It will be convenient that we should narrow the ground to this single issue: for the time is short. And in the remarks I am about to offer, I shall not imitate the example of those preachers who dress out an easy thought in a superfluity of inflated language, only in order that its deformity may escape detection. Be not surprised if I speak to you this morning in uncommonly plain English; for I am determined that the simplest person present shall understand at least what _I_ mean. The dignity of the Blessed Evangelists, who walked with JESUS, and whom JESUS loved,--the dignity of that Gospel which I believe to be penetrated through and through with the Holy Spirit of GOD,--for _that_, I confess to a most unbounded jealousy. As for the "dignity of the pulpit,"--I hate the very phrase! It has been made too often the shield of impiety and the cloak of dulness. To begin, then,--Is it, I would ask you, a reasonable anticipation that the narrative of one inspired by GOD would prove full of inconsistencies, misstatements, slips of memory:--or indeed, that it should contain _any_ misstatements, _any_ inaccuracies at all? What then is the difference between an inspired and an uninspired writing,--the Word of GOD and the Word of Man? The answer which I shall receive, is obvious. As a matter of fact (it is replied) there _are_ these inaccuracies: that is, the same transaction is described by two or more writers, and their accounts prove inconsistent. Thus, St. Matthew begins his account of the healing of the blind at Jericho, with the words,--"And as they were _going out_ of Jericho:" but St. Luke, "While He was _drawing nigh_ to Jericho."--There _are_ these slips of memory; as when St. Matthew ascribes to "Jeremy the prophet" words which are found in the prophet Zechariah.--There _are_ these misstatements, as where the Census of the Nativity is said to have taken place under the presidentship of Cyrenius.--And these are but samples of a mighty class of difficulties, (it is urged:)--the two Genealogies; the Call of the four Disciples; the healing of the Centurion's servant; the title on the Cross; the history of the Resurrection:--and again, "the sixteenth of Tiberius;" "the days of Abiathar;" with many others.--Let me then briefly discuss the three examples first cited,--which really came spontaneously. Each is the type of a class; and the answer to one is, in reality, applicable to all the rest. I humbly ask for your patience and attention; promising that I will abuse neither, though I must tax both.