Deòrum cultu adversus Christianos Every People have their custome each their Rites Now if long time can give authority to Religions belief is to be given to so many ages and we ought to follow our Fathers who have happily follow'd Theirs Unto which the Christian Poet Prudentius replyes to this Sense If there be such a studiousness and care of Antique Custome and it pleases not to depart from old Rites There is extant in antient Books He means the Scriptures a Noble Instance that even in the time of the Deluge or before the Family or People who first inhabited the new Earth and dwelt in the empty World serv'd but one God whence our continued Race derives its pedigree and reforms the Laws of the Piety of the Native Country Si tantum sludium est cura vetusti Moris a prisco placet haud descedere ritu Extat in antiquis exemplum Nobile libris Jam tunc diluvii sub temporae vel priùs Vni Insâ—rvisse Deo gentem quae prima recentes Incoluit terras vacuoque habitavit in Orbe Vnde genus ducit nostrae porrecta propago Stirpis indigenae pietatis jura reformatis Aurel Prudentius contra Symmachum Lib. 2. SECT III. The State of Religion being so craz'd the world being so corrupt in Opinion and Practice God vouchsafed to reveal Himself to Abraham and the other Patriarchs and at the last singled out the posterity of Abraham for his peculiar People Ps 78.5.6.7 8. Deut. 6.6 17. and established a Testimony in Jacob appointed a Law in Israel which he commanded the Fathers that they should make them known to their Children That the Generation to come might know them even the Children which should be born who should arise and declare them to their Children that they might set c. Among these Laws God commanded the owning and Worship of himself exclusively of all pretended Deities whatsoever He prescribed in the greatest accuracy the Substance and very punctilio's of his worship And to fence these sacred Injunctions the better to preserve them from violation at the first delivery of them God strook an holy dread into the People by Thundrings and Lightnings and a thick Cloud so that all in the Camp trembled Exod. 19.16 nay so terrible was the sight that Moses himself said I exceedingly fear and quake Heb. 12.21 And to make all the more sure there was superadded an explicite and formal Covenant between God and the people solemniz'd with the sprinkling of Blood part of it on the Altar Exod. 24.3 4.5 and part on the People and all the People answered with one Voice and said All the words which the Lord hath said will we doe What a large and exact Provision was here made for the safe descending of what God had committed to the People unto all Generations and for the making them trusty Traditioners yet how strangely were they ever and anon declining from the purity of what had been delivered to them Fathers and Children prophaning the Divine Worship and dishonouring God by the mixtures of Heathenish Rites and Idolatrous Abominations In the Chain of Tradition the first Link broke That very People who had so lately trembled at Mount Sinai yet tho' still so near that Mount danced before a Golden Calf saying These be thy Gods Exod. 32.4 O Israel which brought thee out of the Land of Egypt If this fall out so early how much more likely was it that the conveyance of Religion in its purity to after Ages should fail And the event was answerable The Books of Judges Kings and Chronicles and of several of the Prophets so abound in examples of almost perpetual and general defections from the Ancient Faith and Practice that many quotations are needless two will be enough 1. In the Reign of Ahab Elijah mourn'd to God that he only was left of the true Worshippers in Israel at the least of the true Prophets 1 Kings 19.10.18 and that even his life was in danger And tho' the All-seeing God comforted him by the account of seven thousand who had not bow'd the knee to Baal Yet as it seems this was to Elijah an invisible Church so what were these seven thousand to the multitudes of the rest of Israel 2ly In Judah so great and criminous was the Falling off from what God had antiently ordain'd that good Josiah rent his Clothes when he heard the words of the Books of the Law read 2 Kings 22.11 and compar'd former and present Practice with what was there commanded Such were the Apostasies of the Jewish Church from Primitive Doctrine and instituted Worship and for a long time and without any relief and restitution from Oral Tradition the intervening Reformation in Josiah's Reign was ow'd to the Holy Scriptures 2 Kings 23.2 3. Till God reveng'd those miscarriages sharply but very righteously first upon the ten Tribes and afterwards upon the remaining two The two Tribes after seventy years Correction return'd home re-built their City and Temple But in time they split into several Sects which were so many degeneracies from the first Purity of their Religion Our Blessed Lord reprov'd them for their corrupt Traditions as being a vain Worship Math. 15.3.9 and Evacuations of the Commandments of God The Jews have amongst them an Oral Tradition expository of the Law Written and given as is said by them by God to Moses intrusted by Moses with Joshua and the seventy Elders and by them transmitted down from one Generation to another This that People have in (a) Video Hebraeos omnes Legem quae per os tradita est tanti facere ut eam non modò aequent Legi Scriptae sed longe anteferant tanquam animam corpori quò sine eâ impossibile sit ut ipsis videtur Legem Scriptam intelligere aut observare adeoque sine eâ Lex tota non sit nisi corpus â—ine Spiritu c. Episcopii Instit Theol. L. 3. C. 4. very high estimation preferring it to the very Scriptures and honouring it with room in their Creed of which one Article is (a) Leo Modena History of the present Jews c. Translated by Mr. Chilmead p. 248. I believe that the Law which was given by Moses was wholly dictated by God and that Moses put not in one Syllable of himself And so likewise that that which we have by Tradition by way of Explication of the Precepts of the other hath all of it proceeded from the Mouth of God delivering it to Moses Yet Learned Men judge this fardle of Traditions to be a very (b) Episcop Ibid. Cap. 6. per toâ— Figment and that in some Age or other Ancestors have impos'd on the Credulity of their Posterity that Tradition has recommended to them That as deriving from God which never had so sacred and infallible an Author After the foregoing Observation of the Church and how little agreeingly with it's first Model Tradition preserv'd it for two
and this by virtue of the hopes of an Heaven and fears of an Hell For how strongly soever these might be applied to the minds of the first Believers yet that so strong and effectual an Application of them was made by all Fathers to all their Children through all after Ages so that the (a) Ibid. Cause should be always actually causing is uncertain nay very improbable for the Reasons before given 3ly If a less number may be a sufficient party to make a Tradition then meerly the comparative fewness of (b) Catal. Testium veritatis Aâ—rian Râ—gen in Histor Eccles Sâ—avonic Dr. Field in the Appendix to the 3d. Book of the Church those who through several former ages held some fewer some more of the Points in which we Protestants differ from the Romanists and that thy mov'd Eccentricks to the generality of Christians of their times is no rational Objection against them and their Tenents as if they were not truly Primitive nor in a parity of Reason did it justifie the Romanists Tenents that they had got so large a Possession of the Western World nor consequently did our Fathers deserve to be call'd Deserters of Tradition because they departed from some Tenents and Practices