Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

106 THE FIRST AND THE SECOND MAN.receiving the Christian truth as a divine gift, looksfor it also to have a logical cohesion with itself,to be consistent and complete, to be a body oftruth, not a bundle of opinions. Let us takeonce more S. Augustine as expressing, not a privatefeeling, but the universal Christian sense,when he thus reprehended the Donatist pretension,that truth had deserted the Body of theChurch to dwell in the province of Africa. " But,they say, that Church which was the Church ofall nations exists no longer. She has perished.This they say who are not in her. 0 shamelessword ! The Church is not because thou art notin her. See, lest therefore thou be not, for thoughthou be not, she will be. This word, abominable,detestable, full of presumption and falsehood, supportedby no truth, illuminated by no wisdom,seasoned with no sense, " vain, rash, precipitate,and pernicious-this it was which the Spirit ofGod foresaw, and as against these very men, whenHe foretold unity in that saying, 'To announcethe name of the Lord in Zion, and his worship inJerusalem, when the peoples and kingdoms jointogether in one that they may serve the Lord.' "37Now, to suppose that anything which is falsehas been, or is, or can be taught by the Churchof God, is to overthrow the one idea which runsthrough the titles of the Kingdom, Temple, Body,and Spouse of Christ, it is to make the Mother37 S. Aug. in Ps. ci. torn. iv. p. 1105 d.