none of the pretended Rules of Faith all of them building on Scripture's Letter are Certain Disc. 2. 3 4. without Tradition it follows that no other company have any Principle of Distinction from others that is either of Constitution or self-preservation under the notion of Church but that which adheres to Tradition All the loud out-cry then made commonly against that Body which adheres to Tradition callâ—d Roman-Catholick for accounting it self onely the Vniversal Church and excluding all others is but empty noise and her claim rational and well-grounded till it be shown by evident Discourse that the other Pretenders have some other more Evident and Certain Rule to know who are of the Church who not than this of Tradition now produc't and explicated upon which she proceeds and by which she consists 12. There is no arguing against Tradition out of Scripture For since as we have prov'd Disc. 4. there can be no absolute Certainty of Scripture's Letter without Tradition this must first be suppos'd Certain ere the Scripture's Letter can be rationally held such and consequently ought in reason to be held Vncertain while Tradition is thought â—it to be argu'd against that is while it's Certainty is doubted of Wherefore since none can argue solidly upon uncertain Grounds none ought to argue against Tradition out of the Letter of Scripture 13. None can in reason oppose the Authority of the Church or any Church against Tradition First because in reality Tradition rightly understood is the same thing materially with the living Voicâ— and Practice of the whole Church Essential consisting of Pastors and Layity which is so ample that it includes all imaginable Authority which can be conceiv'd to be in a Church Secondly because in the way of generating Faith Tradition formally taken is antecedent to Disc. 2. § 11. and so in the way of Discourse working by formal and abstracted notions its notion must be presuppos'd and its Certainty establish't before the notion and Certainty of Faith consequently of Faithful and consequently of Church which must necessarily be a congregation of Faithful Whence they would argue very preposterously who should go about to oppose Church against Tradition this being the same as to think to establish the House by overthrowing the Foundation 14. None can in reason oppose the Authority of Fathers or Councils against Tradition This is evident by the former Corol. 13. in regard neither of these have any Authority but as Representatives of the Church or Eminent Members of the Church Nor can any determin certainly what is a Father or Council Disc. 2. § 11. till the notion of Church that is of Faithful that is of Faith that is of Rule of Faith that is of Tradition be certainly establish't 15. No Disacknowledgers of Tradition are in Due of reason but in Courtesy onely to be allow'd to argue out of Scripture's Letter Father or Council For since wanting Tradition they have Certainty of none of those as was prov'd Disc. 2. § 11. 't is manifest that disacknowledging Tradition while they alledge and talk of these they alledge and talk of things themselves do not know to be Certain Wherefore 't is too great a Condescendence and courtesy in Catholiks to let them run forwards descanting with wordish Discourses on those Testimonies after their raw manner since they might justly take their advantage against them and show they have no right to make use of Principles which their own Grounds can never make good to them as was Tertullian's smart and solid way de Praescr Haeret. c. 15 16 17 18 19 20 21. denying them the use of Scripture who deny'd the Church which would save many an aiery confus'd discourse about words unapt to evidence any thing satisfactorily Nor can the right of an Opponent to argue ad hominem licence them to claim this favour from our Controvertists in regard we never held that Scriptures Letter hammer'd upon by Criticisms and such pretty knacks of human Learning was the Ground of our Faith nor the way to establish it but onely as interpreted by the Language and Practice of the Church nor consequently can we hold it capable to be prejudic't by such endeavours of private Wits Though then we should allow them a Copy of the Letter and consequently so far a liberty to argue ad hominem against us yet we never allow'd their method of arguing from it as efficacious either to build or evert Faiâ—h but our learned Controvertists ever held direct contrary Whence in case they clamour that in not following their wild method we desert Scripture to avoid which calumny with the vulgar I conceive one reason our Controvertists generally were so civil to them as to cope with them in their fleight way the unreasonableness of the Calumny is to be made appear which is quicklier done not their unreasonable expectation to be satisfy'd 16. No Authority from any History or Testimonial Writing is valid against the force of Tradition For since Falshood is as easy to be writ or printed as Truth 't is evident those Books can give no Testimony to themselves that what they express is certainly true and if we say they are abetted by the Testimony of other Books the same