LEYDEN, Scnoot. or, in theology, the name given to certain Dutch theologians i who follow the rationalistic professors of the university of Leyden. founded in 1575. The principal advocates of this school are.Abram Nuenen, Tiele, and J. B. Seholt en, pro fessors in Leyden, and their pupils. Their views are similar to those of the Dutch ,, Ttibinen school. Sehniten in his younger days was orthodox, and strongly opposed the views of Baur and his associates, but in 1864 came out boldly in defense of them. " Man," the Leyden school teaches, " arrives at a knowledge of the Truth by the holy Scriptures; but they must not be understood as containing the only revelation from God He also reveals himself to the world through the hearts of all believers. The _Bible is the source of the original religion. There is a difference between the Scriptures and the word of God. The latter is what God reveals in the human spirit concerning his will and himself. The writing down of the communication is purely human; therefore the Bible cannot be called a revelation. To prove the certainty of the facts of revelation, historical criticism must be called in." But they assert, in applying " his torical criticism." that we cannot go further back than the middle of the 8th c before Christ, or the time of Hosea and Amos; preceding that "all the preeedin times are enveloped in J hopeless myth. Abraham, Isaac, and acob, the founders of 'Israel, are not persons,
but personifications They are purely ideal figures, for modern historical inquiry teaches us that races are not derived from one progenitor, but many. The development and preservation of Israel—its whole history—were the result of purely national causes." Christianity they regard as " neither superhuman nor supernatural. It is the highest point of the development of human nature itself, and in it is natural and human in the highest acceptation of those terms. It is the mission of science to put mat in a condition to comprehend the divine volume presented by Christianity." And what the relation of science to faith is may be learned from Opzoomer, of Utrecht uni versity, who says. " Science is not to appear before the bar of faith, but faith before that of science; for it is not the credibility of knowledge. but of faitlj, that is to be proved. Science needs no justification. The believer, on the contrary, must justify his faith, and that before the bar of science. Thus, as a matter of course, the final decision and the supreme power rest with science." This writer's arguments against miracles are precisely those of Hume. He says: " We know nothing of the supernatural; to us there is not a single miracle."