And are all these testimonies and
lights of experience to lose their value and efficiency because I
feel no warrant of history, or Holy Writ, or of my own heart for
denying, that in the framework and outward case of this instrument a
few parts may be discovered of less costly materials and of meaner
workmanship? Is it not a fact that the Books of the New Testament
were tried by their consonance with the rule, and according to the
analogy, of faith? Does not the universally admitted canon--that
each part of Scripture must be interpreted by the spirit of the
whole--lead to the same practical conclusion as that for which I am
now contending--namely, that it is the spirit of the Bible, and not
the detached words and sentences, that is infallible and absolute?
Practical, I say, and spiritual too; and what knowledge not practical
or spiritual are we entitled to seek in our Bibles? Is the grace of
God so confined--are the evidences of the present and actuating
Spirit so dim and doubtful--that to be assured of the same we must
first take for granted that all the life and co-agency of our
humanity is miraculously suspended?
Whatever is spiritual, is eo nomine supernatural; but must it be
always and of necessity miraculous? Miracles could open the eyes of
the body; and he that was born blind beheld his Redeemer.
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