ON BIBLE-READING.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 317, 17 February 1910, Page 6

ON BIBLE-READING.

To the Editor. Sir, The effusions of your correspondent "C.W ,\\t;ii! to inin,| the sapient remark made by John Locke in his Lssay r on the Human L liderstanding—that one essentiai in writing ur speaking 011 a subject is to know" something j about it. tine cannot help thinking th.-i"t I this writer's knowledge of the J look of Books is as elementary as his acquaintance with, agriculture and horticulture. ; Seeing "the aspects of fertility visible j on the face of the earth." he disbelieves that it lies under a curse, as he appe.fs | to disbelieve that the sun and moon rule i the day and night —a curious instance ,of mental blindness producing also ! physical infirmity. Had this writer hut a bowing acquaintance with gardening, j for instance, he would not have fallen into the mistake he has on this matter ! of the curse on the land. He might just as well deny the existence of {he evil i wliich the Fall produced in maternity. ' How true and persistent the curse on the land is, is apparent in every land, in every crop, and on every soil. Xot only do thorns and thistles ever accompany cultivation, but each ann rvoty soil of garden and field crop has its j parasites and diseases. No one who I does not till a garden or fann can have 1 any idea of the constant fight these entail. I confess I find it beyond my coin- | prehension that anyone able to write a letter can be ignorant of these facts. The Bible itself informs us that the fear i of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Can it be that this writer has not taken this first primary step on the ladder of learning, and is therefore lost in ;h? '] darkness of dense ignorance? He obi jects to the reading of the Book by our | children, oblivious of the fact that its I study and precepts have been the main ' cause of the spread of civilisation in Europe and America, and that at this j very day it has had the same beneficent 1 effects on numbers of tribes and peoples. | elevating them from cannibalism and I gross idolatry to the status of Christian I people. I confess I do not understand I his allusion to David's seeing the Almighty as a lion; but among his other disabilities of belief which are scarcely necessary to follow one would like to ask him lu>w his theories dovetail m with the extraordinary fulfilment of the prophecies of Moses and the prophets in connection with David's countrymen, the modern Jews: prophecies of which v;e have read the literal fulfilment not only in Josephus. Tacitus, and other ancient historians, but which during the last few years have been fulfilled to the letter in different European countries. made himseli acquainted with these extraordinary predictions, or is he ignorant of them and of the exist--1 once of the Jewish people to-day as a living witness of the truth of God's Word? Will he take the kindly advice

1 of an old man to whom the Bible has I been a light and guide for more than j two generations and studv the Book hj« so flippantly misquotes.—l am. etc., ! B. ENROTH.