“One of the most fruitful ways of analyzing the continuities and commonalities, as well as the discontinuities and nuances of divergence and difference, between the Reformers and the writings of the Reformed orthodox or Puritan writers is to examine trajectories of exegesis–specifically to chart the rise of orthodoxy in and through the developing Reformed exegetical tradition” (Richard A. Muller and Bruce S. Ward, Scripture and Worship: Biblical Interpretation and the Directory for Worship, 3).

“What, then, is the context within which catechizing is to occur if it is to have its optimum sanctifying impact? First, the well-ordered Christian home is the foundation upon which is built the discipleship of covenant children in the ‘discipline and instruction’ (NASB, ESV), what the old version termed the ‘nurture and admonition of the Lord’ (Eph. 6:4 KJV). Fathers are charged with this responsibility” (Terry L. Johnson, Catechizing Our Children: The Whys and Hows of Teaching the Shorter Catechism Today, 2).

“Without conviction of sin there will never be acceptance of the gospel. It is the preaching of man’s total depravity and inability manifested in the overt transgression of God’s law that is calculated to induce this sense of sin, of helplessness and of need. And so this doctrine of depravity and inability is not only necessary as belonging to the whole counsel of God but is also one of the most fruitful elements of that counsel in promoting the interests of wholesome effective evangelism” (John Murray, Collected Writings, vol. 1, 129).

“The faith which God foresees is the fruit and not the root of electing grace” (John Murray, Collected Writings, vol. 1, 121).

“I will argue in this book that the fundamental physics of every socioreligious, cultural-religious formation consists of practices concerning holiness, purity and sacrifice. . . . Relocate the sacred, rearrange the boundaries of purity and pollution, revise its sacrificial procedures, and you have changed the fundamental physics of the society. A revolution here is the most profound of social revolutions, and it is the revolution achieved by Jesus in his cross and resurrection” (Peter J. Leithart, Delivered from the Elements of the World, 12).

Madness it is to hope that human minds / can ever understand the Infinite / that comprehends Three Persons in One Being.

Be satisfied with quia unexplained, / O human race! If you knew everything, / no need for Mary to have borne a son.

(Translation by Mark Musa, Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Purgatory, Canto III, 34-39)

“A society in which consumption has to be artificially stimulated in order to keep production going is a society founded on trash and waste, and such a society is a house built upon sand” (Dorothy L. Sayers, Why Work?, 3).

“We cannot enter into the consciousness of God, and therefore cannot know His thoughts, as they lie in His infinite understanding, without some medium of external revelation” (James Henley Thornwell, The Collected Writings, Vol. 1, 29).

“Like brilliant lights the churches were now illuminating the world, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ was flourishing everywhere when the Devil, who hates what is good, true, and saving, turned all his weapons against the church. Previously he had attacked her from the outside through persecutions, but now that he was prevented, he resorted to internal tactics [i.e. heresy], using wicked impostors as corrupt agents of destruction [e.g. the Gnostics], assuming the name of our religion to destroy every believer they could ensnare while deflecting unbelievers from the path that leads to salvation” (Eusebius, The Church History, Translated by Paul L. Maier, 139).

“It is related that in his [Nero’s] reign Paul was beheaded in Rome itself and that Peter was also crucified, and the cemeteries there still called by the names of Peter and Paul confirm the record” (Eusebius, The Church History, Translated by Paul L. Maier, 85).