title to their Crowns and all men their Estates by the records or testimony of others 9. It is impudent arrogancy for every Infidel to tie God to be at his beck to work Miracles as oft as he requireth it To say I will not believe without a Miracle and if thou work never so many in the sight of others I will not believe unless I may see them my self § 12. There need not be new Revelations and Miracles to confirm the former and oblige men to believe them For then there must be more Revelations and Miracles to confirm the former and oblige men to believe those and so on to the end of the World And then God could not govern the World by a setled Law by Revelations once made which is absurd § 13. Therefore the only natural way to know all such matters of fact is sensible apprehension to those that are present and credible report tradition or history to those that are absent as is aforesaid which is the necessary medium to convey it from their sense to our understandings And in this must we acquiesce as the natural means which God will use § 14. We are not bound to believe all history or report Therefore we must be able to discern between the credible and the incredible neither receiving all nor rejecting all but making choice as there is cause § 15. History is more or less credible as it hath more or less evidence of truth 1. Some that is credible hath only evidence of probability and such is that of meer Humane Faith 2. Some hath evidence of certainty from Natural causes concurring where the conclusion is both of knowledge and of Humane Faith 3. And some hath evidence of certainty from supernatural attestation which is both of Humane Faith and of Divine § 16. That history or report which hath no more evidence than the meer wisdom and honesty of the author or reporter supposing him an imperfect man is but probable and the Conclusion though credible is not infallible and can have no certainty but that which some call Morall and that in several degrees as the wisdom and honesty of the reporter is either more or less § 17. II. Where there is an evident impossibility that all the witnesses or reporters should lie or be deceived there the Conclusion is credible by humane Faith and also sure by a natural certainty § 18. Where these things concurre it is impossible that that report or history should be false 1. When it is certain that the reporters were not themselves deceived 2. When it is certain that indeed the report is theirs 3. When they took their salvation to lie upon the truth of the thing reported and of their own report 4. When they expected Worldly ruin by their testimony and could look for no commodity by it which would make them any reparation 5. When they give full proof of their honesty and conscience 6. When their testimony is concordant and they speak the same things though they had no opportunity to conspire to deceive men yea when their numbers distance and quality make this impossible 7. When they bear their testimony in the time and place where it might well be contradicted and the falsity detected if it were not true and among the most malicious enemies and yet those enemies either confess the matter of fact or give no regardable reason against it 8. When the reporters are men of various tempers countreys and civil interests 9. When the reporters fall out or greatly differ among themselves even to separations and condemnations of one another and yet none ever detecteth or confesseth any falshood in the said reports 10. When the reporters being numerous and such as profess that Lying is a damnable sin and such as laid down their liberties or lives in asserting their testimonies did yet never any of them in life or death repent and confess any falshood or deceit 11. When their report convinceth thousands in that place and time who would have more abhorred them if it had been untrue Nay where some of these concurre the conclusion may be of certainty some of these instances resolve the point into natural necessity 1. It is of natural necessity that men love themselves and their own felicity and be unwilling of their undoing and misery The Will though free is quaedam natura and hath its natural necessary inclination to that good which is apprehended as its own felicity or else to have omnimodam rationem boni and its natural necessary inclination against that evil or aversation from it which is apprehended as its own undoing or misery or to have omnimodam rationem mali Its liberty is only servato ordine finis And some acts that are free are nevertheless of infallible certain futurition and of some kinde of necessity like the Love and Obedience of the Saints in Heaven 2. Nothing can be without a cause sufficient to produce it But some things here instanced can have no cause sufficient to produce them if the thing testified were false As the consent of enemies their not gainsaying the concurrence of so many and so distant and of such bitter Opposites against their own common worldly interest and to the confessed ruine of their souls and the belief of many thousands that could have disproved it if false and more which I shall open by and by There is a natural certainty that Alexander was the King of Macedonia and Caesar Emperour of Rome and that there is such a place as Rome and Paris and Venice and Constantinople And that we have had Civil Warrs between the King and Parliament in England and between the Houses of York and Lancaster and that many thousands were murdered by the French Massacre and many more by the Irish and that the Statutes of this Land were made by the Kings and Parliaments whose names they bear c. Because that 1. There is no cause in Nature which could produce the concurrence of so many testimonies of men so distant and contrary if it were not true 2. And on the contrary side there are natural causes which would infallibly produce a credible contradiction to these reports if they were false § 19. III. When they that testifie such matters of fact do affirm that they do it by Gods own command and prove this by multitudes of evident uncontrolled Miracles their report is both humane and divine and to be believed as most certain by a divine belief This is before proved in the proof of the validity of the testimony of Miracles and such Miracles as these § 20. The Testimonies of the Apostles and other Disciples of Christ concerning his Resurrection and Miracles were credible by all these three several sorts of credibility 1. They were credible and most credible by a humane belief as they were the testimony of honest and extraordinarily honest men 2. They were credible as reported with concauses of natural certainty 3. They were credible as attested by God
are taught to believe that sense is not deceived about the Accidents which they call the Species but about the Substance only when most of the simple people by the species do understand the Bread and Wine it self which they think is to the invisible body of Christ like as our bodies or the body of a Plant is to the soul So that although this instance be one of the greatest in the world of infatuation by humane authority and words it is nothing against the Christian verity Object V. You are not yet agreed among your selves what Christianity is as to the matter of Rule the Papists say it is all the Decrees de fide at least in all General Councils together with the Scriptures Canonical and Apocriphal The Protestants take up with the Canonical Scriptures alone and have not near so much in their Faith or Religion as the Papists have Answ What it is to be a Christian all the world may easily perceive in that solemn Sacrament Covenant or Vow in which they are solemnly entred into the Church and profession of Christianity and made Christians And the antient Creed doth tell the world what hath always been the faith which was professed And those sacred Scriptures which the Churches did receive doth tell the world what they took for the entire comprehension of their Religion But if any Sects have been since tempted to any additions enlargements or corruptions it s nothing to the disparagement of Christ who never promised that no