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58. Accordingly, I think that it is well to warn studious and able
young men, who fear God and are seeking for happiness of life, not to
venture heedlessly upon the pursuit of the branches of learning that are
in vogue beyond the pale of the Church of Christ, as if these could
secure for them the happiness they seek; but soberly and carefully to
discriminate among them. And if they find any of those which have been
instituted by men varying by reason of the varying pleasure of their
founders, and unknown by reason of erroneous conjectures, especially
if they involve entering into fellowship with devils by means of leagues
and covenants about signs, let these be utterly rejected and held in
detestation. Let the young men also withdraw their attention from such
institutions of men as are unnecessary and luxurious. But for the sake
of the necessities of this life we must not neglect the arrangements of
men that enable us to carry on intercourse with those around us. I
think, however, there is nothing useful in the other branches of
learning that are found among the heathen, except information about
objects, either past or present, that relate to the bodily senses, in
which are included also the experiments and conclusions of the useful
mechanical arts, except also the sciences of reasoning and of number.
And in regard to all these we must hold by the maxim, "Not too much
of anything;" especially in the case of those which, pertaining as
they do to the senses, are subject to the relations of space and time.
59. What, then, some men have done in regard to all words and
names found in Scripture, in the Hebrew, and Syriac, and
Egyptian, and other tongues, taking up and interpreting separately
such as were left in Scripture without interpretation; and what
Eusebius has done in regard to the history of the past with a view to
the questions arising in Scripture that require a knowledge of history
for their solution; what, I say, these men have done in regard to
matters of this kind, making it unnecessary for the Christian to spend
his strength on many subjects for the sake of a few items of knowledge,
the same, I think, might be done in regard to other matters, if any
competent man were willing in a spirit of benevolence to undertake the
labor for the advantage of his brethren. In this way he might arrange
in their several classes, and give an account of the unknown places,
and animals, and plants, and trees, and stones, and metals, and
other species of things that are mentioned in Scripture, taking up
these only, and committing his account to writing. This might also be
done in relation to numbers, so that the theory of those numbers, and
those only, which are mentioned in Holy Scripture, might be
explained and written down. And it may happen that some or all of
these things have been done already (as I have found that many things
I had no notion of have been worked out and committed to writing by
good and learned Christians), but are either lost amid the crowds of
the careless, or are kept out of sight by the envious. And I am not
sure whether the same thing can be done in regard to the theory of
reasoning; but it seems to me it cannot, because this runs like a
system of nerves through the whole structure of Scripture, and on that
account is of more service to the reader in disentangling and explaining
ambiguous passages, of which I shall speak hereafter, than in
ascertaining the meaning of unknown signs, the topic I am now
discussing.
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