them to perceive its holyness and worth Where it is indeed sincerely practised And is most dishonoured and misunderstood through the wickedness of Hypocrites who profess it As the Impress on the Wax doth make the Image more discernable than the Sculpture on the Seal but the Sculpture is true and perfect when many accidents may render the Impressed image imperfect and faulty So is it in this case To a diligent Enquirer Christianity is best known in its Principles delivered by Christ the Author of it and indeed is no otherwise perfectly known because it is no where else perfectly to be seen But yet it is much more visible and taking with unskilfull superficial Observers in the Professors Lives For they can discern the good or evil of an action who perceive not the nature of the Rule and Precepts The vital form in the Rose-tree is the most excellent part but the beauty and sweetness of the Rose is more easily discerned Effects are most sensible but causes are most excellent And yet in some respect the Practice of Religion is more excellent than the Precepts in as much as the Precepts are Means to Practice For the end is more excellent than the Means as such A poor man can easilyer perceive the worth of Charity in the person that cloatheth and feedeth and relieveth him than the worth of a treatise or sermon of Charity Subjects easily perceive the worth of a wise and holy and just and mercifull King or Magistrate in his actual Government who are not much taken with the Precepts which require yet more perfection And among all descriptions historical Narratives like Zenophons Cyrus do take most with them Doubtless if ever the Professors of Christianity should live according to their own Profession they would thereby overcome the opposition of the World and propagate their Religion with greatest success through all the Earth Because no man can well judge of the Truth of a doctrine till he first know what it is I think it here necessary to open the true nature of the Christian Religion and tell men truly what it is Partly because I perceive that abundance that profess it hypocritically by the meer power of Education Laws and Custom of their Countrey do not understand it and then are the easilyer tempted to neglect or contemn it or forsake it if strongly tempted to it even to forsake that which indeed they never truely received And because its possible some Aliens to Christianity may peruse these lines Otherwise were I to speak only to those that already understand it I might spare this description § 7. The CHRISTIAN RELIGION containeth two Parts 1. All Theological Verities which are of Natural Revelation 2. Much more which is supernaturally revealed The supernatural Revelation is said in it to be partly written by God partly delivered by Angels partly by inspired Prophets and Apostles and partly by Jesus Christ himself in person § 8. The supernatural Revelation reciteth most of the Natural because the searching of the great Book of Nature is a long and difficult work for the now-corrupted dark and slothfull minde of the common sort of men § 9. These supernatural Revelations are all contained 1. Most copiously in a Book called The Holy Bible or Canonical Scriptures 2. More summarily and contractedly in three Forms called The Belief The Lords Prayer and the Ten Commandements and most briefly and summarily in a Sacramental Covenant This last containeth all the Essential parts most briefly and the second somewhat fuller explaineth them and the first the holy Scriptures containeth also all the Integral parts or the whole frame § 10. Some of the present Professors of the Christian Religion do differ about the authority of some few Writings called Apocrypha whether they are to be numbred with the Canonical Books of God or not But those few containing in them no considerable points of doctrine different from the rest the controversie doth not very much concern the substance or doctrinal matter of their Religion § 11. The sacred Scriptures are written very much Historically the Doctrines being interspersed with the History § 12. This sacred Volume containeth two Parts The first called The Old Testament containing the History of the Creation and of the Deluge and of the Jewish Nation till after their Captivity As also their Law and Prophets The second called The New Testament containing the History of the Birth and Life and Death and Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus Christ The sending of his Apostles the giving of the Holy Ghost the course of their Ministry and Miracles with the summ of the doctrine preached first by Christ and then by them and certain Epistles of theirs to divers Churches and persons more fully opening all that doctrine § 13. The summ of the History of the Old Testament is this That in the beginning God created the Heaven and the Earth with all things in them Viz. That having first made the Intellectual superiour part of the World and the matter of the Elementary World in an unformed Mass he did the first day distinguish or form the active Element of Fire and caused it to give light The second day he separated the rarified Passive Element called Fire expanding it from the Earth upwards to be a separation and medium of action between the superiour and inferiour parts The third day he separated the rest of the Passive Element Earth and Water into their proper place and set their bounds and made individual Plants with their specifick forms and virtue of generation The fourth day he made the Sun Moon and Starrs for Luminaries to the Earth either then forming them or then appointing them to that Office but not revealing their other uses which are nothing to us The fifth day he made Fishes and Birds with the power of generation The sixth day he made the terrestrial Animals and Man with the like generative Power And the seventh day he appointed to be a Sabbath of Rest on which he would be solemnly worshipped by Mankinde as our CREATOR Having made one Man and one Woman in his own Image that is with Intellects Free-will and executive Power in wisdom holiness and aptitude to Obey him and with Dominion over the sensitive and vegetative and inanimate Creatures he placed them in a Garden of pleasure wherein were two Sacramental Trees one called The Tree of Life and the other the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil And besides the Law of Nature he tryed him only with this positive prohibition that he should not eat of the Tree of Knowledge Whereupon the Devil who before this was fallen from his first state of innocency and felicity took occasion to perswade the Woman that Gods Threatning was not true that he meant not as he spake that he knew Man was capable of greater Knowledge but envyed him that happiness and that the eating of that Fruit was not the way to death as God had threatned but to Knowledge and