of the Roman Church which had stolen the general Vogue in some former blind Ages For 't is not affirm'd that the greatest number of Christians but only a great Part and a Body of them would be trusty Traditioners A great Party absolutely considered may be but little comparatively and the Minimum quod sic in the case we are not told Therefore the general Prevalency of certain Romish Tenents at and before the Secession did not conclude them to be therefore justified by Tradition properly so called nor did the bare comparative Paucity suffice to condemn them of Innovation who made the Secession SECT III. 3ly To assure Oral Tradition's infallibility it is press'd that there is an (a) Sure Footing p. 236 237. Author of Sure Footing Ibid. Obligation on Posterity to believe their Ancestors in a matter of Fact or a matter delivered to have been not thought or deem'd but done And 't is confidently added I make account there is not a Man in the World or ever was such is the goodness of rational Nature given us by God who in his natural thoughts could ever raise such a doubt or think he could possibly frame his thoughts to a belief of the contrary And it appears at first sight to be a strange distortion or rather destruction of humane Nature which can so alter it The Instances given in which Posterity is obliged to believe Ancestors are (a) Ibid. p. 217. Alexander's conquering Asia (b) Ibid. p. 236 237. William the Conqueror's Harry the Eights and Mahomet's Existence (c) Ibid. p. 219. 220 221. The proof of the Obligation on Posterity not to believe contrary to Forefathers from Age to Age is thus proceeded in viz. The second Age after the first was obliged to believe the first Age because they saw with their Eyes what was done The third Age was obliged to believe the second tho' they saw it not because the second Age could not be deceived in what the first Age told them and they must be conceived so honest and withal such to be the disinteressedness of the position that they would not conspire to deceive the third Age and so those of the third Age have the first Ages Authority applied to them And by virtue of this same Argument the same effect will be upon the fourth fifth and five hundreth Age. This is the full substance to the best of my understanding of the Author's Argumentation Ans In reply to this If the matter of Fact be but some general thing such as the Author himself has given Example of there may be the more of Truth in this Procedure but then there 's little in it it comes not home enough to our business But if the things done or spoken at or about the same time were divers or if the thing tho' one were wrap'd in several circumstances then the first Eye or Ear-Witnesses might for want of a more close and steady attention mistake or forget some partitulars and so might misreport and therefore might justly be disbelieved or the second Witnesses from the first though suppose things were truly and punctually reported to them by the first yet might misunderstand or forget something if not much of what was related to them or if there should be no misinformation by the second Witnesses yet the third might misapprehend or not well remember what the second told them The same may be said of the Witnesses in the fourth remove or age with regard to the third and of those in the fifth with respect to these in the fourth and so unto the five hundredth till after a discent through so many hazards and chances what was done or spoken at the first be at length wholy altered or become very unlike to its Primitive self Seeing then there may be such failures in successive Testifyings how can a Man be bound to believe conformably to Forefathers especially when as perhaps he is distant hundreds of Successions from the speaking or doing the thing testified of I may confirm the uncertainty of successive Testifyings through Ages by a passage of an Adversary (a) Rushworth Dial 2. Sect. 7. He putting the Question whether the very rehearsing and citing anothers words do not breed uncertainty and variety resolves it in the affirmative 'T is true he aimes at the invalidating Scriptures certainty in conveying to after-Ages the mind of the Authors but what he writes is adaptable to words spoken as well as written For answerably to what he discourses (b) Let us suppose the writer himself play the Translator as for Example that our Saviour himself having spoken in Hebrew or Syriak the holy writer is to express his words in Greek or Latin And farther that this which we have said of Translations be as truly it is grounded in the very nature of divers Languages therefore unavoidable by any Art or Industry will it not clearly follow that even in the Original Copy written by the Evanlists own hand there is not in rigor the true and self-significant words of our Saviour but rather a Comment or Paraphrase explicating and delivering the Sense thereof Nay let him have written in the same Language and let him have set down every word and syllable yet men conversant in noting the changes of meaning in words will tell you that divors accents in the pronunciation of them the turning of the Speakers Head and Body this way or that way the allusion to some Person or to some precedent discourse or the like may so change the Sense of the words that they will seem quite different in writing from what they wree in speaking Rushworth Ibid. And the Title of the next the 8th par is The uncertainty of Equivocation which of necessity is incident
writing things especially Religious Doctrines and Practices should be preferr'd to the hazarding them under the Custody of Oral Tradition That rather than This being the surest means of their preservation For 1. It is much less difficult because there is much less requir'd to keep a Book safe and to hand it from one Generation to another than to preserve a great many of Opinions and Senses of that Book and to transmit them from Age to Age unalter'd To the former meer plain honesty and an easie care are sufficient Here 's no need of much Apprehension and Memory and of a constant Care and Diligence to teach Posterity here 's no necessity of Posterities scrupulous attention to teaching Fathers and of an happy docility or promptness to learn and all this through a long series of Ages But these Punctilios as has been shew'd before are necessary to a faithful and unerring communicating of Truths to after-after-Ages in the way of Oral Tradition therefore there is the more of difficulty and consequently the more likelihood of miscarriage 2ly Books if kept safe do faithfully preserve what is deposited with them Their Memory if I may so speak never fails them there 's no need of an operous care to teach them or rather to remember them what their Authors once told them committed to them They warp not with the Times in which they are extant tho' through several Generations They are not subject to levity and wantonness of Judgment nor to rebound from one extremity to another not to a sequaciousness after Men whose Parts render them remarkable They are not temptable by Hopes or Fears To be read and to be accepted of is their worst Avarice or Ambition Nor does the Paper or Parchment look the paler at a Rack or a Gibbet or the Characters fly thence upon Persecution A Prison can't scare them they are us'd to confinement to a Chain it may be in a Library Thus it is with Books But Oral Traditioners are expos'd to all those inconveniences as has been before manifested whence their Traditions are infected with an answerable craziness Therefore for this second together with the first reason Writings Books are the far less obnoxious the more safe Conveyance And what has been said of Writings in general is much more true