Revelation, the 10th chapter. And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud, and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire. And he had in his hand a little book open, and he set his right foot upon the sea and his left foot on the earth, and cried with a loud voice as when a lion roareth. And when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices. And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, I was about to write, And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them not. And the angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon the earth, lifted up his hand to heaven, and swear by him that liveth for ever and ever, who created heaven, and the things that therein are, and the earth, and the things that therein are, and the sea, and the things which are therein, that there should be time no longer. But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets. And the voice which I heard from heaven spake unto me again and said, Go and take the little book which is open in the hand of the angel which stands upon the sea and upon the earth. And I went unto the angel and said unto him, Give me the little book. And he said unto me, Take it and eat it up, and it shall make thy belly bitter, but it shall be in thy mouth sweet as honey. And I took the little book out of the angel's hand and ate it up, and it was in my mouth sweet as honey. And as soon as I had eaten it, my belly was bitter. He said unto me, Thou must prophesy again before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings. Thus far the reading of God's word. Now this vision in Revelation 10 comes between the sounding of the sixth trumpet, or the second woe trumpet, there was going to be three trumpets of woe, the 6th, 5th, 6th, and 7th. So it comes between the 6th trumpet and the 7th trumpet, the 3rd woe trumpet. Chapter 10 is actually sort of a parenthesis in one continued vision, which goes back from Revelation 9 up to Revelation 11-15. And Revelation 11-15 is where the sounding of the last trumpet, the 7th trumpet, begins. So the purpose of the interruption of this narrative is to describe the state of society just before the seventh trumpet sounds, or just before. It could be many centuries, of course, but it's to describe what society is like on Earth. The great theologian Albert Barnes said, quote, the history had been brought down in the regular course of events to the capturing. He's talking about the history now, where we are in Revelation. the capture of Constantinople by the Turks, and the complete overthrow of the Roman Empire by that event, A.D. 1453, which is Revelation 9, 13-19. This was an important era in the history of the world, and if the exposition which has been proposed is correct, then the sketches of history pertaining to the Roman Empire in the book of Revelation have been made with surprising accuracy. God had scourged the nations. He had cut off multitudes of men. It overthrown the mighty empire that had so long ruled over the world, but the same sins of superstition, idolatry, sorcery, murder, fornication, and theft prevailed afterwards that had prevailed before. Instead of working a change in the minds of men, the world seemed to be confirmed in these abominations more and more. In the exposition of Revelation 9, 20, and 21, it was shown that those things prevailed in the Roman Church. which then embraced the whole Christian world before the invasion of the Eastern Empire by the Turks, and that they continued to prevail afterward. Now, when we left off in our looking at the historical revelation given to John in chapter 9, we were at the point in history when the Islamic Turks captured Constantinople. In fact, it was not only in 1453, but it was on Tuesday, May 29, 1453, in fact. which was the final end to the Roman Empire. Remember that Constantinople had been, at one time, the capital of the Roman Empire. Constantine moved it from Rome to his new city, Constantinople, which today is Istanbul in Turkey. It was the capital of the Roman Empire and later it was the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire when there was a Western and Eastern Roman Empire for over a thousand years. So when the Muslim armies captured it, they were in a very real sense capturing the capital, what had been the capital of the civilized world. Very important, very symbolic capture. One historian, where did I find this? I don't know. Think of Wikipedia, I couldn't find a source for it. On May 22nd, 1453, now the capture was May 29th, so this is a few days before that. On May 22nd, 1453, the moon which was the symbol of Constantinople, the city had a symbol, and this one's the moon, rose in dark eclipse, fulfilling a prophecy on the city's demise. Four days later, the whole city was blotted out by a thick fog, a condition unknown in that part of the world in May. And this was interpreted by some as the Holy Spirit departing from Constantinople. Scholars consider the fall of Constantinople as a key event ending the Middle Ages and starting the Renaissance because at the end of the old religious order in Europe, the Muslims took over, and the use of cannon and gunpowder. That's what Wikipedia said. Scholars consider the fall of Constantinople as the key event ending the Middle Ages and starting the Renaissance because at the end of the old religious order in Europe and the use of cannon and gunpowder. Remember Revelation? 