05-12-2008, 11:29 PM
|
 | Administrator | | Join Date: May 2003 Location: Dallas, Texas
Posts: 16,181
Thanks: 1,641
Thanked 1,965 Times in 994 Posts
| |
Quote: |
Among the gentiles in the time of Christ, the Samaritans undoubtedly made the nearest approach to true piety; yet we hear from his own mouth that they worshiped they knew not what (John 4:22); whence it follows that they were deluded by vain errors. In short, though all did not give way to gross vice, or rush headlong into open idolatry, there was no pure and authentic religion founded merely on common belief. A few individuals may not have gone all insane lengths with vulgar; still Paul's declaration remains true, that the wisdom of God was not apprehended by the princes of this world (1 Cor. 2:8). But if the most distinguished wandered in darkness, what shall we say of the refuse? No wonder, therefore, that all worship of man's device is repudiated by the Holy Spirit as degenerate. Any opinion which man can form in heavenly mysteries, thought it may not beget a long train of errors, is still the parent of error.
| -John Calvin, Institutes, Book I. Ch. 5. Section 13b.
|