There are also places of the Scripture, where, by the “word of God,” is signified such words as are consonant to reason and equity, though spoken sometimes neither by prophet, nor by a holy man. For Pharaoh-Necho was an idolater; yet his words to the good king Josiah, in which he advised him by messengers, not to oppose him in his march against Charchemish, are said to have proceeded from the mouth of God; and Josiah, not hearkening to them, was slain in the battle; as is to be read (2 Chron. 35:21⁠–⁠23). It is true, that as the same history is related in the first book of Esdras, not Pharaoh, but Jeremiah, spake these words to Josiah, from the mouth of the Lord. But we are to give credit to the canonical Scripture, whatsoever be written in the Apocrypha.

The “word of God,” is then also to be taken for the dictates of reason and equity, when the same is said in the Scriptures to be written in man’s heart; as Psalm 37:31; Jer. 31:33; Deut. 30:11, 14, and many other like places.