TRACTS FOR THE TIMES.
RECORDS OF THE CHURCH.
No. XXV.
THE HOLY CHURCH THROUGHOUT ALL THE WORLD DOTH ACKNOWLEDGE THEE.
Vincentius of Lerins on the Tests of Heresy and Error.
(Concluded.)
4. (c. 25.)
It follows, that he is the real and genuine Catholic, who loves God's truth, and the Church, and the body of Christ, who makes all things second to divine religion and the Catholic faith, whether the authority of private men, or their amiable qualities, or their talent, or eloquence, or philosophy; but not regarding any of these, and remaining fixed and stedfast in the faith, deliberately maintains that, and that only, which the Church Catholic is known to have held every where from the beginning; and considers as a temptation, not as a religious truth, whatever novelty has been secretly introduced by some private hand, beside, or even contrary to, the body of Saints. And, above all, as being taught by St. Paul, he receives that heresies must be, in order that the approved may become manifest among us, as if this were the reason why heresiarchs are not at once taken away by divine Providence; that the con-
