Dungan - Hermeneutics
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D. R. <strong>Dungan</strong>'s <strong>Hermeneutics</strong>: A Text-Book: Chapter IV.<br />
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D. R. <strong>Dungan</strong><br />
<strong>Hermeneutics</strong>: A Text-Book (1888)<br />
CHAPTER IV.<br />
CONCERNING METHODS.<br />
SEC. 25. THE VALUE OF METHOD.<br />
(1.) Definition of method.--According to Webster, Method is--<br />
"1. An orderly procedure or process; a rational way of investigating or exhibiting truth; regular mode<br />
or manner of doing anything; characteristic manner.<br />
"'Though this be madness, yet there is method in it.'--Shakespeare.<br />
"2. Orderly arrangement, elucidation, development, or classification; clear and lucid exhibition;<br />
systematic arrangement peculiar to an individual.<br />
"'However irregular and desultory his talk, there is method in the fragments.'--Coleridge.<br />
"'All method is rational progress, a progress toward an end.'--Sir W. Hamilton."<br />
We use the word, in the present work, to indicate the arrangement or plan of investigation. It is the<br />
system by which facts are to be introduced and conclusions reached.<br />
(2.) Method is superior to rule.--Methods are general and rules are special, hence the method governs<br />
all rules, or directs their use. One of the weaknesses of hermeneutics is the want of system, or of any<br />
thought that system is necessary in the study of the Scriptures. Rules have been furnished in abundance,<br />
but the great need has been that of method. Rules may explain how to cut stone and lay up the wall, but<br />
without method you would be [48] as likely to have one form as another in the building. The material that<br />
went into the temple at Jerusalem could have all been put into a building ten feet high and ten feet wide,<br />
by extending it far enough. If rules were all that had been needed, the men of King Hiram would have<br />
known just how to erect the temple of Solomon without any directions from him. But rules were not<br />
enough; it took the divine plan to govern them, to render them of any particular value in erecting the<br />
temple. An army might have all the rules necessary to success--marching, camping, cooking, fighting--<br />
but, without method, they would not unite against any foe, or conduct a campaign with any profitable<br />
results.<br />
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