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The Fundamentals Ah! there is a heavenly culture and a Divine grace of manner that far transcend anything found in the schools of this world. Only a Christian could think of saying with Paul, standing before his judge, “except these bonds” (Acts 26:29). John Bunyan, locked up for twelve years in Bedford Jail, with his Bible and concordance for his constant companions, produced and sent forth to the world his immortal dream, written with such beauty of style and in such chaste and simple manner, as to make it classic in English literature. So perfect and matchless was the intellectual and spiritual culture of this unlearned “tinker of Elstow,” that the scholarly John Owen testified before the King,. “Your Majesty, if I could write as does that tinker in Bedford Jail I would gladly lay down all my learning.” Where did John Bunyan get his culture? In glorious fellowship with Moses in the Law, with David in the Psalms, with Isaiah and the prophets and holy men of God, who wrote as they were moved by the Holy Spirit; with Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; with Paul, Peter and all the rest who wrote and spoke not the thoughts, nor in the words, of man’s wisdom, but God’s thoughts, and in words which the Holy Spirit giveth. Read Homer and Milton, Shakespeare and Dante; read Bacon, Macaulay, Addison and Carlyle; go through all the best literature of all ages, and it will fall infinitely short of the purity, beauty and grandeur of thought and expression found in God’s Word. Goethe, who said he was “not Christian,” hqs declared of the canonical Gospels: “The human mind, no matter h >w much it may advance in intellectual culture, and in the extent and depth of the knowledge of nature, will never transcend the high moral culture of Christianity as it shines and glows in the canonical Gospels.” Renan, the French infidel author, concludes his life of Jesus with these remarkable words. “Whatever may be the surprises of the future, Jesus will never be surpassed; His worship will grow young without ceasing; His legend will call forth tears without end; His suffering
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