the rude and ignorant part of the world All the truth which any Philosopher teacheth is God's truth and it is no wonder if a God of so much goodness do bless his own truth according to its nature and proportion who ever be the messenger of it Whether the success of Philosophy be ever the true sanctification and salvation of any souls is a thing that I meddle not with it belongeth not to us and therefore is not revealed to us But it is visible in the Gospel that all that part of practical doctrine which the Philosophers taught is contained in the doctrine of Christ as a part in the whole and therefore the impress and effect is more full and perfect as the doctrine and the impress and effect of the Philosophers doctrine can be no better than the cause which is partial and defective and mixt with much corruption and untruth All that is good in the Philosophers is in the doctrine of Christ but they had abundance of false opinions and idolatries to corrupt it when Christianity hath nothing but clean and pure So that as no Philosopher affirmed himself to be the Saviour so his doctrine was not attested by the plenary and common effect of Regeneration as Christ's was but as they were but the Ministers of the God of Nature so they had but an answerable help from God who could not be supposed however had they wrought miracles to have attested more than themselves asserted or laid claim to Object But Mahomet ventured on a higher arrogation and pretence and yet if his doctrine sanctifie men it will not justifie his pretences Answ 1. It is not proved that his Doctrine doth truly sanctifie any 2. The effect which it hath can be but lame defective and mixt with much vanity and error as his doctrine is for the effect cannot excell the cause 3. That part of his doctrine which is good and doth good is not his own but part of Christs from whom he borrowed it and to whom the good effects are to be ascribed 4. Mahomet never pretended to be the Son of God and Saviour of the World but only to be a Prophet Therefore his cause is much like that of the Philosophers forementioned saving that he giveth a fuller testimony to Christ 5. If Mahomet had proved his Word by antecedent Prophesies Promises and Types through many ages and by inherent purity and by concomitant Miracles and by such wonderfull subsequent communications of renewing sanctifying grace by the Spirit of God so ordinary in the World we should all have had reason to believe his Word But if he pretend only to be a Prophet and give us none of all these proofs but a foppish ridiculous bundle of Non-sense full of carnal doctrines mixt with holy truth which he had from Christ we must judge accordingly of his Authority and Word notwithstanding God may make use of that common truth to produce an answerable degree of Goodness among those that hear and know no better These Objections may be further answered anon among the rest And thus much shall here suffice of the great and cogent Evidences of the truth of the Christian Faith CHAP. VII Of the subservient proofs and means by which the forementioned Evidences are brought to our certain knowledge THE witness of the Spirit in the four wayes of Evidence already opened is proved to be sure and cogent if first it be proved to be true that indeed such a witness to Jesus Christ hath been given to the World The Argument is undenyable when the Minor is proved He whose Word is attested by God by many thousand years predictions by the inherent Image of God upon the frame of his doctrine by multitudes of uncontrolled Miracles and by the success of his Doctrine to the true Regeneration of a great part of the World is certainly to be believed But such is Jesus Christ Ergo I have been hitherto for the most part proving the Major Proposition and now come to the Minor as to the several branches § 1. I. The Prophetical Testimony of the Spirit is yet legible in the Promises Prophesies and Types and main design of the Old Testament § 2. The Books of Holy Scripture where all these are sound are certain uncorrupted records thereof preserved by the unquestioned tradition and care and to this day attested by the generall confession of the Jewes who are the bitterest enemies to Christianity There are no men of reason that I have heard of that deny the Books of Moses and the Psalms and the Prophets c. to be indeed those that went under those titles from the beginning And that there can be no considerable corruption in them which might much concern their testimony to Christ the comparing of all the Copies and the Versions yet extant will evince together with the testimony of all sorts of enemies and the morall impossibility of their corruption But I will not stand to prove that which no sober adversary doth deny To these Books the Christians did appeal and to these the Jews profess to stand § 3. II. The constitutive inherent image of God upon the Gospel of Christ is also still visible in the Books themselves and needeth no other proof than a capable Reader as afore described § 4. The preaching and Writings of the Ministers of Christ do serve to illustrate this and help men to discern it but adde nothing to the inherent perfection of the Gospel for matter or for method § 5. III. The testimony of the age of Miracles fore-described can be known naturally no way but by sight or other senses to those present and by report or history to those absent § 6. The Apostles and many thousand others saw the Miracles wrought by Christ and needed no other proof of them than their senses The many thousands who at twice were fed by Miracle were witnesses of that The multitude were witnesses of his healing the blinde the lame the paralitick the Demoniacks c. The Pharisees themselves made the strictest search into the cure of the man born blinde Joh. 9. and the raising of Lazarus from the dead and many more His miracles were few of them hid but openly done before the World § 7. The Apostles and many hundreds more were witnesses of Christs own Resurrection and needed no other proof but their sense At divers times he appeared to them together and apart and yielded to Thomas his unbelief so farre as to call him to put his finger into his side and see the print of the Nails He instructed them concerning the Kingdom of God for forty dayes Act. 1. He gave them their Commission Mar. 16. Mat. 28. Joh. 21. He expostulated with Peter and engaged him to feed his Lambs He was seen of more than five hundred brethren at once And lastly appeared after his ascension to Paul and to John that wrote the Revelations § 8. The Apostles also were eye-witnesses of his ascension Act. 1. What he had foretold
A Sellius his milkie Veines and Pecquets Receptacle of the Chyle and Bartholines Glandules and the Vasa Lymphatica are of late discovery Galilaeus his Glasses and his four Medicaean Planets and the Lunary mutations of Venus and the strange either opacous parts and shape of Saturn or the proximity of two other Stars which mishape it to our sight the shadowy parts of the Moon c. with the innumerable Stars in the Via Lactea c. were all unknown to former ages Gilberts magnetical discoveries I speak not of those questionable Inferences which Campanella and others contradict the nature of many Minerals and Plants the chief operations and effects of Chymistry abundance of secrets for the cure of many diseases even the most excellent medicaments are all of very late invention Almost all Arts and Sciences are encreasing neerer towards Perfection Ocular demonstrations by the Telescope and sensible experiments are daily multiplyed Yea the World it self is not all discovered to any one part but a great part of it was but lately made known even to the Europeans whose knowledge is greatest by Columbus and Americus Vesputianus and it is not long since it was first measured by a Circumnavigation If the World had been eternall or of much longer duration than the Scripture speaketh it is not credible that multiplyed experiences would