when the Books of Scripture were gathered into one body of the Law to the end that not the Doctrine only but the Authors also might be extant Of the Prophets the most ancient are Sophoniah Jonas Amos Hosea Isaiah and Michaiah who lived in the time of Amaziah and Azariah otherwise Ozias Kings of Judah But the Book of Jonas is not properly a Register of his Prophecy for that is contained in these few words Fourty dayes and Ninivy shall be destroyed but a History or Narration of his frowardnesse and disputing Gods commandements so that there is small probability he should be the Author seeing he is the subject of it But the Book of Amos is his Prophecy Jeremiah Abdias Nahum and Habakkuk prophecyed in the time of Josiah Ezekiel Daniel Aggeus and Zacharias in the Captivity When Ioel and Malachi prophecyed is not evident by their Writings But considering the Inscriptions or Titles of their Books it is manifest enough that the whole Scripture of the Old Testament was set forth in the form we have it after the return of the Iews from their Captivity in Babylon and before the time of Ptolemaeus Philadelphus that caused it to bee translated into Greek by seventy men which were sent him out of Iudea for that purpose And if the Books of Apocrypha which are recommended to us by the Church though not for Canonicall yet for profitable Books for our instruction may in this point be credited the Scripture was set forth in the form wee have it in by Esdâ—… as may appear by that which he himself saith in the second book chapt 14. verse 21 22 c. where speaking to God he saith thus Thy law is burnt therefore no man knoweth the things which thou hast done or the works that are to begin But if I have found Grace before thee send down the holy Spirit into me and I shall write all that hath been done in the world since the beginning which were written in thy Law that men may find thy path and that they which will live in the later days may live And verse 45. And it came to passe when the forty dayes were fulfilled that the Highest spake saying The first that thou hast written publish openly that the worthy and unworthy may read it but keep the seventy last that thou mayst deliver them onely to such as be wise among the people And thus much concerning the time of the writing of the Bookes of the Old Testament The Writers of the New Testament lived all in lesse then an age after Christs Ascension and had all of them seen our Saviour or been his Disciples except St. Paul and St. Luke and consequently whatsoever was written by them is as ancient as the time of the Apostles But the time wherein the Books of the New Testament were received and acknowledged by the Church to be of their writing is not altogether so ancient For as the Bookes of the Old Testament are derived to us from no other time then that of Esdras who by the direction of Gods Spirit retrived them when they were lost Those of the New Testament of which the copies were not many nor could easily be all in any one private mans hand cannot bee derived from a higher time than that wherein the Governours of the Church collected approved and recommended them to us as the writings of those Apostles and Disciples under whose names they go The first enumeration of all the Bookes both of the Old and New Testament is in the Canons of the Apostles supposed to be collected by Clement the first after St. Peter Bishop of Rome But because that is but supposed and by many questioned the Councell of Laodicea is the first we know that recommended the Bible to the then Christian Churches for the Writings of the Prophets and Apostles and this Councell was held in the 364. yeer after Christ. At which time though ambition had so far prevailed on the great Doctors of the Church as no more to esteem Emperours though Christian for the Shepherds of the people but for Sheep and Emperours not Christian for Wolves and endeavoured to passe their Doctrine not for Counsell and Information as Preachers but for Laws as absolute Governours and thought such frauds as tended to make the people the more obedient to Christian Doctrine to be pious yet I am perswaded they did not therefore falsifie the Scriptures though the copies of the Books of the New Testament were in the hands only of the Ecclesiasticks because if they had had an intention so to doe they would surely have made them more favorable to their power over Christian Princes and Civill Soveraignty than they are I see not therefore any reason to doubt but that the Old and New Testament as we have them now are the true Registers of those things which were done and said by the Prophets and Apostles And so perhaps are some of those Books which are called Apocrypha and left out of the Canon not for inconformity of Doctrine with the rest but only because they are not found in the Hebrew For after the conquest of Asia by Alexander the Great there were few learned Jews that were not perfect in the Greek tongue For the seventy Interpreters that converted the Bible into Greek were all of them Hebrews and we have extant the works of Philo and Josephus both Jews written by them eloquently in Greek But it is not the Writer but the authority of the Church that maketh a Book Canonicall And although these Books were written by divers men yet it is manifest the Writers were all indued with one and the same Spirit in that they conspire to one and the same end which is the setting forth of the Rights of the Kingdome of God the Father Son and Holy Ghost For the Book of Genesis deriveth the Genealogy of Gods people from the creation of the World to the going into Egypt the other four Books of Moses contain the Election of God for their King and the Laws which hee prescribed for their Government The Books of Joshua Judges Ruth and Samuel to the time of Saul describe the acts of Gods people till the time they cast off Gods yoke and called for a King after the manner of their neighbour nations The rest of the History of the Old Testament derives the succession of the line of David to the Captivity out of which line was to spring the restorer of the Kingdome of God even our blessed Saviour God the Son whose coming was foretold in the Bookes of the Prophets after whom the Evangelists write his life and actions and his claim to the Kingdome whilst he lived on earth and lastly the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles declare the coming of God the Holy Ghost and the Authority he left with them and their successors for the direction of the Jews and for the invitation of the Gentiles In summe the Histories and the Prophecies of the old Testament
the◅efore manifest that Christ hath not left to his Ministers in this world unlesse they be also endued with Civill Authority any authority to Command other men But what may some object if a King or a Senate or other Soveraign Person forbid us to beleeve in Christ To this I answer that such forbidding is of no effect because Beleef and Unbeleef never follow mens Commands Faith is a gift of God which Man can neither give nor take away by promise of rewards or menaces of torture And if it be further asked What if wee bee commanded by our lawfull Prince to say with our tongue wee beleeve not must we obey such command Profession with the tongue is but an externall thing and no more then any other gesture whereby we signifie our obedience and wherein a Christian holding firmely in his heart the Faith of Christ hath the same liberty which the Prophet Elisha allowed to Naaman the Syrian Naaman was converted in his heart to the God of Israel For hee saith 2 Kings 5. 17. Thy servant will henceforth offer neither burnt offering nor sacrifice unto other Gods but unto the Lord. In this thing the Lord pardon thy servant that when my Master goeth into the house of Rimmon to worship there and he leaneth on my hand and I bow my selfe in the house of Rimmon when I bow my selfe in the house of Rimmon the Lord pardon thy servant in this thing This the Prophet approved and bid him Goe in peace Here Naaman beleeved in his heart but by bowing before the Idol Rimmon he denyed the true God in effect as much as if he had done it with his lips But then what shall we answer to our Saviours saying Whosoever denyeth me before men I will deny him before my Father which is in Heaven This we may say that whatsoever a Subject as Naaman was is compelled to in obedience to his Soveraign and doth it not in order to his own mind but in order to the laws of his country that action is not his but his Soveraigns nor is it he that in this case denyeth Christ before men but his Governour and the law of his countrey If any man shall accuse this doctrine as repugnant to true and unfegined Christianity I ask him in case there should be a subject in any Christian Common-wealth that should be inwardly in his heart of the Mahometan Religion whether if his Soveraign command him to bee present at the divine service of the Christian Church and that on pain of death he think that Mahometan obliged in conscience to suffer death for that cause rather than to obey that command of his lawfull Prince If he say he ought rather to suffer death then he authorizeth all private men to disobey their Princes in maintenance of their Religion true or false if he say he ought to bee obedient then he alloweth to himself that which hee denyeth to another contrary to the words of our Saviour Whatsoever you would that men should doe unto you that doe yee unto them and contrary to the Law of Nature which is the indubitable everlasting Law of God Do not to another that which thou wouldest not he should doe unto thee But what then shall we say of all those Martyrs we read of in the History of the Church that they have needlessely cast away their lives For answer hereunto we are to distinguish the persons that have been for that cause put to death whereof some have received a Calling to preach and professe the Kingdome of Christ openly others have had no such Calling nor more has been required of them than their owne faith The former sort if they have been put to death for bearing witnesse to this point that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead were true Martyrs For a Martyr is to give the true definition of the word a Witnesse of the Resurrection of Jesus the Messiah which none can be but those that conversed with him on earth and saw him after he was risen For a Witnesse must have seen what he testifieth or else his testimony is not good And that none but such can properly be called Martyrs of Christ is manifest out of the words of St. Peter Act. 1. 21 22. VVherefore of these men which have companyed with us all the time that the Lord Iesus went in and out amongst us beginning from the Baptisme of Iohn unto that same day hee was taken up from us must one one be ordained to be a Martyr that is a Witnesse with us of his Resurrection Where we may observe that he which is to bee a Witnesse of the truth of the Resurrection of Christ that is to say of the truth of this fundamentall article of Christian Religion that Jesus was the Christ must be some Disciple that conversed with him and saw him before and after his Resurrection and consequently must be one of his originall Disciples whereas they which were not so can Witnesse no more but that their antecessors said it and are therefore but Witnesses of other mens testimony and are but second Martyrs or Martyrs of Christs Witnesses He that to maintain every doctrine which he himself draweth out of the History our Saviours of life and of the Acts or Epistles of the Apostles or which he beleeveth upō the authority of a private man wil oppose the Laws and Authority of the Civill State is very far from being a Martyr of Christ or a Martyr of his Martyrs 'T is one Article onely which to die for meriteth so honorable a name and that Article is this that Iesus is the Christ that is to say He that hath redeemed us aud shall come again to give us salvation and eternall life in his glorious Kingdome To die for every tenet that serveth the ambition or profit of the Clergy is not required nor is it the Death of the Witnesse but the Testimony it self that makes the Martyr for the word signifieth nothing else but the man that beareth Witnesse whether he be put to death for his testimony or not Also he that is not sent to preach this fundamentall article but taketh it upon him of his private authority though he be a Witnesse and consequently a Martyr either primary of Christ or secundary of his Apostles Disciples or their Successors yet is he not obliged to suffer death for that cause because being not called thereto t is not required at his hands nor ought hee to complain if he loseth the reward he expecteth from those that never set him on work None therefore can be a Martyr neither of the first nor second degree that have not a warrant to preach Christ come in the flesh that is to say none but such as are sent to the conversion of Infidels For no man is a Witnesse to him that already beleeveth and therefore needs no Witnesse but to them that deny or doubt or have not heard it Christ sent his Apostles and his Seventy Disciples with
