aporrêton]), for even to the faithful it is not committed in all its
fulness and clearness." In St. Paul the word is nearly always found in
connexion with words denoting revelation or publication[76]. The
preacher of the Gospel is a hierophant, but the Christian mysteries
are freely communicated to all who can receive them. For many ages
these truths were "hid in God,[77]" but now all men may be
"illuminated,[78]" if they will fulfil the necessary conditions of
initiation. These are to "cleanse ourselves from all defilement of
flesh and spirit,[79]" and to have love, without which all else will
be unavailing. But there are degrees of initiation. "We speak wisdom
among the perfect," he says (the [Greek: teleioi] are the fully
initiated); but the carnal must still be fed with milk. Growth in
knowledge, growth in grace, and growth in love, are so frequently
mentioned together, that we must understand the apostle to mean that
they are almost inseparable. But this knowledge, grace, and love is
itself the work of the indwelling God, who is thus in a sense the
organ as well as the object of the spiritual life. "The Spirit
searcheth all things," he says, "yea, the deep things of God." The man
who has the Spirit dwelling in him "has the mind of Christ." "He that
is spiritual judgeth all things," and is himself "judged of no man."
It is, we must admit frankly, a dangerous claim, and one which may
easily be subversive of all discipline. "Where the Spirit of the Lord
is, there is liberty"; but such liberty may become a cloak of
maliciousness. The fact is that St. Paul had himself trusted in "the
Law," and it had led him into grievous error. As usually happens in
such cases, his recoil from it was almost violent. He exalts the inner
light into an absolute criterion of right and wrong, that no corner of
the moral life may remain in bondage to Pharisaism. The crucifixion of
the Lord Jesus and the stoning of Stephen were a crushing condemnation
of legal and ceremonial righteousness; the law written in the heart of