As to the certainty of Scripture's Sense is Scripture in earnest so utterly obscure Will their Author say so of the Histories of Livie or Tacitus or of the Philosophical Writings of Plato and Aristotle or of Euclid's Elements Could not God speak clearly and intelligibly to Men as Men have done and that in matters of the greatest consequence to them or would he not do so The Assertion of the one would impeach his Wisdom of the other his mercy and kindness to Souls And if Scriptures leave us so quite in the dark why do they call themselves a Light a Lamp say Ps 119 105.13â— Ps 19.7 8. that they enlighten the Eyes and make wise the simple Were the Books of the Old Testament the Gospels Acts and Epistles of the New Testament in the respective times in which they were writ in themselves unintelligible by them to whom and for whose Souls health they were writ If they were so then they were useless and vain And Oral Tradition could not expound them which was not in Being when those Books were first written for That deals with the Ages following the first conveys what was at the first delivered unto Posterity Did God then write only to amaze his Church 'T is acknowledged that there are several 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 things hard to be understood which it might please God should be partly to win the greater veneration to the Scriptures for what is obvious and presently seen through is in the more danger of contempt partly for the exercise of Christian's Industry Humility and Charity towards each other on occasion of dissent But howsoever the Scriptures are not so lock'd up but that a compâ—tent diligence and a Beraean 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or readiness of mind may be a Key to them may open them in all Points necessary to Salvation And if in other things we remain ignorant or not so certain we may well bear with it while we are yet but in viâ and not comprehensores on our way unto but have not yet reach'd perfection That which makes the noise of Scriptur's obscurity the more loud is that Men are apt to look upon the many subtilties of the Schooles and Niceties of Polemick Writers as Articles of Faith and that men have more mind to fathom depths and to humour their curiosity for which end I believe the Scriptures were not intended and hence are ever racking the Scriptures and vexing the Sacred Text than to exercise themselves in a sober understanding of what is sufficiently plain and in a consciencious practise of the Holy Rules of Life which are evident enough If Christians would more seriously apply themselves to these two things they would find in the Scriptures employment enough and they would be more contented with their difficulties The Romanists have raised a cry of Scriptur's darkness upon another account and out of Policy For having embrac'd several Tenents and Practices which Scripture does condemn or not countenance either it is wholly silent of them or they are but meer appearances there which are snatch'd at and yet it is inconsistent with their grandeur or profit or the affected reputation of an infallibility to part with they are faine to press Tradition to serve in their Wars and for the defence of them Thus they have first made a necessity and then have invented a Remedy for it But when all is done the Remedy is more imaginary than real For how unsure a Conveyance and consequently how weak a Proof Oral Tradition is in matters of Christian Faith and Practice has been already evicted So that if we must be ignorant of Scriptures Sense unless Oral Tradition bless us with the Exposition of it and Scriptures no farther a Light than it is tinded at Tradition's Candle we must sit still in much ignorance or wander in great uncertainties for that cannot relieve us it is not that infallible Commentator it is pretended to be 2. To the upbraiding us with our Distractions I reply 1. Before the charge can be made good that the choice of Scripture for our Canon was the cause of our many Differences and that upon that pretence we should exchange Scripture for Oral Tradition it must be suppos'd that Oral Tradition is a sure and infallible clew to guide us out of the Labyrinth of Errors into the way of Truth and Peace the contrary to which has been sufficiently proved For otherwise to leave Scripture and to follow Tradition would be to relinquish a Guide or Rule which being indited by an unerring Spirit cannot mislead us and to chuse one which may and will carry us out of the way Nor will the pretence of Vnity make amends for this For true Christian Peace can't be otherwhere bottom'd than on Truth when and so far as it is a Cement of Men to the disservice of Truth it commences Faction Nor Reason nor Religion allow much less commend an Agreement of Persons to err together 2. They who have the most amorously espoused Tradition have also their many and great Differences as has been shew'd above only through Fear in some and Policy in the rest they are hush'd up more than amongst us and so do better escape the observation and talk of the World Nay that Church may be justly arraigned as the guilty cause of that which they call a great Schism viz. The Separation of so many Churches from them the Churches call'd Protestant by their imposition of unlawful and therefore impossible termes of Communion with them And (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nilus tells the World that their Imperiousness was the reason of the great Schism between the Greek and the Latin Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pag. 21. 