Inward impulse beyond opened eyes: the Spirit's inward testimony is a secret persuasion, not an audible voice inside

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So for firm, certain faith in the whole of Scripture as divine — the faith it deserves — opened eyes are not enough. Besides the Spirit’s work of opening our mind’s eyes to the light that shines in sacred Scripture, there seems to need to be a certain inward impulse and instinct (so to speak) that moves us to believe with a force greater than every argument and reason.

That instinct is what we take the Spirit’s inward persuasion and the Holy Spirit’s inward testimony properly to mean. When the Spirit is said to testify in believers’ hearts that Scripture is divine truth, we must not picture them hearing an inward voice that says, clear and express, "This is true and is God’s Word." Take it as a kind of virtual testimony: in a secret way the Spirit urges us to believe and stamps on our minds a settled persuasion of Scripture’s divinity.

That is how to read the famous Augustine passage usually cited from his Confessions. "Let me hear," he says, "and understand how in the beginning you made heaven and earth. Moses wrote this, wrote it and went away, passed from here to you, for he is not now before me. For if he were, I would hold him and ask him and through you beg him to open these things to me, and I would offer the ears of my body to the sounds breaking from his mouth. And if he spoke in Hebrew, he would strike my sense in vain and would not, in my way, touch my mind at all. But if in Latin, I would know what he said — yet how would I know he spoke the truth? And if I knew even that, would I know it from him? Within me, yes within, in the dwelling of thought, truth — neither Hebrew nor Greek nor Latin nor barbarian — without mouth and tongue, without the noise of syllables, would say, ’He speaks the truth’; and I at once, certain, would confidently say to that man of yours, ’You speak the truth.’"

Latin

IX. Ut ergo toti Scripturae ceu divinae, sicuti meretur, firmiter et certo credamus, praeter actionem illam Spiritus sancti aperientis mentis nostrae oculos ad lucem in sacra Scriptura fulgentem, necessarius videtur internus quidam, ut sic dicam, impulsus et instinctus, quo nos ad credendum moveat, vi quadam quae sit omni argumento et ratione major. Et instinctus ille est, quem proprie, per suasionem Spiritus intrinsacam, et internum Spiritus sancti testimonium intelligi debere putamus. Non enim existimandum est, quum Spiritus sanctus dicitur in fidelium cordibus de divina Scripturae veritate testari, fideles intus audire vocem quandam, quae diserte et expresse dicat hoc verum est et Dei verbum. Sed istud accipiendum est de virtuali quodam, ut sic loquar, testimonio: nec per hoc datur aliud intelligi, quam quod arcano modo Spiritus sanctus nos ad credendum instigat, et certam de Scripturae divinitate persuasionem mentibus nostris imprimit. Quo modo intelligendus est Celebris ille Augustini locus qui ex Confessionibus ejus citari solet. Audiam, inquit, et intelligam quomodo in principio fecisti caelum et terram. Scripsit hoc Moses, scripsit et abiit, transivit hinc a te, neque enim nunc ante me est. Nam si esset, tenerem eum, et rogarem eum et per te obsecrarem ut mihi ista panderet, et praeberem aures corporis mei sonis erumpentibus ex ore ejus. Et si Hebraea voce loqueretur, frustra pulsaret sensum, nec meo modo mentem meam quicquam tangeret. Si autem Latine, scirem quid diceret: sed unde scirem an verum diceret? quod si et hoc scirem, num ab illo scirem? intus utique mihi, intus in domicilio cogitationis, nec Hebraea, nec Graeca, nec Latina, nec Barbara veritas, sine oris ac linguae organis, sine strepitu syllabarum diceret, verum dicit; et ego statim certus confidenter illi homini tuo dicerem, verum dicis.

About this text

Louis Le Blanc de Beaulieu - Sedan Theological Theses, newly rendered from the 1675 London Latin. Covers De Theologia through Angelorum & Hominum Sanctorum Cultu Romana I-LXXVII and Pars Secunda (Reformata) I-XL. Not the collected folio.

English follows locked Pitt Latin through Imaginum CLOSED + Sanctorum Cultu Romana CLOSED + Pars Secunda Reformata I-XL. 1675 PDF ~384-390 (book ~370-376); Vision OCR + pdftotext + tess. No modern English. This slice densifies Sanctorum Pars Secunda I-XL. Next: Pars Secunda XLI–fin (~CI). Claim stays claimed (book densify not done).

Catalogue & scope

ESTC R17887; Wing L802. IA bub_gb_eOkHAW4G0-wC (+ EEBO 1675 for gap leaves). Densify through Sanctorum Cultu Romana I-LXXVII + Pars Secunda Reformata I-XL (Pars Secunda not closed; not whole folio).

Witnesses

Copy-text Locked Latin, De Theologia I-XLIII (Pitt 1675) (Latin)
Checked print Internet Archive PDF of the 1675 Pitt folio (Latin)
Checked print pdftotext of De Theologia pages (Latin)
Checked print Internet Archive DjVu OCR of the 1675 Pitt folio (Latin)
Copy-text Locked Latin, De Fide I-XXII (Pitt 1675) (Latin)
Copy-text Locked Latin, De Authoritate Scripturae Pars I I-XLVII + Pars II I-XXXV + Pars III I-VIII (Pitt 1675) (Latin)
Copy-text Locked Latin, De Scripturae plenitudine densify (Pitt 1675) (Latin)

This is an AI-assisted study translation. Source fidelity and completeness have not been independently certified. Open Latin on each section (or the Latin source witness link) for the source text. This is not a complete critical edition.