Answer to the form of libel now before the Free Church Presbytery of Aberdeen / by W. Robertson Smith.

64 p.; 21.5 cm. Following the appearance of Smith's article `Bible' in vol. 3 of the 9th edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica on 7 Dec. 1875, in which he wrote: `In this long struggle, which began with the foundation of the theocracy in the work of Moses, and did not issue in conclusive victory until the time of Ezra, the spiritual faith was compelled to show constant powers of new development' (Black & Chrystal, p. 182), in the Edinburgh evening courant for 15 April 1876 the reviewer (A. H. Charteris) hoped that `the publisher and the editor will look after the contributors--or after each other--and cease to pass off rationalistic speculations as ascertained facts.' (p. 189). After growing agitation, a College Committee reported to the General Assembly of the Free Church in May 1877 which then suspended him from his academic duties. Smith then asked the Presbytery of Aberdeen to reduce the charges into a formal libel which after delay was sent to Smith on 12 Feb. 1878, of ways in which he was `denying, tending to deny,or not sufficiently asserting the Divine inspiration of the Bible' (p. 242). Though his Answer (`I have acted on the conviction that loyalty to the Bible, in a Protestant sense, is inseparable from loyalty to the approved laws of scholarly research; for if they are inapplicable to the language of Scripture, God no longer speaks to us in words that we can understand.' (p. 64) was received as `first rate',the case proceeded through Presbytery and General Assembly, resulting in Smith's dismissal from his chair at Aberdeen in 1881. He went on to a distinguished career at Cambridge until his early death in 1894. Good, sidesewn, thumbed and corners worn. Lacks wrapper.…