22. Thus as the Church of Traditioners have no few Dissentions among themselves so they have given a beginning and continuance to the quarrels between them and a considerable part of Christendom 3. Ther 's no need of fetching our Distractions from the Rejection of Oral Tradition there are are other true manifest Causes of them assignable Our Church once flourish'd with Peace and that without the aid of an Oral Tradition whil'st the Reverend Bishops were suffered to govern it and the Royal was able to countenance the Ecclesiastical Authority But when the pious King and blessed Martyr was engag'd in and diverted by the turmoils of a Civil War when Episcopacy was chang'd for Anarchy when the Golden reins of Government in Church and State were broken then begun and increas'd our Divisions and Calamities Unto which it may be there were some assisting Causes from without some who helped to kindle and to blow our Fires And if the Roman Church should chance into the like afflicted State with ours it would be obnoxious to the like Confusions If the Mitre should be forsaken by the secular Crowned Heads and a mutinying multitude should pull their Holy Father out of his infallible Chair then 't is not altogether improbable but that Children would less heavken
did decline so soon how much more probable is it that it should grow yet more feeble and corrupt at such a far greater distance of time As Waters which arise clear and of qualities agreeing with their Fountain the farther they run do the more contract a new relish and gather a foulness from the Chanels through which they travel SECT V. I proceed to the Christian Churches since the more Primitive times and as they are commonly divided into the Eastern and Western Churches so I shall begin with the Eastern and there speak of the Greek Church only In which I suppose none will question but that Christian Religion was planted in a very ample and punctual manner such as might have secur'd a perpetuity of Primitive Truths among the Professors of them as well as among any other Body of Christians This Church administers the Eucharist to the Laiety in both kinds allows Married Priests denys Purgatory-fire to add no more In these things the Roman Church differs from them One of them therefore must err and have receded from what was delivered at the first to them We believe the Roman Church to be guilty of the Recess and they to be sure will deny it But yet which soever it be of the Churches which is in the wrong and one of them must be so Oral Tradition is guilty of Mal-performance of its Duty But moreover this Church holds that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and not from the Son Which is a Tenent condemned by Protestants and Romanists both And the Grecians misbelief in this Article was judg'd by Card. Bellarmine so criminous that he counted it meritorious of the sacking of Constantinople which hapned accordingly in his calculation at the Feast of Pentecost Bellarm. de Christo lib. 2. cap. 30. as a Judgment of God upon them for this error about the Procession of his Holy Spirit And he adds That many compare the Greek Church to the Kingdom of Samaria which separated from the true Temple and for that was punish'd with perpetual Captivity How far charitable in his Censure and right in his (a) Vossius de tribus Symboli in Addendis Chronology the Cardinal was let others judge But this is clear that they of that Communion as they are very numerous so do generally consent in this Opinion that there has been an entail of it upon Posterity through hundreds of years and that though their Reduction has been more than once attempted yet endeavours have prov'd succesless the wound may have been skin'd over but it has not been heal'd (b) Idem Ibid. Though at the Councils of Lyons and Florence it is said there was something of a Closure yet as soon as the Greeks return'd home there was presently a Rupture again and the Churches remain'd at as great a distance as before And they retain their old Error (a) Ricaut of the Greek Church to this day and are observed to defend it with a particular dexterity The same Greek Church denies the Pope's Supremacy that (b) Summa Rei Christianae Bellar In Praef. ad lib. de summo Pontifice Diana of the Romanists They may have yielded the Bishop of Rome a (c) See Nilus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Primacy of Order and yet that too not as enstated on him by Divine Right but indulg'd him by the favour of Princes and Ecclesiastical Canon But they would never grant him a Superiority of Power and Authority They will not (d) Ricaut of the Greek Church yet allow it him These Opinions of the Greek Church cannot in the Judgment of the Romanists who hold contrarily to both and are so especially concern'd in the latter descend from Christ and his Apostles Therefore they must confess that Tradition has miscarried And Traditions miscarrying among so great and formerly renowned tho' now afflicted a Society of Christians for so very long a time and in Points of such moment must needs decry it much below that value to which its friends have enhans'd it SECT VI. Next shall succeed a consideration of the Western