particularly of the Sacred Scriptures Object Against what has been delivered there may lye some seeming prejudice It may be objected that Writings have their fates as well as their Authors They are not exempt from either a total perishing by the oscitancy and carelesness of the Owners or by violence from Enemies Or at least they are liable to corruption and that either wilful and out of design as speaking of Holy Scriptures by Hereticks or through the ignorance or negligence of Transcribers Whence it will follow that notwithstanding the comparative easiness of transmitting Writings and the Fidelity of them if preserv'd yet they may be ravish'd by violence from their Possessors how honest soever they be or they may be lost by them if they should prove careless or they may be adulterated upon one account or another And so Writings may not be preserv'd or not preserv'd sincere and entire Answ That losses and decays alterations and suppositiousness have been incident to Writings is confess'd Yet how many have escap'd injury through long tracts of time have arrived safe with us some plenty of them in Libraries does manifest for there have been more or less Lovers of Learning and Antiquity who have been Guardians to these Orphans And Learned Men have Methods as Trial by Chronology and the Customs and Modes of each Age insight into the Style and Genius of an Author Collation of Copies with others by which to distinguish the Spurious from the Genuine Works and to right the Genuine by requisite Emendations And of such kind of reliefs Scriptures are capable as well as other Writings But we shall see that they have a much greater advantage and are secur'd above all Writings else by peculiar Protections and have been blessed with a special safety SECT II. Sacred Scriptures may be suppos'd to have been in danger from 1. Malice and Design 2ly From Casualty and Neglect And to have been in danger 1. From Malice and Design of profest and publick Enemies 2ly Of pretended Friends I mean Heticks 1. The open and profess'd Enemies of the Holy Scripture design'd and labour'd for their extinction As no Professors of any Religion were ever so persecuted by the opposition and fury of the World as Jews first and then the Christians so the Scriptures in Sympathy with them have been expos'd to great hazards but yet have survived them When the Chaldeans had over-run Judea wasted and plunder'd the Towns ransack'd and destroy'd the Metropolis Jerusalem had rifled and ruined the Temple when they who had escap'd Slaughter were carried away Captive into a strange Land and the Captivity there lasted 70 years Whenas amidst all these hurries Vrim and Thummim the Ark the Pot of Manna the Rod of Aaron whenas these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 holy and choice Rarities of that People and all their Glory sunk in the Deluge of an universal devastation Yet the Holy Scriptures which then were triumph'd over all these Calamities tho' the Copies were then but few in comparison of what they were afterwards For soon after the return from Captivity and reedification of the Temple (a) Nehem. 8.6 7 8. Ezra also Joshua and Bani caus'd the People to understand the Law and the People stood in their place So they read in the Book of the Law of God distinctly and. Some time after this under the Tyranny of Antiochus The (b) 1 Mac. 1.56 57 58. Books of the Law which were found were rent in pieces and burnt with fire And wheresoever was found with any the Book of the Testament or if any consented to the Law the King's Commandement was that they should put him to Death Notwithstanding this Persecution the Holy Book out-liv'd this Scrutiny and Cruelty In the Times of Christianity in the Reign of (c) Petav. Ration p. 241 242. Dioclesian there was an Imperial Edict that the Churches should be demolish'd and the Holy Scripture should be burn'd and tho' some were so base as to betray the Divine Books to the Enemy who thence were call'd Traditores yet they weathered out this Storm also Next to an invisible Divine Hand defending them so many were the Copies of the Sacred Books especially after the Jews return from Babylon and more after the Gospel had been Preached and entertain'd in the World and likewise so zealously did both Jews and Christians concern themselves in them that the Enemies might as soon have rooted out of the World the whole Generations of Jews and Christians as the Bibles 2ly For the same reasons that there should be a Depravation of of Holy Scripture by Additions Substractions or Alterations in any thing material as to Faith and Life that there should be any
the Divine Care in that tho' he believed the Septuagint Translation widely to differ from the Original Hebrew Text and had no Opinion of it as a ground even of (b) Haec mea sententia perpetua fuit Ex quibusdam veterum interpretationibus excerpi aliquas posse variantes teâ—tus Hebraici lectiones ex vulgatâ Graecâ versione nullas Idem Ibid. various Reaings yet there is no such material difference between the Hebrew Text and even that version as may injure the Faith necessary to Salvation Our Adversaries tho' they know of those numerous as they say variae lectiones yet notwithstanding scruple not to profess to have the Genuine Scriptures as was said before or if they have not if they have been careless in a matter of so grand moment as the Conservation of Holy Writ entire how should we trust to their fidelity in other things of less Consequence who yet claim to be the most credible Traditioners in the world SECT II. Ob. 2. If it should be thought a Ground to suspect the care of the Church and of Providence over Scripture that (d) The Epistle to the Hebrews Of St. Jam. 2. Ep. of St. Peter 2d and 3d. Ep. of John the Ep. Ju. the Revelation 1. some Books of the New Testament are accounted now Canonical which Anciently were not reputed so 2. That some Books commonly called the Apocrypha are controverted whether they belong to the Canon of the Old Testament or not it is answered 1. That it is no wonder if all the Books of the New Testament were not presently generally received by all Christians who in especially after the Apostles days had multiplied into very great numbers and liv'd dispers'd in divers places and very remote from each other Time was required for all Christendom truly to inform themselves of a business of so great weight but the reception of these Books never doubted of by all Christians rather doubted of than rejected by some was early enough to satisfy any sober expectation The Council of Laodicea which was had in so much reverence and esteem by those of elder ages that the Canons of it were received into the Code of the Universal Church was held Anno Dom. 364. The Bishops then assembled together (e) Apud Caranzam declare in the last Canon what Books of the Old and New Testament were to be read publickly and to be held as Canonical and they only And among those of the New Testament are reckoned the Epistles before mentioned in the Margent The Apocalypse indeed is omitted but it was omitted only not rejected it was forborn to be named because their Custom was not usually to read it in publick for the special Mysteriousness of it (a) More may be seen of this in the learned Dr. Cosins late Bishop of Duresme in his Scholastic l History of the Canon of Scripture pag. 60. 