question recurrs concerning them in what Age soever they were writ It remains then that 't is onely the Acceptation of Men or Sence writ in their Hearts and so convey'd down from Father to Son that these Books are true Histories and not Fables which gives them any Authority But this has plainly the nature of Tradition They have therefore no Authority but by force of Tradition Therefore they can have no possible force against Tradition since if Tradition or the conveying down from hand to hand sence writ thus universally in men's hearts can deceive us no such Books can have any Authority at all Wherefore not the Books but the Sence writ in men's hearts of the Goodness and skill of the Authours of those Books upon which qualifications the Truth of each passage contain'd in those Books is built is to be alledg'd against Christian Tradition since 't is that Sence which authorizes those Books and gives Credibility to those passages and so is stronger than any dead Testimony from the Books themselves Which devolves into this that onely some great Tradition or living Testimony for things past can in point of Authority be pretended an equal match to Christian Tradition or competent to be alledgâ—d against it 17. No Tradition is alledg'd or alledgeable in reason against Christian Tradition That none is alledgâ—d is Evident from matter of Fact For the Adversaries of Catholick Tradition never pretend the Consent or constant Sence of great multitudes deriv'd from age to age by living voice that at such a time former Tradition was relinquish't new Faith introduc't or the old Faith chang'd or abolisht but onely odd ends or scraps of Histories or other dead Testimonies according as they light on some passage which seems favourable to them or may
blotted worn out c. Which though it seems a remote and impertinent Exception yet to one who considers the wise Dispositions of Divine Providence it will deserve a deep Consideration For seeing the Salvation of Mankind is the End of God's making Nature the means to it should be more settled strong and unalterable than any other piece of Nature whatever Putting then Scripture's Letter to be this Rule and that all its Significativeness of God's Sence that is all its virtue of a Rule is lost if the material Characters its Basis be destroy'd or alter'd who sees not a very disorderly proceeding in laying so weak means in such immediateness to so main an end and concludes not thence that Faith's Rule ought in right reason have a better Basis than such perishable and alterable Elements 3. Reflecting next on those material Characters in complexion with the Causes actually laid in the world to preserve them entire we shall find that either those Causes are Material and then themselves are also liable to continual alterations and innumerable Contingencies or Spiritual that is men's Minds Now these being the noblest pieces in Nature and freed in part from Physical mutability by their Immateriality we may with good reason hope for a greater degree of constancy from them than from any other and indeed for a perfect unalterableness from their Nature and this being to conceive Truth an Inerrableness if due circumstances be observ'd that is if due proposals be made to beget Certain Knowledge and due care us'd to attend to such Proposals Otherwise their very Createdness and Finitness entitle them to defectibility besides their obnoxiousness to mutation and perpetual alteration through the alloy of their material Compart I call it due proposal when it must necessarily affect the Sense and so beget natural Knowledge or when unequivocal terms are so immediately and orderly laid that the Conclusion must as necessarily be seen in the Premises as that the same thing cannot both be and not-be at once by a mind inur'd to reflexion and speculation and I call that due care which preserves the Soul in such temper as permits the objects impression to be heeded and the Mind to be affected by it 4. This premised we may reflect that the Rule of Faith as was provd Disc. 1. § 4 5 10 11. must be obvious to men of ordinary Sence and not onely to Speculators as also that Objects of the Senses may be of two sorts Of the the first are things in Nature or else simple vulgar actions and plain matters of Fact which if oft repeated and familiariz'd are unmistakable and consequently the perceiver inerrable in such a matter Of the second are such actions as are compounded and made up of an innumerable multitude of several particularities to be observed every of which may be mistaken apart each being a distinct little action in its single self Such as is the transcribing a whole book consisting of such myriads of words single Letters and Tittles or Stops and the several actions of writing over each of these so short and cursory that it prevents diligence and exceeds human care to keep awake and apply distinct attentions to every of these distinct actions And yet to do our Opposers right I doubt not but each of these failings may possibly be provided against by oft-repeated Corrections of many sedulous and sober examiners set apart for that business and that the truth of the Letter