Selected quad for the lemma: blood_n
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A48892
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A second vindication of The reasonableness of Christianity, &c, by the author of The reasonableness of Christinaity, &c.
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Locke, John, 1632-1704.
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1697
(1697)
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Wing L2756; ESTC R39074
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184,081
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507
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Man a Christian. Is there any contradiction in it to say There are many Points besides these which Jesus Christ hath taught and revealed which every sincere Christian is indispensibly obliged to endeavour to understand If this be not so It is but for any one to be perfect in Mr. Edward's Creed and then he may lay by the Bible and from thenceforth he is absolutely dispensed with from studying or understanding any thing more of the Scripture But Mr. Edwards's Supremacy is not yet so far established that he will dare to say That Christians are not obliged to endeavour to understand any other Points revealed in the Scripture but what are contained in his Creed He cannot yet well Discard all the rest of the Scripture because he has yet need of it for the compleating of his Creed which is like to secure the Bible to us for some time yet For I will be answerable for it he will not be quickly able to resolve what Texts of the Scripture do and what do not contain Points necessary to be believed So that I am apt to imagine that the Creed-maker upon Second Thoughts will allow that Saying There is but One or there are but Twelve or there are but as many as he shall set down when he has resolved which they shall be necessary to the making a Man a Christian and the saying There are other Points besides contained in the Scripture which every sincere Christian is indispensibly obliged to endeavour to understand and must believe when he knows them to be revealed by Jesus Christ are two Propositions that may consist together without a Contradiction Every Christian is to partake of that Bread and that Cup which is the Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ. And is not every sincere Christian indispensibly obliged to endeavour to understand these Words of our Saviour's Institutions This is my Body and This is my Blood And if upon his serious Endeavour to do it he does understand them in a literal sence that Christ meant that that was really his Body and Blood and nothing else must he not necessarily believe that the Bread and Wine in the Lord's Supper is changed really into his Body and Blood though he doth not know how Or if having his Mind set otherwise he understands the Bread and Wine to be really the Body and Blood of Christ without ceasing to be true Bread and Wine Or else if he understands them that the Body and Blood of Christ are verily and indeed given and received in the Sacrament in a Spiritual manner Or lastly If he understands our Saviour to mean by those words only the Bread and Wine to be a Representation of his Body and Blood In which was soever of these Four a Christian understands these words of our Saviour to be meant by him is he not obliged in that sence to believe them to be true and assent to them Or can he be a Christian and understand these words to be meant by our Saviour in one sence and deny his assent to them as true in that sence Would not this be to deny our Saviour's Veracity and consequently his being the Messiah sent from God And yet this is put upon a Christian where he understands the Scripture in one sence and is required to believe it in another From all which it is evident that to say there is One or any Number of Articles necessary to be known and believed to make a Man a Christian and that there are others contained in the Scripture which a Man is obliged to endeavour to understand and obliged also to assent to as he does understand them is no Contradiction To believe Jesus to be the Messiah and to take him to be his Lord and King let us suppose to be that only which is necessary to make a Man a Christian May it not yet be necessary for him being a Christian to study the Doctrine and Law of this his Lord and King and believe that all that he delivered is true Is there any Contradiction in holding of this But this Creed-maker to make sure Work and not to sail of a Contradiction in Mr. Bold's words misrepeats them p. 241. and quite contrary both to what they are in the Sermon and what they are as set down by the Creed-maker himself in the immediately preceding Page Mr. Bold says There are other Points that Jesus Christ hath taught and revealed which every sincere Christian is indispensibly obliged to understand and which being known to be revealed by Christ he must indispensibly assent to From which the Creed-maker argues thus p. 240. Now if there be other Points and particular Articles and those many which a sincere Christian is obliged and that necessarily and indispensibly to understand believe and assent to then this Writer hath in effect yielded to that Proposition I maintained viz. That the belief of one Article is not sufficient to make a Man a Christian and consequently he runs counter to the Proposition he had laid down Is there no difference I beseech you between being indispensibly obliged to endeavour to understand and being indispensibly obliged to understand any Point T is the first of these Mr. Bold says and 't is the latter of these you argue from and so conclude nothing against him nor can you to your purpose For till Mr. Bold says which he is far from saying that every sincere Christian is necessarily and indispensibly obliged to understand all those Texts of Scripture from whence you shall have drawn your necessary Articles when you have perfected your Creed in the same sence that you do you can conclude nothing against what he hath said concerning that one Article or any thing that looks like running Counter to it For it may be enough to constitute a Man a Christian and one of Christ's Subjects to take Iesus to be the Messiah his appointed King and yet without a Contradiction so that it may be his indispensible Duty as a Subject of that Kingdom to endeavour to understand all the Dictates of his Soveraign and to assent to the Truth of them as far as he understands them But that which the good Creed-maker aims at without which all his necessary Articles fall is that it should be granted him that every sincere Christian was necessarily and indispensibly obliged to understand all those parts of Divine Revelation from whence he pretends to draw his Articles in their true meaning i. e. just as he does But his infallibility is not yet so established but that there will need some proof of that Proposition And when he has proved that every sincere Christian is necessarily and indispensibly obliged to understand those Texts in their true meaning and that his Interpretation of them is that true meaning I shall then ask him whether every sincere Christian is not as necessarily and indispensibly obliged to understand other Texts of Scripture in their true meaning though they have no place in his System For