9 verse 17, please take a look at that, what we said about it. 17, the last part of Revelation 9, 17 says, the very last phrase, and out of their mouths, we're talking about the horses and the vision, and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone. And we said that there's A lot of indications to believe that the description of the horsemen were the Muslim, the Islamic armies, the Turks. Well, in his book, The Byzantine Achievement, Robert Byron says, quote, The fall of Constantinople was the first event of historic importance engineered with the most important weapon of modern warfare, gunpowder. If it was not for gunpowder, the siege of Constantinople in 1453 would have failed. Remember from our previous sermon? So for the first time, as far as history knows, gunpowder was used in battle for the first time when the Islamic armies fought for and conquered Constantinople in 1453. Yes, the Chinese invented gunpowder years before, but it was never used in the Western world in a battle until Constantinople in any large event, shooting shells out of their cannons. And here we have written over a thousand years in Revelation before that event, a description of fire, smoke, and brimstone coming out of the mouths of their weaponry. And if that isn't enough, remember that brimstone is another word, remember, for sulfur. And what is gunpowder made of? Anybody remember what gunpowder is made of? Yeah. Sulfur, saltpeter, and charcoal. So out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone, sulfur, gunpowder. Saltpeter, yeah. Saltpeter, charcoal, and sulfur. So again, do we remember what year the fall of Constantinople occurred? 1453. At the very same time, there appeared what virtually all scholars are agreed is the greatest invention, at least of the first millennium, if not many of most scholars say is the greatest invention in history. An invention that most shaped our world today. affected more lives than any other before or since. Without this invention, modern science would not have been possible. Books would not be possible. Most people would still be illiterate. Accurate history would not be possible. Just a collection of oral stories passed down and changed through generations. Without this invention, the Protestant Reformation would not have been possible. Putting a Bible in the hands of almost anybody who wanted one or certainly in the hands of preachers who could preach it. The invention, of course, is the printing press, specifically the invention of movable type by Johannes Gutenberg. The Gutenberg Bible was printed in 1454, within a year of the Islamic conquest of Constantinople, which also changed the world profoundly. That printing was followed by the publication of several Bibles, including Erasmus' Greek New Testament, which sparked the beginning of the Reformation. Remember that before the printing press was invented, the Bible had been all but forgotten. It's hard for us to imagine that. The few hand-copied manuscripts were collecting dust buried deep in the vaults of monasteries. The only people who were allowed to read these manuscripts were monks and scholars who had special permission from the Roman Church. And most of them weren't interested, as we'll talk about later. The first book Gutenberg printed on his new invention, as we well know, the Gutenberg Bible. But it was in a dead language. Have you ever seen any pages reproduced from the Gutenberg Bible? I had the opportunity in the Library of Congress where they had a copy of it on display. It's in Latin. In fact, it's very difficult even to read the Latin because of the style of type and all. But it was a dead language. Only scholars could read Latin. So it needed to be translated into the languages of the people, various languages, so ordinary people could read it and pastors could preach from it. That's why John Wycliffe, who we studied a few weeks ago, who translated the Bible into the first English edition many years before Martin Luther came on the scene, was so important. That's why he's called the Morning Star of the Reformation. Without a Bible that people could read, without a Bible that pastors could read and preach from, there'd be no Reformation. So there's no question about the printing press making it possible for anyone to read the Bible for themselves that the Reformation would not have occurred and we'd still be depending on Roman priests to tell us what to believe. Albert Barnes wrote about the 10th chapter of Revelation, he wrote this, the next event in the order of time following the 9th chapter was the Reformation and the circumstances are such to lead us to suppose that chapter 10 refers to the Protestant Reformation. This was the next important event in the history of the Church and the history of the world, after the conquest of Constantinople produced the entire downfall of the Roman Empire. And if it was the design of the spirit of inspiration to touch on the great and material events in the history of the Church and the world, then it would be natural to suppose that the Reformation would come next in view, for no previous event had more deeply or permanently affected