(b) The Sceptical appeal to History--much the most formidable to-day, and always intellectually the most respectable--speaks in much bolder tones, thus: “The whole of the Catholic Faith from beginning to end is man-made. It is a mass of illusions: of projections of the human mind thrown by the human imagination upon the void; of deceptions, some of them conscious in some degree, many more but half-conscious; by far the most unconscious, implanted in the mind by early training. What the Catholic Church affirms is false from beginning to end, and History shows that the affirmations of the Catholic Faith have been thus man-made step by step from the very first origins we can discover. The idea of a God is man-made; so is the sacramental idea, the idea of Incarnation--the whole affair.” Such, as it seems to me, are the historical arguments against the claim of the Catholic Church to Divine Authority. Those arguments, tabulated in the order of their importance, that is, of the power they wield over a rational human mind fully open to evidence and to approaches of reason, I will here set down in graphic form: I propose therefore to deal with them in their order, beginning with the least and going on to the greatest. IV (I) THE MINOR OR MORAL ARGUMENT (a) _That the Church has been historically wrong upon a number of facts: a Divine Authority would not go wrong in this fashion._ ⎧ ⎧ (a) The Catholic Church ⎪ ⎪ has taught things later ⎪ ⎪ proved erroneous--which ⎪ ⎪ no Divine Authority would ⎪ ⎪ do. ⎪ I. The _Minor_ or Moral ⎫ ⎪ ⎪ Argument from History ⎪ which ⎪ (b) The Catholic Church ⎪ against the Catholic ⎬ says that ⎨ has taught things erroneous ⎪ claim to Divine ⎪ ⎪ after she knew them to be ⎪ Authority. ⎭ ⎪ erroneous--which no Divine ⎪ ⎪ Authority would do. History shows ⎪ ⎪ the Catholic ⎪ ⎪ (c) The Catholic Church is claim to Divine ⎨ ⎪ highly and increasingly Authority to be ⎪ ⎪ organised--which no Divinely false, by: ⎪ ⎩ Authorised body would be. ⎪ ⎪ ⎧ (a) (Protestant) The ⎪ ⎪ Catholic Church can be