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274 DOCUMENTS CONCERNING SWEDENBORG.
" But possibly you will reject this testimony as un
necessary, urging the sufficiency of the written Scriptures,
which you possess, and that therefore you need not trouble
yourselves about any novel doctrines. It is granted, you
have the written Scriptures of eternal life and truth, and
they are amply sufficient to make you and all others wise
unto salvation, provided they be rightly understood, and
not perverted and falsified by misconstruction and mis
interpretation. But what if these Scriptures should be
misconstrued and misinterpreted ? what iffalse doctrines
should be derived from them instead of true ? what if they
should be made to say things which they do not say, yea,
which they expressly contradict ? what if the state of the
church should have become such, that different, and even
contrary doctrines are every day deduced from those sacred
records, so that the simple do not know what or whom to
believe ? what if the Word of God is thus made ofnone
effect, by the traditions and corrupt glosses of mistaken
men, as was the case amongst the Jews, when our Lord
came into the world, answering herein to that description
in the prophet, The vision ofall is become unto you as
the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to
one that is learned, saying, Read this, I praythee : and
he saith, I cannot ; for it is sealed. And the book is
delivered to him that is not learned, saying, Read this,
Ipray thee : and he saith, I am not learned ?’* Surely,
under these circumstances, you will be disposed to allow
of the necessity of some new interpretation of the Holy
Book, in order that its genuine sense and meaning may
be known and understood, and it may thus answer the
salutary and saving purposes for which it was written.
And surely you must allow, further, that such are the
circumstances which at this day unhappily attend the
interpretation of the Sacred Scriptures, whilst you observe
that the most learned and able critics of the times are at
perpetual war with each other, concerning such interpre
tation, insomuch that they cannot even agree amongst
6
* Isaiah xxix. 11, 12.
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