as in other cases, at first vaguely and generally, and would afterwards be completed by developments.' The notion thus admirably expounded of a gradual understanding of the Bible, a progressive development of Christianity, is the same which was in Bishop Butler's mind when he laid down in his _Analogy_ that 'the Bible contains many truths as yet undiscovered.' 'And as,' he says, 'the whole scheme of Scripture is not yet understood, so, if it ever comes to be understood, before the restitution of all things and without miraculous interpositions, it must be in the same way as natural knowledge is come at,--by the continuance and progress of learning and of liberty, and by particular persons attending to, comparing, and pursuing intimations scattered up and down it, which are overlooked and disregarded by the generality of the world. For this is the way in which all improvements are made; by thoughtful men's tracing on obscure hints, as it were, dropped as by nature accidentally, or which seem to come into our minds by chance.' And again: 'Our existence is not only successive, as it must be of necessity, but one state of our life and being is appointed by God to be a preparation for another, and that to be the means of attaining to another succeeding one; infancy to childhood, childhood to youth, youth to mature age. Men are impatient and for precipitating things; but the author of nature appears deliberate throughout his operations, accomplishing his natural ends by slow successive steps. Thus, in the daily course of natural providence, God operates in the very same manner as in the dispensation of Christianity; making one thing subservient to another, this to somewhat further; and so on, through a progressive series of means which extend both backward and forward, beyond our utmost view. Of this manner of operation everything we see in the course of nature is as much an instance as any part of the Christian dispensation.' All this is indeed incomparably well said; and with Dr. Newman we may, on the strength of it all, beyond any doubt, 'fairly conclude that Christian doctrine admits of formal, legitimate, and true developments;' that 'the whole Bible is written on the principle of development.'