There might be some plausibility in the pretended appeal from the church to the Bible, if the church had not the Bible, or if she avowedly rejected its divine authority; but as the case stands, such an appeal is irregular, illegal, and absurd. The church has and always has had the Bible ever since it was written. It was, as we have seen, originally deposited with her, and it is only from her that those outside of her communion have obtained it or their knowledge of it. She has always held and taught it to be the divinely inspired and authoritative written word of God, which none of her children are allowed to deny or question. There is no opposition possible between her teaching and the Bible, for the Bible is included in her teaching, and consequently no appeal from her teaching to the Bible. It would be only an appeal from herself to herself. The only appeal conceivable in the case is from her understanding of the sacred Scriptures or the revealed word of God to--your own; but as you at best have confessedly no authority to expound, interpret, or declare the law, your understanding of the written word can in no case override or set aside hers. The Reformers, when they pretended to appeal from the church to the Bible, mistook the question and proceeded on a false assumption. There never was any question between the church and the Bible; the only question there was or could be was between her understanding of the Bible and theirs, or, as we have said, between the Bible as expounded by the church and the Bible as expounded by private individuals. This the Reformers did not or would not see, and this their followers do not or will not see to this day. Now, count the authority of the church for as little as possible, her understanding cannot be below that of private individuals, and the understanding of private individuals can never override it, or be a sufficient reason for setting it aside. The Reformers had recognized the church as the supreme authority in matters of faith, and the question was not on admitting her authority as something hitherto unrecognized, but on rejecting an authority they had hitherto acknowledged as divine. They could not legally reject it except on a higher authority, or by the judgment of a superior court. But there was no superior court, no higher authority, and they could oppose to her not the authority of the Bible, as they pretended, but at best only their private opinion or views of what it teaches, which in no case could count for more than her judgment, and therefore could not overrule it or authorize its rejection.