man should ever abuse his Word and that he would keep all the world from adding or corrupting it Receive but so much as the doctrine of Christ which hath certain proof that it was indeed his delivered by himself or his inspired Apostles and we desire no more Object VI. But you are not agreed of the reasons and resolution of your faith one resolveth it into the authority of the Church and others into a private spirit and each one seemeth sufficiently to prove the groundlesness of the others faith Answ Dark minded men do suffer themselves to be fooled with a noise of words not-understood Do you know what is meant by the resolution and grounds of faith Faith is the believing of a conclusion which hath two premises to infer and prove it and there must be more argumentation for the proof of such premises and faith in its several respects and dependances may be said to be resolved into more things than one even into every one of these This general and ambiguous word Resolution is used oft'ner to puzzle than resolve And the grounds and reasons of faith are more than one and what they are I have fully opened to you in this Treatise A great many of dreaming wranglers contend about the Logical names of the Objectum quod quo ad quod the objectum formale materiale per se per accidens primarium secundarium ratio formalis quae qua sub qua objectum univocationis communitatis perfectionis originis virtutis adaequationis c. the motiva fidei resolutio and many such words which are not wholly useless but are commonly used but to make a noise to carry men from the sense and to make men believe that the controversie is de re which is meerly de nomine Every true Christian hath some solid reason for his faith but every one is not learned and accurate enough to see the true order of its causes and evidences and to analize it throughly as he ought And you will take it for no disproof of Euclid or Aristotle that all that read them do not sufficiently understand all their Demonstrations but disagree in many things among themselves Object VII You make it a ridiculous Idolatry to worship the Sun and Jupiter and Venus and other Planets and Stars which in all probability are animate and have souls as much nobler than ours as their bodies are for it 's like God's works are done in proportion and harmony and so they seem to be to us as subordinate Deities And yet at the same time you will worship your Virgin Mary and the very image of Christ yea the Image of the Cross which he was hang'd on and the salita capita and rotten bones of your Martyrs to the dishonour of Princes who put them to death as malefactors Is not the Sun more worthy of honour than these Answ 1. We ever granted to an Eunapius Julian Porphyry or Celsus that the Sun and all the Stars and Planets are to be honoured according to their proper excellency and use that is to be esteemed as the most glorious of all the visible works of God which shew to us his Omnipotency Wisdom and Goodness and are used as his instruments to convey to us his chief corporal mercies and on whom under God our bodies are dependant being incomparably less excellent than theirs But whether they are animated or no is to us utterly uncertain and if we were sure they were yet we are sure that they are the products of the Will of the Eternal Being And he that made both them and us is the Governour of them and us and therefore as long as he hath no way taught us to call them Gods nor to pray to them nor offer them any sacrifice as being uncertain whether they understand what we do or say nor hath any way revealed that this is his will nay and hath expresly forbidden us to do so Reason forbiddeth us to do any more than honourably to esteem and praise them as they are and use them to the ends which our Creator hath appointed 2. And for the Martyrs and the Virgin Mary we do no otherwise by them we honour them by estimation love and praise agreeable to all the worth which God hath bestowed on them and the holiness of humane souls which is his image is more intelligible to us and so more distinctly amiable than the form of the Sun and Planets is But we pray not to them because we know not whether they hear us or know when we are sincere or hypocritical nor have we any such precepts from our common Lord. It is but some ignorant mistaken Christians who pray to the dead or give more than due veneration to their memories And it is Christ and not every ignorant Christian or mistaken Sect that I am justifying against the cavils of unbelief Object VIII You make the holiness of Christian doctrine a great part of the evidence of your faith and yet Papists and Protestants maintain each others doctrine to be wicked and such especially against Kings and Government as Seneca or Cicero or Plutarch would have abhorred The Protestants tell the Papists of the General Council at the Lateran sub Innoc. 3. where Can. 3. it is made a very part of their Religion That temporal Lords who exterminate not Hereticks may be admonished and excommunicated and their Dominions given by the Pope to others and subjects disobliged from their allegiance
esse which was dependent in fieri which are Contradictions 2. The effects in the admirable frame and nature and motions of the Creation declare that the Creator is infinitely wise The smallest insect is so curiously made and so admirably fitted and instructed to its proper end and uses The smallest Plants in wonderfull variety of shapes and colours and smells and qualities uses and operations and beautifull flowers so marvellously constituted and animated by an unseen form and propagated by unsearchable seminal vertue The smallest Birds and Beasts and creeping things so adorned in their kinds and so admirably furnished for their proper ends especially the propagation of their species in love and sagacity and diligence to their young by instinct equaling in those particulars the reasonable creature The admirable composure of all the parts of the body of Man and of the vilest Beast and Vermine The quality and operation of all the Organs humours and spirits The operations of the Minde of man and the constitution of Societies and over-ruling all the matters of the World with innumerable instances in the creature do all concurr to proclaim that man as mad as madness can possibly make him in that particular who thinketh that any lower cause than incomprehensible wisdom did principally produce all this And that by any bruitish or natural motion or confluence of Atomes or any other matter it could be thus ordered continued and maintained without the infinite wisdome and power of a first Cause superiour to meer natural matter and motion What then should we say if we had a sight into the inwards of all the Earth of the nature and cause of Minerals and of the forms of all things If we saw the reason of the motions of the Seas and all other appearances of Nature which are now beyond our reach Yea if we had a sight of all the Orbs both fixed Starrs and Planets and of their matter and form and order and relation to each other and their communications and influences on each other and the cause of all their wonderous motions If we saw not only the nature of the Elements especially the active Element Fire but also the constitution magnitude and use of all those thousand Suns and lesser Worlds which constitute the universal World And if they be inhabited if we knew the Inhabitants of each Did we know all the Intelligences blessed Angels and holy Spirits which possess the nobler parts of Nature and the unhappy degenerate Spirits that have departed from light and joy into darkness and horrour by departing from God yea if we could see all these comprehensively at one view what thoughts should we have of the wisdom of the Creator And what should we think of the Atheist that denyeth it We should think Bedlam too honourable a place for that man that could believe or durst say that any accidental motion of subtile matter or fortuitous concourse of Atomes or any thing below a Wisdom and Power infinitely transcending all that with Man is called by that name was the first Cause and is the chief continuer