Ib. p. 61.
He that without danger will know God, and will speculate of him, let
him look first into the manger, that is, let him begin below, and let
him first learn to know the Son of the Virgin Mary, born at Bethlehem,
that lies and sucks in his mother's bosom; or let one look upon him
hanging on the Cross. ** But take good heed in any case of high
climbing cogitations, to clamber up to heaven without this ladder,
namely, the Lord Christ in his humanity.
To know God as God ([Greek: ton Zaena], the living God) we must assume
his personality: otherwise what were it but an ether, a gravitation?
--but to assume his personality, we must begin with his humanity, and
this is impossible but in history; for man is an historical--not an
eternal being. 'Ergo'. Christianity is of necessity historical and not
philosophical only.
Ib. p. 62.
'What is that to thee'? said Christ to Peter. 'Follow thou me'--me,
follow me, and not thy questions, or cogitations.
Lord! keep us looking to, and humbly following, thee!
Chap. VI. p. 103.
The philosophers and learned heathen (said Luther) have described God,
that he is as a circle, the point whereof in the midst is every where;
but the circumference, which on the outside goeth round about, is no
where: herewith they would shew that God is all, and yet is nothing.
What a huge difference the absence of a blank space, which is nothing,
or next to nothing, may make! The words here should have been printed,
"God is all, and yet is no thing;" For what does 'thing' mean? Itself,
that is, the 'ing', or inclosure, that which is contained within an
outline, or circumscribed.
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