3.6 and the rationalness of his deduction from thence though made by the joyning of a proposition of another Nature to it which they paid a respect to The Multitude were swayed in this case by the meer strength and weight of his argument and are therefore said to have been astonished at his Doctrine Mat. 22.33 They admired his Wonderful Wisdom and profound Sagacity nor were they influenced by any Authority they held him vested with Nor indeed is it any great evidence of a profound Wisedom or of his insight into the Scripture to argue from Media which have no further convincing efficacy or force but what they borrow from his authority that useth them In brief either the Text quoted by our Saviour was sufficient antecedently to Christs using of it and abstracting from his Authority to demonstrate the Resurrection or it was not If it was then it was not meerly from his Authority that they came under an Obligation to a belief of that conclusion If it was not than how comes Christ to lodg their unbelief in reference to the ResurrectioÌ„ upon their ignorance of the Scriptures Marc. 12.24 Mat. 22.31 For if they stood not under the obligation of that consequence but meerly because of his Authority then the best acquaintance imaginable with the sense and meaning of that place could have ministred them no relief in that point yea it had been utterly unlawful to have drawn any such inference from it 5. Exclude Scripture-Consequences and the Papists are not able to impugn one Tenet of the Protestants nor are they in Capacity to prove the first Article of the Roman Faith namely the pretended Infallibility of their Church While they wrest such Weapons out of our hands they at the same time disarm themselves And by endeavouring to disserve the Cause of the Reformed Churches they utterly undo their own For if our Reasonings of this kind be insignificant against them theirs are also insignificant against us and by the same art that they endeavour to blunt the edge of our Swords they are bound to throw away their own I shall discourse this no farther only shut it up with a saying of Justin Martyr 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without Philosophy and right Reason there can be no knowledge nor science in the World § 12. The next thing that belongs to Reason in matters of Religion regards those Doctrines which besides the Foundation that they have in Revelation have also Evidence in the light of Nature And as I intimated before § 5. more is allowable to Reason in and about these than about those we are indebted only to the Scripture for the discovery of 'T is not enough that we enquire into the declaration of them as it lyes in the Bible and how they are there expressed c. but we are further to see what Media there are in the light of Nature by which they may be both discerned and confirmed Yet I shall here crave liberty to premise That where the Authority of the Scripture is owned our chief Topicks in all Theological debates ought to be fetcht from the sacred Records Thence we should both frame our Idea's of them and borrow as well the Arguments as the Colours and Ornaments by which we would commend them to the Minds and Consciences of Believers Especially a regard ought to be had to this in popular Discourses and Sermons As humane Authority ought to have very little place if any at all in the Pulpit so we ought not there to serve our selves too much from Maxims of Philosophie and principles of Reason As God hath impressed more of his Authority upon the Scriptures than upon any thing else that he hath made Himself and his Will known by so there is an Efficacy of the Spirit promised to attend the naked Preaching of the Word beyond what we can expect to accompany our Ratiocinations from principles of Reason As Faith prepares the spirits of men to a submission to what they hear immediately out of the Bible so there is something great and elevated which I know not how to express in Truths as nakedly delivered by the Holy Ghost which Argumentations from Natural Maximes doth for the most part obnubilate and darken The Majesty of God whose commands we deliver doth above all things most attract the respect of our Auditors nor do we at any time so effectually persuade as by the meer authority of him in whose Name we speak Yet I do not deny but that Rational proofs are of great use not only to such with whom Scripture-Testimonies signifie nothing but even to those who own and adore its Authority by shewing that as it is highly reasonable to believe whatsoever God hath said so the things themselves are agreeable to and have foundation in Reason and the two lights of Revelation and Nature do excellently harmonise This being premised among other Truths which besides their being plainly revealed in the Scripture have also evidence given to them in the Light of Nature the Immortality of the Soul and the certainty of Providence are especially remarkable 'T is True there are many other Doctrines of this quality viz. the Attributes of God the Creation of the World Moral Good and Evil c. All which as they are revealed in the sacred Scripture so they are demonstrable from undoubted principles of Reason But wavâ—ng these at present I shall only by way of essay and with all imaginable brevity consider what media there are in Nature by which the two former may be evinced and the serviceableness of Reason in the doing of it I shall begin with the Immortality of the Soul and the Unhappiness of the Age wherein we live doth render the inculcation of this Truth not only seasonable but necessary Men having degraded themselves into Beasts by practice they thence take the Measures of their Opinions and allow no difference betwixt themselves and the pâ—ttifullest Brute but that Matter in them is fallen into a more lucky texture and modification To justifie their sensualities they contend that they have nothing but their Animal inclinations to gratifie and indeed the soul of a Brute will very well serve all the Ends that some men propound to themselves Next the Belief of the Beeing of God the persuasion of the souls being Immortal is the hinge upon which all Religion turns 'T is this that leads us both to contemn the gratifications of the Flesh and to be solicitous about a happiness hereafter though it be with the undergoing of present inconveniences rather than here There is no one Truth hath a more powerful influence upon the whole course of our present life than a steddy and vigorous belief that the soul is immortal Now when we assert the Immortality of the Soul we do nâ—t intend that it is Immortal in such a sense as that by no cause it can be annihilated God alone is thus Immortal for as there are no principles of Corruption in his Nature so there is no forraign