of an whole Book might to a very great degree if not altogether be ascertain'd to us were the Examiners of each Copy known to be very numerous prudent and honest and each of them testifying his single examination of it word by word For then the difficulty consisting in the multiplicity and the variety is provided against by the multitude of the preserving Causes and their multifariousness made convictive to us by their well-testify'd consent 5. To apply this discourse to the matter in hand If we were Certain there had been anciently a multitude of Examiners of the Scripture's Letter in each Copy taken from the first Original or the next Copies from these and so forwards with the exact care we have defin'd the single Examinations of each and the amendment of the Copy according to their Examinations convincingly testify'd and that by Excommunication or heavy Ecclesiastical Prohibitions and Mulcts it had been provided for from the beginning that none should presume to take a Copy of it and that Copy be permitted to be read or seen till it were thus examined much might have been said for the Certainty of the Scripture's Letter upon these men's Principles But if no such Orders or Exactness was ever heard of especially of the New Testament upon the Truth of whose Letter they build Christian Faith If the multitudes of Letters Commaes blottings or illegibleness of the Originals like-appearance of Letters and even whole Words in in the Book like-sounding in the ear or fancy of the Transcriber possibility of misplacing omitting inserting c. did administer very fruitful occasions to human overâ—ight If the more Copies were taken the more the errours were like to grow and the farther from correcting If Experience testifies no such exact diligence has been formerly us'd by the diverse Readings of several Copies now extant and thousands of Corrections which have lately been made of the Vulgar Edition the most universally currant perhaps of any other what can we say but that for any thing these Principles afford Scriptures Letter may be uncertain in every tittle not withstanding the diligence which has de facto been used to preserve it uncorrupted in the way of those who hold it the onely Rule of Faith In their way I say who will not have the Sence of Christ's Doctrine writ in Christians hearts the Rule for the Correcters of the Letter to guide themselves by but the meer Letter of a formeâ— and God knows controvertible Copy out of which the Transcription and by which onely the Examination is made What Certainty accrues to Scripture's Letter by the means of Tradition or the living voice of the present Church in each Age is the Subject of another enquiry 6. Now as for the Certainty of the Scripture's Significativeness which is the other Branch nothing is more evident than that this is quite lost to all in the Uncertainty of the Letter and 〈◊〉 evident that 't is unattainable by the vulgar that is the better half of mankind since they are unfurnisht of those Arts and Skills as Languages Grammar Logick History Metaphysicks Divinity c. requisit to establish and render certain the sence they conceive the Letter ought to bear without which they can never make such an Interpretation of it but an acute Scholler skill'd in those means will be able to blunder theirs and make a seeming clearer one of his own In a word if we see eminent Wits of the Protestants and the Socinians making use of the self-same and as they conceive the best
of Science being to proceed from one piece of Sence to another they carry the war out of the bounds of Science where solid ground is to be found to fix ones fool upon so to overthrow or be overthrown and transfer it to a kind of Spatium Imaginarium of Fancy and unsignifying Sounds the proper sphere for Chimerical Discoursers to buz confusedly and make a noise in Where the Catholick must either let them alone and then they cry Victory or follow them thither and so hazard to prejudice his own cause by seeming to allow their method of discoursing Whereas indeed the Catholick is forc't by their Importunity exciting his Charity towards the unskilfull to show how weakly they discourse in their own shallow way 3. How little faulty the Catholick is in this will be quickly manifest if we consider that â—tis against his Principles and Involuntary in him to take this Method for he builds not upon those aiery Skirmishes for his Faith nor consequently esteems he it conquerable by such attempts he received his Faith from the present Church witnessing it's delivery from the former Age to this anchorage he sticks he stands on immemorial Possession nor doubts he that Christ ' s Doctrin is his true and proper inheritance while brought down by the testimony of so many Christian Nations As long as this foundation stands firm quirks hurt not him Shake this that is show the Church Essential is Mistress of falshood and he must doubt all his Faith but yet cannot hold the Protestants for he must hold nothing No Book can secure him when that Principle which onely can secure to us Books written long ago is insecure it self Now on the contrary the Protestant builds his Faith by