94.1 Through successive ages of darkness, in the midnight of heathenism, God permitted men to try the experiment of finding out God by their own wisdom, not to demonstrate their inability to his satisfaction, but that men themselves might see that they could not obtain a knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ his Son, save through the revelation of his word by the Holy Spirit. When Christ came to the world, the experiment had been fully tried, and the result made it evident that the world by wisdom knew not God. Even in the church God has allowed men to test their own wisdom in this matter, but when a crisis has been brought about through human fallibility, God has risen mightily to defend his people. When the church has been brought low, when trial and oppression have come upon his people, he more abundantly exalted them by signal deliverance. When unfaithful teachers came among the people, weakness followed, and the faith of God's people seemed to wane; but God arose and purged his flo…
"For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe."
The phrase "the world by wisdom knew not God" is directly taken from 1 Corinthians 1:21, making it an explicit allusion rather than just a thematic parallel.