61. (a) De Verbo Dei Lib. 1. c. 17 18 19. also Cap. 16. concerning some little portions of Holy Writ formerly controverted Bellarmine giv's a large account of the Attestations yielded to all these Books and to each of them not alone by the Laodicean Council but some others also and by several Fathers likewise both before and after that Council Indeed after some Debates about them by some in the early days of Christianity they were entertain'd by the Church without contradiction 2. The Controversy between us and the Romanists about the Canon of the Old Testament has in it no great difficulty it seems to be a plain case Those Arguments by which (b) De Verbo Dei L. 2. c. 2. Bellarmine proves that the Jews did not corrupt the Hebrew Text do as strongly conclude that they did not shorten the Hebrew Canon for this latter would have been as great a fault in them as the former rather a greater and would have been more difficult for them to have effected Also (c) De Verbo Dei Lib. 1. c. 8 9 10. Bellarmine acknowledges that the Book of Baruch is not found in the Hebrew Bibles that the fragments of Daniel i. e. The Hymn of the three Children the History of Susanna and of Bell and the Dragon that the Books of Tobit Judith the Wisdom of Solomon Ecclesiasticus and of the Macchabees are not own'd by the Jews Or if he had not confessed so much there is evidence sufficient from the (a) Josephus contra Apion Lib. 1. p. 1036. 1037. Jews themselves that (b) Primis Ordinis Canonica Volumina quae sola apud Hebraeos in authoritate hahentur Judaei c. Sixt. Senens Bibl. Sanct. pag. 2. Certum est Libros hosce Apocryphos sc ab Ecclesià sive Synagogâ Judaicà nunquam in Canonem censitos fuisse tam ante Christi tempora quà m post in hunc usque diem Sim. Episcopii Inst Theolog. 226. P. Ricaut Of the Greek Church they never owned more Books as Divine and Canonical than the Protestants do and likewise the Greek Church agree with the Protestants in rejecting the Apocrypha How then the Roman great Propugnators of Tradition consistently even with that very Principle adopt more Books into the Canon than the Jews ever own'd is not by me conceiveable For to the Jews were committed the Oracles of God they above all in the world best knew what was committed to them they did carefully preserve as is seen before and deliver to Posterity and Posterity could honestly come by no more than what was delivered to them I do not foresee what exception can justly lie against this procedure Therefore that Bellarmine should say tho' the Jews rejected these Books yet the (a) Ecclesia Catholica Libros istos ut caet ros pro Sacris Canonicis habet De verbo Dei Lib. 1. C. 10. Catholick Church he means the Christian and particularly the Trent Council received them as part of the Canon of the Old Testament is exceeding strange and a Riddle to me Seeing that they have no countenance from the most Primitive general and long-liv'd Tradition of the Jewish Church And this is enough to satisfie a rational Christian and to refute our Adversaries even by their own Principle But yet nor is it true that there has been a truly Catholick reception of those Books as Canonical even by the Christian Church It is (a) This deduction of Testimonies is largly and satisfactorily made by the late Reverend Bishop of Duresme Dr. Cosins in his Scholastical History of the Canon of Scripture evinc'd by a continued series of sufficient Testimonies from the first Ages of the Christian Church thro' the several Centuries unto the Council of Trent that the Books which the Protestants call Apocryphal were judg'd to be such by Christians Now that the Council of Trent above 1500 years after Christ and a fragment of Christendom should vote the Apocryphal Books to be entertain'd with a veneration equal to what Christians have for the unquestionable Scriptures was a boldness which
me morable and large Periods of Time I proceed to the Christian Church SECT IV. Being come to the Christian Church let us first take some account of the more early Ages of it As soon as the good Seed was sown the Enemy came and sow'd Tares among the Wheat Tradition was not so viligant but that many corrupt Doctrines and Practices quickly arose and spread in the Church Else St. August might have spar'd his Book of Heresies or the Catalogue would have been shorter But I shall insist on two or three Opinions only which have been antiently countenanced by great Names and have been of considerable continuance in the Church and are now generally rejected by the Church of Rome as well as by others 1. That after the Resurrection Jerusalem should be new built adorn'd and enlarg'd and that Believers in Christ should Reign with him there a thousand years was very early believed Papias the Scholar of St. John Irenaeus Apollinarius Tertullian Victorinus Lactantius Severus and a great multitude of Catholick Persons were of this Judgment St. Hierome tho' he did not hold yet neither would he condemn this Opinion because many Ecclesiastical Persons and Martyrs had own'd it And St. Augustine thought the Tenent tolerable if abstracted from any carnality of Pleasures and confesses that he himself once held it We have all this in (a) Bibl. Stae Lib. 5. Annot. 233. Lib. 6. Annot. 347. Sixtus Senensis But (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Contra Tryphonem p. 307. Justine Martyr Elder than either St. Hierome or St. Augustine speaks of the Millenarian Doctrine as that which was embrac'd by all thorough Orthodox Christians of his time which affirmation whatsoever is oppos'd out of him elsewhere to the diminution of it must mean that at the least a very great number of Christians were thus Opinion'd And though the Judgment of more sober Christians was more clean and inoffensive concerning the Millenarian Reign yet the apprehensions of many were more gross and sensual as were those of the Cerinthians as (a) Cerinthiani mille quoque annos post resurrectionem in terreno regno Christi secundum carnales ventris lihidinâ—s voluptates futuros fabulantur unde etiam Chiliastae sunt appellati De Haeres Cap. 8. St. Augustine tell us and that they were call'd Chiliasts According to (b) In Johan cap. 6. Maldonate St. Augustine's and Innocent's the first Opinion of the necessity of the Eucharist to Infants prevail'd in the Church about six hundred years This practice of Communicating of Infants is acknowledged by (c) Ut enim sanctissimi illi patres sui facti probabilem causam pro illius temporis ratione habâ—erunt ita certè ecs nullâ salutis necessitate id fecisse sine controversiâ credendum est Trid. Conc. Sess 5. Can. 4. Caranz Summa Concil the Council of Trent But they deny that the Practisers of it had any Opinion of its necessity but us'd it upon some probable Motive only And so they (d) Siquis dixerit parvulis antequam ad annos discretionis pervenerint necessariam esse Eucharistiae Communionem Anathema sit Sess 5. Can. 4. De Communione sub utraque specie parvulorum Caran Anathematize them only who shall affirm that the Eucharist is necessary to Children before they come to years of discretion Thus the Trent-Fathers But if Tradition Antient and even Apostolical and also Holy Scriptures can make a Practice necessary then particularly St. Augustine judg'd the Communicating of Infants to be necessary For he (a) Vnde nisi ex antiquâ ut existimo Apostolicâ Traditione Ecclesiae Christi insitum tenent praeter Baptismum participationem Dominicae Mensae non solum ad regnum Dei sed nec ad salutem vitam aeternam posse quenquam hominum pervenire And presently after two or three Quotations out of Scripture he adds Si ergo ut tot tanta divina testimonia concinunt nec salus nec vita aeterna sine Baptismo corpore sanguine Domini cuiquam spectanda est frustra sine his promittitur parvulâ—s Porro si a salute aâ— vitâ aeterna hominem nisi peccata non separant per haec Sacramenta non nisi peccati reatus in parvulis solvitur S. August De peccati merit remiss Contr. Pelag. L. 1. discours'd for it both from Tradition and Scriptures For when he had asserted upon the strength of both those Topiques that without Baptism and partaking of the