to evince it though obstinate persons and such as maintain Tenets in despite of evidence to the contrary may not be convinced by them 'T is the Church in its full latitude and extent that is eminently Christs Body and his Spouse and 't is his Body and Spouse that he is conjoyned and marryed to Now for any one to say that he is united to the Church by the vincula that are between him and Individual Believers is to run himself into the absurdity which we commonly call a circle For if the copula of particular Christians to Christ be their Society and Fellowship with the Christian Church and if the vinculum between Christ and the Church be through the cohesion of particular Believers to Christ there is no remedy but that our Author must be entangled in a circle or else there is no such thing in the World as circular defining and discoursing And to say that Christ is united to the Church by the Churches belief of his Revelations and Obedience to his Laws is but instead of loosing the knot to tye it faster For the Church being an Aggregate Body of Believers she can no other ways embrace the Revelations of the Gospel or yield obedience to its commands but in the virtue of what her particular constituent Members do 2. That our Union with Christ even supposing it a meer Political Relation should be by the means of our Union with the Christian Church is repugnant to that conception and idea which we have of the Church For the Church Catholick-Visible and much more particular instituted Churches being nothing else but the Collective Body of Christians it naturally follows that they must in priority of Nature be Christians before they can any ways belong to the Church Now to suppose them Christians I speak of adult persons without their previous owning the Authority of Jesus Christ through a belief of his Doctrines and a professed subjection to his Laws is an absurd and self-contradictious Imagination 3. If the Apostles were immediately United to Christ without any Antecedent Relation to the Christian Church I see no cause why every Individual Christian ought not to be held united to Him in the same manner that they were For the Apostles being united to Christ under the formal consideration of their being Christians and not under the reduplication of their being Apostles it follows by a short and easie train of ratiocination that all who have a right to the denomination of Christians are united by the same Bond and stand in the same immediateness of conjunction with Christ that they were Yea Paul hath said enough to set this beyond all suspect in that speaking of the Body of Christ he reckons the Apostles in the classis of Members with other Believers 1 Cor. 12.27 28. Now that the Apostles were not united to Christ by the Mediation of any Antecedent Relation to the Christian Church but that their Relation of Oneness with Him was immediate there be unanswerable Arguments at hand to demonstrate But I shall only mention one namely there was no Christian Church pre-existent to them into whose Society and Fellowship they could be admitted I have thus far discoursed these things with Mr. Sherlock taking the church for the universal Catholick Visible Church which is the most favourable acceptation to befriend the Notion of our being united to Christ by the means of Union to the Christian Church that 't is capable of And this acceptation of the Church as our communion with it is the Medium and Bond of our Union with Christ Mr. Sherlock finds himself in some cases necessitated to retreat to If says he there be no Visible Society of Christians professing the Faith of â—hrist and living in Communion with each other as it may happen in times of persecution or some great degeneracy of the Church our Union to Christ then consists in an acknowledgment of his Authority and Subjection to his Laws which makes us Members of the Universal Church though there be no particular Church to communicate with Now if the Notion of Union with Christ by the Medium of a previous Interest in the Catholick Visible Church be not defensible much less is it maintainable on the Hypothesis of an Union with a particular Church as the Vinculum and Foundation of it And yet most of our Authors discourse is fram'd in countenance of this namely that Individual Christians are not united to Christ but by means of their Union to some particular Church Hence we are told that we cannot be United to Christ that is cannot own his Authority and Government till we unite our selves to the publick Societies of Christians and submit to the publick Instructions Authority and Discipline of the Church And this is made the motive and ground of our living in the Communion of the Church where Providence hath cast us so long as she submits to the Laws of Christ and acknowledgeth his Authority because as our Author saith this Unites us to Christ. Mr. Sherlock so far as I am able to conjecture was not at leisure to think what was most serviceable to the Hypothesis he had espoused or what was most disserviceable to it All Immediate Union of particular Christians with Christ save by means of their