thus hammering it out of unsenc't Characters and is quite overthrown would his will give his reason leave to follow his principles if another more dexterously fit the words to a sence inconsistent with his And his hopes of standing are not built as are the Catholicks on the self evidence of ony Thing or Principle but indeed on the Inevidence or Ambiguity of Words and his Way to manage them which is to let no Living Authority sence thew and so they will more easily change their shape as the ingenious contrivances of Fancy molds them and then if the discourse seem but a little plausible Education and Interest make the Vnderstanding content with very easiy satisfaction 4. I am far from blaming the Catholicks prudence for engaging on this manner I rather admire their Charity towards their weaker Brethren that at the expence of so much patience and pains such excellent Wits will condescend to so laborious a talk less sutable both to their own Genius as Catholick and to the nature of their Cause How easily might they rest secure upon Immovable Possession and demand Evidence and Demonstration from the Protestant who denies his right to Christs Doctrin How easily might he show their reasons inconclusive which method was observ'd by a late Learned Writer Mr. J. S. against that Pulpit-vapour of Dr. Pierce especially by discovering the unsatisfactoriness of the Method they take How most easily that they have never a Principle or self evident Ground to begin with That till they settle such a First Principle all their Discourse is frivolous That their rejecting the Churches Living Voice or Tradition brings all into doubt both Sayings of Fathers and Texts of Scripture And hence not to allow them the favour of disputing ad hominem from Scripture or Fathers by granting them any thing Certain but putting them to prove all For since they are to object and bring Evident Reason for changing it lies on them to make their reasons Evident nor has any Disputant right to have any thing allow'd him Certain who renounces that Principle which if renounctâ— all is Vncertain And lastly that he who denies the First Principle in any Science deserves not â—ay cannot in reason abstracted from circumstances be discourst with at all in that Science nor They in Controversy This will force them to lay some First or self-evident Principle which cannot fail to produce these two Advantages One to the World that it shall get into a method of concluding something with evidence The other to Catholick Religion For â—twill be found Impossible their Reason strain'd to its utmost can invent any other in this matter but that of Tradition 5. This will clearly shorten our debates and save the laborious transcribing and Printing Volumes of Testimonies by bringing Conrroversy to the way of Reason for the Certainty of First Authority must needs be manifested by pure Reason But who am I that I should attempt such a change in the method of Controversy or think my self a fit proposer or presser of it Far be it from me Yet if I mistake not Nature her self whom I second in this design is about doing that work For I hear Catholick Writers complain of the Protestant and justly too that he puts him to answer what hâ—â— been an hundred times said before and I am inform'd an Eminent Protestant now writing in behalf of Dr Pierce makes the same counter-complaint of the Catholick and the Dissuader begins his book with the same resentment Besides I am sure the Best Wits of our Nation are weary of this Method seeing t is no more but reciprocating a Saw or transcribing and re-printing what has been done before onely in another Frame or if any new production be made generally t is nothing but some note collected from some Historical book unobserved by others which what satisfactory Evidence t is like to bring with it is easy to be ghest 6. Now all this happens through not first settling and agreeing in some First Principle Not onely for the reasons given in the beginning of this Preface but also because as will be shown hereafter without thiâ— the validity of any Testimony from Father or Council cannot be weigh'd understood or prest with force upon the Adversary For if These be but parts of the Living Voice of the Church Essentiall of their time that is of Christian Tradition it will follow that till the force of Tradition be evidenc't Theirs will not be clearly known Again Tradition once evidenc't wil give principles to distinguish those Citations by and to secure as far as is needful and interpret Scriptures Letter Whence clear Victory will accrue to Truth and full Satisfaction to her ingenuous Seekers Not that I at all doubt but that many things in Catholick Writers of the Testimonial strain carry 4 strong force of Conviction with them but I see thâ—â—â— while the solid Testimonies are not distinguisht and solely insisted on but run mixt with others of less force by such a mixture they weaken their own I see also that they want their effect upon the Protestant by reason he is not first prest to admit that Evident Principle on which their strength is built and which once settled they are irresistable 7. The settling then the
