Sophron and Neophilus, or The School of Wisdom

the biblical history, they present unproven hypotheses; and yet the writings of our theological biblical interpreters teem with hypotheses that have just as little proof for them and often diverge from one another by a vast distance. Why is one granted a freedom that is denied to others?

Soph. Your objection would truly be unanswerable if the core tenets upon which reasonable Christianity rests, as upon its foundation, were such disputed hypotheses. However, among all reasonable adherents of the same, these are settled and generally acknowledged truths, whereas our author’s first principles, upon which he builds all his counterarguments against the Christian religion, are nothing but such opinions accepted entirely without grounds. No sensible Christian accepts anything as essential religious doctrine about which even enlightened Christians themselves are still arguing. Everything, therefore, about which reasonable biblical interpreters are not yet in agreement can, without harm to rational Christian-