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tion of hazy ideas, expi’essed in indefinite language. Religion, 
if it be chiefly an affair of the heart, has for its object the 
conquest of the mind also, and what is of more importance 
still, the direction of the will. But it could hardly have 
attained those objects if its fundamental ideas were incapable 
of being practically realized, — if all the utterances about the 
Fatherhood of God and the Redemption of Man, about Salva- 
tion through Christ’’ s Blood, and life through His Resurrection, 
— were mere loose rhetorical phrases, to which no precise 
meaning could be assigned. If there be anything which 
St. Paul was not, it was a “ literary man ” in the usual sense of 
the term, — that is, one who takes up literature as a business or 
an amusement, who writes either for pay, or for his own 
amusement, or that of others. If he had any object in life, 
it was a severely practical one, to bring every one with whom 
he came into contact into obedience to the law of Christ. It 
is hardly probable that with this intensely practical aim 
before him he would have employed “ fluid, passing, literary ” 
language, the language of a man not in earnest, but only 
desirous of attracting a temporary attention. Moreover, as 
a matter of fact, it has not occurred to the majority of the 
readers of St. Paul, for instance, — indeed to any of them until 
lately, — that he did not know what he meant by the words he 
used. It has generally been supposed that any difficulty of 
understanding him arises from the depth of his thoughts, 
rather than from any vagueness or indefiniteness in the 
language in which he conveyed them. It seems at least pro- 
bable that if there be any vagueness or indefiniteness in our 
apprehension of the great truths contained in the sacred 
writings, the fault is all our own. We have approached them 
fettered by traditional prejudices of one kind or another, 
instead of with a full desire to unlock their inner meaning. 
We have but to go back to the time in which their words 
were uttered, to study the meaning they bore in that age, and 
there will be quite sufficient to enable us to form a conception 
of the main doctrines of our faith, — sufficient, at least, for the 
purpose for which they are designed, namely, to guide us 
through the dangers, the difficulties, the otherwise unsolved 
problems of our earthly life. I might say more. I might 
add that so infinite is the wisdom contained in the sacred 
Scriptures, that men who approach them in the proper spirit, 
men who are desirous to be enlightened by them, rather than 
with patronizing airs of superiority to point out their blunders, 
have advanced, and are still advancing, in the comprehension 
of their meaning. Faith, patience, self-renunciation, freedom 