take with thee one or two more And if he shall neglect to hear them tell it unto the Church but if he neglect to hear the Church let him be unto thee as an Heathen man and a Publican By which it is manifest that the Judgment concerning the truth of Repentance belonged not to any one Man but to the Church that is to the Assembly of the Faithull or to them that have authority to bee their Representant But besides the Judgment there is necessary also the pronouncing of Sentence And this belonged alwaies to the Apostle or some Pastor of the Church as Prolocutor and of this our Saviour speaketh in the 18 verse Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven And conformable hereunto was the practise of St. Paul 1 Cor. 5. 3 4 5. where he saith For I verily as absent in body but present in spirit have determined already as though I were present concerning him that hath so done this deed In the name of our Lord Iesus Christ when ye are gathered together and my spirit with the power of our Lord Iesus Christ To deliver such a one to Satan that is to say to cast him out of the Châ—…rch as a man whose Sins are not Forgiven Paul here pronounceth the Sentence but the Assembly was first to hear the Cause for St. Paul was absent and by consequence to condemn him But in the same chapter ver 11 12. the Judgment in such a case is more expressely attributed to the Assembly But now I have written unto you not to keep company if any man that is called a Brother be a Fornicator c. with such a one no not to eat For what have I to do to judg them that are without Do not ye judg them that are within The Sentence therefore by which a man was put out of Church was pronounced by the Apostle or Pastor but the Judgment concerning the merit of the cause was in the Church that is to say as the times were before the conversion of Kings and men that had Soveraign Authority in the Common-wealth the Assembly of the Christians dwelling in the same City as in Corinth in the Assembly of the Christians of Corinth This part of the Power of the Keyes by which men were thrust out from the Kingdom of God is that which is called Excommunication and to excommunicate is in the Originall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to cast out of the Synagogue that is out of the place of Divine service a word drawn from the custome of the Jews to cast out of their Synagogues such as they thought in manners or doctrine contagious as Lepers were by the Law of Moses separated from the congregation of Israel till such time as they should be by the Priest pronounced clean The Use and Effect of Excommunication whilest it was not yet strengthened with the Civill Power was no more than that they who were not Excommunicate were to avoid the company of them that were It was not enough to repute them as Heathen that never had been Christians for with such they might eate and drink which with Excommunicate persons they might not do as appeareth by the words of St. Paul 1 Cor. 5. ver 9 10 c. where he telleth them he had formerly forbidden them to company with Fornicators but because that could not bee without going out of the world he restraineth it to such Fornicators and otherwise vicious persons as were of the brethren with such a one he saith they ought not to keep company no not to eat And this is no more than our Saviour saith Mat. 18. 17. Let him be to thee as a Heathen and as a Publican For Publicans which signifieth Farmers and Receivers of the revenue of the Common-wealth were so hated and detested by the Jews that were to pay it as that Publican and Sinner were taken amongst them for the same thing Insomuch as when our Saviour accepted the invitation of Zacchaeus a Publican though it were to Convert him yet it was ohjected to him as a Crime And therefore when our Saviour to Heathen added Publican he did forbid them to eat with a man Excommunicate As for keeping them out of their Synagogues or places of Assembly they had no Power to do it but that of the owner of the place whether he were Christian or Heathen And because all places are by right in the Dominion of the Common-wealth as well hee that was Excommunicated as hee that never was Baptized might enter inter into them by Commission from the Civill Magistrate as Paul before his conversion entred into their Synagogues at Damascus to apprehend Christians men and women and to carry them bound to Jerusalem by Commission from the High Priest By which it appears that upon a Christian that should become an Apostate in a place where the Civill Power did persecute or not assist the Church the effect of Excommunication had nothiug in it neither of dammage in this world nor of terrour Not of terrour because of their unbeleef nor of dammage because they are retâ—…rned thereby into the favour of the world and in the world to come were to be in no worse estate then they which never had beleeved The dammage redounded rather to the Church by provocation of them they cast out to a freer execution of their malice Excommunication therefore had its effect onely upon those that beleeved that Jesus Christ was to come again in Glory to reign over and to judge both the quick and the dead and should therefore refuse entrance into his Kingdom to those whose Sins were Retained that is to those that were Excommunicated by the Church And thence it is that St. Paul calleth Excommunication a delivery of the ExcoÌ„municate person to Satan For without the Kingdom of Christ all other Kingdomes after Judgment are comprehended in the Kingdome of Satan This is it that the faithfull stood in fear of as long as they stood Excommunicate that is to say in an estate wherein their sins were not Forgiven Whereby wee may understand that Excommunication in the time that Christian Religion was not authorized by the Civill Power was used onely for a correction of manners not of errours in opinion for it is a punishment whereof none could be sensible but such as beleeved and expected the coming again of our Saviour to judge the world and they who so beleeved needed no other opinion but onely uprightnesse of life to be saved There lyeth Excommunication for Injustice as Mat. 18. If thy Brother offend thee tell it him privately then with Witnesses lastly tell the Church and then if he obey not Let him be to thee as an Heathen man and a Publican And there lieth Excommunication for a Scandalous Life as 1 Cor. 5. 11. If any man that is called a Brother be a Fornicator or Covetous or an Idolater
forward they were accounted the Law of the Jews and for such translated into Greek by Seventy Elders of Judaea and put into the Library of Ptolemy at Alexandria and approved for the Word of God Now seeing Esdras was the High Priest and the High Priest was their Civill Soveraigne it is manifest that the Scriptures were never made Laws but by the Soveraign Civill Power By the Writings of the Fathers that lived in the time before that Christian Religion was received and authorised by Constantine the Emperour we may find that the Books wee now have of the New Testament were held by the Christians of that time except a few in respect of whose paucity the rest were called the Catholique Church and others Haeretiques for the dictates of the Holy Ghost and consequently for the Canon or Rule of Faith such was the reverence and opinion they had of their Teachers as generally the reverence that the Disciples bear to their first Masters in all manner of doctrine they receive from them is not small Therefore there is no doubt but when S. Paul wrote to the Churches he had converted or any other Apostle or Disciple of Christ to those which had then embraced Christ they received those their Writings for the true Christian Doctrine But in that time when not the Power and Authority of the Teacher but the Faith of the Hearer caused them to receive it it was not the Apostles that made their own Writings Canonicall but every Convert made them so to himself But the question here is not what any Christian made a Law or Canon to himself which he might again reject by the same right he received it but what was so made a Canon to them as without injustice they could not doe any thing contrary thereunto That the New Testament should in this sense be Canonicall that is to say a Law in any place where the Law of the Common-wealth had not made it so is contrary to the nature of a Law For a Law as hath been already shewn is the Commandement of that Man or Assembly to whom we have given Soveraign Authority to make such Rules for the direction of our actions as hee shall think fit and to punish us when we doe any thing contrary to the same When therefore any other man shall offer unto us any other Rules which the Soveraign Ruler hath not prescribed they are but Counsell and Advice which whether good or bad hee that is counselled may without injustice refuse to observe and when contrary to the Laws already established without injustice cannot observe how good soever he conceiveth it to be I say he cannot in this case observe the same in his actions nor in his dicourse with other men though he may without blame beleeve his private Teachers and wish he had the liberty to practise their advice and that it were publiquely received for Law For internall Faith is in its own nature invisible and consequently exempted from all humane jurisdiction whereas the words and actions that proceeed from it as breaches of our Civill obedience are injustice both before God and Man Seeing then our Saviour hath denyed his Kingdome to be in this world seeing he had said he came not to judge but to save the world he hath not subjected us to other Laws than those of the Common-wealth that is the Jews to the Law of Moses which he saith Mat. 5. he came not to destroy but to fulfill and other Nations to the Laws of their severall Soveraigns and all men to the Laws of Nature the observing whereof both he himselfe and his Apostles have in their teaching recommended to us as a necessary condition of being admitted by him in the last day into his eternall Kingdome wherein shall be Protection and Life everlasting Seeing then our Saviour and his Apostles left not new Laws to oblige us in this world but new Doctrine to prepare us for the next the Books of the New Testament which containe that Doctrine untill obedience to them was commanded by them that God had given power to on earth to be Legislators were not obligatory Canons that is Laws but onely good and safe advice for the direction of sinners in the way to salvation which every man might take and refuse at his owne perill without injustice Again our Saviour Christs Commission to his Apostles and Disciples was to Proclaim his Kingdome not present but to come and to Teach all Nations and to Baptize them that should beleeve and to enter into the houses of them that should receive them and where they were not received to shake off the dust of their feet against them but not to call for fire from heaven to destroy them nor to compell them to obedience by the Sword In all which there is nothing of Power but of Perswasion He sent them out as Sheep unto Wolves not as Kings to their Subjects They had not in Commission to make Laws but to obey and teach obedience to Laws made and consequently they could not make their Writings obligatory Canons without the help of the Soveraign Civill Power And therefore the Scripture of the New Testament is there only Law where the lawfull Civill Power hath made it so And there also the King or Soveraign maketh it a Law to himself by which he subjecteth himselfe not to the Doctor or Apostle that converted him but to God himself and his Son Jesus Christ as immediately as did the Apostles themselves That which may seem to give the New Testament in respect of those that have embraced Christian Doctrine the force of Laws in the times and places of persecution is the decrees they made amongst themselves in their Synods For we read Acts 15. 28. the stile of the Councell of the Apostles the Elders and the whole Church in this manner It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us to lay upon you no greater burthen than these necessary things c. which is a stile that signifieth a Power to lay a burthen on them that had received their Doctrine Now to lay a burden on another seemeth the same that to oblige and therefore the Acts of that Councell were Laws to the then Christians Neverthelesse they were no more Laws than are these other Precepts Repent Be Baptized Keep the Commandements Beleeve the Gospel Come unto me Sell all that thou hast Give it to the poor and Follow me which are not Commands but Invitations and Callings of men to Christianity like that of Esay 55. 1. Ho every man that thirâ—…teth come yee to the waters come and buy wine and milke without money For first the Apostles power was no other than that of our Saviour to invite men to embrace the Kingdome of God which they themselves acknowledged for a Kingdome not present but to come and they that have no Kingdome can make no Laws And secondly if their Acts of Councell were Laws they could not without sin be disobeyed But we read
the Holy Ghost Separate me Barnabas and saulâ—… c. But seeing the work of an Apostle was to be a Witnesse of the Resurrection of Christ a man may here aske how S. Paul that conversed not with our Saviour before his passion could know he was risen To which is easily answered that our Saviour himself appeared to him in the way to Damascus from Heaven after his Ascension and chose him for a vessell to bear his name before the Gentiles and Kings and Children of Israel and consequently having seen the Lord after his passion was a competent Witnesse of his Resurrection And as for Barnabas he was a Disciple before the Passion It is therefore evident that Paul and Barnabas were Apostles and yet chosen and authorized not by the first Apostles alone but by the Church of Antioch as Matthias was chosen and authorized by the Church of Jerusalem Bishop a word formed in oâ—…r language out of the Greek Episcopus signifieth an Overseer or Superintendent of any businesse and particularly a Pastor or Shepherd and thence by metaphor was taken not only amongst the Jews that were originally Shepherds but also amongst the Heathen to signifie the Office of a King or any other Ruler or Guide of People whether he ruled by Laws or Doctrine And so the Apostles were the first Christian Bishops instituted by Christ himselfe in which sense the Apostleship of Judas is called Acts 1. 