who was beaten from his horse, to Samuel, who was called in sleep, to
Jesus, who taught the new birth, to John, who saw the white throne. But
after a little we learn that the new experience is native to us as
breath. No degeneracy of any period, no immersion in war, trade,
production, tradition, can quite hide the cardinal fact that this
strength of antiquity, of eternity, waits to descend, and does from time
to time descend, into the private breast. He who prays has made the
discovery, and is put by his own act in lonely communication with all
heavens.

We find the sacred history legible only in the same light by which it
was written: we are referred by it, therefore, to sources of
interpretation above itself. God was hidden in the sky; the book in
another sky; who shall reveal God hidden in the book? After so many
ages, it has become a riddle as difficult of solution as any for which
it offers solution: the last and best puzzle of the exulting old Sphinx,
who will never be cheated of her jest. Our Christianity misses the
highest value of the book, as it indicates the resource of universal
man. We use the cover as some charm against danger, but the secret of
devotion is not reached. At last it is plain that secular, nigh
impenetrable Nature is a door as easily opened as this of the book. We
must read upon our knees, we wait for grace to open the text, God must
descend to light the page. The Quaker names our interpreter an inner
light, the Church a Holy Ghost to purge the heart and eye. A deity who
comes directly, and is no longer to seek when we are ready to read, must
abolish the book. Of all gods offered in our Pantheon, of all persons in
our Trinity, this must be the first.

I cannot fasten on the revelation which needs another to make it
revelation to me; but when the divine aid is given, we seek no farther,