THE IRISH
SEPTEMBER, 1865.
NO. IV.
Who is there amongst our readers that has not at some timein his life stood upon the sea-shore to watch the rising tide?Two mighty powers meet, as it were in conflict, and each in itsturn seems for a time to prevail. Wave rolls after wave, buteach again recedes as if baffled in the struggle and exhaustedby the effort. At one moment the waters gain upon the land;then in the next the land wins back all that it had lost; andsometimes even more besides. It is only when some prominentlandmark is reached, which a little while ago stood high anddry upon the beach, that we can no longer entertain a doubt ofthe sure and steady progress of the advancing flood.
Such, as it seems to us, is the conflict which it is the lot ofour age to witness between the flood-tide of infidelity and theEstablished Church in these countries. The one is aggressive,the other is struggling hard to hold its own. On both sides thecontest is carried on with energy and power. To a casual observerit might perhaps seem that the fortunes of each are almostequal, and the victory uncertain. But to one who extends therange of his vision and takes in the distant landmarks, it isplainly evident that one by one they are fast disappearing, andthat the waves of infidelity are sweeping, slowly indeed, butirresistibly, over the face of the Established Church.
In the person of Dr. Colenso they have reached at length theepiscopal bench. His brethren, it is true, have taken the alarm,and have made a show of resistance, but they only demonstratetheir own weakness. Like Canute of old, they command thewaters to advance no further, but their command is vain andfruitless. The great flood is still coming in, and they who butyesterday were considered, from their high position, far removedfrom danger, are to-day surrounded by the waves. In this perilouscrisis the Catholic Church alone affords a home of undisturbedtranquillity to its children, a safe refuge to the stranger.It stands indeed in the midst of the danger, but its walls are toostrong to be shaken, its foundation too solid to be undermined.It has been built by its Divine Founder on a rock, and the rainmay descend, and the floods come, and the winds blow and beatupon that Church, but it falleth not. We have the promise ofGod, that her enemies shall not prevail against her; and thereforewe may look out from our impregnable fortress upon thesurging billows with the same calm sense of security as Noahhad when he looked out from the window of the ark on thewaters of the deluge. But though God had resolved that Noahshould be saved from destruction whilst all around were perishing,yet Noah was not saved without the toil and labour of hisown hands. And so, too, though by a decree of God, errorcannot prevail against His Church, yet has he ordained that thetrue faith should be ever defended by human skill and industry.We hope, therefore, our readers will pardon us if we return onceagain to the charges which Dr. Colenso has brought against thetruth of the Bible.
The increase of the children of Israel in Egypt, as representedin the Mosaic narrative, is Dr. Colenso’s favourite objection. Itis dressed out with the most elaborate ingenuity and care. It isset forth with even more than his usual confidence. It is heldup as, in itself, sufficient to destroy the historical character of thewhole narrative. By this objection, therefore, we may fairlysuppose that he is willing to stand or fall. We have alreadypointed out two fund