union with the Christian Church he was resolved to deny but in what sense the Church was to be taken by Communion with which we come to be copulated with Jesus Christ he durst not determine At one time 't is by our being Members of the Universal Church at another 't is by our Fellowship with such a Church as is under the conduct of Bishops and Pastors whose Members are in regular subjection to their spiritual Guides and Rulers and live in concord and Unity amongst themselves and in a mutual discharge of all Christian Offices But that Communion with a particular Church cannot be the Medium of a Christians Union with Christ I come under the influence and command of these Reasons to believe 1. There may be some Individual Christians where there is no particular Instituted Church of Christ into which they can be admitted Nor may this only be supposed but there are divers instances in Ecclesiastical story to evince it Yea there can be no particular Church without the pre-existence of Individual Believers seeing it is of such that every particular Church is constituted and formed We may as well build a House without pre-existent Materials as erect a particular Church without Believers to constitute it of There must be living stones of which this Temple of God is built and fram'd The being Saints through the effectual Vocation and renewing of the Holy Ghost is the first ground presupposed by the Apostles in their adscription of the Name and Title of Church to any Nor are the Duties required of those that stand in a particular Church Relation possible to be performed but by such as are sincere Christians 2. Christians in the very
may immediately work Miracles in behalf of following Errors what assurance we have that he could not do so in reference to such as preceeded I know no argument that can be brought in proof of the Negative in the latter Case but what will equally conclude in favour of the Negative in the former For if we resolve it into the Nature of God that he could not do so in the last Circumstances the same Essential Perfections in God which lead us to judg so of him in them will persuade us to have the like thoughts of him in all Circumstances that we can imagine Thirdly It is expresly against the Evidence of Scripture-Testimony that God should work a Miracle to confirm either the Mission or the Error of a false pretender See Joh. 9.16.29 30 31. Christ having restored Sight to one that was born blind the Pharisees do notwithstanding question whether he was an Embassador from God yea expresly affirm him to be an Impostor as for this Fellow we know not whence he is Now let us observe after what manner that miraculous Work is urged in Justification that Christ could be no Deceiver p. 16. How can a man that is a Sinner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. one that falsly avoucheth himself to be sent of God do such Miracles and 30 31 The man answered and said unto them why herein is a marvellous thing that ye know not from whence he is and yet he hath opened mine Eyes now we know that God heareth not sinners i. e. doth not by miraculous Works bear witness to them that come in their own Name I know that we are to distinguish between what the Scripture it self saith and what is only â—aid in the Scripture And that the Scripture it self is true though there be many false sayings Historically recited in it because though the expressions themselves be false yet it is true that these Untruths which it reports were spoken But he that looks into the Chapter will plainly perceive that the Holy Ghost doth not only Register these Sayings but Adopt them And that he doth not barely affirm that such Pleas were made but that the Pleas themselves were true and solid The Exceptions why Miracles are not in themselves an Incontestable Evidence of the Doctrine they are wrought in Confirmation of and of the Divine Mission of the persons that work them may easily I think be taken off The 1 st is That Miracles have been wrought by Hereticks Pagans and others whose Persons were neither Authorized by God nor their Doctrine true And here the Wonders reported in History to have been done by Aesculapius Vespasian and especially Apollonius Tyaneus whom Hierocles durst in point of Miraculous Works compare with Jesus Christ are alledged To which I return these Five Things 1. We may justly question the matter of Fact as to many of them nor are the Reporters such as that we are bound to yield them an Implicite Faith Piaefraudes have found Entertainment not only among Heathens but Christians Nor do I doubt but that most of the Ethnick and Popish Miracles are meerly Romantick and that it is enough to discharge our selves from them by putting the Patrons of them on the proof that ever any such things were wrought 2. Many of these seeming Miracles may be salved by Natural Causes We use to Baptize the extraordinary Phaenomena of Nature with the Name of Wonders because of our Ignorance of the Ability of Natural Agents How many things were look't upon by the Pagan World as the immediate Effects of a Supernatural power that we can now give a distinct and Philosophical account of 3. Many of them are to be ascribed to the Power and Operation of the Devil who can 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 make a Lye as well as tell one Next to Oracles Satan hath served his Ends on the World by counterfeit Miracles and in both he hath set himself to Ape God And though we cannot so readily in every one of them detect the Imposture yet in most of them we meet with some Circumstance or other which may induce us to give the Devil the Honour and Reputation of them 4. Some of them and those such as descend to us with the greatest certainty seem to have been wrought to prepare the World for some strange and new Providence that God was to bring upon the Stage or to give reputation to some person that God designed for some solemn undertaking and not in