In regard to the manner in which man is to profit by the Atonement, Hilary shews the same inconsistency as in the case of sin. On the one hand, he lays frequent stress on knowledge concerning God and concerning the nature of sin as the first conditions of salvation; on the other, he insists, less often yet with equal emphasis, upon its being God’s spontaneous gift to men, to be appropriated only by faith. We have already seen that one of Hilary’s positions is that man must take the first step towards God; that if we will make the beginning He will give the increase Cf. p. lxxxv. fin. In Tr. in Ps. cxviii., Nun, 20, Hilary says ‘the reward of the consummation attained depends upon the initiative of the will;’ so also Trin. i. 11.. This increase is the knowledge of God imparted to willing minds Tr. in Ps. ii. 40., which lifts them up to piety. He states strongly the superiority of knowledge to faith;—“There is a certain greater effectiveness in knowledge than in faith. Thus the writer here did not believe; he knew Hilary is commenting on the words, ‘I know, O Lord, that Thy judgments are right.’. For faith has the reward of obedience, but it has not the assurance of ascertained truth. The Apostle has indicated the breadth of the interval between the two by putting the latter in the lower place in his list of the gifts of graces. ‘To the first wisdom, to the next knowledge, to the third faith’ is his message 1 Cor. xii. 8.; for he who believes may be ignorant even while he believes, but he who has come to know is saved by his possession of knowledge from the very possibility of unbelief Tr. in Ps.cxviii., Iod, 12..” This high estimation of sound knowledge was due, no doubt, to the intellectual character of the Arian conflict, in which each party retorted upon the other the charge of ignorance and folly; and it must have been confirmed by the observation that some who were conspicuous for the misinterpretation of Scripture were notorious also for moral obliquity. There was, however, that deeper reason which influenced all Hilary’s thought; the conviction that if there is to be any harmony, any understanding between God and the soul of man, it must be a perfect harmony and understanding. And knowledge is pre-eminently the sphere in which this is possible, for the revelation of God is clear and precise, and unmistakable in its import E.g. Trin. x. 70, xi. 1.. But there was another, a directly practical reason for this insistence. Apprehension of Divine truths is the unfailing test of a Christian mind; conduct changes and faith varies in intensity, but the facts of religion remain the same, and the believer can be judged by his attitude towards them. Hence we cannot be surprised that Hilary maintains the insufficiency of ‘simplicity of faith,’ and ranks its advocates with heathen philosophers who regard purity of life as a substitute for religion. God, he says, has provided copious knowledge, with which we cannot dispense Tr. in Ps. cxviii., prolog. 4.. But this knowledge is to embrace not only the truth concerning God, but also concerning the realities of human life. It is to be a knowledge of the fact that sins have been committed and an opening of the eyes to their enormity Ib. cxxxv. 3; confessio is paraphrased by professa cognitio. Similar language is used in cxxxvii. 2 f.. This will be followed by confession to God, by the promise to Him that we will henceforth regard sin as He regards it, and by the profession of a firm purpose to abandon it. Here again the starting-point is human knowledge. When the right attitude towards sin, intellectually and therefore morally, has been assumed, when there is the purpose of amendment and an earnest and successful struggle against sensual and worldly temptations, then we shall become ‘worthy of the favour of God Ib. ii. 38; cf. lii. 12 in., cxix. 11 (4)..’ In this light confession is habitually regarded It is always confession to God directly. There is no hint of public or ceremonial confession, or of absolution. But Hilary’s abstinence from allusion to the practical system of the Church is so complete that no argument can ever be drawn from his silence as to the existence, or the importance in his eyes, of her institutions.; it is a voluntary moral act, a self-enlightenment to the realities of sin, necessarily followed by repugnance and the effort to escape, and antecedent to Divine pardon and aid. But in contrast to this, Hilary’s normal judgment, there are passages where human action is put altogether in the background. Forgiveness is the spontaneous bounty of God, overflowing from the riches of His loving-kindness, and faith the condition of its bestowal and the means by which it is appropriated Tr. in Ps. lxvi. 2, lvi. 3.. Even the Psalmist, himself perfect in all good works, prayed for mercy; he put his whole trust in God, and so must we Ib. cxviii., Koph, 6.. And faith precedes knowledge also, which is unattainable except by the believer Trin. i. 12.. Salvation does not come first, and then faith, but through faith is the hope of salvation; the blind man believed before he saw Comm. in Matt. ix. 9.. Here again, as in the case of sin, we have two groups of statements without attempt at reconciliation; but that which lays stress upon human initiative is far more numerous than the other, and must be regarded as expressing Hilary’s underlying thought in his exhortations to Christian conduct, to his doctrine of which we may now turn.