speaks, rather than to the lower part of us, to which the world speaks.-Dr. Arnold.

444.

Jest not with the two-edged sword of God's Word. Dr. T. Fuller.

445.

There are things in the Sacred writings which are above the reach of our comprehension; but there are none which are above the reach of our feelings; and if our reason is unable to judge of the things (mysterious as they are) themselves, it is very well to ascertain the justness of those feelings which are excited by them.-W. Danby. 446.

In the adaptation of the Word of God to intellects of all dimensions, it resembles the natural light, which is equally suited to the eye of the minutest insect, and to the extended vision of man. W. B. Clulow.

447.

In matters of weight, wherein the honour of God and the safety of men's souls are concerned, Scripture is punctual, clear, full, and particular; that our faith may be better directed, and we ourselves preserved against cheats and imposture. But as to other matters, they are left to Christian prudence, discretion, and fidelity.Dr. T. Fuller.

448.

It would be no slight service to the cause of Christianity to trace the influence of experimental religion on intellectual character and happiness. It would also be curious, and not uninstructive, to reverse the process, by considering the operation of intellectual peculiarities, especially of the imaginative faculty, on religious character and experience. -W. B. Clulow.

449.

Were a plain, unlettered man, but endowed with common sense, and a certain quantum of observation and of reflection, to read over attentively the four Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, without any note or comment, I hugely doubt whether it would enter into his ears to hear, his eyes to see, or his heart to conceive, the purport of many ideas signified by many words ending in ism, which nevertheless have cost Christendom rivers of ink and oceans of blood.Lacon.

450.

The apotheosis of error is the greatest evil of all, and when folly is worshipped, it is, as it were, a plague-spot upon the understanding. Yet some of the moderns have indulged this folly with such consummate inconsiderateness, that they have endeavoured to build a system of natural philosophy on the first chapter of Genesis, the book of Job, and other parts of Scripture; seeking thus the dead amongst the living.-Bacon.

451.

Many expositions of Scripture have been constructed on a false principle, namely, that the whole of the Bible requires elucidation; whereas the greater part is perfectly simple and easy of comprehension. The only effect of these attempts to explain what needs no explanation, is that you get the same sentiment in different words, but generally so impaired by amplification, that it has lost half its majesty and beauty: Akin to this mode of dealing with Holy Writ are endeavours to clear up what is impenetrable. Many seem reluctant to admit that any phrase or proposition in Scripture can defy interpretation; while of passages which have baffled the keenest wits, they will tender a solution, or rather a number of

contradictory solutions, which every unsophisticated judgment would reject with contempt. If scepticism is an evidence of impiety, facility in adopting the glosses of critics and expositors would in many instances involve an abandonment of reason. The crudities that have been hazarded on that mysterious and sublime composition, the Apocalypse, are a scandal to the human intellect. -W. B. Clulow.

452.

Credulity, or an easiness to believe without reason or Scripture, is a stranger to wisdom, and the very nurse of superstition.-Dr. Whichcote. 453.

Zeal for God will justify no action unless there be discretion to justify our zeal. Even when zeal is a virtue, it is a nice and dangerous one; for the wisest men are apt to mingle their own passions and interests with their zeal for God and religion.

454.

It is not to be imagined, when men are once under the power of superstition, how ridiculous they may be, and yet think themselves religious: how prodigiously they may play the fool, and yet believe they please God: what cruel and barbarous things they may do to themselves and others; and yet be verily persuaded that they do God service. Dr. T. Fuller.

455.

There are some people who would not only destroy all wickedness in the world, but almost all goodness, when it does not make its appearance under the form, or with the sanction of their own particular opinions.—J. F. Boyes.

456.

When misfortunes happen to such as dissent

from us in matters of religion, we call them judgments; when to those of our own sect, we call them trials; when to persons neither way distinguished, we are content to attribute them to the settled course of things.-Shenstone.

457.

I suspect whether that be of any moment in religion which admits of dispute; for methinks it it is not agreeable to the goodness of God, to suffer anything of that universal concern to all men, to remain very obscure and controversial.-Dr. T. Fuller.

458:

Ignorance and credulity have ever been companions, and have misled and enslaved mankind; philosophy has in all ages endeavoured to oppose their progress and to loosen the shackles they had imposed; philosophers have on this account been called unbelievers; unbelievers of what?-of the fictions of fancy, of witchcraft, hobgoblins, apparitions, vampires, fairies; of the influence of the stars on human actions, miracles wrought by the bones of saints, the flights of ominous birds, the predictions from the bowels of dying animals, expounders of dreams, fortune-tellers, conjurors, modern prophets, necromancy, chieromancy, with endless variety of folly? These they have disbelieved and despised, but have ever bowed their heads to truth and nature.—Dr Darwin.

459.

I have seen a harmless dove made dark with an artificial night, and her eyes sealed and locked up with a little quill, soaring upward and flying with amazement, fear, and an undiscerning wing; she made towards heaven, but knew not that she was made a train and an instrument to teach her enemy to prevail upon her, and all her defenceless

kindred. So is a superstitious man, jealous and blind, forward and mistaken; he runs towards heaven as he thinks, but he chooses foolish paths, and out of fear takes any thing that he is told, or fancies and guesses concerning God, by measures taken from his own diseases and imperfections.Bp. Jeremy Taylor.

460.

Any one who properly considers the subject, will find natural philosophy to be, after the Word of God, the surest remedy against superstition, and the most approved support of faith. She is therefore rightly bestowed upon religion as a most faithful attendant, for the one exhibits the will and the other the power of God. Nor was He wrong who observed, "Ye err, not knowing the Scriptures and the power of God; " thus uniting in one bond the revelation of His will and the contemplation of His power.-Bacon.

461.

Superstition has many direct sorrows, but atheism has no direct joys. Superstition admits fear mingled with hope; but atheism, while it excludes hope, affords a very imperfect security against fear. Superstition is ever exposed to the dreary vacuities in the soul, over which atheism is wont to mood in solitude and silence; but atheism is sometimes haunted with forebodings scarcely less confused, or less unquiet, than those by which superstition is annoyed. Superstition stands aghast at the punishment reserved for wicked men in another state; but atheism cannot disprove the possibility of such a state to all men, accompanied by consciousness, and fraught with evils, equally dreadful in degree, and even in duration, with those punishments. Superstition has often preserved men from crimes; but atheism tends to protect them from weaknesses only.