Page:God and His Book.djvu/48



"Inspired" Bumpkins—Why not "Inspire" the Philosophers of Greece and Rome?—The Unlearned Entirely at the Mercy of the Learned—A Specimen from the Writings of the Holy Ghost—No one Language can be Translated with Exact Equivalency into any other—800,000 Various Readings Admitted—The Potency of a Single Gospel-grinder—Testimony of the Rev. Dr. Irons—Mental Thimble-rigging.

Now that we have seen a fac-simile of the Holy Ghost's handwriting, let us consider for a moment the action of his inspiration upon those he inspired. I question whether the majority of those he employed to write gospels that we might be "saved" knew a from a bull's foot, or a  from a lamb's tail. There are few among us who could set down a hind like Elijah or an eel-fisher like John, who knew as much about handwriting, presumably, as a pig does about the binomial theorem, and "inspire" them to write books that every man of us who will put ourselves to the trouble of reading said books and believing in them might have a harp, a crown, and a pair of wings. For those who do not read the Ghost's books, or, reading them, venture to criticise them, there was once an uncomfortably hot hell: but, through lack of faith and brimstone, that has now subsided into a quiet, cool sheol, for which ever blessed be the name of the Lord.

Just imagine to yourself (if, indeed, it be not sacrilege to permit yourself to imagine an incident so sacred) the Ghost feeling himself in the throes of literary composition. He is possessed with an overwhelming anxiety that every soul of us should get to heaven, and he yearns and burns to write us a guide-book from earth