not have brought it above that Infancy of knowledge in which it so long continued Obj. Cursed Warrs by Fire and Depopulation consume all Antiquities and put the World still to begin anew Answ It doth indeed do much this way but it is not so much that Warre could do For when it is in one Countrey others are free and some would fly or lie hid or survive who would preserve Arts and Sciences and be teachers of the rest Who can think now that any Wars are like to make America or Galilaeus's Stars unknown again or any of the forenamed Inventions to be lost 2. Moreover it is strange if the World were eternall or much elder than Scripture speaketh that no part of the World should shew us any elder Monument of Antiquity no engraven Stones or Plates no Mausolus Pyramids or Pillars no Books no Chronological Tables no Histories or Genealogies or other Memorials and Records I know to this also cursed Warrs may contribute much But not so much as to leave nothing to inquisitive Successors § 2. II. It greatly confirmeth my belief of the Holy Scriptures to finde by certain experience the Original and Vniversal pravity of mans nature how great it is and wherein it doth consist exactly agreeing with this Sacred Word when no others have made such a full discovery of it This I have opened and proved before and he is a stranger to the World and to himself that seeth it not Were it not lest I weary the Reader with length how fully and plainly could I manifest it § 3. III. The certain observation of the universal Spiritual Warre which hath been carryed on according to the first Gospel between the Woman's and the Serpent's seed doth much confirm me of the truth of the Scriptures Such a contrariety there is even between Cain and Abel Children of the same Father such an implacable enmity throughout all the World in almost all wicked men against Godliness it self and those that sincerely love and follow it such a hatred in those that are Orthodoxly bred against the true power use and practice of the Religion which they themselves profess such a resolute resistance of all that is seriously good and holy and tendeth but to the saving of the resisters that it is but a publick visible acting of all those things which the Scripture speaketh of and a fulfilling them in all ages and places in the sight of all the World Of which having treated largely in my Treatise against Infidelity of the sin against the Holy Ghost I referre you thither § 4. IV. It much confirmeth me to finde that there is no other Religion professed in the World that an impartial rational man can rest in That man is made for another life the light of Nature proveth to all men And some way or other there must be opened to us to attain it Mahometanisme I think not worthy a confutation Judaisme must be much beholden to Christianity for its proofs and is but the introduction to it inclusively considered The Heathens or meer Naturalists are so blinde so idolatrous so divided into innumerable sects so lost and bewildred in uncertainties and shew us so little holy fruit of their Theology that I can incline to no more than to take those natural Verities which they confess and which they cast among the rubbish of their fopperies and wickedness and to wipe them clean and take them for some part of my Religion Christianity or nothing is the way § 5. V. It much confirmeth me to observe that commonly the most true and serious Christians are the holyest and most honest righteous men and that the worse men are the greater enemies they are to true Christianity And then to think how incredible it is that God should lead all the worst men into the truth and leave the best and godlyest in an error In small matters or common secular things this were no wonder But in the matter of Believing worshipping and pleasing God and saving of Souls it is not credible As for the belief of a Life to come no men are so far from it as the vilest Whoremongers Drunkards perjured persons Murderers Oppressors Tyrants Thieves Rebels or if any other name can denote the worst of men And none so much believe a Life to come as the most godly honest-hearted persons And can a man that knoweth that there is a God believe that he will leave all good men in so great an error and rightly inform and guide all these Beasts or living walking images of the Devil The same in a great measure is true of the friends and enemies of Christianity § 6. VI. It hath been a great convincing argument with me against both Atheisme and Infidelity to observe the marvelous Providences of God for divers of his servants and the strange answer of Prayers which I my self and ordinarily other Christians have had I have been and am as backward to ungrounded credulity about wonders as most men that will not strive against knowledge But I have been oft convinced by great experience and testimonies which I believed equally with my eye-sight of such actions of God as I think would have convinced most that should know as much of them as I did But few of them are fit to mention For some of them so much concern my self that strangers may be tempted to think that they savour of self-esteem and some of them the factions and parties in these times will by their interest be engaged to distaste And some of them have been done on persons whose after scandalous Crimes have made me think it unfit to mention them lest I should seem
of all this Bible uno intuitu in a perfect scheme as it is truly intended by the Spirit of God if you saw all begin the Divine Unity and branch out it self into the Trinity and thence into the Trinity of Relations and Correlations and thence into the multiplied branches of Mercy and Precepts and all these accepted and improved in Duty and Gratitude by man and returned up in Love to the blessed Trinity and Unity again and all this in perfect order proportion and harmony you would see the most admirable perfect method that ever was set before you in the world The resemblance of it is in the circular motion of the humours and spirits in mans body which are delivered on from vessel to vessel and perfected in all their motions I know there are many systems and schemes attempted which shew not this but that is because the wisdom of this method is so exceeding great that it is yet but imperfectly understood for my own part I may say as those that have made some progress in Anatomy beyond their Ancestors that they have no thought that they have yet discovered all but rejoyce in what they have discovered which shewed them the hopes and possibility of more So I am far from a perfect comprehension of this wonderful method of Divinity but I have seen that which truly assureth me that it excelleth all the art of Philosophers and Orators and that it is really a most beautiful frame and harmonious consort and that more is within my prospect than I am yet come to 4. Moreover it is Christ who gave all men all the gifts they have to Logicians Orators Astronomers Grammarians Physicians and Musicians c. what ever gifts are suited to mens just ends and callings he bestoweth on them and to his Apostles he gave those gifts which were most suitable to their work I do not undervalue the gifts of Nature or Art in any I make it not with Aristotle an argument for the contempt of Musick Jovem neque canere neque cytharam pulsare but I may say that as God hath greater excellencies in himself so hath he greater gifts to give and such gifts