them which breeds a certain awe in them before-hand preparing their minds to more reverence for the future Afterwards growing up they come acquainted with the Creed the ten Commandments the Sacraments some common forms of Prayer and other Practices of Christianity and are directed to order their lives accordingly the Actions or Carriage of the circumstant Church and Elder Faithful guiding the Younger notwithstanding the difficulty of the yet-undigested Metaphor in which dialect Faith is delivered to frame their lives to several sorts of Virtues by the doctrine deliver'd in words as Faith Hope Charity Prayer Adoration c. and the concomitant or subservient Virtues to these and the more intelligent whose Understandings are clear'd by Study and the circumstance of conversing with the learneder sort of Fore-fathers to do out of Knowledge and Reflexion what others do as it were naturally and by meer Belief or guidance of others And this goes on by insensible degrees till at last the Teachers die and leave in their room a new Swarm of the same nature with themselves as to Christian Life that is practising the same external Actions which determin to a certain degree the sence of the Words they have been inur'd to and since the practice of those Actions was instill'd from their Infancy and serious holding consequently the Principles of those Actions that is the same Points of Faith with the former Age. And this goes on not by leaps from an hundred years to an hundred or from twenty to twenty but by half-years to half-years nay moneths to moneths and even less according as the young brood of Eaglets made to see the Sun in his full Glory grow up to a capacity of having their tender eyes acquainted first with the dawning afterwards with the common day-light of Christian Doctrin 5. If any should be so dull as to think this looks like a Speculation onely and not to see plainly that 't is confirm'd by ten thousand Experements every day I desire them to consider how the Primitive Faithful were inur'd to Christianity ere the Books of Scripture were writ or communicated or how themselves though Protestants or Presbyterians were first imbu'd with Christian Principles ere they could read and they shall finde it was meerly by this way of Tradition Nay more I dare affirm that the very Presbyterians much more the Protestants still adhere to their Faith because their Parents Pastors taught them it when they were young and not upon the Evidence of Scripture's Letter to their own private Judgement which is manifest by this that those who are brought up under Mr. Baxter are apt to follow him others Mr. Pierce and all in general hold fixedly to the doctrin of others especially if their Parents be of the same persuasion So hard it is to beat down Nature by Designe or not to follow Tradition in practice though at the same time they write and talk never so vehemently and loud against it Nay 't is easie to remark that those who were brought up Protestants while they follow'd their Teachers and Forefathers in the Traditionary way continu'd firmly such and that none declin'd from that Profession until they began to use their own private Judgments in interpreting Scripture and that then they ran by whole shoals into innumerable other Sects However then they exclaim against Tradition yet 't is evident they owe to It all the Union and Strength they have and to the renouncing It all their Distractions and Weakness 6. What is said hitherto is onely to explain the Nature of Tradition perfectly and to settle a right conceit of it which done many Objections will be render'd unnecessary either to be answerd or mention'd as those that proceed against a kind of Prophetical Afflatus which can have no force against our way building upon perfect Evidence of our best Senses but especially those which take so wrong an aym that they dispute against res traditae or the things deliver'd instead of Tradition it self and thereupon accuse us for holding Human Traditions or things invented by men for Faith Whereas when we speak of the Rule of Faith we mean by the word Tradition onely the Method of publickly delivering and conveying down Tenets held to have come from Christ in the manner before declared This note premised to avoid mistake and keep the Reader 's mind more steady to the matter in hand let us see now whether Tradition have in it the nature of a Rule of Faith which is done by examining whether the fore-named Properties belong to it or no. 7. And first 't is already manifest from what is said that the First Property of the Rule of Faith namely that it must be Evident to all as to its Existence absolutely agrees with Tradition For Tradition being the open conveyance down of Practical Doctrines by our best senses of Discipline that is our Eyes and Ears and this by Sounds daily heard and Actions daily seen and even felt 't is as easily appliable to all sorts or Evident to them as to its Existence as it is to see and hear So that it can be insinuated into or affect not onely the rudest vulgar and little Children but in some degree even very Babes as was shown 8. The second Condition which is that its