Lord's Table none can be saved he concludes that therefore without these Salvation is in vain promis'd to Children Without these i. e. Baptism and the Eucharist also So that tho' the Sanctissimi Patres have good words given them yet the holy Augustine and the rest who were of his mind must fall under the Trent-Anathema And considering the clearness of the passage in St. Augustine it is strange it should be said There is an Objection That S. Austine and Innocentius with their Councils held that the Communion of Children was necessary for Salvation and their words seem to be apparent But who looks into other passages of the same Authors will find that their words are Metaphorical and that their meaning is that the Effects of Sacramental Communion to wit an Incorporation into Christ's Body which is done by Baptism is of necessity for Childrens Salvation Rushworth Dial. 3d. Sect. 13. What passages they are which do thus interpret those Authors meaning we are not told But 1. It is strange that if St. Aug. and Innoc. intended Baptism only and by that an Incorporation into Christ's Mystical Body to be necessary to Children for their Salvation They should at all mention the Communion of Christ's Body and Blood and the partaking of the Lord's Table to be necessary to Children for that purpose what needed such a disert and repeated conjunction of Baptism and of the Eucharist in expressing that necessity if there was no necessity of the Communion but of Baptism only What reason for it except they should be thought to have a mind to darken their Sense with Words Nay if they meant one of the Sacraments only to be necessary to Childrens Salvation tho' they explicitly mention both why may it not be said that they intended the Communion only and not Baptism to be necessary for that end seeing they are in words as express for the Communion as for Baptism 2ly As for St. Augustine his word in the Margent will not without extremity of injury admit of such a Construction as the Author above-named would in his commenting way obtrude upon them For certainly when he says That without Babtism and partaking of the Lord's Table and of the Body and Blood of the Lord no man can be saved he meant properly and without a figure why therefore when he adds in way of Inference si ergo if therefore both these Sacraments Baptism and the Body and Blood of the Lord be necessary to Salvation
of the Understanding and any operose Discourse Now where is the more easiness of knowing things there is the less liableness to mistakes And a less liableness to and therefore a less probability of mistake in others is one reason why caeteris paribus to give credit to their Intelligence the more securely 2. Mankind is forc'd to content themselves with Information from Testimony in multitudes of Things which their Curiosity or the Exigency of their Affairs do engage them to be satisfied in and yet their own Sense or Reason can give no prospect of them Those many who never cross'd nor saw the Seas must trust others Relation that there are such places as Paris Rome Constantinople both the Indies where these places lye and what their circumstances are The reason why Men believe that they were born in such a year on or about such a day and therefore that they are of such an Age that they were Baptiz'd and that such is their Name is that they are told so 'T is not possible to come acquainted with Times past and with the divers Revolutions and Events of the numerous Ages before we were born otherwise than by Testimony from History If we would satisfie our selves whether the Books in our possession are indeed the Works of the Authors whose Names they bear that which we must have recourse to is that these Books have been and are witnessed to are generally reputed to be those Authors Works i. e. there 's a general Tradition for it For the two Reasons given it is plain that there is both a comparative safety and likewise a necessity in a considerable measure of reliance upon others Testimony and common Tradition in many things SECT III. Notwithstanding what has been said on the behalf of Testimony and Tradition yet they are not such an Oracle that their Responses must be receiv'd indiscriminately and without wary Examination Though where they well cannot mistake or deceive or there 's little or no temptation to misrepresent things they may be trusty yet both Written and Oral Tradition are often guilty of no small failures Of the two Oral Tradition is subject to the more shortness and uncertainty It is ordinary for Reports to pass from one to another to have a general Vogue and yet to be very false 'T is usual for Stories which might be true enough in the first Relation of them yet after they have travelled through many Mouths to be so much altered from what they were at the first that they look like one of Ovid's Metamorphoses There are Traditions from Fathers which yet the Posterity have not Faith enough or more Wisdom than to believe It will be found upon due Consideration that as when a Man hears others talking at a good distance from him only a noise and now and then a word or two come to his Ears the Articulation of the rest being lost by the way insomuch that little if any thing is understood of what is said So that from past and remote Ages there arrive down to us but meer generals confus'd and very short notices of things and the Credit of those too comes weakned with acknowledgedly fabulous or suspected intermixtures especially is this true of those Antiquities which meer Oral Tradition wafts to us Observe Families one would think that considering the love which Men have for their Native Soil the particular place of their Birth and Habitation for their Inheritance and for the Stock of which they are Branches Young Persons should be much inquisitive from their Fathers and Fathers should delight to Story to their Children the Circumstances pertaining to these things Yet often excepting some general Informations comparatively little News is brought of such concerns and of particulars which hapned but three or four Generations off further than they can be certified from Registries Deeds and the like Writings 'T is not unusual for Persons to enquire of the Church-Book how Old they are Books deserve care they are a relief of Mortality in them the Dead Authors do in some manner survive themselves and continue useful to the world after they have left it Yet what a multitude of these has Tradition suffered to perish to be buried as well as their Authors nothing to be left of them except as an Epitaph the Titles of them Of many there remains no more than some fragmenta some scatter'd Limbs as 't were of a mangled Body Several Books are father'd upon certain Authors of whom they have it may be no more than the Name Divers are more or less corrupted some so much depraved ut samnium in ipso samnio quaeratur that the Books may be search'd for in the very Books and scarce found Hence it follows that Tradition is not so careful a preserver of it's Deposita as it should be not so faithful a Relater of Things past as that it should be thought irrefragable and that Belief should be subjected to it promiscuously and without choice Therefore there must be something else and beyond it which may instruct us how to distinguish of Testimonies and Traditions which to mistrust or to reject and which to believe This Director is Reason which in it's Debate and Decision of the due Credibility of Testimonies and Traditions and of the deserv'd precedence of one to the other proceeds upon the Circumstances of the Testifiers and their qualifications These in general are 1. A sufficient knowledge of the things attested to 2ly Such Honesty and Integrity as may encline the Testifiers