of such an incomprehensible frame § 18. The first Cause must needs be infinitely Good By Goodness I mean all essential Excellency which is known to us by its fruits and appearances in the Creature which as it hath a Goodness natural and moral so is it the Index of that transcendent Goodness which is the first cause of both This goodness is incomparably beyond that which consisteth in a usefulness to the creatures good or Goodness of Benignity as relative to Man And it is known better by the meer name as expressing that which Nature hath an intrinsick sense and notion of than by definitions As sensible qualities light colour sound odour sweet bitter c. are known by the name best which lead to the sensitive memory which informeth the Intellect what they are As the mention of things sensible entereth the definition of sense and the mention of sense doth enter the definition of things sensible and yet the object is in order of nature before the act And as Truth must enter the definition of Intellection and Intellection the definition of Truth and yet Truth is in order before Intellection and contemporary with the Intellect so is it between Goodness and the Will But if we speak of uncreated Good and of a created Will then Good is infinitely antecedent to that Will But the Will which is created hath a nature suited to it and so the notion of Excellency and Goodness is naturally in our estimative faculty and the relish of it or complacency in it is naturally in the Will so far as it is not corrupted and depraved As if I knew a man that had the wisdom and virtue of an Angel my estimation calleth him Excellent and Good and my Will doth complacentially cleave to him though I should never look to be the better for him my self or if I onely heard of him and never saw him or were personally beholden to him That God is thus infinitely Excellent and Good the Goodness of his Creatures proveth for all the goodness that is in Men and Angels Earth and Heaven proceedeth from him If there be any Natural Goodness in the whole Creation there must be more in the Creator If there be any Moral Goodness in Men and Angels there must be more in eminency in him For he can make nothing better than himself nor give to creatures what he hath not § 19. The Goodness of the first Being consisting in this infinite Perfection or Excellency containeth his Happiness his Holiness and his Love or Benignity § 20. The HAPPINESS of the first Being consisteth 1. In his BEING HIMSELF 2. In his KNOWING HIMSELF 3. In his LOVING and ENJOYING HIMSELF The most perfect Being must needs be the most Happy and that in Being what he is his own Perfection being his Happiness And as Knowledge in the Creature is both his Perfection and Delight so the transcendent Omniscience of the Creator must needs be both part of his Perfection as distinguished by our narrow minds and such felicity as may be called Eminently his Delight though what God's Delight is we know not formally And as Love or Complacency is the perfective operation of the Will and so of the Humane Nature in Man and is his highest final and enjoying acts of which all Goodness is the object so there must be something in the Perfection of the first Cause though not formally the same with Love in Man yet eminently so called as knowable to us by no other name And this complacency must needs be principally in Himself because He himself is the Infinite and onely Primitive Good and as there was primitively no Good but Himself to Love so now there is no Good but derived from Him and dependent on Him And as his Creature of which anon is obliged to love Him most so he must needs be most amiable to Himself Self-love and self-esteem in
To consider the innumerable number of the Orbs the multitude of the Fixed Stars which may be called so many Suns and to think of their distances magnitude powers orders influences communications effects c. and how many millions of these for ought we know there may be besides those which are within our sight even though helped by the most perfect Telescopes it striketh the Soul with unspeakable admiration at the Power that created and maintaineth all this When we think of the unconceivable rapid orderly perfect constant motions of all these Orbs or at least of the Planets and circumjacent bodies in every Vortex All these thoughts do make the Deity or first Being to be just to the mind as the Sun is to the eye the most Intelligible of Beings but so Incomprehensible that we cannot endure to gaze too much or near upon his glory § 27. Whether the whole world be animated or inanimate Whether the whole have one constitutive Soul or not Whether each Orb have its particular Soul or not are things unrevealed and beyond the Certain knowledge of the natural mind But it is certain that the first Being is not the proper constitutive Form or Soul of the world but yet that he is much more to it than such a Form or Soul even the total perfect first Cause of all that it is and hath and doth He is not the constitutive Form or Soul of the Universe as it seems Cicero with the Academicks and Stoicks thought because then the Creator and the Creature should be the same or else the Creature should be nothing but dead passive matter and then Man himself who knoweth that he hath a Soul would either be God which his experience and the conscience of his frailty forbiddeth him to imagin or else he should be a Creature more noble than the Universe of which he is so small a part which his reason forbiddeth him also to believe But yet that God is much more to the world than a constitutive Soul is undeniable because he is the creating Cause which is more than a constitutive Cause and his continued causation in its preservation is as a continued creation As in Man the Soul is a dependent cause which can give nothing to the Body but what it hath received nor act but as it is acted or impowered by the first efficient And therefore though we call not God the Soul of Man because we would not so dishonour him nor confound the Creator and the creature yet we all know that he is to us much more than the Soul of Souls for in him we live and move and have our being So also it is as to God's causation of the Being Motion and Order of all the world God is incomparably more to it than its Form as being the total first Cause of Form and Matter To be the Creator is more than to be the Soul § 28. The glory of all being action and order in the creatures is no less due to God when he worketh by means than when he worketh by none at all For when no Means is a Means nor hath being aptitude force or efficacy but from himself he onely communicateth praise to his creatures when he thus useth them but giveth not away the least degree of his own interest and honour for the creature is nothing hath nothing and can do nothing but by him It useth no strength or skill or bounty but what it first received from him therefore to use such means can be no dishonour to him unless it be a dishonour to be a communicative Good As it is no dishonour to a Watch-maker to make that Engine which sheweth his skill instead of performing all the motions without that little frame of means But yet no similitude will reach the case because all creatures themselves are but the continued productions of the Creator's will and the virtue which they put forth is nothing but what God putteth into them And he is as neer to the effect when he worketh by means as when without § 29. Those that call these three faculties or Principles in the Divine Essence by the name of three Hypostases or Persons do seem to me to speak less unaptly than the Schools who call Deum seipsum intelligentem the Father and Deum ut a se intellectum the Son and Deum a se amatum the Holy Ghost For that in God which is to be conceived of us by Analogy to our essential faculties is with less impropriety called an Hypostasis or Person than that which is to be conceived by us in Analogy to our actus secundi or receptions § 30. And those that say the first faculty Omnipotency as eminently appearing in the frame of Nature may therefore be said to be specially therein personated or