Church And what Church in the West would be more taken notice of than the Roman VVhere we are to find the most accurate Tradition or to despair of meeting with it any where They of that Communion having dress'd up and strengthned the Cause of Oral Tradition with the greatest advantages which their wit and learning can give it and claiming it as their (a) Sure Footing P. 116. Priviledge to be the most infallible Traditioners of any Church whatsoever Two things here may be considered 1. VVhat the Accord is of the Roman with the Antient Church 2ly VVhat her Harmony is with herself How well Oral Tradition has preserv'd her in both these respects First how little the Church of Rome comports in her Opinions and Practices with the most antient and purest Churches has been demonstrated by many Learned Protestants I shall insist but on one thing viz. The denyal of the Cup to the Laiety in the Eucharist by the Roman Church The Learned Cassander thought it could not be prov'd that (a) Non puto demonstrari posse totis mille ampliùs annis in ullâ Catholicae Ecclesiae parte sacrosanctum hoc Eucharistiae Sacramentum aliter in sacrâ synazi è mensâ Dominicâ fideli populo quà m sub utroque panis vinique Symbolo administratum fuisse De saerâ Comm. sub utrâque specie He is positive and large in this in his Consultation likewise Much to the same purpose Alphonsus a Castro Tit. Eucharistia Haeresi 13. For above a 1000 years the Sacrament of the Eucharist was otherwise administred to the faithful People than under the Elements of Bread and Wine both Several of our Adversaries give their suffrages with Cassander And the Greek Church administers to the Laiety in both kinds to the present Age. But let us come to that which will with our Adversaries be of more Authority The Council of (a) Praeterea declarat hane potestatem perpetuò in Ecclesiâ fuisse ut in Sacramentorum dispensatione salva illorum substantia ea statueret vel mutaret quae suscipientium utilitati seu ipsorum Sacramentorum venerationi pro rerum temporum locorum varietate magis expedire judicaret Quare agnoscens mater Ecclesia hanc suam in administratione Sacramentorum Anthoritatem licèt ab initio Christianae religionis non infrequens utriusque speciei usus fuisset tamen hanc consuetudinem sub alterâ specie communicandi approbavit pro lege habendam decrevit Sess 5. Can. 2. Apud Caran Trent confesses That from the beginning of Christian Religion the use of both Bread and Wine was not uncommon Yet licèt although such had been the Primitive and not uncommon usage the Council approv'd of Communicating under one kind and decreed it to be observed as a Law And this the Council did by virtue of a pretended Power of the Church to appoint and to
and this by virtue of the hopes of an Heaven and fears of an Hell For how strongly soever these might be applied to the minds of the first Believers yet that so strong and effectual an Application of them was made by all Fathers to all their Children through all after Ages so that the (a) Ibid. Cause should be always actually causing is uncertain nay very improbable for the Reasons before given 3ly If a less number may be a sufficient party to make a Tradition then meerly the comparative fewness of (b) Catal. Testium veritatis Aâ—rian Râ—gen in Histor Eccles Sâ—avonic Dr. Field in the Appendix to the 3d. Book of the Church those who through several former ages held some fewer some more of the Points in which we Protestants differ from the Romanists and that thy mov'd Eccentricks to the generality of Christians of their times is no rational Objection against them and their Tenents as if they were not truly Primitive nor in a parity of Reason did it justifie the Romanists Tenents that they had got so large a Possession of the Western World nor consequently did our Fathers deserve to be call'd Deserters of Tradition because they departed from some Tenents and Practices of the Roman Church which had stolen the general Vogue in some former blind Ages For 't is not affirm'd that the greatest number of Christians but only a great Part and a Body of them would be trusty Traditioners A great Party absolutely considered may be but little comparatively and the Minimum quod sic in the case we are not told Therefore the general Prevalency of certain Romish Tenents at and before the Secession did not conclude them to be therefore justified by Tradition properly so called nor did the bare comparative Paucity suffice to condemn them of Innovation who made the Secession SECT III. 3ly To assure Oral Tradition's infallibility it is press'd that there is an (a) Sure Footing p. 236 237. Author of Sure Footing Ibid. Obligation on Posterity to believe their Ancestors in a matter of Fact or a matter delivered to have been not thought or deem'd but done And 't is confidently added I make account there is not a Man in the World or ever was such is the goodness of rational Nature given us by God who in his natural thoughts could ever raise such a doubt or think he could possibly frame his thoughts to a belief of the contrary And it appears at first sight to be a strange distortion or rather destruction of humane Nature which can so alter it The Instances given in which Posterity is obliged to believe Ancestors are (a) Ibid. p. 217. Alexander's conquering Asia (b) Ibid. p. 236 237. William the Conqueror's Harry the Eights and Mahomet's Existence (c) Ibid. p. 219. 