20. his Bishoprick And afterwards when there were constituted Elders in the Christian Churches with charge to guide Christs flock by their doctrine and advice these Elders were also called Bishops Timothy was an Elder which word Elder in the New Testament is a name of Office as well as of Age yet he was also a Bishop And Bishops were then content with the Title of Elders Nay S. John himselfe the Apostle beloved of our Lord beginneth his Second Epistle with these words The Elder to the Elect Lady By which it is evident that Bishop Pastor Elder Doctor that is to say Teacher were but so many divers names of the same Office in the time of the Apostles For there was then no government by Coercion but only by Doctrine and Perswading The Kingdome of God was yet to come in a new world so that there could be no authority to compell in any Church till the Common-wealth had embraced the Christian Faith and consequently no diversity of Authority though there were diversity of Employments Besides these Magisteriall employments in the Church namely Apostles Bishops Elders Pastors and Doctors whose calling was to proclaim Christ to the Jews and Infidels and to direct and teach those that beleeved we read in the New Testament of no other For by the names of Evangelists and Prophets is not signified any Office but severall Gifts by which severall men were profitable to the Church as Evangelists by writing the life and acts of our Saviour such as were S. Matthew and S. Iohn Apostles and S. Marke and S. Luke Disciples and whosoever else wrote of that subject as S. Thomas and S. Barnabas are said to have done though the Church have not received the Books that have gone under their names and as Prophets by the gift of interpreting the Old Testament and sometimes by declaring their speciall Revelations to the Church For neither these gifts nor the gifts of Languages nor the gift of Casting out Devils or of Curing other diseases nor any thing else did make an Officer in the Church save onely the due calling and election to the charge of Teaching As the Apostles Matthias Paul and Barnabas were not made by our Saviour himself but were elected by the Church that is by the Assembly of Christians namely Matthias by the Church of Jerusalem and Paul and Barnabas by the Church of Antioch so were also the Presbyters and Pastors in other Cities elected by the Churches of those Cities For proof whereof let us consider first how S. Paul proceeded in the Ordination of Presbyters in the Cities where he had converted men to the Christian Faith immediately after he and Barnabas had received their Apostleship We read Acts 4. 23. that they ordained Elders in every Church which at first sight may be taken for an Argument that they themselves chose and gave them their authority But if we confider the Originall text it will be manifest that they were authorized and chosen by the Assembly of the Christians of each City For the words there are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is When they had Ordained them Elders by the Holding up of Hands in every Congregation Now it is well enough known that in all those Cities the manner of choosing Magistrates and Officers was by plurality of suffrages and because the ordinary way of distinguishing the Affirmative Votes from the Negatives was by Holding up of Hands to ordain an Officer in any of the Cities was no more but to bring the people together to elect them by plurality of Votes whether it were by plurality of elevated hands or by plurality of voices or plurality of balls or beans or small stones of which every man cast in one into a vessell marked for the Affirmative or Negative for divers Cities had divers customes in that point It was therefore the Assembly that elected their own Elders the Apostles were onely Presidents of the Assembly to call them together for such Election and to pronounce them Elected and to give them the benediction which now is called Consecration And for this cause they that were Presidents of the Assemblies as in the absence of the Apostles the Elders were were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in Latin Aâ—…tistites which words signifie the Principall Person of the Assembly whose office was to number the Votes and to declare thereby who was chosen and where the Votes were equall to decide the matter in question by adding his own which is the Office of a President in Councell And because all the Churches had their Presbyters ordained in the same manner where the word is Constitute as Titus 1. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For this cause left I thee in Crete that thou shouldest constitute Elders in every City we are to understand the same thing namely that hee should call the faithfull together and ordain them Presbyters by plurality of suffrages It had been a strange thing if in a Town where men perhaps had never seen any Magistrate otherwise chosen then by an Assembly those of the Town becomming Christians should so much as have thought on any other way of Election of their Teachers and Guides that is to say of their Presbyters otherwise called Bishops then this of plurality of suffrages intimated by S. Paul Acts 14. 23. in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nor was there ever any choosing of Bishops before the Emperors found it necessary to regulate them in order to the keeping of the peace amongst them but by the Assemblies of the Christians in every severall Town
should not violate our Faith that is a commandement to obey our Civill Soveraigns which wee constituted over us by mutuall pact one with another And this Law of God that commandeth Obedience to the Law Civill commandeth by consequence Obedience to all the Precepts of the Bible which as I have proved in the precedent Chapter is there onely Law where the Civill Soveraign hath made it so and in other places but Counsell which a man at his own perill may without injustice refuse to obey Knowing now what is the Obedience Necessary to Salvation and to whom it is due we are to consider next concerning Faith whom and why we beleeve and what are the Articles or Points necessarily to be beleeved by them that shall be saved And first for the Person whom we beleeve because it is impossible to beleeve any Person before we know what he saith it is necessary he be one that wee have heard speak The Person therefore whom Abraham Isaac Jacob Moses and the Prophets beleeved was God himself that spake unto them supernaturally And the Person whom the Apostles and Disciples that conversed with Christ beleeved was our Saviour himself But of them to whom neither God the Father nor our Saviour ever spake it cannot be said that the Person whom they beleeved was God They beleeved the Apostles and after them the Pastors and Doctors of the Church that recommended to their faith the History of the Old and New Testament so that the Faith of Christians ever since our Saviours time hath had for foundation first the reputation of their Pastors and afterward the authority of those that made the Old and New Testament to be received for the Rule of Faith which none could do but Christian Soveraignes who are therefore the Supreme Pastors and the onely Persons whom Christians now hear speak from God except such as God speaketh to in these days supernaturally But because there be many false Prophets gone out into the world other men are to examine such Spirits as St. Iohn adviseth us 1 Epistle Chap. 4. ver 1. whether they be of God or not And therefore seeing the Examination of Doctrines belongeth to the Supreme Pastor the Person which all they that have no speciall revelation are to beleeve is in every Common-wealth the Supreme Pastor that is to say the Civill Soveraigne The causes why men beleeve any Christian Doctrine are various For Faith is the gift of God and he worketh it in each severall man by such wayes as it seemeth good unto himself The most ordinary immediate cause of our beleef concerning any point of Christian Faith is that wee beleeve the Bible to be the Word of God But why wee beleeve the Bible to be the Word of God is much disputed as all questions must needs bee that are not well stated For they make not the question to be Why we Beleeve it but How wee Know it as if Beleeving and Knowing were all one And thence while one side ground their Knowledge upon the Infallibility of the Church and the other side on the Testimony of the Private Spirit neither side concludeth what it pretends For how shall a man know the Infallibility of the Church but by knowing first the Infallibility of the Scripture Or how shall a man know his own Private spirit to be other than a beleef grounded upon the Authority and Arguments of his Teachers or upon a Presumption of his own Gifts Besides there is nothing in the Scripture from which can be inferred the Infallibility of the Church much lesse of any particular Church and least of all the Infallibility of any particular man It is manifest therefore that Christian men doe not know but onely beleeve the Scripture to be the Word of God and that the means of making them beleeve which God is pleased to afford men ordinarily is according to the way of Nature that is to say from their Teachers It is the Doctrine of St. Paul concerning Christian Faith in generall Rom. 10. 17. Faith cometh by Hearing that is by Hearing our lawfull Pastors He saith also ver 14 15. of the same Chapter How shall they beleeve in him of whom they have not heard and how shall they hear without a Preacher and how shall they Preach except they be sent Whereby it is evident that the ordinary cause of beleeving that the Scriptures are the Word of God is the same with the cause of the beleeving of all other Articles of our Faith namely the Hearing of those that are by the Law allowed and appointed to Teach us as our Parents in their Houses and our Pastors in the Churches Which also is made more manifest by experience For what other cause can there bee assigned why in Christian Common-wealths all men either beleeve or at least professe the Scripture to bee the Word of God and in other Common-wealths scarce any but that in Christian Common-wealths they are taught it from their infancy and in other places they are taught otherwise But if Teaching be the cause of Faith why doe not all beleeve It is certain therefore that Faith is the gift of God and hee giveth it to whom he will Neverthelesse because to them to whom he giveth it he giveth it by the means of Teachers the immediate cause of Faith is Hearing In a School where many are taught and some profit others profit not the cause of learning in them that profit is the Master yet it cannot be thence inferred that learning is not the gift of God All good things proceed from God yet cannot all that have them say they are Inspired for that implies a gift supernaturall and the immediate hand of God which he that pretends to pretends to be a Prophet and is subject to the examination of the Church But whether men Know or Beleeve or Grant the Scriptures to be the Word of God if out of such places of them as are without obscurity I shall shew what Articles of Faith are necessary and onely necessary for Salvation those men must needs Know Beleeve or Grant the same The Vnum Necessarium Onely Article of Faith which the Scripture maketh simply Necessary to Salvation is this that JESUS IS THE CHRIST By the name of Christ is understood the King which God had before promised by the Prophets of the Old Testament to send into the world to reign over the Jews and over such of other nations as should beleeve in him under himself eternally and to give them that eternall life which was lost by the sin of Adam Which when I have proved out of Scripture I will further shew when and in what sense some other Articles may bee also called Necessary For Proof that the Beleef of this Article Iesus is the Christ is all the Faith required to Salvation my first Argument shall bee from the Scope of the Evangelists which was by the description of the life of our Saviour to establish that one
were in a Child For as a Child wants the judgement to dissent from counsell given him and is thereby necessitated to take the advise of them or him to whom he is committed So an Assembly wanteth the liberty to dissent from the counsell of the major part be it good or bad And as a Child has need of a Tutor or Protector to preserve his Person and Authority So also in great Common-wealths the Soveraign Assembly in all great dangers and troubles have need of Custodes libertatis that is of Dictators or Protectors of their Authoritie which are as much as Temporary Monarchs to whom for a time they may commit the entire exercise of their Power and have at the end of that time been oftner deprived thereof than Infant Kings by their Protectors Regents or any other Tutors Though the Kinds of Soveraigntie be as I have now shewn but three that is to say Monarchie where One Man has it or Democracie where the generall Assembly of Subjects hath it or Aristocracie where it is in an Assembly of certain persons nominated or otherwise distinguished from the rest Yet he that shall consider the particular Common-wealthes that have been and are in the world will not perhaps easily reduce them to three and may thereby be inclined to think there be other Formes arising from these mingled together As for example Elective Kingdomes where Kings have the Soveraigne Power put into their hands for a time or Kingdomes wherein the King hath a power limited which Governments are nevertheles by most Writers called Monarchie Likewise if a Popular or Aristocraticall Common-wealth subdue an Enemies Countrie and govern the same by a President Procurator or other Magistrate this may seeme perhaps at first sight to be a Democraticall or Aristocraticall Government But it is not so For Elective Kings are not Soveraignes but Ministers of the Soveraigne nor limited Kings Soveraignes but Ministers of them that have the Soveraigne Power Nor are those Provinces which are in subjection to a Democracie or Aristocracie of another Common-wealth Democratically or Aristocratically governed but Monarchically And â—…irst concerning an Elective King whose power is limited to his life as it is in many places of Christendome at this day or to certaine Yeares or Moneths as the Dictators power amongst the Romans If he have Right to appoint his Successor he is no more Elective but Hereditary But if he have no Power to elect his Successor then there is some other Man or Assembly known which after his decease may elect a new or else the Common-wealth dieth and dissolveth with him and returneth to the condition of Warre If it be known who have the power to give the Soveraigntie after his death it is known also that the Soveraigntie was in them before For none have right to give that which they have not right to possesse and keep to themselves it they think good But if there be none that can give the Soveraigntie after the decease of him that was first elected then has he power nay he is obliged by the Law of Nature to provide by establishing his Successor to keep those that had trusted him with the Government from relapsing into the miserable condition of Civill warre And consequently he was when elected a Soveraign absolute Secondly that King whose power is limited is not superiour to him or them that have the power