expressed a view of the harmful tendencies without a knowledge of the inner light: Now this seems to be so explained in the writings called the Scriptures, that we might gain a great deal of profitable instruction, if we would read them under the regulating influence of the spirit of God. But they can afford no instruction to those who read them in their own ability; for, if they depend on their own interpretation, they are as a dead letter, in so much, that those who profess to consider them the proper rule of faith and practice, will kill one another for the Scriptures' sake. Another sentiment from his writings is as follows: Hicks rejected of the notion of an outward Devil as the source of evil, but rather emphasized that it was the human 'passions' or 'propensities'. Hicks stressed that basic urges, including all sexual passions, were neither implanted by an external evil, but all were aspects of human nature as created by God. Hicks claimed, in his sermon Let Brotherly Love Continue at the Byberry Friends Meeting in 1824 that: He gave us passions—if we may call them passions—in order that we might seek after those things which we need, and which we had a right to experience and know. Hicks taught that all wrongdoing and suffering occurred in the world as the consequence of "an excess in the indulgence of propensities. Independent of the regulating influence of God's light." One of the most intriguing ministers the society of friends has ever encountered, he labored earnestly to lead them in what he considered the true new covenant dispensation, an invisible inward covenant and union with God, and saw the tendency that tradition, books, rituals and even the Bible itself had to hinder that light within. Even at 81 years of age, facing heavy opposition from orthodox friends, bodily afflictions, and material in circulation to damage his reputation as a minister, he never wavered in his convictions on placing the sure rule of faith, the law written on the heart, the only thing sufficient to bring each of the children of men to the true peace and love of God. Although liberal friends today claim that he is their founder, many would be uncomfortable with his definition of Christianity: "Nothing more than a complete mortification of our own will, and a full and final annihilation of all self exaltation."