denominated the Creating Person speak nothing which derogateth from the honour of the Deity § 31. Though we cannot trace the vestigia the adumbration or appearances of this Trinity in Vnity through the whole Body of Nature and Morality because of the great debility and narrowness of our Minds Yet is it so apparent on the first and most notable parts of both as may make it exceeding probable that it runneth in perfect method through them all if our understandings were but able to follow and comprehend that wonderfull method in the numerous minute and less discernable particulars I shall now give no other instance than in two of the most noble Creatures The Soul of Man which is made after Gods Image from whence we fetch our first knowledge of him hath in the unity of a living Spirit the three foresaid faculties of vital and executive Power Vnderstanding and Will which are neither three species nor three parts nor three accidents of the Soul But three faculties certainly so far distinct as that the Acts from whence they are denominated really differ and therefore the faculties differ at least in their Virtual Relation to those acts and so in a well-grounded denomination To understand is not to will for I understand that which I have no will to even against my will for the Intellect may be forced Therefore the same Soul hath in it the virtue or power both of understanding and willing and so of executing which are denominated from the different acts which they relate to There is some Reason in the powers virtues or faculties of the real difference in the acts So in the Sun and all the superior Luminaries there is in the unity of their Essence a Trinity of Faculties or Powers 1. Motiva 2 Illuminativa 3. Calefactiva causing motion light and heat The doctrine of Motion is much improved by our late Philosophers when the doctrine of Light and Heat are so also and vindicated from the rank of common accidents and qualities the nature of the Luminaries and of Fire will be also better cleared The Sun is not to these Powers or Acts either a Genus a Totum or a Subjectum
its own nature and not meerly by their abuse and if it ended in misery by the designment of the Giver and the tendency of the gift then were it as you say no mercy but a Plague But it is Mercy which in its nature and by the Donors will hath a fitness and tendency to mens recovery and to prevent their misery and they are commanded and intreated accordingly to use it and are warned of the danger of abuse Obj. But God knoweth when he giveth it them that they will so abuse it Answ Gods fore-knowledge or Omniscience is his perfection and will you argue from thence against his Mercy His foreknowledge of mens sin and misery causeth them not What if he foreknew them not Were it any praise to him to be ignorant And yet the Mercy would be but the same If you will not be reconciled to Gods wayes till he cease to be Omniscient or till he prevent all the sin and misery which he foreknoweth you will perish in your enmity and he will easily justifie his mercy against such accusations Obj. But God could give men so much more grace as to prevent mens sin and misery if he would Answ True he is not unable And so he could make every clod a tree and every tree a beast and every beast a man and every man an Angel as I said before but must he therefore do it Here note that it is one thing to say of any Punishment This is so deserved that God may inflict it if he please without Injustice yea and thereby demonstrate his Justice and another thing to say This is so due that God must or will inflict it if he will be just unless a compensation be made to Justice It is of the first sort that I am now speaking For God may have variety of times and measures and kinds of Punishments which he may use at his own choice and yet not leave the sin unpunished finally But whether he properly dispense with any Law which is determinate as to the penalty I am not now to speak it being not pertinent to this place and subject § 3. Therefore God doth in some sort and measure pardon sin to the generality of mankinde while he remitteth some measure of the deserved punishment To remit or forgive the Punishment is so far to forgive the sin for forgiveness as to execution is but non punire proceeding from commiseration or mercy And it is certain by all the Mercy bestowed on them that God remitteth something of the punishment which in Law and Justice he might inflict Though this be not a total pardon it is not therefore none at all § 4. The Goodness of Gods Nature with this universal Experience of the World possesseth all mens minds with this apprehension of God that he is gracious mercifull long-suffering and ready to forgive a capable subject upon terms consistent with his truth and honour and the common good It s true that self-love and self-flattery doth cause men to think of the Mercy of God as indulgent to their lusts and suitable to their fleshly desires and therefore their conceits are none of the measure of his mercy But yet it may be perceived that this foresaid conception of God as Mercifull and ready to forgive a capable subject is warranted by the soberest Reason and is not bred by sin and error For the wise and better and less sinfull any is the more he is inclined to such thoughts of God as of a part of his Perfection § 5. This apprehension is increased in Mankinde by Gods obliging us to forgive one another For though it doth not follow that God must forgive all that which he bindeth us to forgive for the Reasons before expressed Yet we must believe that the Laws of God proceed from that Wisdom and Goodness which is his Perfection and that they bear the Image of them and that the obeying of them tendeth to form us more to his Image our selves and to make us Holy as he is Holy And therefore that this Command of God to Man to be mercifull and forgive doth intimate to us that mercy and forgiveness are agreeable and pleasing unto God § 6. God cannot cast away from his Love and from Felicity any soul which truly loveth Him above all and which so repenteth of his sin as to turn to God in Holiness of Heart and Life Here seemeth to arise before us a considerable difficulty That God can finde in his heart to damn one that truly loveth him and is sanctified is incredible Because 1. then Gods own Image should be in Hell and a Saint be damned 2. Because then the Creature should be readyer to love God than God to love him 3. Then a Soul in Hell should have holy desires Prayers Praises and other acts of Love 4. And a Soul capable of the glorifying mercy of God should miss of it This therefore is not to be believed For God cannot but take complacency in them that love him and bear his Image And those will be happy that God taketh complacency in And yet on the other side Do not the sins of them that love God deserve death and misery according to his Law And might he not inflict that on men which they deserve Doth not Justice require punishment on them that yet sin not away the Love of God nor a state of Holiness To this some answer that all those that consist with Love and Holiness are Venial sins which deserve only temporal chastisement and not perpetual misery I rather answer 1. That all sin considered in it self abstracted from the Cause which counterballanceth it and procureth pardoning mercy doth deserve perpetual misery and therefore so do the sins of the Best in themselves considered But that Grace which causeth their Sanctification and their Love to God doth conjunctly cause the pardon of their sins so that God will not deal with such as in rigour they deserve 2. And if the sin of any that Love God should provoke him to cast them into Hell it followeth not that one that loveth God in sensu composito should be damned For God hath an Order in his Punishments And first he would withdraw his Grace from such a one and leave him to himself and then he will no longer Love God and so it is not a Lover of God that would be damned § 7. The sinfull World is not so farr forsaken of God as to be shut up under desperation and utter impossibility of recovery and salvation For if that were so they were not in Via or under an obligation to use any means or accept of any mercy in order to their recovery nor could they rationally do it or be perswaded to it There is no means to be used where there is no end to be attained and no hope of success § 8. The light of Nature and the foresaid dealings of God with men continuing them under his Government in