to relate things as they know them to be Some of the particular Rules or Cautions in the accepting Testimonies may be 1. The More the Testifiers are the stronger the Testimony is and the More are to be preferr'd to the Fewer supposing a Parity of Circumstances 2ly Forasmuch as generals and the substance of things are commonly more easily knowable and remembred than Particulars and minuter Circumstances therefore Testimony may be more safely credited in the former than in the latter 3ly Because Integrity is least to be suspected or question'd when not under temptation by Interest therefore the Testimony of clear and uninteressed Witnesses may be the more confidently admitted 4ly The nearer the Testifiers liv'd to the Times in which what is witnessed to was spoken or done the more valuable their Testimony is for the greater the remove is from what is Evidenced to the more accidents might intervene for the clouding and misrepresentation of it By this it appears that Reason's Court is the Soveraign Judicatory where lies the last Appeal here it being to be determin'd concerning the competency and validness of the Testimony or Tradition So much of Tradition in general whose so near alliance to Testimony at large makes them much to agree in their use and force what it is in what matter most properly useful and argumentative It 's Efficacy and yet it 's Failures into what it is lastly resolv'd where the relief lyes against a deception by it in it's
been said it is more than likely that there may have been Obreptions points of Faith and Religious Practice may have been materially changed and yet no great Tumult have been rais'd in the Christian Common-weal no Schisme because perhaps the Innovations rush'd not in the whole at once but convey'd themselves into the Church in a Climax insinuated themselves by sly and gradual Transitions therefore with the less if any observations especially might this surprize be undiscern'd in blind and irreligious Ages 2. Secondly as for notice of the changes of Opinions and Practices from Church-Histories So great is the use of Ecclesiastical Histories that we may with reason wish we could rather boast of a plenty than complain of their scarcity which yet Learned Men do especially considering the great extent of the Christian Church for Time and Place which necessarily afforded as huge a variety of Events and Revolutions (a) Is Casaub in Proleg ad Exercitat For above 200 years after the Apostles till Eusebius Pamphilus there was none who did more than begin to designe some History of the Church rather than seriously set about it For a considerable while after the six hundreth year that (b) Idem Ibid. Learned Man quoted in the Margent doubts whether to call those Ages 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Times of Portentiloquie or of Ignorance But there are those who say as much or more and were Sons of the Church of Rome The great (c) Nulla res ita hactenus negligi vis est ac rerum Ecclesiasticarum gestarum vera certa exactâ diligentiâ perquisita Narratio Baron in Praefatione ad Annal. Tom. prim Annalist confesses That nothing seem'd to have been so much neglected as a true and certain and exact History of Ecclesiastical Affairs And before Him it was acknowleg'd by (d) Maximum saepenumero dolorem cepi dum ipse mecum reputo quà m diligenter Acta verò Apostolorum Martyrum deinque Divorum nostrae Religionis ipsius sive crescentis Ecclesiae sive jam adultae opâ—rta maximix tenebris ferè ignorari Fuere qui magna pietatis loco ducerent mendacia pro religione confingere Lib. 5. de Trad. Discipl .. Ludovicus Vives That the Acts of the Apostles of the Martyrs and of the Saints and the Concerns of the Church both growing up and grown were unknown being conceal'd under very great darkness In this penury of Ecclesiastical History how much of the Changes in the Church with an abundance of other very memorable accidents must have perished In those Histories which were Written and are still extant we can expect no more than the most remarkable Occurrents in the respective Ages of which the Authors wrote if all those That a Change in the Church should be remarkable it was requisite that it should raise a Storm cause a Publick disquiet and Breach of Communion which yet might not have hapned tho' there were an Alteration in material Points as has been shewn above and therefore Church-Histories if we had more of them to speak might be silent of it And yet notwithstanding Protestants can say more viz. That Ecclesiastical Writings are not so wholly unintelligencing but that they do report when and how several Points of the Romanists controverted between them and us got into the Church how and by whom they were observ'd and resisted in the several Ages of the Church For which among others (a) Way to the true Ch. p. 195 196 c. Dr. J. White may be seen But I am not engag'd necessarily to insist on this having said what is sufficient before SECT V. Scriptures Councils and Fathers were (b) Sure Footing p. 126 c. once drawn into the Field to engage in the defence of Oral Tradition but upon after thoughts a Retreat is sounded to Two of them For the Author of Sure Footing says That he Discourses from his Scriptural Allegations but (c) Letter of thanks p. 106. Topically and that in Citation of them he proceeds on such Maximes as are ut'd in Word-skirmishes on which account he believes that those Texts he uses sound more favourably for him than for us But in Word-skirmishes i. e. Appearances ministred from Words which may afford to a pleasant Sophister an opportunity of making passages seem to favour his Hypothesis when really they do not so I have no inclination to deal and I conceive such a wordy velitation to be below the Gravity of the Cause depending between us and our Adversaries Next the Author disclaims his Quotations of (a) Ibid. p. 105. Councils to be intended against Protestants if so then I am not obliged to take notice of them As for the Fathers I know all Protestants do declare that they do highly value the Fathers to such a degree as can be justly demanded from them and as the Fathers themselves were they now living would require from them And concerning their Testimonies both of Holy Scripture and of Tradition something shall be said in the Second Part and there on a particular occasion I have now dispatch'd the First Part of my Undertaking and have evinc'd from the Nature of Oral Tradition from Experience or Event and also by Answer to the Defenses brought for it That it is a very unsafe and insufficient Conveyance of Divine Truths down from their Original Delivery unto us And here I might rest thinking that I had compleated my work if I might be allow'd to discourse after the manner of the * P. 52. Author of Sure Footing with the change only of a few words and to say There being only two grounds or Rules of Faith own'd namely delivery of it down by Writing and by Words and Practices which we call Oral and Practical Tradition 't is left unavoidably out of the impossibility that Oral and Practical Tradition should be infallible as a Rule that Sacred Scriptures must be such and therefore that they are the surest Conveyance of faith But I shall not so crudely conclude my enquiry but shall in a Second Part prove Holy Scriptures to be the most safe immediate Conservatory and Conveyance of Divine Truths down from their first Delivery unto all after Ages Only having been large in the First Part I suppose I may be the briefer in the Second PART II. Sacred Scriptures are the safest Conservatory and Conveyance of Divine Truths down from their Original Delivery through succeeding Ages CHAP. I. SECT I. IF we may collect the Judgment of Mankind from their Practice we may believe that in the Conveyance of Matters of Moment to Posterity they judge the Precedence due to Writings about Oral Tradition because they so commonly commit things of that nature to Books tho' they know the Books themselves must be trusted with Tradition and Providence How much more should this Practice take place in Religion which concerns Men as highly as their Blessedness does And besides common Practice there 's great reason why the
