John Locke

“ And what readier way can there be to run ourselves into the most extravagant errors and miscarriages, than thus to set up fancy for our supreme and sole guide, and to believe any proposition to be true, any action to be right, only because we believe it to be so ? The strength of our persuasions is no evidence at all of their own rectitude : crooked things may be as stiff and inflexible as straight : and men may be as positive and peremptory in error as in truth. ”

“ Enthusiasm fails of evidence, that the proposition is from God. In all that is of divine revelation, there is need of no other proof but that it is an inspiration from God : for he can neither deceive nor be deceived. But how shall it be known that any proposition in our minds is a truth infused by God ; a truth that is revealed to us by him, which he declares to us, and therefore we ought to believe ? ”

“ Reason must be our last judge and guide in everything. I do not mean that we must consult reason, and examine whether a proposition revealed from God can be made out by natural principles, and if it cannot, that then we may reject it : but consult it we must, and by it examine whether it be a revelation from God or no : and if reason finds it to be revealed from God, reason then declares for it as much as for any other truth, and makes it one of her dictates. ”

“ So that the knowledge of any proposition coming into my mind, I know not how, is not a perception that it is from God. Much less is a strong persuasion that it is true, a perception that it is from God, or so much as true. But however it be called light and seeing, I suppose it is at most but belief and assurance : and the proposition taken for a revelation is not such as they know to be true, but take to be true. For where a proposition is known to be true, revelation is needless : and it is hard to conceive how there can be a revelation to any one of what he knows already. ”

“ Light, true light, in the mind is, or can be, nothing else but the evidence of the truth of any proposition ; and if it be not a self-evident proposition, all the light it has, or can have, is from the clearness and validity of those proofs upon which it is received. To talk of any other light in the understanding is to put ourselves in the dark, or in the power of the Prince of Darkness, and, by our own consent, to give ourselves up to delusion to believe a lie. ”

“ In any truth that gets not possession of our minds by the irresistible light of self-evidence, or by the force of demonstration, the arguments that gain it assent are the vouchers and gage of its probability to us ”

“ This I take to be properly enthusiasm, which, though founded neither on reason nor divine revelation, but rising from the conceits of a warmed or overweening brain, works yet, where it once gets footing, more powerfully on the persuasions and actions of men than either of those two, or both together : men being most forwardly obedient to the impulses they receive from themselves ; and the whole man is sure to act more vigorously where the whole man is carried by a natural motion. ”

“ But it is not the strength of our private persuasion within ourselves, that can warrant it to be a light or motion from heaven : nothing can do that but the written Word of God without us, or that standard of reason which is common to us with all men. Where reason or Scripture is express for any opinion or action, we may receive it as of divine authority : but it is not the strength of our own persuasions which can by itself give it that stamp. ”

“ So that he that takes away reason to make way for revelation, puts out the light of both, and does much what the same as if he would persuade a man to put out his eyes, the better to receive the remote light of an invisible star by a telescope. ”

“ Firmness of persuasion no Proof that any proposition is from God. This cannot be otherwise, whilst firmness of persuasion is made the cause of believing, and confidence of being in the right is made an argument of truth. St. Paul himself believed he did well, and that he had a call to it, when he persecuted the Christians, whom he confidently thought in the wrong : but yet it was he, and not they, who were mistaken. Good men are men still liable to mistakes, and are sometimes warmly engaged in errors, which they take for divine truths, shining in their minds with the clearest light. ”

“ I ask how shall any one distinguish between the delusions of Satan, and the inspirations of the Holy Ghost ? He can transform himself into an angel of light. And they who are led by this Son of the Morning are as fully satisfied of the illumination, i.e. are as strongly persuaded that they are enlightened by the Spirit of God as any one who is so : they acquiesce and rejoice in it, are actuated by it : and nobody can be more sure, nor more in the right (if their own belief may be judge) than they.
14. Revelation must be judged of by reason. ”

“ Immediate revelation being a much easier way for men to establish their opinions and regulate their conduct than the tedious and not always successful labour of strict reasoning, it is no wonder that some have been very apt to pretend to revelation, and to persuade themselves that they are under the peculiar guidance of heaven in their actions and opinions, especially in those of them which they cannot account for by the ordinary methods of knowledge and principles of reason. ”

“ And yet, for all this, one may truly say, that there are very few lovers of truth, for truth’s sake, even amongst those who persuade themselves that they are so. How a man may know whether he be so in earnest, is worth inquiry : and I think there is one unerring mark of it, viz. The not entertaining any proposition with greater assurance than the proofs it is built upon will warrant. Whoever goes beyond this measure of assent, it is plain, receives not the truth in the love of it ; loves not truth for truth’s sake, but for some other bye-end. ”

“ Reason is natural revelation, whereby the eternal Father of light and fountain of all knowledge, communicates to mankind that portion of truth which he has laid within the reach of their natural faculties : revelation is natural reason enlarged by a new set of discoveries communicated by God immediately ”

“ Hence we see that, in all ages, men in whom melancholy has mixed with devotion, or whose conceit of themselves has raised them into an opinion of a greater familiarity with God, and a nearer admittance to his favour than is afforded to others, have often flattered themselves with a persuasion of an immediate intercourse with the Deity, and frequent communications from the Divine Spirit. ”

“ Love of truth necessary. He that would seriously set upon the search of truth ought in the first place to prepare his mind with a love of it. For he that loves it not will not take much pains to get it ; nor be much concerned when he misses it. There is nobody in the commonwealth of learning who does not profess himself a lover of truth : and there is not a rational creature that would not take it amiss to be thought otherwise of. ”

“ For how almost can it be otherwise, but that he should be ready to impose on another’s belief, who has already imposed on his own ? Who can reasonably expect arguments and conviction from him in dealing with others, whose understanding is not accustomed to them in his dealing with himself ? ”

“ Their minds being thus prepared, whatever groundless opinion comes to settle itself strongly upon their fancies is an illumination from the Spirit of God, and presently of divine authority : and whatsoever odd action they find in themselves a strong inclination to do, that impulse is concluded to be a call or direction from heaven, and must be obeyed : it is a commission from above, and they cannot err in executing it. ”

“ For strong conceit, like a new principle, carries all easily with it, when got above common sense, and freed from all restraint of reason and check of reflection, it is heightened into a divine authority, in concurrence with our own temper and inclination. ”

“ Whereby in effect it takes away both reason and revelation, and substitutes in the room of them the ungrounded fancies of a man’s own brain, and assumes them for a foundation both of opinion and conduct. ”

“ God when he makes the prophet does not unmake the man. ”