to limit it and he that is not superiour is not supreme that is to say not Soveraign The Soveraignty therefore was alwaies in that Assembly which had the Right to Limit him and by consequence the government not Monarchy but either Democracy or Aristocracy as of old time in Sparta where the Kings had a priviledge to lead their Armies but the Soveraignty was in the Ephori Thirdly whereas heretofore the Roman People governed the land of Judea for example by a President yet was not Judea therefore a Democracy because they were not governed by any Assembly into the which any of them had right to enter nor by an Aristocracy because they were not governed by any Assembly into which any man could enter by their Election but they were governed by one Person which though as to the people of Rome was an Assembly of the people or Democracy yet as to people of Judea which had no right at all of participating in the government was a Monarch For though where the people are governed by an Assembly chosen by themselves out of their own number the government is called a Democracy or Aristocracy yet when they are governed by an Assembly not of their own choosing 't is a Monarchy not of One man over another man but of one people over another people Of all these Formes of Government the matter being mortall so that not onely Monarchs but also whole Assemblies dy it is necessary for the conservation of the peace of men that as there was order taken for an Artificiall Man so there be order also taken for an Artificiall Eternity of life without which men that are governed by an Assembly should return into the condition of Warre in every age and they that are governed by One man assoon as their Governour dyeth This Artificiall Eternity is that which men call the Right of Succession There is no perfect forme of Government where the disposing of the Succession is not in the present Soveraign For if it be in any other particular Man or private Assembly it is in a person subject and may be assumed by the Soveraign at his pleasure and consequently the Right is in himselfe And if it be in no particular man but left to a new choyce then is the Common-wealth dissolved and the Right is in him that can get it contrary to the intention of them that did Institute the Common-wealth for their perpetuall and not temporary security In a Democracy the whole Assembly cannot faile unlesse the Multitude that are to be governed faile And therefore questions of the right of Succession have in that forme of Government no place at all In an Aristocracy when any of the Assembly dyeth the election of another into his room belongeth to the Assembly as the Soveraign to whom belongeth the choosing of all Counsellours and Officers For that which the Representative doth as Actor every one of the Subjects doth as Author And though the Soveraign Assembly may give Power to others to elect new men for supply of their Court yet it is still by their Authority that the Election is made and by the same it may when the publique shall require it be recalled The greatest difficultie about the right of Succession is in Monarchy And the difficulty ariseth from this that at first sight it is not manifest who is to appoint the Successor nor many times who it is whom he hath appointed For in both these cases there is required a more exact ratiocination than every man is accustomed to use As to the question who shall appoint the Successor of
and the Gospels and Epistles of the New Testament have had one and the same scope to convert men to the obedience of God 1. in Moses and the Priests 2. in the man Christ and 3. in the Apostles and the successors to Apostolicall power For these three at several times did represent the person of God Moses and his successors the High Priests and Kings of Judah in the Old Testament Christ himself in the time he lived on earth and the Apostles and their successors from the day of Pentecost when the Holy Ghost descended on them to this day It is a question much disputed between the divers sects of Christian Religion From whence the Scriptures derive their Authority which question is also propounded sometimes in other terms as How wee know them to be the Word of God or Why we b◅leeve them to be so And the difficulty of resolving it ariseth chiefly from the impropernesse of the words wherein the question it self is couched For it is beleeved on all hands that the first and originall Author of them is God and consequently the question disputed is not that Again it is manifest that none can know they are Gods Word though all true Christians beleeve it but those to whom God himself hath revealed it supernaturally and therefore the question is not rightly moved of our Know edge of it Lastly when the question is propounded of our Beleefe because some are moved to beleeve for one and others for other reasons there can be rendred no one generall answer for them all The question truly stated is By what Authority they are made Law As far as they differ not from the Laws of Nature there is no doubt but they are the Law of God and carry their Authority with them legible to all men that have the use of naturall reason but this is no other Authority then that of all other Morall Doctrine consonant to Reason the Dictates whereof are Laws not made but Eternall If they be made Law by God himselfe they are of the nature of written Law which are Laws to them only to whom God hath so sufficiently published them as no man can excuse himself by saying he knew not they were his He therefore to whom God hath not supernaturally revealed that they are his nor that those that published them were sent by him is not obliged to obey them by any Authority but his whose Commands have already the force of Laws that is to say by any other Authority then that of the Common-wealth residing in the Soveraign who only has the Legislative power Again if it be not the Legislative Authority of the Common-wealth that giveth them the force of Laws it must bee some other Authority derived from God either private or publique if private it obliges onely him to whom in particular God hath been pleased to reveale it For if every man should be obliged to take for Gods Law what particular men on pretence of private Inspiration or Revelation should obtrude upon him in such a number of men that out of pride and ignorance take their own Dreams and extravagant Fancies and Madnesse for testimonies of Gods Spirit or out of ambition pretend to such Divine testimonies falsely and contrary to their own consciences it were impossible that any Divine Law should be acknowledged If publique it is the Authority of the Common-wealth or of the Church But the Church if it be one person is the same thing with a Common-wealth of Christians called a Common-wealth because it consisteth of men united in one person their Soveraign and a Church because it consisteth in Christian men united in one Christian Soveraign But if the Church be not one person then it hath no authority at all it can neither command nor doe any action at all nor is capable of having any power or right to any thing nor has any Will Reason nor Voice for all these qualities are personall Now if the whole number of Christians be not contained in one Common-wealth they are not one person nor is there an Universall Church that hath any authority over them and therefore the Scriptures are not made Laws by the Universall Church or if it bee one Common-wealth then all Christian Monarchs and States are private persons and subject to bee judged deposed and punished by an Universall Soveraigne of all Christendome So that the question of the Authority of the Scriptures is reduced to this Whether Christian Kings and the Soveraigne Assemblies in Christian Common-wealths be absolute in their own Territories immediately under God or subject to one Vicar of Christ constituted of the Vniversall Church to bee judged condemned deposed and put to death as hee shall think expedient or necessary for the common good Which question cannot bee resolved without a more particular consideration of the Kingdome of God from whence also wee are to judge of the Authority of Interpreting the Scripture For whosoever hath a lawfull power over any Writing to make it Law hath the power also to approve or disapprove the interpretation of the same CHAP. XXXIV Of the Signification of SPIRIT ANGEL and INSPIRATION in the Books of Holy Scripture SEeing the foundation of all true Ratiocination is the constant Signification of words which in the Doctrine following dependeth not as in naturall science on the Will of the Writer nor as in common conversation on vulgar use but on the sense they carry in the Scripture It is necessary before I proceed any further to determine out of the Bible the meaning of such words as by their ambiguity may render what I am to inferre upon them obscure or disputable I will begin with the words BODY and SPIRIT which in the language of the Schools are termed Substances Corporeall and Incorporeall The Word Body in the most generall acceptation signifieth that which filleth or occupyeth some certain room or imagined place and dependeth not on the imagination but is a reall part of that we call the Vniverse For the Vniverse being the Aggregate of all Bodies there is no reall part thereof that is not also Body nor any thing properly a Body that is not also part of that Aggregate of all Bodies the Vniverse The same also because Bodies are subject to change that is to say to variety of apparence to the sense of living creatures is called Substance that is to say Subject to various accidents as sometimes to be Moved sometimes to stand Still and to seem to our senses sometimes Hot sometimes Cold sometimes of one Colour Smel Tast or Sound somtimes of another And this diversity of Seeming produced by the diversity of the operatiō of bodies on the organs of our sense we attribute to alterations of the Bodies that operate call them Accidents of those Bodies And according to this acceptation of the word Substance and Body signifie the same thing and therefore Substance incorporeall are words which when they are joined together destroy one another as if
fault that Jonathan had committed in eating a honey-comb contrary to the oath taken by the people And Iosh. 18. 10. God divided the land of Canaan amongst the Israelite by the lots that Ioshua did cast before the Lord in Shiloh In the same manner it seemeth to be that God discovered Ioshua 7. 16 c. the crime of Achan And these are the wayes whereby God declared his Will in the Old Testament All which ways he used also in the New Testament To the Virgin Mary by a Vision of an Angel To Ioseph in a Dream again to Paul in the way to Damascus in a Vision of our Saviour and to Peter in the Vision of a sheet let down from heaven with divers sorts of flesh of clean and unclean beasts and in prison by Vision of an Angel And to all the Apostles and Writers of the New Testament by the graces of his Spirit and to the Apostles again at the choosing of Matthias in the place of Judas Iscariot by lot Seeing then all Prophecy supposeth Vision or Dream which two when they be naturall are the same or some especiall gift of God so rarely observed in mankind as to be admired where observed And seeing as well such gifts as the most extraordinary Dreams and Visions may proceed from God not onely by his supernaturall and immediate but also by his naturall operation and by mediation of second causes there is need of Reason and Judgment to discern between naturall and supernaturall Gifts and between naturall and supernaturall Visions or Dreams And consequently men had need to be very circumspect aud wary in obeying the voice of man that pretending himself to be a Prophet requires us to obey God in that way which he in Gods name telleth us to be the way to happinesse For he that pretends to teach men the way of so great felicity pretends to govern them that is to say to rule and reign over them which is a thing that all men naturally desire and is therefore worthy to be suspected of Ambition and Imposture and consequently ought to be examined and tryed by every man before hee yeeld them obedience unlesse he have yeelded it them already in the institution of a Common-wealth as when the Prophet is the Civill Soveraign or by the Civil Soveraign Authorized And if this examination of Prophets and Spirits were not allowed to every one of the people it had been to no purpose to set out the marks by which every man might be able to distinguish between those whom they ought and those whom they ought not to follow Seeing therefore such marks are set out Deut. 13. 1 c. to know a Prophet by and 1 Iohn 4. 1. c. to know a Spirit by and seeing there is so much Prophecying in the Old Testament and so much Preaching in the New Testament against Prophets and so much greater a number ordinarily of false Prophets then of true every one is to beware of obeying their directions at their own perill And first that there were many more false then true Prophets appears by this that when Ahab 1 Kings 12. consulted four hundred Prophets they were all false Impostors but onely one Michaiah And a little before the time of the Captivity the Prophets were generally lyars The Prophets saith the Lord by Ieremy cha 14. verse 14. prophecy Lies in my name I sent them not neither have I commanded them nor spake unto them they prophecy to you a false Vision a thing of naught and the deceit of their heart In so much as God commanded the People by the mouth of the Prophet Iâ—…remiah chap. 23. 16. not to obey them Thus saith the Lord of Hosts hearken not unto the words of the Prophets that prophecy to you They make you vain they speak a Vision of their own heart and not out of the mouth of the Lord. Seeing then there was in the time of the Old Testament such quarrells amongst the Visionary Prophets one contesting with another and asking When departed the Spirit from me to go to thee as between Michaiah and the rest of the four hundred and such giving of the Lye to one another as in Ierem. 14. 14. and such controversies in the New Testament at this day amongst the Spirituall Prophets Every man then was and now is bound to make use of his Naturall Reason to apply to all Prophecy those Rules which God hath given us to discern the true from the false Of which Rules in the Old Testament one was conformable doctrine to that which Moses the Soveraign Prophet had taught them and the other the miraculous power of foretelling what God would bring to passe as I have already shewn out of Deut. 13. 