as were fittest for the confirmation of the truth of the Gospel and first planting of the Churches he gave to the Apostles and such as were fit for the edifying of the Church he giveth to his Ministers ever since And such as were fit for the improvement of Nature in lower things he gave the Philosophers and Artists of the world Object XVII The Scripture hath many contradictions in it in points of History Chronology and other things Therefore it is not the word of God Answ Nothing but ignorance maketh men think so understand once the true meaning and allow for the errors of Printers Transcribers and Translators and there will no such thing be found Young Students in all Sciences think their books are full of contradictions which they can easily reconcile when they come to understand them Books that have been so oft translated into so many Languages and the Originals and Translations so oft transcribed may easily fall into some disagreement between the Original and Translations and the various Copies may have divers inconsiderable verbal differences But all the world must needs confess that in all these Books there is no contradiction in any point of Doctrine much less in such as our salvation resteth on There are two opinions among Christians about the Books of the holy Scripture the one is That the Scriptures are so entirely and perfectly the product of the Spirit 's Inspiration that there is no word in them which is not infallibly true The other is That the Spirit was promised and given to the Apostles to enable them to preach to the world the true Doctrine of the Gospel and to teach men to observe what ever Christ commanded and truly to deliver the History of his Life and Sufferings and Resurrection which they have done accordingly But not to make them perfect and indefectible in every word which they should speak or write no not about Sacred things but only in that which they delivered to the Church as necessary to salvation and as the Rule of Faith and Life but every Chronological and Historical narrative is not the Rule of Faith or Life I think that the first opinion is right and that no one errour or contradiction in any matter can be proved in the Scriptures yet all are agreed in this that it is so of Divine Inspiration as yet in the manner and method and style to partake of the various abilities of the Writers and consequently of their humane imperfections And that it is a meer mistake which Infidels deceive themselves by to think that the Writings cannot be of Divine Inspiration unless the Book in order and style and all other excellencies be as perfect as God himself could make it Though we should grant that it is less Logical than Aristotle and less Oratorical and Grammatical and exact in words than Demosthenes or Cicero it would be no disparagement to the certain truth of all that is in it It doth not follow that David must be the ablest man for strength nor that he must use the weapons which in themselves are most excellent if he be called of God to overcome Goliah but rather that it may be known that he is called of God he shall do it with less excellence of strength and weapons than other men and so there may be some real weakness not culpable in the Writings of the several Prophets and Apostles in point of style and method which shall shew the more that they are sent of God to do great things by little humane excellency of speech and yet that humane excellency be never the more to be disliked no more than a sword because David used but a sling and stone If Amos have one degree of parts and Jeremiah another and Isaiah another c. God doth not equal them all by Inspiration but only cause every man to speak his saving truth in their own language and dialect and style As the body of Adam was made of the common earth though God breathed into him a rational soul and so is the body of every Saint even such as may partake of the infirmities of parents so Scripture hath its style and language and methods so from God as we have our bodies even so that there may be in them the effects of humane imperfection and it is not so extraordinarily of God as the truth of the Doctrine is All is so from God as to be suitable to its proper ends but the body of Scripture is not so extraordinarily from him as the soul of it is as if it were the most excellent and exact in every kind of ornament and perfection The Truth and Goodness is the soul of the Scripture together with the power manifested in it and in these it doth indeed excel So that variety of gifts in the Prophets and
know without this were to know without knowledge Faith is an act or species of knowledge it is so far from being contrary to reason that it is but an act of cleared elevated reason it is not an act of immediate intuition of God or Jesus Christ himself but a knowledge of the truth by the divine evidence of its certainty they that wrangle against us for giving reason for our Religion seem to tell us that they have none for their own or else reprehend us for being men If they had to do with them who make God to be but the Prime Reason would they say that Faith is something above Reason and therefore something above God I believe that our Reason or Intellection is far from being univocally the same thing with God's but I believe that God is Intellection Reason or Wisdom eminenter though not formaliter and that though the name be first used to signifie the lower derivative Reason of many yet we have no higher to express the Wisdom of God by nor better notion to apprehend it by than this which is its Image I conclude therefore that § 1. The Christian Religion must be the most Rational in the world or that which hath the soundest reason for it if it be the truest And the proof of it must be by producing the evidences of its truth § 2. The evidence which Faith requireth is properly called Evidence of credibility § 3. When we speak of Humane Faith as such Credibility is somewhat short of proper Certainty but when we speak of Divine Faith or a Belief of God evidence of Credibility is evidence of Certainty § 4. The great Witness of Jesus Christ or the demonstrative Evidence of his Verity and Authority was The HOLY SPIRIT § 5. The Word or Doctrin of Jesus Christ hath four several infallible testimonies of God's Spirit which though each of them alone is convincing yet all together make up this one great Evidence that is 1. Antecedently 2. Constitutively or Inherently 3. Concomitantly and 4. Subsequently of which I shall speak in course § 6.1 Antecedently the Spirit of Prophecy was a Witness to Jesus Christ Under which I comprehend the prediction also of Types He that was many hundred years before yea from age to age fore-told to come as the Messiah or Saviour by Divine prediction of Promises Prophesies and Types is certainly the true Messiah our Saviour But Jesus Christ was so foretold Ergo. 1. For Promises and Prophesies Gen. 3.15 presently after the Fall of Adam God said I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between thy seed and her seed it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel As it is certain that it was Satan principally and the Serpent but instrumentally that is spoken of as the deceiver of Eve so it is as plain that it was Satan and his wicked followers principally and the Serpent and its seed only as the instruments that are here meant in the condemnation And that it is the seed of the