the least to confirm any erroneous Doctrine or false Religion and as to such miraculous Works I know nothing hinders why they may not be ascribed to God Thus would I resolve the Cures wrought by Vespasian on the blind and lame Men to have been done for the better introducing and establishing him in the Romane Empire God haveing intended him for the Minister of his Wrath against the Jewish Nation But that from some Circumstances of the Story as it is related by Suetonius and Tacitus I am apt to think that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Enemy not easily discovered or the Agency of the Devil was in the whole For I find the infirm Persons alledging their being advised by Serapis to make their Address to Vespasian for Relief against their Maladies Now it is not likely that God should employ the Daemon for the Herald of what himself would accomplish or that he should encourage Idolatry by Communion with Votaries at the Devil's Temple 2 dly The Method of restoring the blind Man to his Sight by spitting upon his Eyes seems plainly to have been done in Imitation of Christ and that Satan was the principal Agent in the whole intending hereby either to disparage some of the Miracles of our Saviour or to maintain his own Kingdom in the way that He had erected his 5. Some of the wonderful Works urged in the proof of what we are contending against might be wrought in Confirmation of the Truth of God and yet without any respect to the justifying the Mission of the Publisher of it And with reference to such works I know no danger in entitling God to be the Author of them An instance to this purpose we have Mark 9.38 Where the Person casting out Devils was neither Commissioned by Christ nor did so much as directly own and embrace Him and yet God lent him his Power to accomplish these Effects And supposing a Truth in the Matters of Fact as reported of the Romish Missionaries in the Indies I should think this Key sufficient to unlock them The second and great Exception why Miracles are not always a sufficient Proof of the Doctrine in whose behalf they are wrought is fetch 't from Scripture And truly if the Texts pressed in this Service be not found either mistaken or urged beyond their true Intendment we will readily resign both our selves and the Cause we have been pleading Nor shall any Shew or Appearance of Reason in favour of it weigh with us there being no Reason so great as
to believe what God hath said The first Argument levied from Scripture for this Warfare is drawn from what the Magicians did in their Contest with Moses in Egypt whereof we have an Account in the 7 th and 8 th Chapters of Exodus To which I reply 1. That most yea all saving one or two Interpreters deny any thing done by them to have been truly Miracles 2. The Way Manner and Rites they used in effecting what they attempted do plainly acquit God from any Agency about their Works further than the permitting them For they are said to have done so by their Inchantments Exod. 7.11 and 8.7 I dare not think that God was at the Magicians Beck or that he would conciliate Credit to their Hellish Arts by subserving them or that he would exert his Sacred and Almighty power in Honour of Satans Institutions and Ceremonies 3. The Magicians finding themselves out-done by Moses in the matter of turning Dust into Lice cry out that the Finger of God was there Exod. 8.19 which I take to be no less than an Acknowledgment that whatsoever they had done before they had done it by Magick And that it was through the influence and Agency of the Devil that their Rods had been turned into Serpents and that Frogs had been brought upon the Land 4 ly Though what they did in the two first Instances wherein they confronted Moses seems to bear such a Resemblance to true Miracles that it was not at first easie to distinguish the one from the other yet it were easie to demonstrate that the things which they effected were not without the compass of the Power of Daemons And that it might appear that the Power by which Moses acted was different from that by which they acted God therefore wisely ordered it that his Rod should devour theirs thereby leaving an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 singular Peculiarity in the Miracles of Moses to witness their Divine Original The second Argument mustred from Scripture to fight in this cause is brought from Mat. 24.24 2 Thes. 2.9 Apoc. 13.13 To all which I answer 1. By granting that the Expressions are lofty wherein the Holy Ghost predicts the Signs and wonders which false Christs and false Prophets were to work yet I think we are not to conclude from the Majesty of the Terms in which they are foretold that the Works themselves were real Miracles But that God would intimate to us either that they should be such as would so hugely resemble true Miracles that it would not be easie to detect them or that he would thereby awaken us to examine the Doctrines of Men by their Consonancy to the Scripture which was then given out and established rather than Implicitely to resigne our selves to the Conduct of every Wonder-monger 2. The best Key to judge of the quality of the Signs and Wonders there foretold whether they be true Miracles or not is to take a View of the extraordinary Works Recorded to have been done by the pretended Jewish Messiahs and the Apostatical Roman Church one or both of whom are referred to in the objected places And if we will apply our selves to this Method of Tryal I dare undertake that there is not so much as one Sign or Wonder truly Recorded concerning them which may not be solved either by a Co-incidence of Natural Causes or by the hidden Power of Daemons 3. They are expresly stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lying Wonders and that not so much Respectu finis because they were wrought in Confirmation of a Falsity as Respectu Materiae because they only Ap'd true Miracles but in truth were not such