Texts which seem to imply that a right taste, disposition, affection, logically precedes both knowledge of God and obedience to God, are the following: _Ps. 34:8_—“_Oh taste and see that Jehovah is good_”; _119:36_—“_Incline my heart unto thy testimonies_”; _Jer. 24:7_—“_I will give them a heart to know me_”; _Mat. 5:8_—“_Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God_”; _John 7:17_—“_If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it is of God_”; _Acts 16:14_—of Lydia it is said: “_whose heart the Lord opened to give heed unto the things which were spoken by Paul_”; _Eph. 1:18_—“_having the eyes of your heart enlightened._” “Change the centre of a circle and you change the place and direction of all its radii.” The text _John 1:12, 13_—“_But as many as received him, to them gave him the right to become children of God, even to them that believe on his name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God_”—seems at first sight to imply that faith is the condition of regeneration, and therefore prior to it. “But if ἐξουσίαν here signifies the ‘_right_’ or ‘privilege’ of sonship, it is a right which may presuppose faith as the work of the Spirit in regeneration—a work apart from which no genuine faith exists in the soul. But it is possible that John means to say that, in the case of all who received Christ, their power to believe was _given_ to them by him. In the original the emphasis is on ‘_gave,_’ and this is shown by the order of the words”; see Hovey, Manual of Theology, 345, and Com. on _John 1:12, 13_—“The meaning would then be this: ‘Many did not receive him; but some did; and as to all who received him, he _gave_ them grace by which they were enabled to do this, and so to become God’s children.’ ”