Hugh Binning, Works, p. 191:
“O taste and see how good the Lord is,” Ps. 34:8. Some things indeed cannot be known but by some sense. You cannot make a blind man apprehend what light is, till he see it. A deaf man cannot form a notion of sounds in his mind, except he once heard them; neither can a man understand the sweetness of honey, but by tasting it. Truly spiritual things are of that nature: there is some hidden virtue and excellency in them, which is not obvious to every man that hath the bare knowledge of the letter; there is a spirit and life in them, that cannot be transmitted into your ears with the sound of words, or infused into ink and paper. It is only the inspiration of the Almighty can inspire this sensible perception, and real taste of spiritual things. Some powders do not smell till they are beaten; truly till these truths be well powdered and beaten small by meditation, they cannot smell so fragrantly to the spirit. As meats do not nourish till they be chewed and digested, so spiritual things do not relish to a soul, nor can they truly feed the soul, till they be chewed and digested into the heart by serious and earnest consideration.
“O taste and see how good the Lord is,” Ps. 34:8. Some things indeed cannot be known but by some sense. You cannot make a blind man apprehend what light is, till he see it. A deaf man cannot form a notion of sounds in his mind, except he once heard them; neither can a man understand the sweetness of honey, but by tasting it. Truly spiritual things are of that nature: there is some hidden virtue and excellency in them, which is not obvious to every man that hath the bare knowledge of the letter; there is a spirit and life in them, that cannot be transmitted into your ears with the sound of words, or infused into ink and paper. It is only the inspiration of the Almighty can inspire this sensible perception, and real taste of spiritual things. Some powders do not smell till they are beaten; truly till these truths be well powdered and beaten small by meditation, they cannot smell so fragrantly to the spirit. As meats do not nourish till they be chewed and digested, so spiritual things do not relish to a soul, nor can they truly feed the soul, till they be chewed and digested into the heart by serious and earnest consideration.