1. c. And in the New Testament there was but one onely mark and that was the preaching of this Doctrine That Iesus is the Christ that is the King of the Jews promised in the Old Testament Whosoever denyed that Article he was a false Prophet whatsoever miracles he might seem to work and he that taught it was a true Prophet For St. Iohn 1 Epist. 4. 2 c. speaking expressely of the means to examine Spirits whether they be of God or not after he had told them that there would arise false Prophets saith thus Hereby know ye the Spirit of God Every Spirit that confesseth that Iesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God that is is approved and allowed as a Prophet of God not that he is a godly man or one of the Elect for this that he confesseth professeth or preacheth Jesus to be the Christ but for that he is a Prophet avowed For God sometimes speaketh by Prophets whose persons he hath not accepted as he did by Baalam and as he foretold Saul of his death by the Witch of Endor Again in the next verse Every Spirit that confesseth not that Iesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of Christ. And this is the Spirit of Antichrist So that the Rule is perfect on both sides that he is a true Prophet which preacheth the Messiah already come in the person of Jesus and he a false one that denyeth him come and looketh for him in some future Impostor that shall take upon him that honour falsely whom the Apostle there properly calleth Antichrist Every man therefore ought to consider who is the Soveraign Prophet that is to say who it is that is Gods Vicegerent on Earth and hath next under God the Authority of Governing Christian men and to observe for a Rule that Doctrine which in the name of God hee hath commanded to bee taught and thereby to examine and try out the truth of those Doctrines which pretended Prophets with miracle or without shall at any time advance and if they find it contrary to that Rule to doe as they did that came to Moses and complained that there were some that Propecyed in the Campe whose Authority so to doe they doubted of and leave to the
of them that were absent or that being present were not willing it should be done According to this sense I define a CHURCH to be A company of men professing Christian Religion united in the person of one Soveraign at whose command they ought to assemble and without whose authority they ought not to assemble And because in all Common-wealths that Assembly which is without warrant from the Civil Soveraign is unlawful that Church also which is assembled in any Common-wealth that hath forbidden them to assemble is an unlawfull Assembly It followeth also that there is on Earth no such universall Church as all Christians are bound to obey because there is no power on Earth to which all other Common-wealths are subject There are Christians in the Dominions of severall Princes and States but every one of them is subject to that Common-wealth whereof he is himself a member and consequently cannot be subject to the commands of any other Person And therefore a Church such a one as is capable to Command to Judge Absolve Condemn or do any other act is the same thing with a Civil Common-wealth consisting of Christian men and is called a Civill State for that the subjects of it are Men and a Church for that the subjects thereof are Christians Temporall and Spirituall Government are but two words brought into the world to make men see double and mistake their Lawfull Soveraign It is true that the bodies of the faithfull after the Resurrection shall be not onely Spirituall but Eternall but in this life they are grosse and corruptible There is therefore no other Government in this life neither of State nor Religion but Temporall nor teaching of any doctrine lawfull to any Subject which the Governour both of the State and of the Religion forbiddeth to be taught And that Governor must be one or else there must needs follow Faction and Civil war in the Common-wealth between the Church and State between Spiritualists and Temporalists between the Sword of Iustice and the Shield of Faith and which is more in every Christian mans own brest between the Christian and the Man The Doctors of the Church are called Pastors so also are Civill Soveraignes But if Pastors be not subordinate one to another so as that there may bee one chief Pastor men will be taught contrary Doctrines whereof both may be and one must be false Who that one chief Pastor is according to the law of Nature hath been already shewn namely that it is the Civill Soveraign And to whom the Scripture hath assigned that Office we shall see in the Chapters following CHAP. XL. Of the RIGHTS of the Kingdome of God in Abraham Moses the High Priests and the Kings of Judah THe Father of the Faithfull and first in the Kingdome of God by Covenant was Abraham For with him was the Covenant first made wherein he obliged himself and his seed after him to acknowledge and obey the commands of God not onely such as he could take notice of as Morall Laws by the light of Nature but also such as God should in speciall manner deliver to him by Dreams and Visions For as to the Morall law they were already obliged and needed not have been contracted withall by promise of the Land of Canaan Nor was there any Contract that could adde to or strengthen the Obligation by which both they and all men else were bound naturally to obey God Almighty And therefore the Covenant which Abraham made with God was to take for the Commandement of God that which in the name of God was commanded him in a Dream or Vifion and to deliver it to his family and cause them to observe the same In this Contract of God with Abraham wee may observe three points of important consequence in the government of Gods people First that at the making of this Covenant God spake onely to Abraham and therefore contracted not with any of his family or seed otherwise then as their wills which make the essence of all Covenants were before the Contract involved in the will of Abraham who was therefore supposed to have had a lawfull power to make them perform all that he covenanted for them According whereunto Gen. 18. 18 19. God saith All the Nations of the Earth shall be blessed in him For I know him that he will command his children and his houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord. From whence may be concluded this first point that they to whom God hath not spoken immediately are to receive the positive commandements of God from their Soveraign as the family and seed of Abraham did from Abraham their Father and Lord and Civill Soveraign And consequently in every Common-wealth they who have no supernaturall Revelation to the contrary ought to obey the laws of their own Soveraign in the externall acts and profession of Religion As for the inward thought and beleef of men which humane Governours can take no notice of for God onely knoweth the heart they are not voluntary nor the effect of the laws but of the unrevealed will and of the power of God and consequently fall not under obligation From whence proceedeth another point that it was not unlawfull for Abraham when any of his Subjects should pretend Private Vision or Spirit or other Revelation from God for the countenancing of any doctrine which Abraham should forbid or when they followed or adhered to any such pretender to punish them and consequently that it is lawfull now for the Soveraign to punish any man that shall oppose his Private Spirit against the Laws For hee hath the same place in the Common-wealth that Abraham had in his own Family There ariseth also from the same a third point that as none but Abraham in his family so none but the Soveraign in a Christian Common-wealth can take notice what is or what is not the Word of God For God spake onely to Abraham and it was he onely that was able to know what God said and to interpret the same to his family And therefore also they that have the place of Abraham in a Common-wealth are the onely Interpreters of what God hath spoken The same Covenant was renewed with Isaac and afterwards with Jacob but afterwards no more till the Israelites were freed from the Egyptians and arrived at the Foot of Mount Sinai and then it was renewed by Moses as I have said before chap. 35. in such manner as they became from that time forward the Peculiar Kingdome of God whose Lieutenant was Moses for his owne time and the succession to that office was setled upon Aaron and his heirs after him to bee to God a Sacerdotall Kingdome for ever By this constitution a Kingdome is acquired to God But seeing Moses had no authority to govern the Israelites as a successor to the right of Abraham because he could not claim it by inheritance it appeareth not as yet that the
his successors may probably enough have crept into the Religion of the Jews But seeing it is not likely our Saviour would countenance a Heathen rite it is most likely it proceeded from the Legall Ceremony of Washing after Leprosie And for the other Sacrament of eating the Paschall Lambe it is manifestly imitated in the Sacrament of the Lords Supper in which the Breaking of the Bread and the pouring out of the Wine do keep in memory our deliverance from the Misery of Sin by Christs Passion as the eating of the Paschall Lambe kept in memory the deliverance of the Jewes out of the Bondage of Egypt Seeing therefore the authority of Moses was but subordinate and hee but a Lieutenant to God it followeth that Christ whose authority as man was to bee like that of Moses was no more but subordinate to the authority of his Father The same is more expressely signified by that that hee teacheth us to pray Our Father Let thy Kingdome come and For thine is the Kingdome the Power and the Glory and by that it is said that Hee shall come in the Glory of his Father and by that which St. Paul saith 1 Cor. 15. 24. then commeth the end when hee shall have delivered up the Kingdome to God even the Father and by many other most expresse places Our Saviour therefore both in Teaching and Reigning representeth as Moses did the Person of God which God from that time forward but not before is called the Father aud being still one and the same substance is one Person as represented by Moses and another Person as represented by his Sonne the Christ. For Person being a relative to a Representer it is consequent to plurality of Representers that there bee a plurality of Persons though of one and the same Substance CHAP. XLII Of POWER ECCLESIASTICALL FOr the understanding of POVVER ECCLESIASTICALL what and in whom it is we are to distinguish the time from the Ascension of our Saviour into two parts one before the Conversion of Kings and men endued with Soveraign Civill Power the other after their Conversion For it was long after the Ascension before any King or Civill Soveraign embraced and publiquely allowed the teaching of Christian Religion And for the time between it is manifest that the Power Ecclesiasticall was in the Apostles and after them in such as were by them ordained to Preach the Gospell and to convert men to Christianity and to direct them that were converted in the way of Salvation and after these the Power was delivered again to others by these ordained and this was done by Imposition of hands upon such as were ordained by which was signified the giving of the Holy Spirit or Spirit of God to those whom they ordained Ministers of God to advance his Kingdome So that Imposition of hands was nothing else but the Seal of their Commission to Preach Christ and teach his Doctrine and the giving of the Holy Ghost by that ceremony of Imposition of hands was an imitation of that which Moses did For Moses used the same ceremony to his Minister Joshua as wee read Deâ—…teronomy 34. ver 9. And Ioshua the Son of Nun was full of the Spirit of VVisdome for Moses had laid his hands upon him Our Saviour therefore between his Resurrection and Ascension gave his Spirit to the Apostles first by Breathing on them and saying Iohn 20. 22. Receive yee the Holy Spirit and after his Ascension Acts 2. 2 3. by sending down upon them a mighty wind and Cloven tongues of fire and not by Imposition of hands as neither did God lay his hands on Moses and his Apostles afterward transmitted the same Spirit by Imposition of hands as Moses did to Joshua So that it is manifest hereby in whom the Power Ecclesiasticall continually remained in those first times where there was not any Christian Common-wealth namely in them that received the same from the Apostles by successive laying on of hands Here wee have the Person of God born now the third time For as Moses and the High Priests were Gods Representative in the Old Testament and our Saviour himselfe as Man during his abode on earth So the Holy Ghost that is to say the Apostles and their successors in the Office of Preaching and Teaching that had received the Holy Spirit have Represented him ever since But a Person as I have shewn before chapt 13. is he that is Represented as often as hee is Represented and therefore God who has been Represented that is Personated thrice may properly enough be said to be three Persons though neither the word Person nor Trinity be ascribed to him in the Bible St. Iohn indeed 1 Epist. 5. 7. saith There be three that bear witnesse in heaven the Father the Word and the Holy Spirit and these Three are One But this disagreeth not but accordeth fitly with three Persons in the proper signification of Persons which is that which is Represented by another For so God the Father as Represented by Moses is one Person and as Represented by his Sonne another Person and as Represented by the Apostles and by the Doctors that taught by authority from them derived is a third Person and yet every Person here is the Person of one and the same God But a man may here ask what it was whereof these three bare witnesse St. Iohn therefore tells us verse 11. that they bear witnesse that God hath given us eternall life in his Son Again if it should bee asked wherein that testimony appeareth the Answer is easie for he hath testified the same by the miracles he wrought first by Moses secondly by his Son himself and lastly by his Apostles that had received the Holy Spirit all which in their times Represented the Person of God and either prophecyed or preached Jesus Christ. And as for the Apostles it was the character of the Apostleship in the twelve first and great Apostles to bear Witnesse of his Resurrection as appeareth expressely Acts 1. ver 21 22. where St. Peter when a new Apostle was to be chosen in the place of Judas Iscariot useth these words Of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Iesus went in and out amongst us beginning at the Baptisme of Iohn unto that same day that hee was taken up from us must one bee ordained to be a Witnesse with us of his Resurrection which words interpret the bearing of Witnesse mentioned by St. John There is in the same place mentioned another Trinity of Witnesses in Earth For ver 8. he saith there are three that bear VVitnesse in Earth the Spirit and the VVater and the Bloud and these three agree in one that is to say the graces of Gods Spirit and the two Sacraments Baptisme and the Lords Supper which all agree in one Testimony to assure the consciences of beleevers of eternall life of which Testimony he saith verse 10. He that beleeveth on the Son of man hath the
