Page:The Other Life.djvu/21

 any one who thinks he may tell us something of the world in which we are to live for ever:

"If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book."

Examine the verse closely, and you will discover that this curse is pronounced against those who presume to add anything to "the prophecies" contained in the Book of Revelation, a book written by John, and not recognized as a sacred book nor bound up with the other Scriptures until hundreds of years after. This verse, therefore, could have no reference to the Bible as a whole, for the biblical canon had not been decided at the time the verse was written.

A man might describe heaven and hell truly and most minutely without adding an iota to the Bible; for the Bible is a revelation, not of heaven and hell, but of the Divine Law

Nor is the unfolding of the spiritual sense of the Bible any addition to it. It is simply a bringing to view of what was already there, and not heretofore discovered. As well might we say that he who reveals the laws of the human mind, adds something to the anatomy of the human body.