the condition of mankind. So let's look at verse 1 in chapter 10. And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud, and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire. Well, who would this mighty angel be? There are a few scholars who have some different opinions about it. I believe that the evidence indicates this is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. The description is similar to his appearance in Revelation 1.15 and chapter 20 verse 1. We know that Jesus ascended into heaven on the clouds. Acts 1.9, remember the men were looking up and Jesus was gone from their sight by a cloud. And he will come again in clouds to judge the world, Matthew 24 and 26 and Mark 13, Revelation 1, 7. In Revelation 4, 3, as we studied, the throne in heaven is represented as encircled by a rainbow. The rainbow, of course, is the sign of the covenant with Noah. In his wrath, the Lord remembers mercy. That's why he's the sign of the covenant. I will see the bow in the sky and I'll remember my mercy. I'll remember his promise. The Geneva Bible of 1560, the Bible of the Reformers, comments here This mighty angel was Jesus Christ. He came to comfort his church against the furious assaults of Satan and Antichrist. I might add, Satan and Antichrist principally came in the guise that he used of Islam and Roman Catholicism. Verse 2, And he had in his hand a little book open. The Greek word actually means little book. Little book. On his deathbed, the famous English author Sir Walter Scott asked his son, bring me the book. Bring me the book. And his son said, which book father? Walter Scott had many books. Scott said, my son, there is only one book. Now, which book did the angel hold in his hand? There can be only one book, the Bible. the written word of God. Now note that it's no longer a closed Bible as it was in chapter 5. If you look back in chapter 5, verse 3, Revelation. Let's begin with verse 1. And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book written within, and on the back side sealed with seven seals. It's closed up, it's sealed up. I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the book and to loose the seals thereof? And no man in heaven nor on earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon. And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look thereon." Of course, Jesus Christ, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, opened the book. The Bible was, for centuries, kept from the people, as you know. So, in effect, it was closed. But in this verse in Revelation, in chapter 10, it is an open Bible, signifying it's now available to all people. Now, in 1453, the Lord began to cause his word to be read aloud and preached throughout the known world. That's what started it, as never before in history. through the idea he gave to Johannes Gutenberg about movable type printing. That made the mass production of the Bible possible. Not mass in the sense that we think of it today, but it started it. And that resulted in the Protestant Reformation just a few decades later. It would be difficult to imagine a more striking symbol of the art of printing than an angel giving an open book to mankind. And if you wanted to design a symbol to represent the Protestant Reformation, you could design no better symbol, I think, than an open Bible. For centuries, the Church kept the Bible from the people, the Roman Church. Priests told them what to believe. The Reformation put the Bible into the hands of the average person. And the Holy Spirit worked in their hearts in both reading and hearing the word. Everything that every great reformer did, Wycliffe, Huss, Tyndale, Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Knox, Busser, on and on and on and on, can be traced to the rediscovery of the Bible. Did you know that Martin Luther once was a a very faithful Augustinian monk, Roman Catholic monk, a lot of theological training. He found a Bible, found a Bible on his own, the Latin Vulgate translation, the only translation the church had that there was, hidden away in the shelves of a university library. And that's when he read it, and that's what changed his life and changed our lives. God used him to change our lives. Now, it's hard for us to comprehend, but according to scholars, until then, Luther, who was a highly trained theologian, had never read the New Testament. He had never even read a complete book of the New Testament. Possibly none in the Old Testament as well. Luther had thought, according to scholars, that the Gospel and Epistles were some verses here and there, only found in the Roman prayer book. In this, he wasn't alone. That's what every priest believed. Even very few scholars had ever read the Bible. And the Roman parish priests, the Roman bishops, archbishops, cardinals, other church officers, were even more ignorant of the Bible than Luther was, because they were not trained theologians. Many, if not most of them, were illiterate. At least many of them. I'm not saying most of them, but many of them were illiterate. In his history of Charles V, published in 1769, historian William Robertson said, many of the clergy did not understand the prayers which they were obliged daily to recite. Some of them could scarcely read their prayer book. Persons of the