authority to preach he sent not all that beleeved And he sent them to unbeleevers I send you saith he as sheep amongst wolves not as sheep to other sheep Lastly the points of their Commission as they are expressely set down in the Gospel contain none of them any authority over the Congregation We have first Mat. 10. that the twelve Apostles were sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel and commanded to Preach that the Kingdome of God was at hand Now Preaching in the originall is that act which a Crier Herald or other Officer useth to doe publiquely in Proclaiming of a King But a Crier hath not right to Command any man And Luke 10. 2. the seventy Disciples are sent out as Labourers not as Lords of the Harvest and are bidden verse 9. to say The Kingdome of God is come nigh unto you and by Kingdom here is meant not the Kingdome of Grace but the Kingdome of Glory for they are bidden to denounce it ver 11. to those Cities which shall not receive them as a threatning that it shall be more tolerable in that day for Sodome than for such a City And Mat. 20. 28. our Saviour telleth his Disciples that sought Priority of place their Office was to minister even as the Son of man came not to be ministred unto but to minister Preachers therefore have not Magisteriall but Ministeriall power Bee not called Masters saith our Saviour Mat. 23. 10. for one is your Master even Christ. Another point of their Commission is to Teach all nations as it is in Mat. 28. 19. or as in St. Mark 16. 15. Goe into all the world and Preach the Gospel to every creature Teaching therefore and Preaching is the same thing For they that Proclaim the comming of a King must withall make known by what right he commeth if they mean men shall submit themselves unto him As St. Paul did to the Jews of Thessalonica when three Sabbath dayes he reasoned with them out of the Scriptures opening and alledging that Christ must needs have suffered and risen again from the dead and that this Iesus is Christ. But to teach out of the Old Testament that Jesus was Christ that is to say King and risen from the dead is not to say that men are bound after they beleeve it to obey those that tell them so against the laws and commands of their Soveraigns but that they shall doe wisely to expect the coming of Christ hereafter in Patience and Faith with Obedience to their present Magistrates Another point of their Commission is to Baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost What is Baptisme Dipping into water But what is it to Dip a man into the water in the name of any thing The meaning of these words of Baptisme is this He that is Baptized is Dipped or Washed as a sign of becomming a new man and a loyall subject to that God whose Person was represented in old time by Moses and the High Priests when he reigned over the Jews and to Jesus Christ his Sonne God and Man that hath redeemed us and shall in his humane nature Represent his Fathers Person in his eternall Kingdome after the Resurrection and to acknowledge the Doctrine of the Apostles who assisted by the Spirit of the Father and of the Son were left for guides to bring us into that Kingdome to be the onely and assured way thereunto This being our promise in Baptisme and the Authority of Earthly Soveraigns being not to be put down till the day of Judgment for that is expressely affirmed by S. Paul 1 Cor. 15. 22 23 24 where he saith As in Adam all die so in Christ all shall be made alive But every man in his owne order Christ the first fruits afterward they that are Christs at his comming Then commeth the end when he shall have delivered up the Kingdom to God even the Father when he shall have put down all Rule and all Authority and Power it is manifest that we do not in Baptisme constitute over us another authority by which our externall actions are to bee governed in this life but promise to take the doctrine of the Apostles for our direction in the way to life eternall The Power of Remission and Retention of Sinnes called also the Power of Loosing and Binding and sometimes the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven is a consequence of the Authority to Baptize or refuse to Baptize For Baptisme is the Sacrament of Allegeance of them that are to be received into the Kingdome of God that is to say into Eternall life that is to say to Remission of Sin For as Eternall life was lost by the Committing so it is recovered by the Remitting of mens Sins The end of Baptisme is Remission of Sins and therefore St. Peter when they that were converted by his Sermon on the day of Pentecost asked what they were to doe advised them to repent and be Baptized in the name of Iesus for the Remission of Sins And therefore seeing to Baptize is to declare the Reception of men into Gods Kingdome and to refuse to Baptize is to declare their Exclusion it followeth that the Power to declare them Cast out or Retained in it was given to the same Apostles and their Substitutes and Successors And therefore after our Saviour had breathed upon them saying Iohn 20. 22. Receive the Holy Ghost hee addeth in the next verse VVhos 's soever Sins ye Remit they are Remitted unto them and whose soever Sins ye Retain they are Retained By which words is not granted an Authority to Forgive or Retain Sins simply and absolutely as God Forgiveth or Retaineth them who knoweth the Heart of man and truth of his Penitence and Conversion but conditionally to the Penitent And this Forgivenesse or Absolution in case the absolved have but a feigned Repentance is thereby without other act or sentence of the Absolvent made void and hath no effect at all to Salvation but on the contrary to the Aggravation of his Sin Therefore the Apostles and their Successors are to follow but the outward marks of Repentance which appearing they have no Authority to deny Absolution and if they appeare not they have no authority to Absolve The same also is to be observed in Baptisme for to a converted Jew or Gentile the Apostles had not the Power to deny Baptisme nor to grant it to the Un-penitent But seeing no man is able to discern the truth of another mans Repentance further than by externall marks taken from his words and actions which are subject to hypocrisie another question will arise Who it is that is constituted Judge of those marks And this question is decided by our Saviour himself If thy Brother saith he shal trespasse against thee go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone if shall hear thee thou hast gained thy Brother But if he will not hear thee then
to be without terrour The name of Fulmen Excommunicationis that is the Thunderbolt of Excommunication proceeded from an imagination of the Bishop of Rome which first used it that he was King of Kings as the Heathen made Jupiter King of the Gods and assigned him in their Poems and Pictures a Thunderbolt wherewith to subdue and punish the Giants that should dare to deny his power Which imagination was grounded on two errours one that the Kingdome of Christ is of this world contrary to our Saviours owne words My Kingdome is not of this world the other that hee is Christs Vicar not onely over his owne Subjects but over all the Christians of the World whereof there is no ground in Scripture and the contrary shall bee proved in its due place St. Paul coming to Thessalonica where was a Synagogue of the Jews Acts 17. 2 3. As his manner was went in unto them and three Sabbath dayes reasoned with them out of the Scriptures Opening and alledging that Christ must needs have suffered and râ—…sen again from the dead and that this Iesus whom he preached was the Christ. The Scriptures here mentioned were the Scriptures of the Jews that is the Old Testament The men to whom he was to prove that Jesus was the Christ and risen again from the dead were also Jews and did beleeve already that they were the Word of God Hereupon as it is verse 4. some of them beleeved and as it is in the 5. ver some beleeved not What was the reason when they all beleeved the Scripture that they did not all beleeve alike but that some approved others disapproved the Interpretation of St. Paul that cited them and every one Interpreted them to himself It was this S. Paul came to them without any Legall Commission and in the manner of one that would not Command but Perswade which he must needs do either by Miracles as Moses did to the Israelites in Egypt that they might see his Authority in Gods works or by Reasoning from the already received Scripture that they might see the truth of his doctrine in Gods Word But whosoever perswadeth by reasoning from principles written maketh him to whom hee speaketh Judge both of the meaning of those principles and also of the force of his inferences upon them If these Jews of Thessalonica were not who else was the Judge of what S. Paul alledgâ—…d out of Scripture If S. Paul what needed he to quote any places to prove his doctrine It had been enough to have said I find it so in Scripture that is to say in your Laws of which I am Interpreter as sent by Christ. The Interpreter therefore of the Scripture to whose Interpretation the Jews of Thessalonica were bound to stand could be none every one might beleeve or not beleeve according as the Allegations seemed to himselfe to be agreeable or not agreeable to the meaning of the places alledged And generally in all cases of the world hee that pretendeth any proofe maketh Judge of his proofe him to whom he addresseth his speech And as to the case of the Jews in particular they were bound by expresse words Deut. 17. to receive the determination of all hard questions from the Priests and Judges of Israel for the time being But this is to bee understood of the Jews that were yet unconverted For the conversion of the Gentiles there was no use of alledging the Scriptures which they beleeved not The Apostles therefore laboured by Reason to confute their Idolatry and that done to perswade them to the faith of Christ by their testimony of his Life and Resurrection So that there could not yet bee any controversie concerning the authority to Interpret Scripture seeing no man was obliged during his infidelity to follow any mans Interpretation of any Scripture except his Soveraigns Interpretation of the Laws of his countrey Let us now consider the Conversion it sâ—…lf and see what there was therein that could be cause of such an obligation Men were converted to no other thing then to the Beleef of that which the Apostles preached And the Apostles preached nothing but that Jesus was the Christ that is to say the King that was to save them and reign over them eternally in the world to come and consequently that hee was not dead but risen again from the dead and gone up into Heaven and should come again one day to jâ—…dg the world which also should rise again to be judged and reward every man according to his works None of them preached that himselfe or any other Apostle was such an Interpreter of the Scripture as all that became Christians ought to take their Interpretation for Law For to Interpret the Laws is part of the Administration of a present Kingdome which the Apostles had not They prayed then and all other Pastors ever since Let thy Kingdome come and exhorted their Converts to obey their then Ethnique Princes The New Testament was not yet published in one Body Every of the Evangelists was Interpreter of his own Gospel and every Apostle of his own Epistle And of the Old Testament our Saviour himselfe saith to the Jews Iohn 5. 39. Search the Scriptures for in them yee thinke to have eternall life and they are they that testifie of me If hee had not meant they should Interpret them hee would not have bidden them take thence the proof of his being the Christ he would either have Interpreted them himselfe or referred them to the Interpretation of the Priests When a difficulty arose the Apostles and Elders of the Church assembled themselves together and determined what should bee preached and taught and how they should Interpret the Scriptures to the People but took not from the People the liberty to read and Interpret them to themselves The Apostles sent divers Letters to the Churches and other Writings for their instruction which had been in vain if they had not allowed them to Interpret that is to consider the meaning of them And as it was in the Apostles time it must be till such time as there should be Pastors that could authorise an Interpreter whose Interpretation should generally be stood to But that could not be till Kings were Pastors or Pastors Kings There be two senses wherein a Writing may be said to be Canonicall for Canon signifieth a Rule and a Rule is a Precept by which a man is guided and directed in any action whatsoever Such Precepts though given by a Teacher to his Disciple or a Counsellor to his friend without power to Compell him to observe them are neverthelesse Canons because they are Rules But when they are given by one whom he that receiveth them is bound to obey then are those Canons not onely Rules but Laws The question therefore here is of the Power to make the Scriptures which are the Rules of Christian Faith Laws That part of the Scripture which was first Law was the Ten Commandements written in two Tables of Stone