Ruling Power should be easily Evidenceable to any Enquirer is thus shown to agree to Tradition Let the rudest Doubter come and desire to be certify'd that Tradition is a Rule able if follow'd to convey down Christ's doctrin to our very daies or to the world's end and let these plain Interrogatories be put to him Suppose all Protestants in England were settled in an unanimous Profession of their Faith and that their Children without looking farther should believe and practice as their Fathers had brought them up would it not follow in self-evident terms that those Children while they followed this method would be Protestants too Suppose these now grown men under those Parents should have children too of their own who should behave themselves in the same manner towards their Fathers by believing and practising as they taught them without looking any farther would it not be equally evident they would still be Protestants also Since to believe and practice thus is to be a Protestant and would not this method if followed carry on that doctrin still forwards from Generation to Generation to the very end of the world 'T is then most easily evidenceable to the rudest capacity that this immediate delivery of Tradition as above explicated is a certain way of deriving down Christs Doctrin while the world shall last This Property therefore of the Rule of Faith is found evidently to agree to Tradition 9. The third Condition which is that the Rule of Faith must be apt to justify unreflecting and unredoubting persons that they proceed rationally while they rely on it is found most exactly in Tradition For the common course of human conversation makes it a madness not to believe great
but that Christ promist his Church Infallibility is not thus self-evident but needs other Knowledges to evidence it unless we will make all come by Inspiration Besides if God's Providence laid in second Causes for Tradition's Indeficiency be not Certain in its self abstracting from Christ's promise to his Faithful Tradition can never convey certainly that Promise to us It must then be assur'd to us by Scripture's Letter ascertain'd onely by imagin'd diligence from Copy to Copy not by Tradition that is that Letter could not be certain its self and so fit to ascertain others till Tradition's Certainty be establish't antecedently And were it suppos'd a true Letter this Letter Tradition being as yet suppos'd unknown to be able to convey down certainly Christs sence must be interpreted onely by private skills and so all the Churches Veracity that is all Mankinds Salvation must be built on that private Interpretation Private I say for in that supposition till the Scripture's Letter for that point be Interpreted certainly truly the Churches veracity or power to interpret it truly is not yet known which besides the common Rule that no Scripture is of private Interpretation is particularly and highly faulty in this case that it would make our Fundamental of Fundamentals the Certainty of our Rule of Faith rely on such a private Interpretation Moreover to say Tradition of the Church is Certain because Christ promist it puts it to be believ'd not seen and is the same in Controversy as it is in Nature to say in common such an Effect is wrought because 't is God's will which gives no account of that particular Effect but onely sayes something in common Wherefore since the Certainty of the Rule of Faith it being antecedent to Faith must be seen not believ'd a Controversial Divine ought to make it seen that is ought to demonstrate its Certainty and Indeficiency by intrinsecal mediums or dependence on proper Causes It signisies therefore no more in the Science of Controversy to say Christ promist than in Natural Science to answer to every Question in stead of showing a proper Cause that God wills it which is a good saying for a Christian as is also the other but neither of them a competent Principle either for Philosopher or Controvertist Consent Of AUTHORITY To the substance of the foregoing Discourses 1. THus far Reason Let 's see how 't is seconded by Authority And first by the Scriptures 2. For the Self-evidence of the Way to Faith or which is all one The Rule of Faith see the Prophet Isay c. 35. v. 8. This shall be to you a direct way so that Fools cannot err in it That is evident to the rudest Vulgar or self-evident else Fools might possibly err in it in case it needed any Skill of Discourse and were not obvious to Common Sense 3. Now what this Self-evident Rule is is most expressively declar'd by the same Prophet c. 59. v. 21. speaking of God's favour intended to the Gentiles that is of the Law of Grace This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord my Spirit which is in thee and my words which I have put in thy Mouth shall not depart from thy mouth and from the mouth of thy Seed and from the mouth of thy Seed's Seed from henceforth for ever Here we see God's promise to perpetuate Christ's Doctrin and on what manner that is by Oral Tradition or Delivering it from Father to Son by word of Mouth or Teaching not by scanning a Book put in their hands We see it promist also that this Tradition