Yea as if that were not enough to acquit God from being the Author of them they are expresly ascribed to an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Agency of the Devil The third and last Argument brought in Relief of their Opinion who think that God may exert a Miracle-Working Power in the Confirmation of a Falsity is taken from Deut. 13.1 2 3. To which I answer 1. That the place doth more especially relate to the fore-telling of Events than to the working of Wonders And therefore if God never lent his Omniscience to the Service of an Impostor we have no reason to think that he should lend his Omnipotency to the Service of one And if all the Predictions of false Prophets may be salved without Recourse to Divine Inspiration as indeed they may I suppose their Wonders may be also salved without Recourse to God's Infinite Power 2. They are the Prophets after the Promulgation and Establishment of the Law of Moses that are there spoken of and therefore the Law being given out as the Test of after-Revelation at least during that Oeconomy God tells his People that they are not to try the Mission of Prophets only by Miracles but especially by the Agreeableness of their Doctrine to that of Moses And this may be a reason why we do not find that other Pen-men of Old-Testament Scripture were honoured with the working of Miracles I know indeed that some Prophets were intrusted with Miraculous Power but so far as I remember there was not one besides Moses who was made use of in giving forth the Revelation of God to the Old-Testament-Church that had this Priviledg conferred on him Having thus made appear that all Miracles are Effects of a Divine Power and that wheresoever God exerts his Miracle-Working Power in Confirmation of any Doctrine he declares it to be of and from himself and to be Unquestionably True I shall not now insist on the proving that the Bible is justified by Innumerable Great and Undeniable Miracles that being largely and beyond all possibility of Reply done by other Hands I shall only say that even those who suppose that God may sometimes put forth his Wonder-working Power in Attestation of an Error do not hereby design to Rob us of the Evidence of Miracles for the Divinity of the Script For as none have gone beyond them in the proof of the Divine Authority of the Bible in general so no one hath improved the Medium of Miracles to better purpose As they have shewed that the Scripture is attested by a greater Number of Miracles and those both more eminent more conspicuous longer continued and oftner repeated than ever any Errour either was or ever could be So they not only prove that God never wrought a Miracle in confirmation of a Falsity for Tryal till he had first incontestably established his own Truth but they also declare that he could not It is not then upon an apprehension of their having disserved the Authority of the Bible in this particular that I have assumed the freedom of discoursing these things but that an opportunity of more light in this matter may be afforded The Cause of the Scripture will suffer nothing in the main on what side soever this Controversy issues And as I know my self in more need of being instructed than of capacity to offer information to any So it
Agent that can deprive him of his Being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He only hath Immortality 1 Tim. 6.16 All things owing their Existence to him there is both a Power and a Right resident in him of depriving them should he judg it fit of their Beings Whatsoever is derived from his Power and Bounty he may take away at his pleasure Yet I reckon it absurd to think that he doth annihilate our Souls it being contrary to the Method which he observes in other parts of the Universe No substance yet ever perished Under all the Mutations that Matter undergoes by which this and that Individual body comes to be destroy'd there is not so much as one single Atome lost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 No substantial Entity is totally destroyed saith the Philosopher Non perit in tanto quicquid mihi credite mundo Ovid. By the Immortality of the soul then we mean no more but that it includes no principles in its self by which it can be brought to decay And this it derives from it being Immaterial No spiritual substance is capable of that dissolution which a Body is lyable to and suffers For seeing Material subjects come to be corrupted only by a separation of their conjoyned parts The Soul being Immaterial and so void of parts is in danger of no such dissolution Now in discoursing the Immortality of the Soul I think fit in the beginning to discharge my self from an exception or two which though hugely insisted on by those who will have the soul to be meerly corporeal and consequently corruptible yet are in themselves absurd and irrational The first is this that there is no such thing in the World as an Incorporeal Being and that Existence is not to be affirmed of any thing but what is perceivable by sense and that we cannot have assurance that any thing is but what we have ocularly beheld To which I reply 1 That they miserably beg the question which they ought to prove They have not been able to assign any contradiction that lyes against an Incorpoâ—eal Being more than against a Corporeal 2. Their Objection doth equally militate against the Being of God as against the Immaterial Nature of the Soul For if God be at all he is Incorporeal a Corporeal God being pregnant with Contradictions 3. We are not to require more proof of any thing than it is capable of According to the diversity of Objects we are furnished with distinct faculties in order to the perception of them and there are different lights in which they are seen Who questions the being of Sounds Odours c. because they are not discerned by the same Organical Faculty that Colours are To require that an Immaterial should fall under the perception of sight