220 221. The proof of the Obligation on Posterity not to believe contrary to Forefathers from Age to Age is thus proceeded in viz. The second Age after the first was obliged to believe the first Age because they saw with their Eyes what was done The third Age was obliged to believe the second tho' they saw it not because the second Age could not be deceived in what the first Age told them and they must be conceived so honest and withal such to be the disinteressedness of the position that they would not conspire to deceive the third Age and so those of the third Age have the first Ages Authority applied to them And by virtue of this same Argument the same effect will be upon the fourth fifth and five hundreth Age. This is the full substance to the best of my understanding of the Author's Argumentation Ans In reply to this If the matter of Fact be but some general thing such as the Author himself has given Example of there may be the more of Truth in this Procedure but then there 's little in it it comes not home enough to our business But if the things done or spoken at or about the same time were divers or if the thing tho' one were wrap'd in several circumstances then the first Eye or Ear-Witnesses might for want of a more close and steady attention mistake or forget some partitulars and so might misreport and therefore might justly be disbelieved or the second Witnesses from the first though suppose things were truly and punctually reported to them by the first yet might misunderstand or forget something if not much of what was related to them or if there should be no misinformation by the second Witnesses yet the third might misapprehend or not well remember what the second told them The same may be said of the Witnesses in the fourth remove or age with regard to the third and of those in the fifth with respect to these in the fourth and so unto the five hundredth till after a discent through so many hazards and chances what was done or spoken at the first be at length wholy altered or become very unlike to its Primitive self Seeing then there may be such failures in successive Testifyings how can a Man be bound to believe conformably to Forefathers especially when as perhaps he is distant hundreds of Successions from the speaking or doing the thing testified of I may confirm the uncertainty of successive Testifyings through Ages by a passage of an Adversary (a) Rushworth Dial 2. Sect. 7. He putting the Question whether the very rehearsing and citing anothers words do not breed uncertainty and variety resolves it in the affirmative 'T is true he aimes at the invalidating Scriptures certainty in conveying to after-Ages the mind of the Authors but what he writes is adaptable to words spoken as well as written For answerably to what he discourses (b) Let us suppose the writer himself play the Translator as for Example that our Saviour himself having spoken in Hebrew or Syriak the holy writer is to express his words in Greek or Latin And farther that this which we have said of Translations be as truly it is grounded in the very nature of divers Languages therefore unavoidable by any Art or Industry will it not clearly follow that even in the Original Copy written by the Evanlists own hand there is not in rigor the true and self-significant words of our Saviour but rather a Comment or Paraphrase explicating and delivering the Sense thereof Nay let him have written in the same Language and let him have set down every word and syllable yet men conversant in noting the changes of meaning in words will tell you that divors accents in the pronunciation of them the turning of the Speakers Head and Body this way or that way the allusion to some Person or to some precedent discourse or the like may so change the Sense of the words that they will seem quite different in writing from what they wree in speaking Rushworth Ibid. And the Title of the next the 8th par is The uncertainty of Equivocation which of necessity is incident
any material Error but it is strait Alarum'd and then stands upon its guard and consequently is in a capacity to defend and to preserve it self And this is one reason more why the Church receiving her Faith by Tradition and not from Doctors Ibid. p. 44. hath ever kept her entire Answ 1. But first to wave a consideration how little an alteration some Doctrines cause in Christians Practice whether they are held pro or con it is deny'd that it was not possible that any material Point of Faith can be chang'd as it were by Obreption but it must needs raise a great Scandal and Tumult in the Christian Common-weal For that there should be a noise and tumult in the Church it was requisite that there should be a Breach of Communion a separation of one part from another Thus it hapned in the Arrian controversie and some others there was a manifest siding a departure of the Dissenters from each other Such was the Case too in Germany England c. Several Corruptions had possess'd the Church of Rome for a long time and that Church made the Profession and Practice of those corruptions a Condition of Communion with her upon which the Protestants withdrew from her Communion which occasion'd the notice of the World and the Guilt lies on them who were the cause of the Breach who gave the Offence But there may have been Innovations in Doctrine and Discipline too and yet