[23] After S. Paul, S. Augustine is the great exponent of this principle in early days; see esp. _de spiritu et littera_, xix. (34): Lex ergo data est ut gratia quaereretur: gratia data est ut lex impleretur. [24] See esp. Heb. ix. 8, 'The Holy Spirit this signifying;' and cf. Dr. Westcott on this Epistle, pp. 233 ff. [25] I would venture to recommend Riehm's _Messianic Prophecy_ (Clark's trans.), as a summary account of prophecy both reverent and critical. [26] Cf. Hooker's account of our grounds for believing that 'Scripture ... is divine and sacred.' 'By experience,' he says, 'we all know, that the first outward motive leading men so to esteem of the Scripture is the authority of God's Church.... Afterwards the more we bestow our labour in reading or hearing the mysteries thereof, the more we find that the thing itself doth answer our received opinion concerning it.' Later again, as against 'infidels or atheists,' we must 'maintain the authority of the books of God ... by such kind of proofs ... that no man living shall be able to deny it, without denying some apparent principle such as all men acknowledge to be true.' _E. P._ III. viii. 14. [27] The Chronicles and the later historical books, as is well known, were included in the third class of 'Hagiographa' with the Psalmists and Moralists. The truth of this paragraph depends upon (1) the character, (2) the extent of the idealism of Old Testament facts. On this something more is said later on. Here I am only concerned to distinguish an idealism which truly interprets facts, even if it throws their spiritual meaning into high relief, from a merely imaginative treatment which perverts and distorts them. Thus if the Chronicler idealizes, it is by emphasizing, beyond the point of actual fact, the priestly element in the history which at the same time did both really exist and really represent the divine purpose. [28] _De Gestis Pelag._ v. (15), 'Sicut veteri Testamento si esse ex Deo bono et summo negetur, ita et novo fit injuria si veteri aequetur.' S. Augustine does not perhaps carry out the recognition of this principle as fully as some other of the Fathers: for refs. see pp. 229 ff. [29] S. Matt. xix. 8. [30] See pp. 329 ff. [31] _Religion of the Semites._ Edinburgh, 1889, p. 4. [32] p. 329, note 2. The passage here added is from S. Chrysost. _in Matt._ vi. 3. The same idea is discerned by Bp. Lightfoot in S. Paul; see on Gal. iv. 11. [33] I use the word 'myth' for those primitive stories on p. 356. The legitimacy of this use may be disputed, see e.g. Riehm, _Einleitung_, p. 342. But I endeavour to explain exactly the sense in which the word is used. On Strauss's application of the myth theory to the Gospel narratives, I should quite assent to the remarks of Dr. Mill, _Mythical Interpretation of the Gospels_ (Cambridge, 1861), pp. 97, 98. [34] S. John i. 14, xix. 35, xxi. 24; 1 S. John i. 1-3. [35] S. Luke i. 1-4.