woman by an excellency so called that is primarily here meant and under him her natural seed secondarily is proved not only by the Hebrew Masculine Gender but by the fulfilling of this Promise in the Expository effects and in other Promises to the like effect The rest of the Promises and Prophesies to this purpose are so many that to recite them all would swell the Book too big and therefore I must suppose that the Reader perusing the Sacred Scripture it self will acquaint himself with them there only a few I shall repeat Gen. 22.18 In thy seed shall all the Nations of the earth be blessed Gen. 49.10 The Scepter shall not depart from Judah nor a Law-giver from between his feet until Shiloh come The whole second Psalm is a Prophecy of the Kingdom of Christ Why do the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing The Kings of the earth set themselves and the Rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his Annointed c. Yet have I set my King upon my holy hill of Sion I will declare the decree the Lord hath said unto me Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession Be wise therefore O ye Kings be learned ye Judges of the earth serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce with trembling Kiss the Son lest he be angry and ye perish c. Psal 16.10 For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell neither wilt thou suffer thine holy one to see corruption Psal 22.16 17 18. Dogs have compassed me the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me they pierced my hands and my feet I may tell all my bones they look and stare upon me they part my garments among them and cast lots upon my vesture Psal 69.21 They gave me also gall for my meat and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink Isa 53. Who hath believed our report and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed for he shall grow up before him as a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground he hath no form nor comeliness and when we shall see him there is no beauty that we should desire him He is despised and rejected of men a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief and we hid as it were our faces from him he was despised and we esteemed him not Surely he hath born our griefs and carried our sorrows yet we did esteem him stricken smitten of God and afflicted But he was wounded for our transgressions he was bruised for our iniquities the chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes we are healed All we like sheep have gone astray we have turned every one to his own way and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all He was oppressed and he was afflicted yet he opened not his mouth he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before the shearers is dumb so he opened not his mouth He was taken from prison and from judgment and who shall declare his generation For he was cut off out of the land of the living for the transgression of my people was he stricken and he made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death because he had done no violence nor was any deceit in his mouth Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him he hath put him to grief When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin he shall see his seed he shall prolong his days and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand He shall see of the travel of his soul and shall be satisfied by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many for he shall bear their iniquities Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great and he shall divide the spoil
and blessedness of the Life to come that they say nothing of it that is ever likely to make any considerable number set their hearts on Heaven and to live a heavenly Life 9. They were so unacquainted with the nature and will of God that they taught and used such a manner of Worship as tended rather to delude and corrupt men than to sanctifie them 10. They medled so little with the inward sins and duties of the heart especially about the holy Love of God and their goodness was so much in outward acts and in meer respect to men that they were not like to sanctifie the Soul or make the Man good that his actions might be good but only to polish men for Civil Societies with the addition of a little Varnish of Superstition and Hypocrisie 11. Their very style is either suitable to dead speculation as a Lecture of Metaphysicks or sleight and dull and unlike to be effectual to convert and sanctifie mens Souls 12. Almost all is done in such a disputing sophistical way and clogg'd with so many obscurities uncertainties and self-contradictions and mixt in heaps of Physical and Logical Subtilties that they were unfit for the common peoples benefit and could tend but to the benefit of a few 13. Experience taught and still teacheth the World that Holy Souls and Lives that were sincerely set upon God and Heaven were strangers amongst the Disciples of the Philosophers and other Heathens Or if it be thought that there were some such among them certainly they were very few in comparison of true Christians and those few very dark and diseased and defective with us a Childe at ten years old will know more of God and shew more true piety than did any of their Philosophers with us poor women and labouring persons do live in that holiness and heavenliness of minde and conversation which the wisest of the Philosophers never did attain I spake of this before but here also thought meet to shew you the difference between the effect of Christs doctrine and the Philosophers 2. And that all this is justly to be imputed to Christ himself I shall now prove 1. He gave them a perfect pattern for his holy obedient heavenly Life in his own person and his conversation here on Earth 2. His Doctrine and Law requireth all this holiness which I described to you You finde the Prescript in his Word of which the holy Souls and Lives of men are but a transcript 3. All his Institutions and Ordinances are but means and helps to this 4. He hath made it the condition of mans Salvation to be thus holy in sincerity and to desire and seek after perfection in it He taketh no other for true Christians indeed nor will save any other at the last 5. All his comforting Promises of mercy and defence are made only to such 6. He hath made it the Office of his Ministers through the World to perswade and draw men to this Holiness And if you hear the Sermons and read the Books which any faithfull Minister of Christ doth preach or write you will soon see that this is the business of them all And you may soon perceive that these Ministers have another kinde of preaching and writing than the Philosophers had more clear more congruous more spiritual more powerfull and likely to win men to Holiness and Heavenliness When our Divines and their Philosophers are compared as to their promoting of true Holiness verily the latter seem to be but as Glow-worms and the former to be the Candles for the Family of God And yet I truly value the wisdom and virtue which I finde in a Plato a Seneca a Cicero an Antonine or any of them If you say our advantage is because coming after all we have the helps of all even of those Philosophers I answer mark in our Books and Sermons whether it be any thing but Christianity which we preach It is from Christ and Scripture that we fetch our Doctrine and not from the