We may, indeed,
refuse hearing him, and raise a din to stun our ears: but when we
hear him it is not in our power to contradict him. Nothing is more
unlike man than that invisible master that instructs and judges him
with so much severity, uprightness, and perfection. Thus our
limited, uncertain, defective, fallible reason, is but a feeble and
momentaneous inspiration of a primitive, supreme, and immutable
reason, which communicates itself with measure, to all intelligent
beings.
SECT. LX. The Superior Reason that resides in Man is God Himself;
and whatever has been above discovered to be in Man, are evident
Footsteps of the Deity.
It cannot be said that man gives himself the thoughts he had not
before; much less can it be said that he receives them from other
men, since it is certain he neither does nor can admit anything from
without, unless he finds it in his own bottom, by consulting within
him the principles of reason, in order to examine whether what he is
told is agreeable or repugnant to them. Therefore there is an
inward school wherein man receives what he neither can give himself,
nor expect from other men who live upon trust as well as himself.
Here then, are two reasons I find within me; one of which, is
myself, the other is above me. That which is myself is very
imperfect, prejudiced, liable to error, changeable, headstrong,
ignorant, and limited; in short it possesses nothing but what is
borrowed. The other is common to all men, and superior to them.
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