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knowledge was but vanity. They were ig norant altogether in that saving truth which the prophet David was so desirous to learn. The mysteries of salvation were so hard to be conceived by the very apostles of Christ Jesus, that he was forced many times to rebuke them for their dulness; which unless he had removed, by opening the eyes of their mind, they could never have attained to the knowledge of Salvation in Christ Jesus. The ears of that woman Lydia would have been as close shut against the preaching of Paul as any others, if the finger of God had not touched and opened her heart. As many as learn, they are taught of God."

Archbishop Usher, in his Sum and Substance of the Christian Religion, observes, "that it is required that we have the Spirit of God, as well to open our eyes to see the light, as to seal up fully in our hearts that truth which we see with our eyes. For the same Holy Spirit that inspired the Scripture, inclineth the hearts of God's children to believe what is revealed in them; and inwardly assureth them, above all reasons and arguments, that these are the Scriptures of

God."

God." And further on in the same work he says, "The Spirit of God alone is the certain interpreter of his Word written by his Spirit; for no man knoweth the things pertaining to God but the Spirit of God.”

Our great Milton also gives us a similar opinion in the following words, which are taken from his Paradise Lost:

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Wolves shall succeed for teachers, grievous wolves,
Who all the sacred mysteries of Heaven
To their own vile advantages shall turn
Of lucre and ambition, and the truth
With superstitions and traditions taint,
Left only in those written records pure,
Though not but by the Spirit understood.”

Of the same mind was the learned bishop Taylor, as we collect from his sermon De Viâ Intelligentiæ. "For although the Scriptures," says he, "are written by the Spirit of God, yet they are written within and without. And besides the Light that shines upon the face of them, unless there be a Light shining within our hearts, unfolding the leaves, and interpreting the mysterious sense of the Spirit, convincing our consciences, and preaching to our hearts; to look

for

for Christ in the leaves of the Gospel is to look for the living among the dead.

There

is a life in them; but that life is," according to St. Paul's expression, "hid with Christ in God; and unless the Spirit of God first draw it, we shall never draw it forth."

Again: "Human learning brings excellent ministeries towards this. It is admirably useful for the reproof of heresies, for the detection of fallacies, for the letter of the Scripture, for collateral testimonies, for exterior advantages: but there is something beyond this, that human learning, without the addition of divine, can never reach. Moses was learned in all the learning of the Egyptians, and the holy men of God contemplated the glories of God in the admirable order, motion, and influences of the heaven; but, besides all this, they were taught something far beyond these prettinesses. Pythagoras read Moses's books, and so did Plato; and yet they became not proselytes of the religion, though they were the learned scholars of such a master."

CHAP

CHAPTER IV.

The Spirit of God, which has been thus given to man in different degrees, was given him as a spiritual teacher or guide in his spiritual concerns-It performs this office, the Quakers say, by internal monitions-Sentiments of Taylorand of Monro-and, if encouraged, it teaches even by the external objects of the CreationWilliam Wordsworth.

THE Quakers believe that the Spirit of God, which has been thus given to man in different degrees or measures, and without which it is impossible to know spiritual things, or even to understand the Divine Writings spiritually, or to be assured of their divine origin, was given to him, among other purposes, as a teacher of good and evil, or to serve him as a guide in his spiritual concerns. By this the Quakers mean, that if any man will give himself up to the directions of the spiritual principle that resides within him, he will attain a know

ledge

ledge sufficient to enable him to discover the path of his duty both to God and his fellow-man.

That the Spirit of God was given to man as a spiritual instructor, the Quakers conceive to be plain from a number of passages which are to be found in the Sacred Writings.

They say, in the first place, that this was the language of the holy men of old *. “I said," says Elihu, "days should speak, and multitudes of years should teach wisdom. But there is a Spirit (or the Spirit itself is) in man, and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth him understanding." The Levites are found also making an acknowledgment to God, that "he gave also their forefathers his good Spirit to instruct them." The Psalms of David are also full of the same language, such as of "Show me thy ways, O Lord; lead me in the truth." know," says Jeremiah §," that the way of man is not in himself. It is not in man, that walketh, to direct his steps.' The

*Job xxxii. 7.

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+ Nehemiah ix. 20.

+ Psalm xxv. 4.
§ Jeremiah x. 23. *.

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