Philosophers we use their helps in Logick Physicks c. But that 's nothing to our Doctrine He that taught me to speak English did not teach me the Doctrine which I preach in English And he that teacheth me to use the Instruments of Logick doth not teach me the doctrine about which I use them And why did not those Philosophers by all their art attain to that skill in this Sacred work as the Ministers of Christ do when they had as much or more of the Arts than we I read indeed of many good Orations then used even in those of the Emperour Julian there is much good and in Antonine Arrian Epictetus Plutarch more And I read of much taking-Oratory of the Bonzii in Japan c. But compared to the endeavours of Christian Divines they are poor pedantick barren things and little sparks and the success of them is but answerable 7. Christ did before hand promise to send his Spirit into mens Souls to do all this work upon all his Chosen And as he promised just so he doth 8. And we finde by experience that it is the preaching of Christs doctrine by which the work is done It is by the reading of the sacred Scripture or hearing the Doctrine of it opened and applyed to us that Souls are thus changed as is before described And if it be by the medicines which he sendeth us himself by the hands of his own Servants that we are healed we need not doubt whether it be he that healed us His Doctrine doth it as the instrumental Cause for we finde it adapted thereunto and we finde nothing done upon us but by that Doctrine nor any remaining effect but what is the impression of it But his Spirit inwardly reneweth us as the Principal cause and worketh with and by the Word For we finde that the Word doth not work upon all nor upon all alike that are alike prepared But we easily perceive a voluntary distinguishing choice in the operation And we finde a power more than can be in the words alone in the effect upon our selves The heart is like the Wax and the Word like the Seal and the Spirit like the hand that strongly applyeth it We feel upon our hearts that though nothing is done without the Seal yet a greater force doth make the impression than the weight of the Seal alone could cause By this time it is evident that this work of Sanctification is the attestation of God by which he publickly owneth the Gospel and declareth to the World that Christ is the Saviour and his Word is true For 1. It is certain that this work of Renovation is the work of God For 1. It is his Image on the Soul It is the life of the Soul as flowing from his Holy Life wherein are contained the Trinity of Perfections It is the Power of the Soul by which it can overcome the Flesh the World and the Devil which without it none is able to do It is the
the rest would quickly detect it and be upon his head § 88. 9. Yea the many Sects and Contentions among Christians and the many Hereticks that were at enmity with them would certainly have detected any combination to corrupt the Scriptures § 89. 10. Some few Hereticks in the beginning did attempt to bring in the Gospel of Nicodemus and some other forged Writings and to have corrupted some parts of Scripture and the Churches presently cryed them down § 90. 11. Most Hereticks have pleaded these same Scriptures and denyed them not to be genuine Yea Julian Celsus Porphyry and other Heathens did not deny it but took it as a certain truth § 91. 12. The ancient Writers of the Church Clemens Ignatius Justin Irenaeus Tertullian Cyprian Arnobius Athenagoras Lactantius Eusebius Nazianzene Nyssen Basil Chrysostom Epiphanius Hierom Augustine c. do all cite these Scriptures as we now have them in all things material § 92. 13. The Christian Emperours have inserted the mention of some passages in their Laws in the same words as they are in our Bibles § 93. 14. Several Councils have not only cited several passages out of them but pleaded them still as the Word of God and enumerated the particular Books which constitute the whole Systeme All this set together will tell any man of reason consideration and impartiality that we have much fuller certainty that these Scriptures are the same which the first Churches received from the Apostles than they can have that Virgil's Ovid's Cicero's or Plutarch's works are theirs or that the Statutes of this Land are currant Yea were it not lest I be too tedious I might distinctly shew you the forementioned threefold certainty of all this 1. A moral certainty of the strongest humane Faith 2. A natural certainty grounded upon Physical impossibilities of the contrary 3. And somewhat of a Divine supernatural attestation by the continued blessing of God on the Scriptures for the sanctifying of souls in every age And this bringeth me up to the last part of this Chapter I have all this while been shewing how the three first parts of the Spirits witness to Christ are made known to us viz. Prophecy the Holyness of the Doctrine and Miracles I come now in a word to the fourth § 94. IV. How may we certainly know the fourth part of the SPIRITS witness to Christ viz. The success of his doctrine in the Regeneration of his Disciples and the actual saving them from their sins Answ I shall answer this 1. As to the times past and 2. As to the present age § 95. 1. What men have been in times past we have but these three wayes to know 1. By the History of those ages 2. By their remaining works 3. By their successors in whom their belief and qualities are continued And 1. that there have been holy persons in all ages yea that all true Christians were such we have as good testimony as History can afford whether you will judge of them by their profession life or sufferings 2. Their remaining works are very great testimonies what a spirit of Holiness Charity and Justice doth breath in the writings of those holy men which are come to our hands Clemens Romanus Ignatius Cyprian Ephrem Syrus Macarius Augustine Gregory Nazianzene Gr. Nyssen Basil Ambrose Chrysostom Salvian Cassianus Bernard c. 3. Those that succeed them at this day in the serious profession of Christianity are a living history of the virtues of their ancestors § 96. 2. Of the sanctity of the Christians of this present age there is a double knowledge to be had 1. By them that are Regenerate themselves 2. By them that are not Between these wayes of knowledge the difference must be great § 97. 