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27. All which things having been heard and considered, I am
unwilling to contend about words. for that is profitable to nothing but
to the subverting of the hearers. But the law is good to edify, if a
man use it lawfully;. for the end of it "is charity out of a pure
heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned." And well
did our Master know, upon which two commandments He hung all the Law
and the Prophets.x And what doth it hinder me, 0 my God, Thou
light of my eyes in secret, while ardently confessing these
things, since by these words many things may be understood, all of
which are yet true, what, I say, doth it! hinder me, should I
think otherwise of what the writer thought than some other man
thinketh? Indeed, all of us who read endeavour to trace out and to
understand that which he whom we read wished to convey; and as we
believe him to speak truly, we dare not suppose that he has spoken
anything which we either know or suppose to be false. Since,
therefore, each person endeavours to understand in the Holy
Scriptures that which the writer understood, what hurt is it if a man
understand what Thou, the light of all true-speaking minds, dost
show him to be true although he whom he reads understood not this,
seeing that he also understood a Truth, not, however, this Truth?
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