is to demand that an Immaterial should be a Material There are Innumerable things whereof we have the most convincing Certainty and yet they were never the Objects of Sense No man ever saw a Thought and yet we are fully assured that we have Thoughts How many things do the Gentlemen that make this exception believe which yet they never saw 4 Though Incorporeal Beings be not Immediately perceived by sense yet through diverse of their operations which affect our Sensitive Organs we have a mediate assurance of their Existence by our very Senses The second exception is taken from the inexplicableness of Union betwixt a Material and an Immaterial There is no Cement say they by which the one can be knit to the other Incorporeals are of a penetrating Nature and consequently cannot take hold of Matter so as to make a Whole consisting of two constituent parts so vastly different To this I answer 1. That there is nothing more Unreasonable than wholly to question the Existence of things because we do not Understand the Modes according to which they Exist To discharge a Cause out of the precincts of Being because we cannot give a reason of all its particular effects ought to be justly reckon'd amongst the greatest of absurdities Whatsoever is prov'd by Reason we are firmly to believe it though there may be many things in the Theory of it that are wholly inconceivable While we have all imaginable assurance of the conjunction of the soul with the body and that the soul cannot be corporeal our Faith ought no ways to be weakned though we know not the Physical way of their coalition and how they come to be United 2. There is as much difficulty in apprehending the connexion of one part of Matter with another as in Understanding the Incorporation of the Soul with the Body and yet no man questions but that there are bodies in which the particles of matter are united I hope to make it appear Châ—pt 3d. that there is not any Hypothesis of Philosophy yet extant by which the Union of the parts of Matter in contâ—nuous Bodies can be solved and yet we are very well assured they are connected together A 3d. Exception is raiâ—ed from the Sympathy that is betwixt the Soul and the Body from which they would conclude an Identity of Nature between them To which I briefly return to these things 1. There are many cases in which our Souls are affected without the least impression either from bodily Objects without us or any previous excitation of the Spirituous Blood within us For not to mention the impression which the Soul receives from the consideration of things purely Spiritual and Divine which do no ways immediately affect the Body all the Influence imaginable which they have upon it proceeding primarily from the mind it self and its dominion over the Animal Spirits I shall only name Troubles of Conscience which arise only from Moral Causes and the exercise of our Reasons about what we have done I may add that there are many cases wherein the Soul and Body seem to have no Communion with one another and that not only in Ecstasies when the Soul is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in a manner for a season separated from the Body but even in other Hence men upon the borders of Grave when without strength vigor or pulse yet even then they have their thoughts more refined and their understandings more spritely than at other times And which is more strange are so little affrighted at death though they fully understand it that they lay down the Body with the same compoâ—edness and more delight than if they were only putting off their Cloaths Nor are they only persons tired with the miseries of the World that do so bâ—t such many times who have enjoyed all the delight that this earthly state can afford 2. We find our Souls frequently determining themselves in way of chusing and refusing contrary to the provocations of sense and the cravings of the bodily Appetite Though our Intellectual Faculties have a perception of sensual Delights yet they often chuse both that which is contrary to fleshly pleasures and which no Corporeal Faculty is able so much as once to apprehend
supposing this be true the inference of his being only a Metaphorick Priest is not to be avoided and consequently all the Texts where he is any wayes stiled a Priest are to be understood only Metaphorically For if his Priestly and Kingly Offices be not distinct either his Regal Office must be reduced to and included in his Sacerdotal which our Author will not affirm and if he should he would only gain by it the making Christ a Metaphorick King instead of a Metaphorick Priest or else his Sacerdotal Office must belong to and be included in his Regal being only a readiness to exercise that Authority and Power for his Church which as a King appertains to Him And if so then those innumerable places of Scripture which report Christ to be a Priest to have given himself a Sacrifice to God for us to have expiated Sin to have made atonement and to have rendred God propitious are every one of them Metaphorical I have insisted the longer on this Opinion of Mr. Sherlock concerning Christs Priestly Office being only a different part and administration of his Mediatory Kingdome 1 st to make it appear that by Charging Socinianism upon some of our late pretended Rational Divines we do not transform them into any thing but what they are The truth of the imputation rather than the foulness seems to be that which makes them angry As the Historian tels us of Tiberius that he was both the readier to believe the more offended at something which was said of Him because it was the true report of his guilt so I wish it were not as much the Justness as the Odiousness of the Character of Socinian which renders some men stingy But 2 ly the main reason of my insisting upon these passages was to demonstrate that whereas they arraign the Non-Conformists for turning the plainest Scriptures into Metaphors the crime