De betoverde weereld ... in vier boeken

Churches, both by word of mouth and with writings, where matters and the occasion require it. Now I may well speak like Prudentius a Roman Christian poet, that which fits exactly my years.

<note original: "Per quinquennia jam decem, / Ni fallor, fuimus: septimus in ſupe / Annum cardo rotat, dum fruimur ſole volubili. / Quid nos utile tanti ſpatio temporis egimus?">
Through five decades now,
If I am not mistaken, we have been: the seventh year
Turns on its hinge, while we enjoy the revolving sun.
What useful thing have we done in such a span of time?

Five times ten years, and almost the end of seven,
I enjoyed the sunlight in this fickle life.
God calls to old age, which steps firmly toward me.
In what is all my time, which he gave, spent?

Should I make up that account, that work would be too long here. But as for the time that God shall yet further grant me, however long or short that may then be: whatever of it remains for me for serious exercise, besides what my established church service requires, in this city full of business, that I hope to apply, through God's grace, to a diligent investigation of such things which all the world in general, continually and strongly says, falsely believes, or wrongly experiences. For I would gladly have people wiser and better than they are: although one finds few who wish to be. And it happens that the greatest part is content to believe what one believes, and to do as one does. But how dangerous such writing is, I was already taught in Friesland when I came to light with my first book: and at the same time, that for whom it is to be done for favor or advantage, one must not write as I do; who have set aside all prejudice or adherence to the whims of more famous men, to follow plainly nothing but Reason or Scripture, according as the matter rests on Reason or Scripture. The thanks for such labor may follow me when I am dead: but during my life I do not expect much of it. Nevertheless, I would rather venture to bring something to light while I am still in the world myself: to hear its judgment first, and to defend my work, or to improve it where it is necessary: because it seems to me that such would not happen

so conveniently from others, who might have fairer thoughts of me, after my death; as each is himself the best interpreter of his own meaning and words. Although the Reader will easily be able to see from the design of the work in the 1st Chapter what I actually aim for in it. In such I am here fully assured, that no one ever set himself more powerfully against Atheisterye atheism, nor better secured the divinity of the holy Scripture, nor more assured the truth of the Christian Godsdienst Religion, nor better promoted the honor of the Most High: than the one who sets himself in such a manner as I do against the general opinion that the world has of the power and strength of the Duivel Devil. Whoever wishes to read this Book through with an attentive and unbiased heart shall see that therein. Although I am at peace: yet I know, however, that as far as the use of Reason is concerned here, I shall least satisfy those who entirely reject the grounds of Des Cartes René Descartes, or build too broadly upon them; according to which I distinguish Spirit and Body from each other, and both from the Creator: without establishing from their operations that which I see no consequence of. In such a way that at once the mad error of Spinosa Baruch Spinoza, who mixes God and World together, is most powerfully contradicted. And I wish that someone would show me who ever held the infinity of the distinction between God and Creature, or the unmixability of the attributes of Spirit and Body, more firmly than I do here. Also I must, if my work is to stand, let it rest solely on that (so far as Reason has anything to say in it). And it also gives me that satisfaction for myself among other things, that I also place the doctrine of our Churches safely before that known test, that the true Religion is most to be recognized by this; that it gives God the most honor, and the Creature all the less. Therefore this Book shall also serve me as a testimony, that I return so much more of the honor of His Power and Wisdom to the Most High, as they had taken from Him who gave it to the Devil. I banish him from the World and bind him in Hell: so that King Jesus may reign all the more freely; although until the last day in the midst of enemies, who behave themselves here, of the Devil's people, in whom his image still plays through the work of sin. With such a mind I have then also not shrunk, in the second book, from explaining God's holy Word in several places differently than has been done until now: He who does not see so well therein that it is to increase God's honor, as his own which he has explained differently is diminished thereby: he shows thus which of the two goes most to his heart, God's or his own praise. I again, who have also been in their opinion, gladly give mine