 |  |
"Sophia" in Colossians.
A | 1: 9. Wisdom and walk (Godward).
B | 1: 28. Warning and teaching.
C | 2: 3. The treasure of wisdom.
D | 2: 8. Vain deceitful philosophy.
C | 2: 23. The show of wisdom.
B | 3: 16. Teaching and warning.
A | 4: 5. Wisdom and walk (Manward).
With this full assurance, understanding, knowledge and treasure available, why should
we turn aside to empty cisterns that can hold no water? We conclude with the following
lines of Cowper (known to many as the writer of the Olney Hymns) whose Bi-centenary
falls in this year of grace:--
"But reason still, unless divinely taught,
Whate'er she learns, learns nothing as she ought;
The lamp of revelation only shows,
What human wisdom cannot but oppose,
That man in nature's richest mantle clad,
And graced with all philosophy can add.
Though fair without, and luminous within,
Is still the progeny and heir of sin.
Thus taught, down falls the plumage of his pride,
He feels his need of an unerring guide,
And knows that falling he shall rise no more,
Unless the power that bade him stand, restore.
This is indeed philosophy; this known,
Makes wisdom, worthy of the name, his own;
And without this, whatever he discuss,
Whether the space between the stars and us,
Whether he measure earth, compute the sea,
Weigh sunbeams, carve a fly, or spit a flea,
The solemn trifler with his boasted skill
Toils much, and is a solemn trifler still;
Blind was he born, and his misguided eyes
Grown blind in trifling studies, blind he dies."