From “The Way of the Intellectuals,” an essay in “An Approach to the Book of Mormon,” pp. 375-376.
One thing the Book of Mormon illustrates is that there is no compromise possible with those who attack the gospel on what they call intellectual grounds. The church flourished mightily when it got rid of them, but suffered gravely while they were in its midst. No men spent more time with Jesus than the Scribes and Pharisees; they questioned him constantly, and he always answered them — yet there is no instance of his ever converting one of them. The doctors talked his language, they studied the scriptures day and night, they heard him preach, and they held long discussions with him, yet though he converted dockworkers and bankers, farmers and women of the streets, tax-collectors and soldiers, he never converted the doctors. It was they who planned his death.
After all, no man can learn enough in his lifetime to count for very much, and no one knows that better than the man who diligently seeks knowledge — that is the lesson of Faust. How then can any honest man believe that his modicum of knowledge can supersede revelation and supplant the authority of the priesthood?
Discuss.