the rude and ignorant part of the world All the truth which any Philosopher teacheth is God's truth and it is no wonder if a God of so much goodness do bless his own truth according to its nature and proportion who ever be the messenger of it Whether the success of Philosophy be ever the true sanctification and salvation of any souls is a thing that I meddle not with it belongeth not to us and therefore is not revealed to us But it is visible in the Gospel that all that part of practical doctrine which the Philosophers taught is contained in the doctrine of Christ as a part in the whole and therefore the impress and effect is more full and perfect as the doctrine and the impress and effect of the Philosophers doctrine can be no better than the cause which is partial and defective and mixt with much corruption and untruth All that is good in the Philosophers is in the doctrine of Christ but they had abundance of false opinions and idolatries to corrupt it when Christianity hath nothing but clean and pure So that as no Philosopher affirmed himself to be the Saviour so his doctrine was not attested by the plenary and common effect of Regeneration as Christ's was but as they were but the Ministers of the God of Nature so they had but an answerable help from God who could not be supposed however had they wrought miracles to have attested more than themselves asserted or laid claim to Object But Mahomet ventured on a higher arrogation and pretence and yet if his doctrine sanctifie men it will not justifie his pretences Answ 1. It is not proved that his Doctrine doth truly sanctifie any 2. The effect which it hath can be but lame defective and mixt with much vanity and error as his doctrine is for the effect cannot excell the cause 3. That part of his doctrine which is good and doth good is not his own but part of Christs from whom he borrowed it and to whom the good effects are to be ascribed 4. Mahomet never pretended to be the Son of God and Saviour of the World but only to be a Prophet Therefore his cause is much like that of the Philosophers forementioned saving that he giveth a fuller testimony to Christ 5. If Mahomet had proved his Word by antecedent Prophesies Promises and Types through many ages and by inherent purity and by concomitant Miracles and by such wonderfull subsequent communications of renewing sanctifying grace by the Spirit of God so ordinary in the World we should all have had reason to believe his Word But if he pretend only to be a Prophet and give us none of all these proofs but a foppish ridiculous bundle of Non-sense full of carnal doctrines mixt with holy truth which he had from Christ we must judge accordingly of his Authority and Word notwithstanding God may make use of that common truth to produce an answerable degree of Goodness among those that hear and know no better These Objections may be further answered anon among the rest And thus much shall here suffice of the great and cogent Evidences of the truth of the Christian Faith CHAP. VII Of the subservient proofs and means by which the forementioned Evidences are brought to our certain knowledge THE witness of the Spirit in the four wayes of Evidence already opened is proved to be sure and cogent if first it be proved to be true that indeed such a witness to Jesus Christ hath been given to the World The Argument is undenyable when the Minor is proved He whose Word is attested by God by many thousand years predictions by the inherent Image of God upon the frame of his doctrine by multitudes of uncontrolled Miracles and by the success of his Doctrine to the true Regeneration of a great part of the World is certainly to be believed But such is Jesus Christ Ergo I have been hitherto for the most part proving the Major Proposition and now come to the Minor as to the several branches § 1. I. The Prophetical Testimony of the Spirit is yet legible in the Promises Prophesies and Types and main design of the Old Testament § 2. The Books of Holy Scripture where all these are sound are certain uncorrupted records thereof preserved by the unquestioned tradition and care and to this day attested by the generall confession of the Jewes who are the bitterest enemies to Christianity There are no men of reason that I have heard of that deny the Books of Moses and the Psalms and the Prophets c. to be indeed those that went under those titles from the beginning And that there can be no considerable corruption in them which might much concern their testimony to Christ the comparing of all the Copies and the Versions yet extant will evince together with the testimony of all sorts of enemies and the morall impossibility of their corruption But I will not stand to prove that which no sober adversary doth deny To these Books the Christians did appeal and to these the Jews profess to stand § 3. II. The constitutive inherent image of God upon the Gospel of Christ is also still visible in the Books themselves and needeth no other proof than a capable Reader as afore described § 4. The preaching and Writings of the Ministers of Christ do serve to illustrate this and help men to discern it but adde nothing to the inherent perfection of the Gospel for matter or for method § 5. III. The testimony of the age of Miracles fore-described can be known naturally no way but by sight or other senses to those present and by report or history to those absent § 6. The Apostles and many thousand others saw the Miracles wrought by Christ and needed no other proof of them than their senses The many thousands who at twice were fed by Miracle were witnesses of that The multitude were witnesses of his healing the blinde the lame the paralitick the Demoniacks c. The Pharisees themselves made the strictest search into the cure of the man born blinde Joh. 9. and the raising of Lazarus from the dead and many more His miracles were few of them hid but openly done before the World § 7. The Apostles and many hundreds more were witnesses of Christs own Resurrection and needed no other proof but their sense At divers times he appeared to them together and apart and yielded to Thomas his unbelief so farre as to call him to put his finger into his side and see the print of the Nails He instructed them concerning the Kingdom of God for forty dayes Act. 1. He gave them their Commission Mar. 16. Mat. 28. Joh. 21. He expostulated with Peter and engaged him to feed his Lambs He was seen of more than five hundred brethren at once And lastly appeared after his ascension to Paul and to John that wrote the Revelations § 8. The Apostles also were eye-witnesses of his ascension Act. 1. What he had foretold