highest rank in society, not just priests, persons of the highest rank in society, in the most eminent stations in life, very wealthy people, very well-known people, very powerful people, couldn't either read nor write. In his monumental work, which I highly recommend, the History of Protestantism, Reverend J. A. Wiley, published in 1878, and there are reprints available today, he said, and this is before the Reformation, quote, instruction in theology formed no part of preparation for the ministry. Structural theology formed no part of preparation for the priesthood, essentially, of the minister. No doubt theology after a fashion was studied, yet not a theology whose substance was drawn from the Bible, but from a man-invented system. In his book, Acts and Monuments of the English Church, 1844, John Fox said in the seminaries, quote, there was no mention or almost any word spoken of scripture. Instead of Peter and Paul, men occupied their time in studying Aquinas. and Duns Scotus and Peter Lombard. These were scholastics. They talk about those who studied how many angels to dance on the head of a pin. This is what we're talking about in a large sense. Scary, continuing this quote from John Fox, scarcely any other thing was seen in the churches or taught or spoken of in sermons, but only heaping up of certain shadowed ceremonies upon ceremonies. Neither was there any end of their heaping. The people were taught to worship no other thing but that which they did not see, and they did see almost nothing which they did not worship." They were taught to worship nothing but that which they did not see, but they saw almost nothing which they did not worship. Statues, crosses, water, holy water. Wiley goes on to say, Wolfgang Musculus. I'm not sure how to pronounce his name, I'm not familiar with him, but I'm quoting from here, from the 16th century, says that many of them never saw the scripture, many of the priests never saw the scripture in all their lives. Going out with a quote, it would seem incredible, but is delivered by no less an authority than Professor Amama, who was a Sixtinus Amama from the 16th century, a professor of Old Testament, It would seem incredible, Wiley says, but it is delivered by no less an authority than Professor Amama that a Roman Archbishop of Mainz, Germany, lighting upon a Bible and looking into it, expressed himself thus, Of a truth I do not know what book this is, but I perceive everything in it is against us. It's an archbishop. So the people's religion before the Reformation consisted of the traditions of the Roman faith, or more accurately, what Rome said its traditions were. Rome claimed, and still claims, that she gave the world the Bible, and therefore the world must believe what she says it means. That's their position. The Church gave the world the Bible, and therefore the Church, meaning the Roman Church, has the authority to tell you what it means. The Roman Church decided, they say, what the Bible would be. They say, well, we had these councils that came together and decided what books were in the Bible, and those were our people, so we decided. This is a myth that's propagated a lot, that there were certain church councils that sat down and decided what the Bible would contain. That's not true. It's the people, the churches, decided what the Bible would contain, and they simply affirmed what the churches were already using. The Holy Spirit put the Bible together. Well, the facts are, instead of giving us the Bible, Rome did everything in its power to keep it from the people. Rome did not teach it to her priests. Rome kept it under lock and seal, refusing to translate it out of the Latin, a dead language only some scholars could read. They believed in the Bible and they translated it for the people. They didn't want people to read it. And few of these scholars were even interested. When finally Wycliffe and his successors broke that seal, what did Rome do? Oh, wonderful. The Word of God is now available to people. You know what happened. Rome responded viciously, warning that if anyone dared to read the Bible or have one in their possession, they risked excommunication and eternal damnation. But the Reformation made the Bible an open book. It opened the floodgates and poured God's Word out among the starving people. And the Roman hierarchy was fatally wounded, as we will see later in Revelation. Fatally wounded. rather than church tradition, rather than church tradition, the Bible is the religion of Protestants. The Dort Dutch Bible comments on this verse we're looking at in Revelation. Some take this book to mean the book of the gospel, which at the time Antichrist was at its highest, meaning the Roman Catholic faith, the gospel was like a closed book. But from the time onward that the Terps broke loose against Christianity, as seen in the ninth chapter of Revelation, the Bible was more and more opened up and more plainly presented to the Church, that is, God's elect people, by several exceptional men of God, such as Wycliffe, Luther, Calvin, etc. Well, let's move on in Revelation 10. Much more we could say, but let's go on. Verse 2, "...and he had in his hand a little book open, and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth." We're looking at the latter half of that verse