Religion, whethernatural or revealed, has always the same beneficial influence on the mind. In youth, in health and prosperity, it awakens feelings of gratitude and sublime love, and purifies at the same time that which it exalts; but it is in misfortune, in sickness, in age, that its effects are more truly and beneficially felt; when submission is cherished in faith and humble trust in the Divine will, when duties become pleasures, undecaying sources of consolation, then it creates powers which were believed to be extinct, and gives a freshness to the mind which was supposed to have passed away for ever, but which is now renovated as an immortal hope. Its influence outlives all earthly enjoyments, and becomes stronger as the organs decay and the frame dissolves; it appears as that evening star of light in the horizon of life which we are sure is to become, in another season, a morning star, and to throw its radiance through the gloom and shadow of death. (Sir Humphrey Davey.)
Knowledge of God the result of revelation
Ido not look to the Bible to teach me what I or my successors may some day find out by the use of observations and the inductive faculties; I go to the Bible to learn what I cannot find out for myself. Apart from revelation, what do I know about the world to come, about anything but what I can touch, taste, and handle? What hope have I for the future if I look only to nature? Nature tells me that when I die I shall probably be just like the dog, or horse, or any other animal. “All immortal, none immortal,” she seems to say. Therefore I must get light from revelation. I must even look to revelation for the motives which influence conduct, for personally I am not satisfied with these systems of ethics that are founded on utilitarian motives. I do not see how I can be said to have knowledge of God unless He in some way reveal Himself to me. (Prof. Bonney.)