not any where that they who received not the Doctrine of Christ did therein sin but that they died in their sins that is that their sins against the Laws to which they owed obedience were not pardoned And those Laws were the Laws of Nature and the Civill Laws of the State whereto every Christian man had by pact submitted himself And therefore by the Burthen which the Apostles might lay on such as they had converted are not to be understood Laws but Conditions proposed to those that sought Salvation which they might accept or refuse at their own perill without a new sin though not without the hazard of being condemned and excluded out of the Kingdome of God for their sins past And therefore of Infidels S. John saith not the wrath of God shall come upon them but the wrath of God remaineth upon them and not that they shall be condemned but that they are condemned already Nor can it be conceived that the benefit of Faith is Remission of sins unlesse we conceive withall that the dammage of Infidelity is the Retention of the same sins But to what end is it may some man aske that the Apostles and other Pastors of the Church after their time should meet together to agree upon what Doctrine should be taught both for Faith and Manners if no man were obliged to observe their Decrees To this may be answered that the Apostles and Elders of that Councell were obliged even by their entrance into it to teach the Doctrine therein concluded and decreed to be taught so far forth as no precedent Law to which they were obliged to yeeld obedience was to the contrary but not that all other Christians should be obliged to observe what they taught For though they might deliberate what each of them should teach yet they could not deliberate what others should do unless their Assembly had had a Legislative Power which none could have but Civil Soveraigns For though God be the Soveraign of all the world we are not bound to take for his Law whatsoever is propounded by every man in his name nor any thing contrary to the Civill Law which God hath expressely commanded us to obey Seeing then the Acts of Councell of the Apostles were then no Laws but Counsells much lesse are Laws the Acts of any other Doctors or Councells since if assembled without the Authority of the Civill Soveraign And consequently the Books of the New Testament though most perfect Rules of Christian Doctrine could not be made Laws by any other authority then that of Kings or Soveraign Assemblies The first Councell that made of the Scriptures we now have Canon is not extant For that Collection of the Canons of the Apostles attributed to Clemens the first Bishop of Rome after S. Peter is subject to question For though the Canonicall books bee there reckoned up yet these words Sint vobis omnibus Clericis Lâ—…icis Libri venerandi c. containe a distinction of Clergy and Laity that was not in use so neer St. Peters time The first Councell for setling the Canonicall Scripture that is extant is that of Laodicea Can. 59. which forbids the reading of other Books then those in the Churches which is a Mandate that is not addressed to every Châ—…istian but to those onely that had authority to read any thing publiquely in the Church that is to Ecclesiastiques onely Of Ecclesiasticall Officers in the time of the Apostles some were Magisteriall some Ministeriall Magisteriall were the Offices of preaching of the Gospel of the Kingdom of God to Infidels of administaing the Sacraments and Divine Service and of teaching the Rules of Faith and Manners to those that were converted Ministeriall was the Office of Deacons that is of them that were appointed to the administration of the secular necessities of the Church at such time as they lived upon a common stock of mony raised out of the voluntary contributions of the faithfull Amongst the Officers Magisteriall the first and principall were the Apostles whereof there were at first but twelve and these were chosen and constituted by our Saviour himselfe and their Office was not onely to Preach Teach and Baptize but also to be Narâ—…yrs Witnesses of our Saviours Resurrection This Testimony was the specificall and essentiall mark whereby the Apostleship was distinguished from other Magistracy Ecclesiasticall as being necessary for an Apostle either to have seen our Saviour after his Resurrection or to have conversed with him before and seen his works and other arguments of his Divinity whereby they might be taken for sufficient Witnesses And therefore at the election of a new Apostle in the place of Judas Iscariot S. Peter saith Acts 1. 21 22. Of these men that have companyed with us all the time that the Lord Iesus went in and out among us beginning from the Baptisme of Iohn unto that same day that he was taken up from us must one be ordained to be a Witnesse with us of his Resurrection where by this word must is implyed a necessary property of an Apostle to have companyed with the first and prime Apostles in the time that our Saviour manifested himself in the flesh The first Apostle of those which were not constituted by Christ in the time he was upon the Earth was Matthias chosen in this manner There were assembled together in Jerusalem about 120 Christians Acts 1. 15. These appointed two Ioseph the Iust and Matthias ver 23. and caused lots to be drawn and ver 26. the Lot fell on Matthias and he was numbred with the Apostles So that here we see the ordination of this Apostle was the act of the Congregation and not of St. Peter nor of the eleven otherwise then as Members of the Assembly After him there was never any other Apostle ordained but Paul and Barnabas which was done as we read Acts 13. 1 2 3. in this manner There were in the Church that was at Antioch certaine Prophets and Teachers as Barnabas and Simeon that was called Niger and Lucius of Cyrene and Manaen which had been brought up with Herod the Tetrarch and Saul As they ministred unto the Lord and fasted the Holy Ghost said Separate mee Barnabas and Saul for the worke whereunto I have called them And when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them they sent them away By which it is manifest that though they were called by the Holy Ghost their Calling was declared unto them and their Mission authorized by the particular Church of Antioch And that this their calling was to the Apostleship is apparent by that that they are both called Acts 14. 14. Apostles And that it was by vertue of this act of the Church of Antioch that they were Apostles S. Paul declareth plainly Rom. 1. 1. in that hee useth the word which the Holy Ghost used at his calling For hee stileth himself An Apostle separated unto the Gospel of God alluding to the words of
Article Iesus is the Christ. The summe of St. Matthews Gospell is this That Jesus was of the stock of David Born of a Virgin which are the Marks of the true Christ That the Magi came to worship him as King of the Jews That Herod for the same cause sought to kill him That John Baptist proclaimed him That he preached by himselfe and his Apostles that he was that King That he taught the Law not as a Scribe but as a man of Authority That he cured diseases by his Word onely and did many other Miracles which were foretold the Christ should doe That he was saluted King when hee entred into Jerusalem That he fore-warned them to beware of all others that should pretend to be Christ That he was taken accused and put to death for saying hee was King That the cause of his condemnation written on the Crosse was JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEVVES All which tend to no other end than this that men should beleeve that Iesus is the Christ. Such therefore was the Scope of St. Matthews Gospel But the Scope of all the Evangelists as may appear by reading them was the same Therefore the Scope of the whole Gospell was the establishing of that onely Article And St. John expressely makes it his conclusion Iohn 20. 31. These things are written that you may know that Iesus is the Christ the Son of the living God My second Argument is taken from the Subject of the Sermons of the Apostles both whilest our Saviour lived on earth aud after his Ascension The Apostles in our Saviours time were sent Luke 9. 2. to Preach the Kingdome of God For neither there nor Mat. 10. 7. giveth he any Commission to them other than this As ye go Preach saying the Kingdome of Heaven is at hand that is that Iesus is the Messiah the Christ the King which was to come That their Preaching also after his ascension was the same is manifest out of Acts 17. 6. They drew saith St. Luke Iason and certain Brethren unto the Rulers of the City crying These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also whom Iason hath received And these all do contrary to the Decrees of Caesar saying that there is another King one Iesus And out of the 2. 3. verses of the same Chapter where it is said that St. Paul as his manner was went in unto them and three Sabbath dayes reasoned with them out of the Scriptures opening and alledging that Christ must needs have suffered and risen againe from the dead and that this Iesus whom hee preached is Christ. The third Argument is from those places of Scripture by which all the Faith required to Salvation is declared to be Easie. For if an inward assent of the mind to all the Doctrines concerning Christian Faith now taught whereof the greatest part are disputed were necessary to Salvation there would be nothing in the world so hard as to be a Christian. The Thief upon the Crosse though repenting could not have been saved for saying Lord remember me when thou commest into thy Kinâ—…dome by which he testified no beleefe of any other Article but this That Iesus was the King Nor could it bee said as it is Mat. 11. 30. that Christs yoke is Easy and his burthen Light Nor that Little Children beleeve in him as it is Matth. 18. 6. Nor could St. Paul have said 1 Cor. 1. 21. It pleased God by the Foolishnesse of preaching to save them that beleeve Nor could St. Paul himself have been saved much lesse have been so great a Doctor of the Church so suddenly that never perhaps thought of Transubstantiation nor Purgatory nor many other Articles now obtruded The fourth Argument is taken from places expresse and such as receive no controversie of Interpretation as first Iohn 5. 39. Search the Scriptures for in them yee thinke yee have eternall life and they are they that testifie of mee Our Saviour here speaketh of the Scriptures onely of the Old Testament for the Jews at that time could not search the Scriptures of the New Testament which were not written But the Old Testament hath nothing of Christ but the Markes by which men might know him when hee came as that he should descend from David be born at Bethlem and of a Virgin doe great Miracles and the like Therefore to beleeve that this Jesus was He was sufficient to eternall life but more than sufficient is not Necessary and consequently no other Article is required Again Iohn 11. 26. Whosoever liveth and beleeveth in mee shall not die eternally Therefore to beleeve in Christ is faith sufficient to eternall life and consequently no more faith than that is Necessary But to beleeve in Jesus and to beleeve that Jesus is the Christ is all one as appeareth in the verses immediately following For when our Saviour verse 26. had said to Martha Beleevest thou this she answereth verse 27. Yea Lord I beleeve that thou art the Christ the Son of God which should come into the world Therefore this Article alone is faith sufficient to life eternall and more than sufficient is not Necessary Thirdly Iohn 20. 31. These things are written that yee might beleeve that Iesus is the Christ the Son of God and that beleeving yee might have life through his name There to beleeve that Iesus is the Christ is faith sufficient to the obtaining of life and therefore no other Article is Necessary Fourthly 1 Iohn 4. 2. Every spirit that confesseth that Iesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God And 1 Ioh. 5. 1. Whosoever beleeveth that Iesus is the Christ is born of God And verse 5. Who is hee that overcommeth the world but he that beleeveth that Iesus is the Son of God Fiftly Act. 8. ver 36 37. See saith the Eunuch here is water what doth hinder me to be baptized And Philip said If thou beleevest with all thy heart thou mayst And hee answered and said I beleeve that Iesus Christ is the Son of God Therefore this Article beleeved Iesus is the Christ is sufficient to Baptisme that is to say to our Reception into the Kingdome of God and by consequence onely Necessary And generally in all places where our Saviour saith to any man Thy faith hath saved thee the caâ—…se he saith it is some Confession which directly or by consequence implyeth a beleef that Jesus is the Christ. The last Argument is from the places where this Article is made the Foundation of Faith For he that holdeth the Foundation shall bee saved Which places are first Mat. 24. 23. If any man shall say unto you Loe here is Christ or there beleeve it not for there shall arise false Christs and false Prophets and shall shew great signes and wonders c. Here wee see this Article Jesus is the Christ must bee held though hee that shall teach the contrary should doe great miracles The second place is Gal. 1. 8. Though