the Members of the Church have still continued mutual Communion and therefore no cry have been rais'd little if any notice been taken not because of the little consequence of the Doctrine or Practice but tho' it might be considerable by reason of its surprizing manner of entrance Some things in their first beginnings because small and in their progresses because stealing on sensim sine sensu by invisible steps are often little if at all discern'd till arriving at some maturity and a size much exceeding what they had in their Infancy and sly growth they then manifest themselves and awaken other's Observation Is it not thus frequently in Nature Are there not some latent Diseases which make secret attempts upon the Life and undiscover'd till by more sensible effects and rudeness to Nature they warn the Patient of his danger Let us enquire whether the like may not have hapned in Religion also It has not been uncommon for Persons of busie Parts and good Credit for Virtue and Learning in their times to have mov'd in a little Sphere of their own to have held some Opinions against or beside the general Vogue of the Age. Now suppose one such Person in Preaching or Writing to have started a Doctrine This coming into the Church commended by the Reputation and plausible Arguments of the Author wins the good liking of many and is passable as a probable Opinion for some years Till in the next Generation through a wontedness to it and a forgetfulness in what degree of assent it was at the first entertain'd it comes to be believ'd as necessary Which advance would be the more facile and likely if the Doctrine were such as had not been expresly defin'd against in any general Council for then it would pass with the greater shew of Modesty or were very advantageous and particularly were such to the governing Party in the Church as suppose the Doctrine of the Supreme and Universal Domination of the Bishop of Rome or that of Pardons and Indulgences c. for then Interest would cast another weight into the Scale and it might be judg'd convenient to be believ'd as necessary By a zealous straining of Expressions and Practices there might in time be a slip from the Mean to an Extremity The high and deserv'd Veneration for the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper might occasion some lofty expressions of it and reverential Gestures at the Celebration of it And then from the Hyperbolies of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. might arise Transubstantiation and Adoration of the Host There may have been very antiently a Solemn and Publick Commemoration of them who dyed in the Lord in way of Thanksgiving to God for such holy useful Persons and of recommendation of them as Religious Exemplars to the People It may be some too might pray for the Dead out of a superabundant Charity yet not for a release of them from Pains but for a more speedy consummation of their begun blessedness And hence in time might creep in an Opinion of a middle state of the departed and Prayers for the deliverance of Souls out of a Purgatory fire As the first Ages of the Church were Blessed with a multitude of Glorious Martyrs so the Christians of those Ages had a very high and fitting esteem of them Sometimes it was an use to pray at the Monuments of the Martyrs to address them also with Rhetorical Apostrophes till at the last the Saints departed came to be prayed to and to be Worshipped Thus it is intelligible enough how there might be alterations in the Church's Doctrine and Practice by stealth and unobservedly and this is sufficient to oppose to the Authors whom I quoted at the beginning of this Section it is not possible that any material Point should be chang'd as it were by Obreption c. But this secret and little notic'd Intrusion of Opinions and Practices into the Church will be found to have been the more feasible if we look back upon former Ages in it and the Genius of them For a great while Learning was very scarce and Piety likewise The Ignorance Irreligion and Debaucheries of the Laiety and Clergy also were so notorious in the eleventh and following Centuries that they occasion'd the great and loud (a) The Authors and the Collections out of them may be seen in Dr. J. White 's Way to the trâ—e Church p. 113 114 115. In Dr. James his Manuduction 103 104 105 106 107 108. And in Dr. Whitby's Absurdity and Idolatry of Host Worship the Appendix from p. 70 to p. 108. complaints of many who liv'd in the Roman Communion and in the respective Ages and may provoke to wonder and grief Those who shall read them This being adverted to 't is so far from being impossible that Changes should invade Religion that rather 't is impossible but that Doctrines and Practices should be corrupted and alter'd from their first Purity in their passage through so long and foul a sink as those dark and impure Ages are represented to have been For as good Knowledge and Piety are great defensatives against Error 's seizure of the Judgment so Ignorance in the Understanding lewdness and depravedness of the Will and Passions make Men indifferent for Religion and unwary in the matters of it dispose Men to a reception of Opinions and Practices precipitantly and without a due Examination of them whence they come and what they are without a discreet prospect whether they tend and what their issue may be at the last So that from what has