shall be Indefectible or Vninterrupted and Lastly that his Spirit or Sanctity is both in the Church and will continue ever with her which being so she must needs be supernaturally assisted by the Holy Ghost that is incomparably above the power of Nature to this Effect of perpetuating Christ's doctrin by Tradition 4. As pithy and home is that of the Prophet Ieremiah c. 31. I will give my Law in their Bowels and iâ— their Hearts will I write it and still more that of St. Paul contradistinguishing the Law of Grace from Moses his Law by this that the later was writ in Tables of Stone the former in the fleshy Tables of mens Hearts Both as express as can be imagined to send us for our Faith to living Sence in the hearts of the Faithful not to meer dead Letters in a Book that is recommending to us Tradition which is the perfectest and naturalest way imaginable to write them there as hath been shown Note the word Hearts which in the Metaphorical expression is the Principle of Action not of meeâ— Speculative Knowledge as is the word Brain Which intimates the Practical nature of Tradition and that it imprints Christs Law and conveys it down by Christian Carriage and Action not by Speculative scanning the significativeness of Characters in a Book Note also the word Fleshy which signifies that the manner of writing Christ's Law is through the affecting the Soul by her Inferiour part considering her as she is a virtue of understanding that is by Sensations which make strong and plain Impressions in Mankind according to their material part and so force into them Natural Knowledge Whence things thus imprinted are apt to settle themselves solidly and even sink deeply into the most material gross and vulgar understandings Quite contrary to which in all regards is the way of beginning with reading and labouring to understand certainly Letters in a Book which is a kind of Speculation and so belongs to the Superiour part of the Soul as she is understanding being Artificial both in the very Nature of such Characters the skill in Reading and highest skills requisit to Sence them with Certainty 5. After Scripture-verdict succeed next in order those of Councils I will onely mention three in several Ages leaving multitudes of others The first Synod of Lateran We all confirm unanimously and consequently with one heart and mouth the Tenets and sayings of the Holy Fathers adding nothing subtracting nothing of those things which are DELIVERâ—D VS quae TRADITA sunt nobis by them and we believe so as the Fathers have believed we preach so as they have TAVGHT The Council of Sardica in its Encyclical sent to all Catholick Bishops We have received this Doctrin we have been taught so we hold this Catholick Tradition Faith and Confession And the seventh General Council in its second Act. We imbu'd with the precepts of the Fathers have so confest and do confess In the Third we receive and venerate the Apostolical Traditions of the Church And in the seventh Act giving their final determination they declare the Grounds on which they proceed in these words We walking in the King's-high-way Regiam viam incedentes and relying on the Doctrin of our holy and divine Fathers and observing the TRADITION of the Catholick Church define c. where we see General Councils that is the greatest Authority in the Catholick Church relying on the Teaching of
with such a person were not he mad that is a renouncor of Reason or Man's Nature who should not believe them You see then these Witnesses have power to propose such an Object as can oblige to Belief You see the Dissenters are Irrational that their act of dissenting springs from some Passion or Vice and Vice is punishable and so is the Effects of that Dissent if it be in such a matter as is highly pernicious to Mankind's best concerns Now our Church makes account she is able to propose an Authority incomparably more ample than the Attestation now spoken of for the true Descent of her Faith and judges such a proposal founded on the eye-sight of all those Witnesses to be able to oblige to interiour Assent in such a degree as to render them most highly wilful vicious and irrational who should disbelieve it hence the crime intrenching upon the order to mankind's Salvation the highest concern imaginable both to edify those dissenters by correcting their vice and the circumstant Faithful by breeding a conceit in them through the punishment of the others of the sacredness of Faith and its Rule and the hainousness of Pride of understanding the ready way to all Heresies they may nay ought punish their Interiour Dissent Not out of an height of Authority without motives as Mr. Whitby conceits but because that Authority is her self such a motive to Belief that onely irrational vicious and wilfully-blind persons can recede from it by disbelief And hence our Churches procedure is rational natural sweet and charitable tending to amend an enormity of Will not bred from a rationally but passionate dissatisfy'd Understanding Nay Mr. Whitby's discourse justifies Our Churches procedure who seems to allow his Church a power to require a positive Assent when the case comes to be such