Page:A Compendium of the Chief Doctrines of the True Christian Religion.djvu/212

28 all those who are influenced by the faith of the present church. I have at times conversed in the spiritual world with those who maintain the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and have told them, that their doctrine is erroneous, and absurd, and that it occasioneth a false security, blindness, sleep, and darkness, with respect to spiritual things, and thereby bringeth death to the soul; exhorting them at the same time to desist from it; but the answer I have commonly received was, How desist? Doth not the superior excellence of clerical erudition over that of the laity depend solely on this doctrine? Then I represented to them that, according to this way of reasoning, they do not so much regard the salvation of souls as the aggrandizement of their own reputation, and that in consequence of applying the truths of the word to their own false principles, and thereby adulterating them, they are angels of the bottomless pit, called and, Rev. ix. 11, by which are signified the destroyers of the church by the total falsification of the word; but they replied, What is that to the purpose? By our knowledge of the mysteries of this faith we are oracles, and from this faith, as from an oracular temple, we give our answers to all that ask us, wherefore we are not Apollyons, but ; to this I replied with some warmth of indignation, If ye are Apollos, ye are also, the chief amongst you crooked Leviathans, and the inferior amongst you oblong Leviathans, whom God will visit with his strong and great sword, Isaiah xxvii. 1; but at this they smiled, and departed.