we or an Angell from Heaven preach any other Gospell unto you than that wee have preached unto you let him bee accursed But the Gospell which Paul and the other Apostles preached was onely this Article that Jesus is the Christ Therefore for the Beleef of this Article we are to reject the Authority of an Angell from heaven much more of any mortall man if he teach the contrary This is therefore the Fundamentall Article of Christian Faith A third place is 1 Joh. 4. 1. Beloved beleâ—…ve not every spirit Hereby yee shall know the Spirit of God every spirit that confesseth that Iesus Christ is come in the flâ—…sh is of God By which it is evident that this Article is the measure and rule by which to estimate and examine all other Articles and is therefore onely Fundamentall A fourth is Matt. 16. 18. where after St. Peter had professed this Article saying to our Saviour Thou art Christ the Son of the living God Our Saviour answered Thou art Peter and upon this Rock I will build my Church from whence I inferre that this Article is that on which all other Doctrines of the Church are built as on their Foundation A fift is 1 Cor. 3. ver 11 12 c. Other Foundation can no man lay than that which is laid Jesus is the Christ. Now if any man build upon this Foundation Gold Silver pretious Stones Wood Hay Stubble Every mans work shall be made manifest For the Day shall declare it because it shall be revealed by fire and the fire shall try every mans work of what sort it is If any mans work abide which he hath built thereupon he shall receive a reward If any mans work shall bee burnt he shall suffer losse but he himself shall be saved yet so as by fire Which words being partly plain and easie to understand and partly allegoricall and difficult out of that which is plain may be inferred that Pastors that teach this Foundation that Jesus is the Christ though they draw from it false consequences which all men are sometimes subject to they may neverthelesse bee saved much more that they may bee saved who being no Pastors but Hearers beleeve that which is by their lawfull Pastors taught them Therefore the beleef of this Article is sufficient and by consequence there is no other Article of Faith Necessarily required to Salvation Now for the part which is Allegoricall as That the fire shall try every mans work and that They shall be saved but so as by fire or through fire for the originall is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it maketh nothing against this conclusion which I have drawn from the other words that are plain Neverthelesse because upon this place there hath been an argument taken to prove the fire of Purgatory I will also here offer you my conjecture concerning the meaning of this triall of Doctrines and saving of men as by Fire The Apostle here seemeth to allude to the words of the Prophet Zachary Ch. 13. 8 9. who speaking of the Restauration of the Kingdome of God saith thus Two parts therein shall be cut off and die but the third shall be left therein And I will bring the third part through the Fire and will refine them as Silver is refined and will try them as Gold is tryed they shall call on the name of the Lord and I will hear them The day of Judgment is the day of the Restauration of the Kingdome of God and at that day it is that St. Peter tells us * shall be the Conflagration of the world wherein the wicked shall perish but the remnant which God will save shall passe through that Fire unhurt and be therein as Silver and Gold are refined by the fire from their drosse tryed and refined from their Idolatry and be made to call upon the name of the true God Alluding whereto St. Paul here saith That the Day that is the Day of Judgment the Great Day of our Saviours comming to restore the Kingdome of God in Israel shall try every mans doctrine by Judging which are Gold Silver Pretious Stones Wood Hay Stubble And then they that have built false Consequences on the true Foundation shall see their Doctrines condemned neverthelesse they themselves shall be saved and passe unhurt through this universall Fire and live eternally to call upon the name of the true and onely God In which sense there is nothing that accordeth not with the rest of Holy Scripture or any glimpse of the fire of Purgatory But a man may here aske whether it bee not as necessary to Salvation to beleeve that God is Omnipotent Creator of the world that Jesus Christ is risen and that all men else shall rise again from the dead at the last day as to beleeve that Jesus is the Christ. To which I answer they are and so are many more Articles but they are such as are contained in this one and may be deduced from it with more or lesse difficulty For who is there that does not see that they who beleeve Jesus to be the Son of the God of Israel and that the Israelites had for God the Omnipotent Creator of all things doe therein also beleeve that God is the Omnipotent Creator of all things Or how can a man beleeve that Jesus is the King that shall reign eternally unlesse hee beleeve him also risen again from the dead For a dead man cannot exercise the Office of a King In summe he that holdeth this Foundation Jesus is the Christ holdeth Expressely all that hee seeth rightly deduced from it and Implicitely all that is consequent thereunto though he have not skill enough to discern the consequence And therefore it holdeth still good that the beleef of this one Article is sufficient faith to obtaine remission of sinnes to the Penitent and consequently to bring them into the Kingdome of Heaven Now that I have shewn that all the Obedience required to Salvation consisteth in the will to obey the Law of God that is to say in Repentance and all the Faith required to the same is comprehended in the beleef of this Article Jesus is the Christ I will further alledge those places of the Gospell that prove that all that is Necessary to Salvation is contained in both these joined together The men to whom St. Peter preached on the day of Pentecost next after the Ascension of our Saviour asked him and the rest of the Apostles saying Act. 2. 37. Men and Brethren what shall we doe To whom St. Peter answered in the next verse Repent and be Baptized every one of you for the remission of sins and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost Therefore Repentance and Baptisme that is beleeving that Jesus is the Christ is all that is Necessary to Salvation Again our Saviour being asked by a certain Ruler Luke 18. 18. What shall I doe to inherite eternall life Answered verse 20. Thou knowest the Commandements Doe not commit
Redemption Church the Lords house Ecclesia properly what Acts 19. 39. In what sense the Church is one Person Church defined A Christian Common-wealth and a Church all one The Soveraign Rights of Abraham Abraham had the sole power of ordering the Religion of his own people No pretence of Private Spirit against the Religion of Abraham Abraham sole Judge and Interpreter of what God spake The authority of Moses whereon grounded John 5. 31. Moses was under God Soveraign of the Jews all his own time though Aaron had the Priesthood All spirits were subordinate to the spirit of Moses After Moses the Soveraignty was in the High Priest Of the Soveraign power between the time of Joshua and of Saul Of the Rights of the Kings of Israel The practice of Supremacy in Religion was not in the time of the Kings according to the Right thereof 2 Chro. 19. 2. After the Captivity the Iews â—…ad no setled Common-wealth Three parts of the Office of Christ. His Office as a Redeemer Christs Kingdome not of this woâ—…ld The End of Christs comming was to renew the Covenant of the Kingdome of God and to perswade the Elect to imbrace it which was the second part of his Office The preaching of Christ not contrary to the then law of the Iews nor of Caesar. The third part of his Office was to be King under his Father of the Elect. Christs authority in the Kingdome of God subordinate to that of his Father One and the same God is the Person represented by Moses and by Christ. Of the Holy Spirit that fel on the Apostles Of the Trinity The Power Ecclesiasticall is but the power to teach An argument thereof the Power of Christ himself From the name of Regeneration From the compariâ—…on of it with Fishing Leaven Seed Fâ—…om the nature of 〈◊〉 2 Cor. 1. 24. From the Authority Christ hath lâ—…st to Civill Princes What Christians may do to avoid persecution Of Martyrs Argument from the points of their Commission To Preach And Teach To Baptize And to Forgive and Retain Sinnes Mat. 18. 15 16 17. Of Excommunication The use of Excommunication without Civill Power Acts 9. 2. Of no effect upon an Apostate But upon the faithfull only For what fault lyeth Excommunication Ofpersons liaable to Excommunication 1 Sam. 8. Of the Interpreter of the Scriptures before Civil Soveraigns became Christians Of the Power to make Scripture Law Of the Ten Commandements Of the Iudiciall and Leviticall Law The Second Law * 1 Kings 14 26. The Old Testament when made Canonicall The New Testament began to be Canonicall under Christian Soveraigns Of the Power of Councells to make the Scriptures Law John 3. 36. John 3. 18. Of the Right of constituting Ecclesiasticall Officers in the time of the Apostles Matthias made Apostle by the Congregation Paul and Barnabas made Apostles by the Church of Antioch What Offices in the Church are Magisteriall Ordination of Teachers Ministers of the Church what And how chosen Of Ecclesiasticall Revenue under the Law of Moses In our Saviours time and after Mat. 10. 9 10. * Acts 4. 34. The Ministers of the Gospel lived on the Benevolence of their flocks 1 Cor. 9. 13. That the Civill Soveraign being a Christian hath the Right of appointing Pastors The Pastor all Authority of Soveraigns only is de Jure Divino that of other Pastors is Jure Civili Christian Kings have Power to execute all manner of Pastoral function * John 4. 2. * 1 Cor. 1. 14 16. * 1 Câ—…r 1. 17. The Civill Soveraigne if a Christian is head of the Church in his own Dominions Cardinal Bellarmines Books De Summo Pontifice considered The first book The second Book The third Book * Dan. 9. 27. The fourth Book Texts for the Infaâ—…ibility of the Popes Judgement in points of Faith Texts for the same in point of Manners The question of Superiority between the Pope and other Bishops Of the Popes â—…mporall Power The difficulty of obeying God and Man both at once Is none to them that distinguish between what is and what is not Necessary to Salvation All that is Necessary to Salvation is contained in Faith and Obedience What Obedience is Necessary And to what Laws In the Faith of a Christian who is the Person beleeved The causes of Christian Faith Faith comes by Hearing The onely Necessary Article of Christian Faith Proved from the Scope of the Evangelists From the Sermons of the Apostles From the Easinesse of the Doctrine From formall â—…ud cleer texts From that it is the Foundation of all other Articles 2 Pet. 3. v. 7 10 12. In what sense other Articles may be called Nâ—…cessary That Faith and Obedience are both of them Necessary to Salvation What each of them contributes thereunto Obedience to God and to the Civill Soveraign not inconsistent whether Christian Or Infidel The Kingdom of Darknesse what * Eph. 6. 12. * Mat. 12. 26. * Mat. 9. 34. * Eph. 2. 2. * Joh. 16. 11. The Church not yet fully â—…reed of Darknesse Four Causes of Spirituall Darknesse Errors from misinterpreting the Scriptures concerning the Kingdome of God As that the Kingdome of God is the present Church And that the Pope is his Vicar generall And that the Pastors are the Clergy Error from mistaking Consecration for Conjuration Incantation in the Ceremonies of Baptisme And in Marriage in Visitation of the Sick and in Consecration of Places Errors from mistaking Eternall Life and Everlasting Death As the Doctrine of Purgatory and Exorcismes and Invocation of Saints The Texts alledged for the Doctrines aforementioned have been answered before Answer to the text on which Beza inferreth that the Kingdome of Christ began at the Resurrection Explication of the Place in Mark 9. 1. Abuse of some other texts in defence of the Power of the Pope The manner of Consecrations in the Scripture was without Exorcisms The immortality of mans Soule not proved by Scripture to be of Nature but of Grace Eternall Torments what Answer of the Texts alledged for Purgatory Places of the New Testament for Purgatory answered Baptisme for the Dead how understood The Originall of Daemonclogy What were the Daemons of the Ancients How that Doctrine was spread How far received by the Jews John 8. 52. Why our Saviour controlled it not The Scriptures doe not teach that Spirits are Incorporeall The Power of Casting out Devills not the same it was in the Primitive Church Another relique of Gentilisme Worshipping of Images left in the Church not brought into it Answer to certain seeming texts for Images What is Worship Distinction between Divine and Civill Worship An Image what Phantasmes Fictions Materiall Images Idolatry what Scandalous worship of Images Answer 〈◊〉 the Argument from the Cherubins and Brazen Serpent * Exod. 32. 2. * Gen. 31. 30. Painting of Fancies no Idolatry but abusing them to Religious Worship is How Idolatry was left in the Church Canonizing of Saints The name of Pontifex Procession of Images Wax Candles and Torches lighted What Philosophy is Prudence no part of Philosophy No false Doctrine is part of Philosophy No more is Revelation supernaturall Nor learning taken upon credit of Authors Of the Beginnings and Progresse of Philosophy Of the Schools of Philosophy amongst the Athenians Of the Schools of the Jews The Schoole of the Graecians unprofitable The Schools of the Jews unprofitable University what it is Errors brought into Religion from Aristotles Metaphysiques Errors concerning Abstract Essences Nunc-stans One Body in many places and many Bodies in one place at once Absurdities in naturall Philosopy as Gravity the Cause of Heavinesse Quantity put into Body already made Powring in of Soules Ubiquity of Apparition Will the Cause of Willing Ignorance an occult Cause One makes the things incongruent another the Incongruity Private Appetite the rule of Publique good And that lawfull Marriage is Unchastity And that all Government but Popular is Tyranny That not Men but Law governs Laws over the Conscience Private Interpretation of Law Language of Schoole-Divines Errors from Tradition Suppression of Reason He that receiveth Benefit by a Fact is presumed to be the Author That the â—…hurch Militant is the Kingdome of God was first taught by the Church of Rome And maintained also by the Presbytery Infallibility Subjection of Bishops Exemptions of the Clergy The names of Saceâ—…dotes and Sacriâ—… The Sacramentation of Marriage The single life of Priests Auricular Confession Canonization of Saints and declaring of Martyrs Transubstantiation Pennance Absolution Purgatory Indulgences Externall works Daemonology and Exorcism School-Divinity The Authors of spirituall Darknesse who they be Comparison of the Papacy with the Kingdome of Fayries