that the denier of it must needs be held wilfull and our Church neither sayes nor acts otherwise 15. By this Discourse I would not have Mr Whitby imagin that I am about proving our Churches Infallibility in this place but onely showing that holding She can evidence her Authority She goes rationally to work and consonantly to her self in requiring Assent to her Proposals whereas Theirs confessing her self fallible even in interpreting Scripture upon which all both her Faith and Authority as a Church depends were self-condemn'd irrational and tyrannical if She should go about to require any such Interiour Assent Now though he in big words denies this to be her carriage asking when did they meaning Bishops Convocations or Parliaments challenge any power over our minds and Consciences and alledges the consent of their Divines for it yet I wonder what he thinks of the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy made by a Protestant Parliament is there no obligation there to hold any thing Yes as strong as Oath can tye it And which is worse 't is more Irrational to go about to bind Our Assents who are not of their Church than to bind their own Subjects This in practice is perform'd towards all but so imprincipled a procedure that their Church waves it when it comes to a rational scanning in a Dispute and Controversy acknowledging so their want of Grounds to make it good Which shows that the Authority of their Church sprang from the Parliament or Secular State in regard She professes her self very heartily content with external Obedience let the Interiour Assent goes where it will most unlike the Church settled by the Wisdome of the Eternal Father and constituted the Pillar and Ground of Truth who provided in the first place for the Churches Power to hold us to the same Tenets which are the Principles of our Actions knowing that unless the Root of Faith be sound the Actions its branches must needs be rotten and unconscientious and that no Congregation could long hold together nor indeed longer than the plain force of the Secular Sword aw'd them unless by power to evidence its Authority it had power to oblige men's Understandings connaturally to an Unity in the same Faith which done all else would follow And hence we may see confessedly in the Protestant Principles the reason of their present and past distractions and divine of the future for men's Fancies being naturally various and no power in her to keep them in an Union they must needs ramble into multitudes of dissenting Sects which to strive to unite into one were to force both Nature and Conscience too Nature in striving to unite their Understandings in Faith without offering them Evidence of Authority Conscience in binding them to Act as Protestants do whereas they are ready to stake their Salvation upon it that their best reasons working upon the very Rule of Faith Protestants recommend obliges them to the contrary and that to force them to act with Them is to force them to sin So that the Protestants at once profess they will not or cannot oblige their Vnderstandings and yet at the same time contend by force to oblige their Wills without nay against their Understandings 16. In a word let Protestants write talk quote words as long as they will Plainest Common Sence tells them and every man who considers it that unless they settle some undisputable Method of arriving at Christ's Sence or Faith that is some self-evident and so all-obliging Rule of Faith the Protestant Church can never hope for Power to reduce their Dissenters nor to hold together or govern efficaciously their own Subjects that is they can never hope for Unity within themselves nor lastly Union with them that have it and charitably endeavour they may have it too THIRD APPENDIX Animadversions On Some Passages in Mr. Stillingfleet 1. THe loud Fame of Mr. Stillingfleet's Book preventing its Publication and withall the report of his good parts coming from diverse Judicious Persons bred in me a great Impatience to see something of his other Writings that so I might have more solid Ground to build my Expectation on than common rumour or commendation of acquaintances A Protestant Friend show'd me a little Treatise of his concerning Excommunication I perus'd the beginning of it and immediately told him Mr. Stillingfleet was a very ingenious person and writ the best I ever yet saw any Protestant For he settled first his notion or the true nature of the Thing and thence attempted by intrinsecal mediums to draw immediate Consequences which show'd that his head lay right for Science But withal I assur'd my Friend 't was impossible he could write against us and take that method the nature of his Cause not enduring so severe a Test. His Book coming forth and bearing in its Title a Rational Account of the Grounds of Protestant Religion my Expectation was more erected and till my self could get leasure to peruse it I told diverse both Catholicks and Protestants that they might expect from Mr. Stillingfleet's Wit the most that could be said either for the later or against the former But coming to over-look cursorily his Infallibility of Tradition