lodgeth especially with themselves and that the principles which they have Espoused are not otherwise defensible but by turning the plainest Scriptures into Metaphors So that here Clodius accusat maechos And providing Mr. Sherlock will abide by his Notion That the Offices of Prophet Priest and King are not properly distinct Offices in Christ I do here undertake to prove by easy trains of deduction that for one Text capable of a proper sense which the Phanaticks pervert by imposing a Metaphorick one upon it he lyes under a necessity if he will preach or write consequentially to his Tenets of wresting twenty in the same manner § 10. But this is not the only opinion imbib'd by our Author which I impeach as pregnant with this mischief His Notion of Justification being attended with the same inconvenience nor is it any ways maintainable but by perverting innumerable Texts from their plain and natural sense to a Metaphorick In the prosecution of this Charge I shall first give a true representation of his thoughts about Justification and then endeavour to demonstrate that besides what else lyes against him it is accompanied with this fatal unhappiness of turning a great part of the Bible into meer insignificant and empty Metaphors His sentiments then in reference to Justification are these That we are only Justified by our believing and obeying the Gospel of Christ. That the Sacrifice of Christs Death and the Righteousness of his life have no other Influence upon our acceptance with God but that to them we owe the Covenant of Grace That is God being well pleased with the Obedience of Christs life and the sacrifice of his Death for his sake entred into a New Covenant with Mankind wherein he promiseth pardon of Sin and eternal life to those who believe and obey the Gospel so that the Righteousness of Christ is not the formal Cause of our Justification but the Righteousness of his life death is the meritorious Cause of that Covenant whereby we are declared Righteous rewarded as Righteous persons The Covenant of Grace which God for Christs sake hath made pardoning our past sins follies and rewarding a sincere though imperfect Obedience The Gospel by its great arguments motives and powerfull assistances forms our minds to the Love and practice of Holiness and so makes us inherently Righteous and the grace of the Gospel accepts and rewards that sincere Obedience which according to the Rigor and severity of the Law could deserve no reward This I take to be a true account of Mr. Sherlocks Judgement about Justification and I have quoted it in his own words that he may neither complain of his being imposed upon nor the Reader question the Truth and sincerity of this representation And as whosoever consults the pages I referr to will find that I treat my adversary with faithfulness so if they compare them with some other places where he hath declared himself with less Modesty they will have reason to say that I have exposed his Opinion in the favourablest manner I could Now I design not any accurate ventilation of this great Theme nor any severe research into Mr. Sherlocks faileurs in the manage of it nor a Critical survey of his neglect of Truth as well as Modesty in treating his Adversaries about it nor yet his partiality in arraigning only the Non-conformists when he could not but know that the most Eminent Persons that ever the Church of England bred as well as the Generality of Protestant Divines are equally involved having appeared in the Defence of that very Notion of Justification which he so invidiously represents and tragically declaime's against those for The full handling of Justification stands reserved for other hands who in due time will retrive the spoyles wherewith our Author hath enriched his Wardrobe and strip him of the Lawrels wherewith he hath adorned his Temples I shall only bestow one stricture upon him and then apply to the proof of the inconvenience I have already charged his Opinion with and for which in this place I cited it In brief then I see not how the Covenant of Grace is any ways owing to the Sacrifice of Christs Death and the Righteousness of his life providing that Mr. Sherlock will be constant to and write consonantly to some of his other principles For if the Natural Notions which men have of God assure them that he is very Good and that it is not possible to understand what Goodness is without pardoning Grace as our Author elsewhere tells us I say supposing this to be true I see not how the Righteousness of Christs life and Death can be the meritorious cause of Gods forgiving our sins and Follies for as much as his Essential Goodness obliged him to it I take it for a principle of Reason that nothing can be merited which is due upon an Antecedent Title Merit in its essential Notion importing an acquisition of a Right which we had not before there can be no room for it in reference to that which we stood entitled to by the natural goodness of
and Opinions But to resume my Theme That a person may by Philosophy and Contemplation attain such a degree of Union with God as to know and understand things by a contactus and conjunction of substance with the Deity hath been asserted both by the Platonick some of the Aristotelian Philosophers The passages which occur in Plotinus Porphyrius Jamblichus and Proclus all great and famous Platonists of such a tendency are numerous and need not to be here transcribed The possibility of arriving by Contemplation at the knowledg of the first and supreme cause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a kind of bodily touch is asserted in those Fragments of Metaphysicks Fathered upon Theophrastus the Disciple of Aristotle and the immediate Successor in his School The same Imagination became espoused by the Arabian Philosophers especially by Averroes a great adorer of Aristotle and who hath signalized himself by his Commentaries upon him Had this Notion been only entertain'd