them they saw him fulfill § 9. All these eye-witnesses were not themselves deluded in thinking they saw those things which indeed they did not see For 1. They were persons of competent understanding as their Writings shew and therefore not like Children that might be cheated with palpable deceits 2. They were many the twelve Apostles and 70 Disciples and all the rest besides the many thousands of the common people that only wondered at him but followed him not One or two may be easilyer deceived than such multitudes 3. The matters of fact were done neer them where they were present and not far off 4. They were done in the open light and not in a corner or in the dark 5. They were done many times over and not once or twice only 6. The nature of the things was such as a juggling deluding of the senses could not serve for so common a deceit As when the persons that were born blinde the lame the Paralitick c. were seen to be perfectly healed and so of the rest 7. They were persons who followed Christ and were still with him or very oft and therefore if they had been once deceived they could not be so alwayes 8. And vigilant subtile enemies were about them that would have helped them to have detected a deceit 9 Yea the twelve Apostles and 70 Disciples were employed themselves in working Miracles healing the sick and Demoniacks in Christs own life-time and rejoyced in it And they could not be deceived for divers years together in the things which they saw and heard and felt and also in that which they did themselves Besides that all their own Miracles which they wrought after Christs ascension prove that they were not deceived 10 There is no way left then but one to deceive them and that is if God himself should alter and delude all their senses which it is certain that he did not doe For then he had been the chief cause of all the delusion and all the consequents of it in the World He that hath given men sight and hearing and feeling will not delude them all by unresistable alterations and deceits and then forbid them to believe those lies and propagate them to others Man hath no other way of knowing things sensible but by sense He that hath his senses sound and the object proportionate and at a just distance and the medium fit and his understanding sound may well trust his senses especially when it is the case of many And if sense in those cases should be deceived we should be bound to be deceived as having no other way of knowing or of detecting the deceit § 10. Those that saw not Christ's miracles nor saw him risen received all these matters of fact from the testimony of them that said they saw them Having no other way by which they could receive them § 11. Supposing now Christs Resurrection and Miracles to be true it is certain that their use and obligation must extend to more than those that saw them even to persons absent and of other generations This I have fully and undenyably proved in a Disputation in my Book against Infidelity by such arguments as these 1. The use and obligation of such Miracles doth extend to all that have sufficient evidence of their truth But the Nations and generations which never saw them may have sufficient evidence of their truth that they were done Ergo the use and obligation doth extend to such The Major is past all contradiction He that hath sufficient evidence of the truth of the fact is obliged to believe it The Minor is to be proved in the following Sections 2. The contrary doctrine maketh it impossible for God to oblige the World by Miracles according to their proper use But it is not impossible Therefore that doctrine is false Here note that the use and force of miracles lyeth in their being extraordinary rather than in the Power which they manifest For it is as great an effect of Omnipotency to have the Sun move as to stand still Now if miracles oblige none to believe but those that see them then every man in every City Countrey Town Family and in all generations to the end of the World must see Christ risen or not believe it and must see Lazarus risen or not believe it and must see all the miracles himself which oblige him to believe But this is an absurdity and contradiction making Miracles Gods ordinary works and so as no miracles 3. They that teach men that they are bound to believe no Miracles but what they see do deprive all after-ages of all the benefit of all the miraculous works of God both Mercies and Judgements which their forefathers saw But God wrought them not only for them that saw them but also for the absent and after-times 4. By the same reason they will disoblige men from believing any other matters of fact which they never saw themselves And that is to make them like new comers into the World yea like Children and Fools and to be uncapable of Humane Society 5. This reasoning would rob God of the honour of all his most wonderous works as from any but those that see them so that no absent person nor following age should be obliged to mention them believe them or honour him for them which is absurd and impious 6. The World would be still as it were to begin anew and no age must be the wiser for all the experiences of those that have gone before if we must not believe what we never saw And if men must not learn thus much of their Ancestors why should they be obliged to learn any thing else but Children be left to learn only by their own eye-sight 7. If we are not bound to believe Gods wonderous works which have been before our dayes then our ancestors are not bound to tell them us nor we to be thankfull for them The Israelites should not have told their Posterity how they were brought out of the Land of Egypt nor England keep a day of Thanksgiving for its deliverance from the Powder-plot But the consequent is absurd Ergo so is the antecedent What have we our tongues for but to speak of what we know to others The love that Parents have to their Children will oblige them to acquaint them with all things usefull which they know The Love which men have naturally to truth will oblige them to divulge it Who that had but seen an Angel or received instructions by a Voice from Heaven or seen the dead raised would not tell others what he had seen and heard And to what end should he tell them if they were not obliged to believe it 8. Governments and Justice and all humane converse is maintained by the belief of others and the reports and records of things which we see not Few of the Subjects see their King Witnesses carry it in every cause of Justice Thus Princes prove their Successions and
heard and did things which were nothing so for so long together nor yet so subtile as to be able to lay such a deceiving plot and carry it on so closely to the end And they that suspect the Apostles and first Disciples to be the Authors of the plot will not suspect all the Churches too For if there were Deceivers there must be some to be deceived by them If Christ deceived the Disciples then the Disciples could not be wilfull deceivers themselves For if they were themselves deceived they could not therein be wilfull deceivers And then how came they to confirm their testimony by Miracles If the Apostles only were deceivers then all the Disciples and Evangelists who assisted them must be deceived and not wilfull deceivers And then how came they also to do miracles If all the Apostles and Disciples of the first Edition were wilfull Deceivers then all the Churches through the World which were gathered by them were deceived by them and then they were not wilsul deceivers themselves which is all that I am now proving having proved before that they were not deceived § 47. 2. If they had been cunning enough it is most inprobable that so many thousands in so many Nations should be so bad as to desire and endeavour at such a rate as their own temporal and eternal ruine to deceive all the world into a blasphemy without any benefit to themselves which might be rationally sufficient to seem a tempting compensation to them § 48. For all these Churches which witnessed the Apostles Miracles 1. Did profess to believe lying and deceiving to be a heinous sin 2. And to believe an everlasting punishment for liars 3. They were taught by their Religion to expect calamity in this world 4. They had experience enough to confirm them in that expectation Therefore they had no motive which could be sufficient to make them guilty of so costly a deceit For 1. Operari sequitur esse A man will do ill but according to the measure that he is ill and as bad as humane nature is it is not yet so much depraved as that thousands through the world could agree without any commodity to move them to it to ruine their own estates and lives and souls for ever meerly to make the world believe that other men did miracles and to draw them to believe a known untruth And 2. as free as the will is it is yet a thing that hath its nature and inclination and cannot act without a cause and object which must be some apparent good Therefore when there is no good-appearing but wickedness and misery it cannot will it So that this seemeth inconsistent with humane nature § 49. And the certain history of their lives doth shew that they were persons extraordinary good and conscionable being holy heavenly and contemners of this world and ready to suffer for their Religion and therefore could not be so extremely bad as to ruine themselves only to do mischief to the world and their posterity § 50. And their enemies bare them witness that they did and suffered all this in the hopes of a reward in heaven which proveth that they were not wilful liars and deceivers for no man can look for a reward in heaven for the greatest known-villany on earth even for suffering to cheat all the world into a blasphemy Even Lucian scoffeth at the Christians for running into sufferings and hoping to be rewarded for it with a life everlasting § 51. 