1. As he that hath learning or love to his Parents or loyalty to his King or faithfulness to his friend may know that he hath it so may he that is renewed by the Spirit of God and hath a predominant love to God a heavenly minde and conversation a hatred of sin a delight in holiness a love to all men even his enemies a contempt of the World a mastery over his fleshly appetite sense and lusts a holy Government of his passions thoughts and tongue with a longing desire to be perfect in all this and a supporting hope to see Gods glory and enjoy him in the delights of Love and Praise for evermore § 98. This evidence of the Spirit of Sanctification in our selves is not the reason or motive of our first faith but of our confirmation and fuller assurance in believing afterwards For a man must in some sort believe in Christ before he can know that he is sanctifyed by him The rest of the motives are sufficient to begin the work of Faith and are the means which God ordinarily useth to that end § 99. It is Christs appointed Method that by learning of Him and using his appointed means Men be brought up to such a degree of Holyness as to be able to discern this witness in themselves and thence to grow up to full assurance of Faith and Hope Therefore if any one that hath heard the Gospel do want this inward assuring testimony it is because they have been false to the truth and means before revealed to them He that will but enquire into the Gospel and receive it and obey it so far as he hath reason to do it and not be false to his own Reason and Interest shall receive that renewing sanctifying Spirit which will be an abiding witness in himself But if he will reject known truth and refuse known duty and neglect the most reasonable means that are proposed to him he must blame himself if he continue in unbelief and want that evidence which others have Suppose that in a common Plague one Physician should be famed to be the only and infallible Curer of all that take his remedies and suppose many defame him and say He is but a Deceiver and others tell you He hath cured us and many thousands and we can easily convince you that his Remedies have nothing in them that is hurtfull and therefore you may safely try them especially having no other help He that will so far believe in him and trust him now as to try his Remedies may live but he that will not must blame none but himself if he die of his disease He that tryeth shall know by his own cure and experience that his Physician is no Deceiver And he that will not and yet complaineth that he wanteth that experimental knowledge doth but talk like a peevish self-destroyer § 100. 2. He that yet hath not the evidence of the Spirit of Regeneration in himself may yet be convinced that it is in others and thereby may know that Christ is indeed the Saviour of the World and no deceiver Even as in the aforesaid instance he that never tryed the Physician himself yet if he see thousands cured by him may know by that that
advantage of honour to his mercy and in the fullest demonstration of that love and goodness which may win our love And where will you find this done but in Jesus Christ alone 2. You must distinguish between Anger and Justice when God is said to be angry it meaneth no more but that he is displeased with sin and sinners and executeth his governing-justice on them 3. You must distinguish between sufferings in themselves considered and as in their signification and effects God loved not any mans pain and suffering and death as in it self considered and as evil to us no not of a sacrificed beast but he loveth the demonstration of his truth and justice and holiness and the vindication of his Laws from the contempt of sinners and the other good ends attained by this means and so as a means adapted to such ends he loveth the punishment of sin Object XV. It is a suspicious sign that he seeketh but to set up his name and get disciples that he maketh it so necessary to salvation to believe in him and not only to repent and turn to God Answ He maketh not believing in him necessary sub ratione finis as our holiness and love to God is but only sub ratione medii as a means to make us holy and work us up to the love of God He proclaimeth himself to be the Way the Truth and the Life by whom it is that we must come to the Father and that he will save to the uttermost all that come to God by him Heb. 7.25 Joh. 14.6 So that he commandeth Faith but as the bellows of Love to kindle in us the heavenly flames And I pray you how should he do this otherwise Can we learn of him if we take him for a deceiver Will we follow his example if we believe him not to be our pattern Will we obey him if we believe not that he is our Lord Will we be comforted by his gracious promises and covenant and come to God with ever the more boldness and hope of mercy if we believe not in his Sacrifice and Merits Shall we be comforted at death in hope that he will justifie us and receive our souls if we believe not that he liveth and will judge the world and is the Lord of life and glory Will you learn of Plato or Aristotle if you believe not that they are fit to be your Teachers Or will you take Physick of any Physician whom you trust not but take him for a deceiver Or will you go in the Vessel with a Pilot or serve in the Army under a Captain whom you cannot trust To believe in Christ which is made so necessary to our justification and salvation is not a dead opinion nor the joyning with a party that cryeth up his name But it is to become Christians indeed that is to take him unfeignedly for our Saviour and give up our selves to him by resolved consent or covenant to be saved by him from sin and punishment and reconciled to God and brought to perfect holiness and glory This is true justifying and saving faith And it is our own necessities that have made this faith so necessary as a means to our own salvation And shall we make it necessary for our selves and then quarrel with him for making it necessary in his Covenant Object XVI If Christ were the Son of God and his Apostles inspired by the holy Ghost and the Scriptures were God's Word they would excel all other men and writings in all true rational worth and excellency whereas Aristotle excelleth them in Logick and Philosophy and Cicero and Demosthenes in Oratory and Seneca in ingenious expressions of morality c. Answ You may as well argue that Aristotle was no wiser than a Minstrel because he could not fiddle so well nor than a Painter because he could not limn so well or than a harlot because he could not dress himself so neatly Means are to be estimated according to their fitness for their ends Christ himself excelled all mankind in all true perfections and yet it became him not to exercise all mens arts to shew that he excelleth them He came not into the world to teach men Architecture Navigation Medicine Astronomy Grammar Musick Logick Rhetorick c. and therefore shewed not his skill in these The world had sufficient helps and means for these in Nature It was to save men from sin and hell and bring them to pardon holiness and heaven that Christ was incarnate and that the Apostles were inspired and the Scriptures written and to be fitted to these ends is the excellency to be expected in them and in this they excell all persons and writings in the world As God doth not syllogize or know by our imperfect way of ratiocination but yet knoweth all things better than syllogizers do so Christ hath a more high and excellent kind of Logick and Oratory and a more apt and spiritual and powerful style than Aristotle Demosthenes Cicero or Seneca He shewed not that skill in methodical healing which Hippocrates and Galen shewed But he shewed more and better skill when he could heal with a word and raise the dead and had the power of life and death so did he bring more convincing evidence than Aristotle and perswaded more powerfully than Demosthenes or Cicero And though this kind of formal learning was below him and below the inspired messengers of his Gospel yet his inferiour servants an Aquinas a Scotus an Ockam a Scaliger a Ramus a Gassendus do match or excel the old Philosophers and abundance of Christians equalize or excel a Demosthenes or Cicero in the truest Oratory 2. His mercy had a general design for the salvation of all sorts and ranks of men and therefore was not to confine it self to a few trifling pedantick Logicians and Orators or those that had learned to speak in their new-made words and phrases but he must speak in the common Dialect of all those whom he would instruct and save As the Statutes of the land or the Books of Physick which are most excellent are written in a style which is fitted to the subject matter and to the Readers and not in Syllogisms or terms of Logick so was it more necessary that it should be with the doctrine of salvation The poor and unlearned were the greatest number of those that were to be converted and saved by the Gospel and still to use the holy Scriptures 3. There is greater exactness of true Logical method in some parts of the Scripture as e. g. in the Covenant of Faith the Lord's Prayer and the Decalogue than any is to be found in Aristotle or Cicero though men that understand them not do not observe it The particular Books of Scripture were written at several times and on several occasions and not as one methodical system though the Spirit that indited it hath made it indeed a methodical system agreeably to its design but if you saw the doctrines