by Contemplative Heathens I should not have taken notice of it but it was imbib'd and that very timely by Persons professing Christianity Origen seems to have been one of those that were first tainted with it and to have received it with many other Platonick Dogms with which he corrupted the Truth and simplicity of the Gospel either from Ammonius the Renowned Professor of Platonism at Alexandria whose Schollar he was or from some more ancient Patrons and Advocates of that Sect. From Origen the Ancient Monks derived the Ferment leaven of it The counterfeit Dionysius Areopagita for that he was not truly the Person whose Name he assumes and that he lived not till about the Sixt Century or at least the Fift hath been demonstrated by Scultetus Rivetus Daillaeus and is acknowledged by Petavius appears by the whole of his Discourse de Mystica Theologia to have been dipt in that Mad and Frantick Notion From all or some of these it spread among the Romish Monasticks I mean such of them as are called Mystick Theologues Nothing more frequent with that sort of men than a tattle of an Intime Union with God whereby the soul becomes Deified And from them the Weigelians and Familists borrowed their Magnificent language of being Godded with God and Christed with Christ. The adventurous determinations of the School-men concerning the Beatifical Vision smell rank of the same Blasphemous Nonsensical figment For by their contending that the Divine Essence is immediatly united as an Intelligible species to the Intellect of the Blessed and that this species and the Glorified Understanding do not remain distinct things but become identified they do in effect affirm the soul to be Transubstantiated into God and to be really Deified And seeing 't is a Matter of easie demonstration that the knowledg which we shall enjoy of God in Heaven differeth only in degree from that which we possess here otherwise 't is both altogether unintelligible and uncapable of rational explication it will follow by a short Harangue of discourse either that Believers have no knowledge of God in this life or else that their souls become Deified and essentially United to God by knowing Him I need not name the admired Non-sense and high-flown Cantings of the Quakers which carry a broad fac'd aspect this way That which we have suggested is enough to instruct us out of what springs they and other Wild Enthusiasts have drawn the putid conceits which they propine to the World But as to the Persons whom Mr. Sherlock censures for placing all their hopes of Salvation in a Personal Union with Christ I dare not only say that they renounce any such Union but that there is nothing in their Principles which consequentially leads to it If our Doctrine of Believers Union with the Person of Christ cannot be defended without introducing a Personal Union with Him we profess our selves ready to disclaim it and do assure all the World that if it harbour any such thing in its bosom our meaning is not so bad as our Opinion We believe the Person of Christ and the Persons of Believers to remain distinct after all the Union that intercedes between them We are thankful for the Influences of his Grace and the inhabitation of his Spirit but we detest those swelling words of Pride and Ignorance of being Christed and Deified Whatsoever be the Nature and kind of the Union between Christ and Christians is a Hypostatical Union it cannot without Blasphemy be imagined to be For admitting once a Personal Union it will immediately follow that Christ and They are but one Person As two drops of water which existing apart made distinct supposita coming to be Physically United make but one Physical Body substance and suppositum so two or more subsisting Intellectual substances which considered separate are so many Persons do by Personal Union come to have one singular subsistence and to make but one Person Now to imagine this of Christ Believers interfere's with all that Reason which as Men we are possessed of To be One Person with Christ and yet to be locally distant is a thing which our Discursive Faculties will style a Contradiction Seeing similitude and Identity are opposite Notions and our highest attainment is only to resemble Christ it is impossible that by any Union whatsoever we should become one Individual Numerical Person with Him Innocency and guilt Legal Merit and Demerit not to mention other Innumerable Adjuncts do too vastly disagree to center in the same Individual subject or to be predicable of the same Identical Intellectual Being To be made One real Physical Person with Christ is an Hypothesis attended with such a troop of Absurdities that he neither understands what Christ nor himself is who gives it entertainment They are rather to be encountred with an Anathema who espouse such a blasphemous figment than to be combated with Rational Arguments nor should I have further concerned my self about it than barely to disclaim it but that we have to do with some who will not believe us unless we disprove it also And indeed it seems to have been an apprehension of the Non-conformists owning a Personal Union with Christ which influenced Mr. Sherlock to tell the World that it is not very intelligible how we can be or abide in the Person of Christ and that 't is more unintelligible still how we can be in the Person of Christ and the Person of Christ at the same time be in us which is a new piece of Philosophy called Penetration of Dimensions In reference to which I shall only say that as our Author's supposition so far as it relates to the Opinion of the Non-conformists is both false and disingenuous so the Medium by which he assaults the thing supposed viz. A personal Union is weak sophistical For as the preexisting Corpuscles of Matter do without any Penetration or without ceasing to be entitatively as distinct as they were before come to constitute one Physical Body meerly by being copulated together and