now. So the book is held by the angel, who stands with one foot on the land and one foot on the sea, signifying the entire earth, land and sea. It means the Word of God is going to cover the entire earth. It's a symbolic showing that it's going to cover the entire earth. As Jesus said in Matthew 28, All power is given unto me in heaven and on earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son of the Holy Ghost. So this standing upon the land and sea signifies that all power has been given to the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the one standing here in heaven and on earth, all over the earth. All power is given unto me in heaven and on earth. He doesn't say that a lot of our fundamentalist friends would read that and say all power is going to be given to me in heaven and on earth. It says all power is given unto me in heaven and on earth. We pray thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Not in this far by and by Christ says the kingdom is what? The kingdom is now, it's with you. The kingdom of God has come upon you, not will come upon you in the future. Not all power will be given to me in heaven and on earth when I come in final judgment, which is what our fundamentalist friends believe. No, he said, all power has been given to me, is given unto me in heaven and on earth. He has begun to subdue all of creation under his feet. 1 Corinthians 15, 24. Then come at the end when he shall deliver it up to the kingdom, to God, even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and authority and power, for he must reign till he has put all enemies under his feet. Verse 3 in chapter 10, And cried with a loud voice, as when a lion roared. And when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their voices. And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, I was about to write, and I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them not. We have a word that is often used to apply to Jesus, lion. Revelation 5.5, called the Lion of the tribe of Judah. And he cried with a loud voice, as when a lion roars. Then seven thunders uttered their voices, apparently in answer to the Lord's utterances. Well, this seems mysterious at first, but let's look at it carefully. First, it should strike you that when the Lord cries out, who are you to answer back? Yet when he cried with a loud voice, seven thunders responded. Now, if they had responded in adoration, a loud amen, that would be praiseworthy. But it doesn't say that. We would think their words then would also be here written for us to read in the Revelation. Just in earlier verses, remember, the saints around the throne responded to the Lord in adoration, in prayer. But what the seven thunders said is not written not written. We know why. The Lord himself ordered John, as we see in the next verse, seal up those things which is seven thunders and don't write them, write them not. Now if we continue with the idea that this chapter is about the Protestant Reformation, Would not the loud and commanding voice of Christ properly represent the proclamation of the gospel as it was begun to be spread in the earth, both written and preached? A contemporary of Luther's, very interestingly enough, not having this verse in mind, in describing the impact of Luther's opening the doctrines of the Bible to the people, wrote, quote, in the space of a fortnight, two weeks, they spread over Germany the doctrines of the Bible. in the space of two weeks, what Luther pointed out, what Luther said about the Bible, the doctrines of the Bible, spread over Germany and within a month they had run through all of Christendom as if angels themselves had been the bearers of them to all men. Verse 3, and the angel cried with a loud voice as when a lion roars. This is an indication of him presenting the gospel to the world Angels themselves had been the bearers of them to all men just spread over the prison of the known world of the time But seven thunders uttered their voices in response to Christ's proclamation of the gospel Christ had just presented the open Bible to the world through the Reformation before was closed Now it's open. The gospel is no longer hidden and suppressed the next event in church history immediately following Wycliffe, in the opening of the Bible, and some of the men we've mentioned, was Rome's reaction. That's the next invented church history. Furious proclamations, anathemas, condemning the reformers as heretics, excommunications, and, of course, retried and true method of dealing with God's people, torture followed by burning them alive at the stake. Interestingly, in history by historians, the papal orders of excommunication, papal bulls, B-U-L-L-S they're called, were frequently called thunders. It's a word that's used by historians, by the church sometimes informally. Now if you add to this that Rome is well known as the city on the seven hills, then we may have the key to understanding the seven thunders uttering their voices. The Pope of Rome sitting on the city of the seven hills, thundering his decrees of excommunication on the Protestant Reformers in answer to Christ proclaiming the gospel, giving the open book. And when the seven thunders had uttered their voices, I was about to write, verse 