I met with passages which had been used as proofs of doctrines to which they had not the slightest reference. There were the words of Jeremiah for instance: "Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?" The prophet is speaking of the impossibility of men, after long continuance in wilful sin, breaking off their bad habits; as the closing words of the passage show; "Then may ye who are _accustomed_ to do evil, do well." But the theologians took the words and used them in support of the doctrine that no man in his unconverted state can do anything towards his salvation,--a doctrine which is neither Scriptural nor rational. Again; Isaiah, referring to the calamitous condition of the Jewish nation, in consequence of God's judgments, says: "The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot to the head, there is no soundness; but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores," &c. This, which the prophet said with regard to the _state_ of the _Jews_, the theologians applied to the _character_, not of the Jews only, but of _all mankind_. What Paul said about the law of Moses, and the works or deeds required by that law, the theologians applied to the law of Christ. And so with regard to multitudes of passages. I was constantly coming across passages that the theologians systematically perverted, taking them from their proper use and meaning, and forcing them into the support of notions to which they had not the slightest reference. The liberties taken with the words of Paul went far towards turning the writings of that great advocate and example of holiness into lessons of licentiousness. It was plain that, on many points, theology was one thing, and Christianity another; and that many and important changes would have to be made in the creeds and confessions of Christendom, before they could be brought into harmony with the truth as taught by Jesus. Some theological doctrines I found rested on the authority of Milton's Paradise Lost, or of the Church of England Prayer Book, or on the authority of earlier works from which Milton or the authors of the Prayer Book had borrowed.