I need scarcely say that many persons, and some of them most excellent men, have entertained the idea of a graduated scale of inspiration, and hence the great importance of the question. Is it equal throughout? Or is it variable? In attempting an answer to this question, it is essential that we observe the wide distinction between the authorship and the subject-matter of the book, for, if not, we shall soon get into confusion. Now Christian brethren must not be startled by my stating that in the subject-matter there are the widest possible distinctions. It appears indeed to consist of three distinct classes of subjects, or rather three distinct kinds of matter. In the first place, there are direct communications, communicated from heaven without the use of the mind of man. Of this class are the ten commandments, the words, ‘This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,’ and the discourses of our Lord. Such words were not given by inspiration, for they did not pass through the medium of the human mind, but came direct from heaven. In them there was no inspiration, but communication. There is a second large class of passages which were given by inspiration. The human mind was employed as the medium for conveying God’s will and purpose. This was the case with the prophets, the Psalms, and other similar passages. Here was inspiration, and the words so uttered were divine words, though given through the human medium, and not in direct communication. But there is a third large class of passages in which there is neither inspiration nor communication. There are various sayings and doings of uninspired men, good actions and bad actions, good words and bad words, interspersed with miracles and other wonders of God’s hand. Now no one supposes that all these persons spoke by inspiration, and it is utterly unfair to quote such passages as inconsistent with the inspiration of Scripture, for no one asserts that they are inspired. It is utterly unfair, for example, of Mr. Coleridge to quote the language of Job’s friends, and to attack the inspiration of the book by the assertion that it is impossible to believe them to be inspired. Of course it is, for, if we believed them to be inspired, we should be flying in the face of the inspired book itself which records the divine communication, ‘Ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right’ (Job, xlii. 7.) We do not claim inspiration for those words, but for the authorship of the book which declares that the speakers spoke those words, and that in doing so they were wrong.