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p206 [From the French.] Mons. Eynard, I have often, of late, insisted upon the fact, that all sorts of things are related in the scriptures: the malice of Satan, the mistakes and evil thoughts of men, their sins, unmixed evil, a mixture of good and evil, things and words where the influence of the Holy Spirit in the heart finds its way athwart the prejudices and the thoughts of men. But all these things are given us in the word by inspiration, in order that we may know man and the ways of God. At the same time, God's own thoughts are also communicated to us in order to enable us to judge all this according to His judgment. Thus we comprehend, in a far truer way, the state of man and all that is connected with his relations with God.

What I seek in an inspired book, is the perfect communication of the thoughts of God, such as He deigns to communicate them to me, and a perfect history of man, a history such that possessing the thoughts of God, I may perfectly judge of what man is, as God, the God of truth, would shew him to me. Now, for this, I must know his faults, his thoughts, what he is without law, under law, under the influence of affections which the Holy Spirit produces, whether the flesh is entirely mortified or, in what proceeds from the heart, it colours the affections produced, giving them the form of the individual's condition of mind.

In this latter case, when it is a question of this mixture, I do not take the result as the proper expression of the thoughts of God, nor as affections absolutely approved of Him, such at least as they are expressed. But I accept what is told, as a revelation from God, which makes man known to me in that phase. For the effect of the work of God in man will only be perfect, when, in the glory, we reflect what He is according to the pattern of Jesus, to whose image we shall be conformed. The moment we have to do with the thoughts of God revealed directly, it is another thing; but man depicted by God, the work of Satan, the effect of the work of God in man, are never that. There is difficulty only in this latter case, on account of the mixture. For my own part, I do not doubt that a powerful effect of the Spirit of God is often produced, where the moral form with which that which produces it is clothed participates, to a very great degree, in all the thoughts of the class of persons who are the vessels and channels of it. The Holy Spirit produces zeal and affections; their form is often that of the religious education of the individual, or even of the nation.

June 16th, 1852.

[51106F]

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