3. If they had been never so cunning and so bad yet was it impossible that they should be able for the successful execution of such a deceit as will appear by all these following evidences § 52. 1. It was impossible that so many thousands at such a distance who never saw each others faces could lay the plot in a way of concord but one would have been of one mind and another of another § 53. 2. It is impossible that they should agree in carrying it on and keeping it secret through all the world if they had accorded in the first contrivance and attempts § 54. 3. It is impossible that all the thousands of adversaries among them who were eye-witnesses and ear-witnesses as well as they should not discover the deceit All those Parthians Medes Elamites and other Country-men mentioned Act. 2. were not Christians and the Christians though many were but a small part of the Cities and Countries where they dwelt And Paul saith that Tongues and Miracles were for the sake of unbelievers and unbelievers were ordinarily admitted into the Christian assemblies and the Christians went among them to preach and most of the miracles were wrought in their sight and hearing § 55. 4. It is impossible that the falling out of Christians among themselves among so many thousands in several Nations should never have detected the deceit if they had been all such deceivers § 56. 5. It is impossible but some of the multitudes of the perverted exasperated separating or excommunicate Hereticks which were then in most Countries where there were Christians and opposed the Orthodox and were opposed by them should have detected this deceit if it had been such § 57. 6. It is impossible but some of the Apostates of those times who are supposed to have joyned in the deceit would have detected it to the world when they fell off from Christianity § 58. 7. It is scarce possible among so many thousands in several Lands that none of their own consciences living or dying should be constrained in remorse and terrour to detect so great an evil to the world § 59. 8. Much more impossible is it that under the conscience of such a villany they should live and suffer and die rejoycingly and think it a happy exchange to forsake life and all for the hopes of a reward in heaven for this very thing § 60. 9. Lastly it is impossible that these thousands of Christians should be able to deceive many more than themselves into the belief of the same untruths in the very time and place where the things were said to be done and where the detection of the deceit had been easie yea unavoidable Christianity was then upon the increase they that were converted did convert more than themselves Suppose in Jerusalem Ephesus Corinth Rome c. some thousands believed by the preaching of the Apostles in a few years at the first in a few years more there were as many more added Now supposing all this had been but a cheat if the Christians had told their neighbours Among us unlearned men speak in the Languages of all Countries they cast out devils they cure all diseases with prayer and annointing they prophesie and interpret Tongues they do many other miracles and the same Spirit is given to others by their imposition of hands and all this in the Name and by the Power of Jesus would not their neighbours easily know whether this were true or not And if it were false would they not
these Who can say that God is unable to raise the dead who seeth so much greater things performed by him in the daily motion of the Sun or Earth and in the support and course of the whole frame of Nature He that can every Spring give a kinde of Resurrection to Plants and Flowers and Fruits of the Earth can easily raise our bodies from the dust And no man can prove that the Wisdom of God or yet his Will are against our Resurrection but that both are for it may be proved by his Promises Shall that which is beyond the power of Man be therefore objected as a difficulty to God 2. Yea it is congruous to the Wisdom and Governing Justice of God that the same Body which was partaker with the Soul in sin and duty should be partaker with it in suffering or felicity 3. The Lord Jesus Christ did purposely die and rise again in his humane body to put the Resurrection out of doubt by undenyable ocular demonstration and by the certainty of belief 4. There is some Natural Reason for the Resurrection in the Souls inclination to its Body As it is unwilling to lay it down it will be willing to reassume it when God shall say The time is come As we may conclude at night when they are going to bed that the people of City and Countrey will rise the next morning and put on their Cloaths and not go naked about the streets because there is in them a Natural inclination to rising and to cloaths and a natural aversness to lie still or to go uncloathed so may we conclude from the souls natural inclination to its body that it will reassume it as soon as God consenteth 5. And all our Objections which reason from supposed contradictions vanish because none of us all have so much skill in Physicks as to know what it is which individuateth this Numerical Body and so what it is which is to be restored But we all confess that it is not the present mass of flesh and humours which being in a continual flux is not the same this year which it was the last and may vanish long before we die Obj. X. If Christ be indeed the Saviour of the World why came he not into the World till it was 4000 years old And why was he before revealed to so few and to them so darkly Did God care for none on earth but a few Jews or did he not care for the Worlds recovery till the later age when it drew towards its end Answ It is hard for the Governour of the World by ordinary means to satisfie all self-conceited persons of the wisdom and equity of his dealings But 1. it belongeth not to us but to our free Benefactor to determine of the measure and season of his benefits May he not do with his own as he list And shall we deny or question a proved truth because the reason of the circumstances is unrevealed to us If our Physician come to cure us of a mortal disease would we reject him because he came not sooner and because he cured not all others that were sick as well as us 2. The Eternal Wisdom and Word of God the second Person in the Trinity was the Saviour of the World before he was incarnate He did not only by his Vndertaking make his future performances valid as to the merit and satisfaction necessary to our deliverance but he instructed Mankinde in order to their recovery and Ruled them upon terms of grace and so did the work of a Redeemer or Mediator even as Prophet Priest and King before his Incarnation He enacted the Covenant of Grace that whoever repenteth and believeth shall be saved and so gave men a conditional pardon of their sins 3. And though Repentance and the Love of God was necessary to all that would be saved even as a constitutive cause of their salvation yet that Faith in the Mediator which is but the means to the Love of God and to sanctification was not alwayes nor in all places in the same particular Articles necessary as it is now where the Gospel is preached Before Christs coming a more general belief might serve the turn for mens salvation without believing that This Jesus is the Christ that he was conceived by the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary suffered under Pontius Pilate was crucified dead and buryed and descended to Hades and rose again the third day and ascended into Heaven c. And as more is necessary to be