As to the certainty of Scripture's Sense is Scripture in earnest so utterly obscure Will their Author say so of the Histories of Livie or Tacitus or of the Philosophical Writings of Plato and Aristotle or of Euclid's Elements Could not God speak clearly and intelligibly to Men as Men have done and that in matters of the greatest consequence to them or would he not do so The Assertion of the one would impeach his Wisdom of the other his mercy and kindness to Souls And if Scriptures leave us so quite in the dark why do they call themselves a Light a Lamp say Ps 119 105.13â— Ps 19.7 8. that they enlighten the Eyes and make wise the simple Were the Books of the Old Testament the Gospels Acts and Epistles of the New Testament in the respective times in which they were writ in themselves unintelligible by them to whom and for whose Souls health they were writ If they were so then they were useless and vain And Oral Tradition could not expound them which was not in Being when those Books were first written for That deals with the Ages following the first conveys what was at the first delivered unto Posterity Did God then write only to amaze his Church 'T is acknowledged that there are several 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 things hard to be understood which it might please God should be partly to win the greater veneration to the Scriptures for what is obvious and presently seen through is in the more danger of contempt partly for the exercise of Christian's Industry Humility and Charity towards each other on occasion of dissent But howsoever the Scriptures are not so lock'd up but that a compâ—tent diligence and a Beraean 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or readiness of mind may be a Key to them may open them in all Points necessary to Salvation And if in other things we remain ignorant or not so certain we may well bear with it while we are yet but in viâ and not comprehensores on our way unto but have not yet reach'd perfection That which makes the noise of Scriptur's obscurity the more loud is that Men are apt to look upon the many subtilties of the Schooles and Niceties of Polemick Writers as Articles of Faith and that men have more mind to fathom depths and to humour their curiosity for which end I believe the Scriptures were not intended and hence are ever racking the Scriptures and vexing the Sacred Text than to exercise themselves in a sober understanding of what is sufficiently plain and in a consciencious practise of the Holy Rules of Life which are evident enough If Christians would more seriously apply themselves to these two things they would find in the Scriptures employment enough and they would be more contented with their difficulties The Romanists have raised a cry of Scriptur's darkness upon another account and out of Policy For having embrac'd several Tenents and Practices which Scripture does condemn or not countenance either it is wholly silent of them or they are but meer appearances there which are snatch'd at and yet it is inconsistent with their grandeur or profit or the affected reputation of an infallibility to part with they are faine to press Tradition to serve in their Wars and for the defence of them Thus they have first made a necessity and then have invented a Remedy for it But when all is done the Remedy is more imaginary than real For how unsure a Conveyance and consequently how weak a Proof Oral Tradition is in matters of Christian Faith and Practice has been already evicted So that if we must be ignorant of Scriptures Sense unless Oral Tradition bless us with the Exposition of it and Scriptures no farther a Light than it is tinded at Tradition's Candle we must sit still in much ignorance or wander in great uncertainties for that cannot relieve us it is not that infallible Commentator it is pretended to be 2. To the upbraiding us with our Distractions I reply 1. Before the charge can be made good that the choice of Scripture for our Canon was the cause of our many Differences and that upon that pretence we should exchange Scripture for Oral Tradition it must be suppos'd that Oral Tradition is a sure and infallible clew to guide us out of the Labyrinth of Errors into the way of Truth and Peace the contrary to which has been sufficiently proved For otherwise to leave Scripture and to follow Tradition would be to relinquish a Guide or Rule which being indited by an unerring Spirit cannot mislead us and to chuse one which may and will carry us out of the way Nor will the pretence of Vnity make amends for this For true Christian Peace can't be otherwhere bottom'd than on Truth when and so far as it is a Cement of Men to the disservice of Truth it commences Faction Nor Reason nor Religion allow much less commend an Agreement of Persons to err together 2. They who have the most amorously espoused Tradition have also their many and great Differences as has been shew'd above only through Fear in some and Policy in the rest they are hush'd up more than amongst us and so do better escape the observation and talk of the World Nay that Church may be justly arraigned as the guilty cause of that which they call a great Schism viz. The Separation of so many Churches from them the Churches call'd Protestant by their imposition of unlawful and therefore impossible termes of Communion with them And (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nilus tells the World that their Imperiousness was the reason of the great Schism between the Greek and the Latin Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pag. 21. 22. Thus as the Church of Traditioners have no few Dissentions among themselves so they have given a beginning and continuance to the quarrels between them and a considerable part of Christendom 3. Ther 's no need of fetching our Distractions from the Rejection of Oral Tradition there are are other true manifest Causes of them assignable Our Church once flourish'd with Peace and that without the aid of an Oral Tradition whil'st the Reverend Bishops were suffered to govern it and the Royal was able to countenance the Ecclesiastical Authority But when the pious King and blessed Martyr was engag'd in and diverted by the turmoils of a Civil War when Episcopacy was chang'd for Anarchy when the Golden reins of Government in Church and State were broken then begun and increas'd our Divisions and Calamities Unto which it may be there were some assisting Causes from without some who helped to kindle and to blow our Fires And if the Roman Church should chance into the like afflicted State with ours it would be obnoxious to the like Confusions If the Mitre should be forsaken by the secular Crowned Heads and a mutinying multitude should pull their Holy Father out of his infallible Chair then 't is not altogether improbable but that Children would less heavken
