Quotable

That old enemy of mankind, the devil, has no more subtle device for ruining souls than that of spreading false doctrine....Outside the Church he is ever persuading men to maintain barbarous customs and destructive superstitions....

Inside the Church he is ever labouring to sow heresies, to propagate errors, to foster departures from the faith. If he cannot prevent the waters flowing from the Fountain of Life, he tries hard to poison them. If he cannot destroy the medicine of the gospel, he strives to adulterate and corrupt it....

The Divine Comforter of the Church, the Holy Ghost, has always employed one great agent to oppose Satan’s devices...the Word of God...expounded and unfolded, the Word explained and opened up, the Word made clear to the head and applied to the heart. The Word is the chosen weapon by which the devil must be confronted and confounded.

The Word was the sword which the Lord Jesus wielded in the temptation. To every assault of the Tempter, He replied, “It is written.” The Word is the sword which His ministers must use in the present day, if they would successfully resist the devil. The Bible, faithfully and freely expounded, is the safeguard of Christ’s Church....

We live in an age when men profess to dislike dogmas and creeds....He who dares to say of one doctrine that “it is true,” and of another that “it is false,” must expect to be called narrow-minded and uncharitable, and to lose the praise of men.

—J. C. Ryle, Warnings to the Churches (nineteenth century)