me who I know canst neither be deceived or by any falshood or seduction deceive On thee therefore O my dear Redeemer do I cast and trust this sinful soul with Thee and with thy holy Spirit I renew my Covenant I know no other I have no other I can have no other Saviour but thy self To thee I deliver up this soul which thou hast redeemed not to be advanced to the wealth and honours and pleasures of this world but to be delivered from them and to be healed of sin and brought to God and to be saved from this present evil world which is the portion of the ungodly and unbelievers to be washed in thy Bloud and illuminated quickned and confirmed by thy SPIRIT and conducted in the ways of holiness and love and at last to be presented justified and spotless to the Father of spirits and possessed of the glory which thou hast promised O thou that hast prepared so dear a medicine for the clensing of polluted guilty souls leave not this unworthy soul in its guilt or in its pollution O thou that knowest the Father and his Will and art nearest to him and most beloved of him cause me in my degree to know the Father acquaint me with so much of his will as concerneth my duty or my just encouragement leave not my soul to groap in darkness seeing thou art the Sun and Lord of Light O heal my estranged thoughts of God! is he my light and life and all my hope and must I dwell with him for ever and yet shall I know him no better than thus shall I learn no more that have such a Teacher and shall I get no nearer him while I have a Saviour and a Head so near O give my faith a clearer prospect into that better world and let me not be so much unacquainted with the place in which I must abide for ever And as thou hast prepared a Heaven for holy souls prepare this too-unprepared soul for Heaven which hath not long to stay on earth And when at death I resign it into thy hands receive it as thine own and finish the work which thou hast begun in placing it among the blessed Spirits who are filled with the sight and love of God I trust thee living let me trust thee dying and never be ashamed of my trust And unto Thee the Eternal Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son the Communicative LOVE who condescendest to make Perfect the Elect of God do I deliver up this dark imperfect soul to be further renewed confirmed and perfected according to the holy Covenant Refuse not to bless it with thine indwelling and operations quicken it with thy life irradiate it by thy light sanctifie it by thy love actuate it purely powerfully and constantly by thy holy motions And though the way of this thy sacred influx be beyond the reach of humane apprehension yet let me know the reality and saving power of it by the happy effects Thou art more to fouls than souls to bodies than light to eyes O leave not my soul as a carrion destitute of thy life nor its eyes as useless destitute of thy light nor leave it as a senseless block without thy motion The remembrance of what I was without thee doth make me fear lest thou shouldest with-hold thy grace Alass I feel I daily feel that I am dead to all good and all that 's good is dead to me if thou be not the life of all Teachings and reproofs mercies and corrections yea the Gospel it self and all the liveliest Books and Sermons are dead to me because I am dead to them yea God is as no God to me and Heaven as no Heaven and Christ as no Christ and the clearest evidences of Scripture verity are as no proofs at all if thou represent them not with light and power to my soul Even as all the glory of the world is as nothing to me without the light by which it 's seen O thou that hast begun and given me those heavenly intimations and desires which flesh and bloud could never give me suffer not my folly to quench these sparks nor this bruitish flesh to prevail against thee nor the powers of hell to stifle and kill such a heavenly seed O pardon that folly and wilfulness which hath too often too obdurately and too unthankfully striven against thy grace and depart not from an unkind and sinful soul I remember with grief and shame how I wilfully bore down thy motions punish it not with desertion and give me not over to my self Art thou not in Covenant with me as my Sanctifier and Confirmer and Comforter I never undertook to do these things for my self but I consent that thou shouldest work them on me As thou art the Agent and Advocate of Jesus my Lord O plead his cause effectually in my soul against the suggestions of Satan and my unbelief and finish his healing saving work and let not the flesh or world prevail Be in me the resident witness of my Lord the Author of my Prayers the Spirit of Adoption the Seal of God and the earnest of mine inheritance Let not my nights be so long and my days so short nor sin eclipse those beams which have often illuminated my soul Without thee Books are senseless scrawls studies are dreams learning is a glow-worm and wit is but wantonness impertinency and folly Transcribe those sacred precepts on my heart which by thy dictates and inspirations are recorded in thy holy word I refuse not thy help for tears and groans but O shed abroad that love upon my heart which may keep it in a continual life of love And teach me the work which I must do in Heaven refresh my soul with the delights of holiness and the joys which arise from the believing hopes of the everlasting Joys Exercise my heart and tongue in the holy praises of my Lord. Strengthen me in sufferings and conquer the terrors of death and hell Make me the more heavenly by how much the faster I am hastening to heaven and let my last thoughts words and works on earth be likest to those which shall be my first in the state of glorious immortality where the Kingdom is delivered up to the Father and GOD will for ever be All and In all of whom and through whom and to whom are all things To whom be glory for ever Amen CHAP. XIII Consectaries 1. What Party of Christians should we joyn with or be of seeing they are divided into so many Sects I Shall briefly dispatch the Answer of this Question in these following Propositions § 1. GODLYNESS and CHRISTIANITY is our only Religion and if any party have any other we must renounce it § 2. The Church of Christ being his Body is but One and hath many Parts but should have no Parties but Vnity and Concord without Division § 3. Therefore no Christian must be of a Party or Sect as such that is as