The Great Controversy The Great Controversy | Page 321

be adapted to his understanding. He determined to study the Scriptures
for himself, and ascertain if every apparent contradiction could not be
harmonized.
Endeavoring to lay aside all preconceived opinions, and dispensing
with commentaries, he compared scripture with scripture by the aid of
the marginal references and the concordance. He pursued his study in
a regular and methodical manner; beginning with Genesis, and reading
verse by verse, he proceeded no faster than the meaning of the several
passages so unfolded as to leave him free from all embarrassment. When
he found anything obscure, it was his custom to compare it with every
other text which seemed to have any reference to the matter under
consideration. Every word was permitted to have its proper bearing
upon the subject of the text, and if his view of it harmonized with
every collateral passage, it ceased to be a difficulty. Thus whenever he
met with a passage hard to be understood he found an explanation in
some other portion of the Scriptures. As he studied with earnest prayer
for divine enlightenment, that which had before appeared dark to his
understanding was made clear. He experienced the truth of the psalmist’s
words: “The entrance of Thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding
unto the simple.” Psalm 119:130.
With intense interest he studied the books of Daniel and the
Revelation, employing the same principles of interpretation as in the
other scriptures, and found, to his great joy, that the prophetic symbols
could be understood. He saw that the prophecies, so far as they had
been fulfilled, had been fulfilled literally; that all the various figures,
metaphors, parables, similitudes, etc., were either explained in their
immediate connection, or the terms in which they were expressed were
defined in other scriptures, and when thus explained, were to be literally
understood. “I was thus satisfied,” he says, “that the Bible is a system
of revealed truths, so clearly and simply given that the wayfaring man,
though

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