4, I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them not. If the seven thunders are these papal decrees, these bulls of excommunication, The Lord is telling John and telling us, these are unimportant. These are inconsequential. They're not a part of the revelation I'm giving to you. They're not God's word. They're the insolent words of the Pope. They're not my words and should not be recorded as scripture. The proclamations of Roman church councils, the ex cathedra, papal decrees, ex cathedra is when the Pope speaks as God, infallibly. blasphemously claims infallibility when that's one of the holy attributes belonging only to God himself. The Lord says to John, seal them up, write them not, for they are never to be thought of as coming from me. These are things, as he says in Jeremiah 19.5, which I commanded not, nor spake it, neither came it into my mind. He says to his elect people, still finding themselves in the clutches of Rome in Revelation 18.4, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. Believe the Bible, not religious traditions. or what a priest or Pope claims the Bible means. Don't even believe what a minister says the Bible means without going to the Bible yourself. Remember the Bereans, as I've said many times, were praised by the Apostle Paul for listening to what he had to say and then going and looking in Scripture to see if what he said was true. And he commended them for it. Well, if an Apostle commends people for going to the Bible, how can a minister of the Gospel today say Just trust me what the Bible says. No, go look for the Bible yourself. See what the Holy Spirit tells you the Bible is saying. But don't believe a man who blasphemously claims to be God's High Priest, the Vicar of Christ, the Pope. Believe God's Word, the Bible, and study the lives of and honor the memory of those humble men who risk their property, their persons, their families, They put Jesus Christ above their families and their very lives to make it possible for you to read the Bible you hold in your hands. Men, none of whom assumed naiota of the authority claimed by the Popes, some of these men whose names you know, like John Wycliffe, John Hus, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, many others we need to know By whom the Lord is willing, we will discover in future sermons. I want to close with a quote from J. A. Wiley in History of Protestantism. We owe the Bible, that is the transmission of it, to those persecuted communities which we have studied, as he says in his book. They received it from the primitive church. He's talking about the Wolvenzians, Albeginians, and others. They received it from the primitive church and carried it down to us. They translated it into the mother tongue of the nations. They carried it over Christendom, singing it in their songs as troubadours, preaching it in their sermons as missionaries, and living it out as Christians. They fought the battle of the Word of God against tradition, which sought to bury it. They sealed their testimony for it at the stake. But for them, so far as human agency is concerned, the Bible would, ere this day, have disappeared from the world. Their care to keep this torch burning is one of the marks which indubitably certify them as forming part of that one true Catholic Church, which God called into existence at first by His word, and which by the same instrumentality He has in the conversion of souls perpetuated from age to age. Let's go to him. containing thousands of classic and contemporary Puritan and Reform books, tapes and videos at great discounts is on the web at www.swrb.com. We can also be reached by email by phone at 780-450-3730 by fax at 780-468-1096 or by mail at 4710-37A Edmonton, that's E-D-M-O-N-T-O-N Alberta, abbreviated capital A, capital B, Canada, T6L3T5. You may also request a free printed catalog. And remember that John Kelvin, in defending the Reformation's regulative principle of worship, or what is sometimes called the scriptural law of worship, commenting on the words of God, which I commanded them not, neither came into my heart. From his commentary on Jeremiah 731, writes, God here cuts off from men every occasion for making evasions, since He condemns by this one phrase, I have not commanded them, whatever the Jews devised. There is then no other argument needed to condemn superstitions than that they are not commanded by God. For when men allow themselves to worship God according to their own fancies, and attend not to His commands, they pervert true religion. And if this principle was adopted by the Papists, all those fictitious modes of worship in which they absurdly exercise themselves would fall to the ground. It is indeed a horrible thing for the Papists to seek to discharge their duties towards God by performing their own superstitions. There is an immense number of them, as it is well known, and as it manifestly appears. Were they to admit this principle, that we cannot rightly worship God except by obeying his word, they would be delivered from their deep abyss of error. The Prophet's words, then, are very important, when he says that God had commanded no such thing, and that it never came to his mind, as though he had said that men assume too much wisdom when they devise what he never required, nay, what he never knew.