to testifying Fathers but that there would be more Alumbrados and the like Freaks might be acted among our Adversaries which tore our Church But withal I think it seasonable to let my Reader know that those Men so call'd i. e. Alumbâ—ados in Spain were no other in most of their Tenents and Practises than these our Quakers are now in England â— câ—nfess I am very destitute of Books at this time to â—â—ve the Readeâ— so gâ—od an account of this bâ—â—ness as I could wâ—sh All I can say of thâ— at nâ—w is out of some Fâ—â—â—â—ch Books where I find a lâ—rge â—â—dict against them containing their several Tenents and â—â—rers whereâ—f c. 〈◊〉 â—lumbradoâ— of Sâ—ain 〈…〉 to be known and talk'd 〈◊〉 the year of our Lord 162â— Dr. Meric Caâ—aâ—bon Tâ—â—â—tise of Euthusiasme p. 17â— 174 175. and speaking in general Christians are too apt to fail in holy prudence meekness charity and such pacifique virtues thence arise too many breaches among them and a want of these virtues is incident to our Adversaries as well as to Protestants for they are Sons of Adam too only they are wiser in their Generation To conclude the Reply to the two last little Objections and the whole Treatise Eternal Blessedness is our end the means to attain to that great end are right Believing and holy Living That which gives the Regulation to Christian Belief and Life is the revealed will of God But because the Divine Revelations were delivered at the distance of many Ages from us therefore there is need of somthing which may conduct them safe and entire to us and that which is the safest and most certain Conveyance of them to us is that fixed Standard or Rule whence we are to take the measures of our Christian Faith and Practices Such a Conveyance and consequently such a Standard or Rule I have prov'd not Oral Tradition but Holy Scripture to be This being first establish'd there may then then be consider'd the Perspicuity of this Rule which is Scripture and the Agreement or Vnity of those who adhere to it Here 1. We may be sure that this Rule is very sufficiently intelligible and clear in all things necessary for our direction to our Blessedness But then it must be left to Gods Pleasure what difficulties and dubiousness he would mix with that sufficient plainness and we ought to be thankful for what is plain in it and not quarrel at the obscurities 2ly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arâ—â—t Eth. â— 1 C. 8. We may be certain that this Rule and Conveyance of Divine Truths to us there being so much Harmony in Truth must be very apt it must be its most genuine effect to harmonize Christian 's Judgments and Affections and to beget a peaceableness of mutual Conversation yet too it must be judg'd very possible or rather more that the folly and corruptions of Men may too much frustrate this its most natural issue So that now to conclude a thing this great Standard and Rule of Faith and Manners because it pretends to be the most plain and also to make meer Vnity a Demonstration of the Truth would be a crude way of Discourse For first a wrong way may be smooth and easy enough perhaps more plain than that which leads a Man to his Home Next not Truth only but likewise Interest may hold Men very fast together and the Conscience of its own guilt and feebleness may prompt to Error to strengthen it self by the closest Confederacies FINIS Some Books Printed for and Sold by Robert Clavel at the Sign of the Peacock in St. Paul's Church-yard THe Annals of King James and King Charles the First The Compleat Conformist Or seasonable Advice concerning strict Conformity and frequent Celebration of the Holy Communion In a Sermon Preached Jan. 7. Being the first Sunday after the Epiphany in the year 1682. At the Cathedral and in a Letter written to the Clergy of the Archdeaconry of Durham By Denis Grenville D. D. Arch-Deacon and Prebendary of Durham London Printed for Robert Clavel and are to be Sold by Hugh Hutchenson in Durham A Sermon Preached at Windsor before His Majesty the Second Sunday after Easter 1684. By John Arch-Bishop of Tuam Published by His Majesties special Command Both sold by Robert Clavel at the sign of the Peacock in St. Paul's Church-yard 1684. 3. King James not so much influenced by Gondamore as is related by Mr. Rushworth 4. The Three Estates in Parliament who they were in King James 's Speech in Parliament 1620. 5. An Authentick and Impartial Account of the beginning of the Troubles in Scotland and the Wars which ensued 6 The True State of our late Civil Wars their Beginnings Causes who the Aggressors c. The rest are too large to take notice here but may be seen in the Preface Varenius's Geography in Folio English Illustrated with many Copper Cuts Dr. Willis 's Works in Folio English The History of the Irish Rebellion traced from many precedings Acts to the grand Eruption the 23d of Octobers 1641. and thence pursued to the Act of Settlement 1662. Tracts Written by John Selden of the Inner-Temple Esq and Translated by the Eminent Dr. A. L. The 1st Jani Anglorum facies altera with large Notes thereupon 2ly Englands Epinomis 3ly Of the Original of Ecclesiastical Jurisdictions of Testaments The 4th of the Disposition or Administration of intestate Goods Mr. Scrivener 's Body of Divinity Dr. Cumber on the Liturgy in Folio Mr. Sam 's Britannia Ogleby's History of Africa Asia and America Bishop of St. Davids 's Vindication of the Bishops Rights to Vote in Capital Cases his seasonable Corrective The Compleat Catalogue to the end of Easter Term 1684. Newly Published Short Discourses upon the whole Common-Prayer designed to inform the Judgment and excite the Devotion of such as dayly use the same by Tho. Comber D. D. The Laver of Regeneration and the Cup of Salvation Two plain and profitable Discourses upon the two Sacraments The 1. laying open the Nature of Baptism and earnestly pressing the serious Consideration and Religious Observation of the Sacred Vow made by all Christians in their Baptism The other pressing as earnestly the frequent renewing of our Baptismal Vow at the Lords Holy Table Demonstrating the indispensible necessity of receiving and the great sin and danger of neglecting the Lords Supper with Answers to the chief Pretences whereby the Absenters would excuse themselves The General Catalogue of Books Printed in England since the Dreadfull Fire of 1666 to the end of Trinity Term 1684. To which are added a Catalogue of Latin Books Printed in Foreign Parts and in England since the year 1670. Printed for Rob. Clavel at the Peacock in St. Paul's Church-yard ERRATA PAg. 4. l. 1. r. is or involves in it Testimony l. ult for witnessed to r. tradition'd p. 5. l. 16. for the Application r. this Application p. 8. l. 7. for the use r. this use p. 9. l. 1. r. where there is p. 19. l. ult for blinded r. blended p. 35. in marg l. 21. for taxata r. laxata p. 40. l. 10. for part r. paragraph p. 49. l. 9. and 11. r. Methuselah l. 12. del very near p. 50. l. 23. for though r. through p. 53 p. 65. in marg l. ult del p. p. 67. l. 4. for Authors r. Others l. 7. after this way add or at least uncertainty which way p 94. in marg l. 12. 13. r. Cap. 10. Quaest 15. P. r. p. 96. in marg l. 5. for 82. r. 43. p. 105. l. 26. r. Christians are to yield p. 106. for or also r. else p. 107 l. 3. for Traditions r. Tradition p. 149. in marg l. 6 after p. 108. add Of this Cressy also may be seen During those worst times thereof i. e. the Church when ignorance worldliness pride tyranny c. reigned with so much scope I mean during the time of about six Ages before Luther Exom Cap. 68. p. 151. l. 2. del above l. 4. r. Pamphilius p. 154. l. 15. for all Protestants do declare r. I have the leave of all Protestants to declare p. 157. l. 15 for Writings about r. Writings above p. 162. l. 10. r. the holy Scriptures l. 24. r. Or 2ly p. 168. in marg l. 9. r. His igitur p. 172. in marg l. ult del Evangel nigrum Atram Thool p. 178. l. 5. del would r. owns p. 179. l. 19. for p. 29 r. 39. p. 211. l. 2. after semi-colon r. what was committed to them they did carefully preserve p. 218. l. 15. for their r. those p. 224 l. 20. r. they have only p. 225. l. 3. for their r. this p. 229. l. 3. r. is no farther