth; how does it follow that it is "impossible" to apply the language of the Creeds to the interpretation of Holy Scripture? Explain to me how that "world of understanding" affects _the Nicene_ Creed? Even in the case of that most precious Creed called the Athanasian,--why need we _assume_ that "the growth of ideas" has been a spurious growth? What if it should prove, on the contrary, that the development has been that of the plant from the seed[211]? Above all, why talk of "the fourth _or sixth_ century,"--as if the Creeds were not essentially much older; nay, _co-eval with Christianity itself_?... Such writing shews nothing so much as a confused mind,--a weak, ill-informed, and illogical thinker. Indeed Mr. Jowett seems to be altogether in the dark on the subject of the Creeds: for he speaks of them as "the result of three or four centuries of reflection and controversy," (p. 353,)--which is by no means true of all of them; nor, except in a certain sense, of any. But when he inquires,--"If the occurrence of the phraseology of the Nicene age in a verse of the Epistles would detect the spuriousness of the verse in which it was found,--how can the Nicene _or Athanasian Creed_ be a suitable instrument for the interpretation of Scripture?" (p. 354.)--he simply asks a fool's question. The cases are not only not parallel, but there is not even any analogy between them. Let us hear him a little further:-- "Absorbed as St. Paul was in the person of Christ, ... he does not speak of Him as 'equal to the Father,' or 'of one substance with the Father[212].' Much of the language of the Epistles, (passages for example such as Romans i. 2: Philippians ii. 6,) would lose their meaning if distributed in alternate clauses between our LORD'S Humanity and Divinity[213]. Still greater difficulties would be introduced into the Gospels by the attempt to identify them with the Creeds[214]. We should have to suppose that He was and was not tempted[215]; that when He prayed to His Father He prayed also to Himself[216]; that He knew and did not know 'of that hour' of which He as well as the angels were ignorant[217]. How could He have said 'My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?' or 'Father, if it be possible let this cup pass from Me.' How could He have doubted whether 'when the Son of Man cometh He shall find faith upon the earth[218]?' These simple and touching words," (p. 355,)--pah!