“Knowledge, when wisdom is too weak to guide her,
Is like a headstrong horse that throws the ride.”
One of St. Paul’s pithy sayings is, “Knowledge puffeth up, but love buildeth up.” He does not mean to depreciate knowledge. He is not glorifying ignorance. Knowledge builds up too. It is right for us to be learners. We should always be seeking after knowledge. He who is content to be ignorant in this world, where the stores of knowledge are so accessible, fails to grasp the meaning of life. We are to read God’s thoughts wherever we can find them written. Intelligence makes one’s life broader and deeper. It adds to one’s power of usefulness. It makes a man more a man. We are not to understand St. Paul as casting contempt upon knowledge. He himself had mastered the best knowledge of his day.
But he is speaking of a certain kind of knowledge. The eating of meats which had been offered to idols is the subject he is discussing. Those to whom he was writing had been declaring that there was nothing wrong in eating such things. They knew that; and therefore they were not disposed to show any leniency of judgment to those who could not see the subject just as they saw it, nor to modify their own conduct in the slightest degree to suit the weak consciences of these other Christians. They knew that they themselves were right, and that was enough. Their knowledge settled the matter.
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