Example To make use of the Instance above-mentioned is not every sincere Christian necessarily and indispensibly obliged to endeavour to understand these Words of our Saviour This is my body and this is my blood that he may know what he receives in the Sacraments Does he cease to be a Christian who happens not to understand them just as the Creed-maker does Or may not the old Gentleman at Rome who has somewhat the ancienter Title to Infallibility make Transubstantiation a Fundamental Article necessarily to be believed there as well as the Creed-maker here makes his Sence of any disputed Text of Scripture a Fundamental Article necessary to be believed Let us suppose Mr. Bold had said that instead of one point the Right Knowledge of the Creed-makers One Hundred Points when he has resolved on them doth constitute and make a Person a Christian yet there are many other Points Jesus Christ hath taught and revealed which every sincere Christian is indispensibly obliged to endeavour to understand and to make a due use of For this I think the Creed-maker will not deny From whence in the Creed-maker's Words I will thus argue Now if there be other Points and particular Articles and those many which a sincere Christian is obliged and that necessarily and indispensibly to understand and believe and assent to then this Writer doth in effect yield to that Proposition which I maintained viz. That the Belief of those one hundred Articles is not sufficient to make a Man a Christian. For this is that which I maintain That upon this ground the Belief of the Articles which he has set down in his List are not sufficient to make a Man a Christian and that upon Mr. Bold's Reason which the Creed-maker insists on against one Article viz. because there are many other Points Jesus Christ hath taught and revealed which every sincere Christian is as necessarily and indispensibly obliged to endeavour to understand and make a due use of But this Creed-maker is cautious beyond any of his Predecessors He will not be so caught by his own Argument and therefore is very shy to give you the precise Articles that every sincere Christian is necessarily and indispensibly obliged to understand and give his assent to Something he is sure there is that he is indispensibly obliged to understand and assent to to make him a Christian but what that is he cannot yet tell So that whether he be a Christian or no he does not know and what other People will think of him from his treating of the serious things of Christianity in so trifling and scandalous a way must be left to them In the next Paragraph p. 242. The Creed-maker tells us Mr. Bold goes on to confute himself in saying a true Christian must assent unto this that Christ Jesus is God But this is just such another Confutation of himself as the before-mentioned i. e. as much as a Falshood substituted by another Man can be a confutation of a Man's self who has spoken Truth all of a piece For the Creed-maker according to his sure way of baffling his Opponents so as to leave them nothing to answer hath here as he did before changed Mr. Bold's words which in the 35. p. quoted by the Creed-maker stand thus When a true Christian understands that Christ Jesus hath taught that He is a God he must assent unto it Which is true and conformable to what he had said before that every sincere Christian must endeavour to understand the Points taught and revealed by Jesus Christ which being known to be revealed by him he must assent unto The like piece of Honesty the Creed-maker shews in the next Paragraph p. 243. where he charges Mr. Bold with saying that a true Christian is as much obliged to believe that the Holy Spirit is God as to believe that Iesus is the Christ p. 40. In which place Mr. Bold's words are When a true Christian understands that Christ Jesus hath given this Account of the Holy Spirit viz That he is God He is as much obliged to believe it as he is to believe that Iesus is the Christ. Which is an uncontestable Truth but such an one as the Creed-maker himself saw would do him no Service and therefore he mingles it and leaves out half to make it serve his turn But he that should give a Testimony in the slight Affairs of Men and their Temporal Concerns before a Court of Judicature as the Creed-maker does here and almost every where in the great Affairs of Religion and the Everlasting Concern of Souls before all Mankind would lose his Ears for it What therefore this worthy Gentleman alledges out of Mr. Bold as a Contradiction to himself being only the Creed-maker's Contradiction to Truth and clear Matter of Fact needs no other Answer The rest of what he calls Reflections on Mr. Bold's Sermon being nothing but either rude and mis-becoming Language of him Or pitiful Childish Application to him to change his Perswasion at the Creed-maker's Intreaty and give up the Truth he hath owned in Courtesie to this doubty Combatant shews the Ability of the Man Leave off begging the Question and superciliously presuming that you are in the right and instead of that shew it by Argument And I dare answer for Mr. Bold you will have him and I promise you with him one Convert more But Arguing is not it seems this notable Disputant's way If Boasting of himself and contemning others false Quotations and feigned Matters of Fact which the Reader neither can know nor is the Question concerned in if he did know will not do there is an end of him He has shewn his excellency in scurrilous Declamation and there you have the whole of this unanswerable Writer And for this I appeal to his own Writings in this Controversie if any judicious Reader can have the patience to look them over In the beginning of his Reflections on Mr. Bold's Sermon he confidently tells the World That he had found that the Manager of the Reasonableness of Christianity had prevailed on Mr. Bold to Preach a Sermon upon his Reflections c. And adds And we cannot but think that that Man must speak the truth and defend it very impartially and substantially who is thus brought on to undertake the Cause And at the latter end he Addresses himself to Mr. Bold as one that is drawn off to be an under Journey-man Worker in Socinianism In his gracious Allowance Mr. Bold is seemingly a Man of some relish of Religion and Piety p. 244. He is forced also to own him to be a Man of Sobriety and Temper p. 245. A very good rise to give him out to the World in the very next words as a Man of a profligate Conscience For so he must be who can be drawn off to Preach or Write for Socinianism when he thinks it a most dangerous Errour who can dissemble with himself and choak his inward Perswasions as the Creed-maker insinuates that Mr. Bold