believed since Christs incarnation and resurrection than before so more was before necessary to the Jewes who had the Oracles of God and had more revealed to them than to other Nations who had less revealed And now more is necessary where the Gospel cometh than where it doth not 4. So that the Gentiles had a Saviour before Christs Incarnation and not only the Jewes They were reprieved from Legal Justice and not dealt with by God upon the proper terms of the Covenant of Works or meer Nature They had all of them much of that mercy which they had forfeited which came to them by the Grace of the Redeemer They had time and helps to turn to God and a course of means appointed them to use in order to their recovery and salvation According to the use of which they shall be judged They were not with the Devils left remediless and shut out of all hope under final desperation No one ever perished in any Age or Nation of the World who by believing in a mercifull pardoning holy God was recovered to love God above all And if they did not this they were all without a just excuse 5. The course of Grace as that of Nature doth wisely proceed from low degrees to higher and bringeth not things to perfection at the first The Sun was not made the first day of the Creation nor was Man made till all things were prepared for him The Churches Infancy was to go before its Maturity We have some light of the Sun before it rise much more before it come to the height As Christ now teacheth his Church more plainly when he is himself gone into Glory even by his Pastors whom he fitteth for that work and by his Spirit so did he though more obscurely yet sufficiently teach it before he came in the flesh by Prophets and Priests His work of Salvation consisteth in bringing men to live in Love and Obedience And his way of Teaching them his saving doctrine is by his Ministers without and by his Spirit within And thus he did before his coming in flesh and thus he doth since we that are born since his coming see not his Person any more than they who were born before But we have his Word Ministers and Spirit and so had they His reconciling sacrifice was effectual morally in esse cognito volito before the performance of it And the means of reconciling our mindes to God
was once as improbable as the Calling of the Jews is and yet it was done 3. And many of those Prophecies are hereby fulfilled it being not a worldly Kingdom as the carnal Jews imagined which the Prophets foretold of the Messiah but the spiritual Kingdom of a Saviour When the power and glory of the Roman Empire in its greatest height did submit and resign it self to Christ with many other Kingdoms of the world there was more of those Prophecies then fulfilled than selfishness will suffer the Jews to understand And the rest shall all be fulfilled in their season But as in all Sciences it is but a few of the extraordinarily wise who reach the most subtile and difficult points so it will be but a very few Christians who will understand the most difficult prophecies till the accomplishment interpret them Obj. XXIII But the difficulties are as great in the Doctrines as in the Prophecies Who is able to reconcile Gods Decrees foreknowledge and efficacious special Grace with mans Free-will and the righteousness of Gods Judgement and the reasonableness of his Precepts Promises and Threats How Gods Decrees are all fulfilled and in him we live and move and be and are not sufficient for a good thought of our selves but to believe to will and to do is given us and he will have mercy on whom he will have mercy and whom he will he hardeneth and it is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy And yet that he would not the death of a sinner but rather that he repent and live and that he would have all men saved and come to the knowledge of the truth and layeth all the blame of their misery on themselves Ans First consider these things apart and in themselves and then comparatively as they respect each other 1. Is it an incredible thing that all Being should be from the First Being and all Goodness from the Infinite Eternal Good and that nothing should be unknown to the infinite omniscient Wisdom and that nothing can overcome the Power of the Omnipotent or that he is certainly able to procure the accomplishment of all his own Will and that none shall disappoint his Purposes nor make him fall short of any of his Councils or Decrees Go no further now and do not by false or uncertain Doctrine make difficulties to your selves which God never made and then tell me whether any of this be doubtfull 2. On the other side is it incredible that Man is a rational free Agent and that he is a Creature governable by Laws and that God is his Ruler Law-giver and Judge and that his Laws must command and prohibit and the sanction contain rewards and punishments and that men should be judged righteously according to their works or that the Messengers of Christ should intreat and perswade men to obey and that they should be moved as men by motives of good or evil to themselves Is there any thing in this that is incredible or uncertain I think there is not And these difficulties will concern you nevertheless whether you are Christians or not They are harder points to Philosophers than to us and they have been their controversies before Christ came into the World They are points that belong to the natural part of Theology and not that which resteth only on supernatural Revelation and therefore this is nothing against Christ 2. But yet I will answer your question Who can reconcile these things 1. They can do much to the reconciling of them who can distinguish a meer Volition or Purpose or Decree from an efficacious pre-determining influx 2. And can distinguish between those effects which need a positive cause and purpose or decree and those nullities which having no cause but defective do need no positive purpose or decree 3. And can distinguish between the need we have of Medicinal Grace for holy actions and the need we have of common help for every action natural and free 4. And can distinguish between an absolute Volition and a limited Volition in tantum ad hoc and no further 5. They that can distinguish between mans Natural liberty of self-determination and his Civil liberty from restraint of Law and his moral liberty from vicious habits 6. They that can well difference mans Natural power or faculties from his moral power of good and holy disposition 7. They that know what a free Power is and how far the causer of that Power is or is not the cause of the act or its omission 8. They that can distinguish between those acts which God doth as our Owner or as our free Benefactor and those which he doth as Rector 9. And between those which he doth as Rector by his Legislative will antecedent to mens keeping or breaking of his Laws and by his Judicial and executive will as consequent to these acts of man 10. He that can distinguish between Gods method in giving both the first Call of the Gospel and the first internal Grace to receive it and of his giving the Grace of further sanctification justification and glory 11. And between the manner of his procuring our first faith and the procuring our following sanctification 12. And he that knoweth how easie it is with God to attain what he willeth without destroying the Liberty of our wills As a Miller can make the stream of water turn his Mill and grinde his Corn without altering any thing in the inclination of the water 13. And withall how incomprehensible the nature and manner of Gods operation is to Man and how transcendently it is above all Physical agency by corporeal contact or motion I say he that understandeth and can apply these distinctions can reconcile the Decrees and concourse of God with his Government and mans Free-will as farre as is necessary to the quieting of our understandings Obj. XXIV But the Christian Faith doth seem to be but Humane and not Divine in that it is to be resolved into the Credit of Men Even of those men who tell us that they saw Christs miracles and saw him risen and ascend and of those who saw the miracles of the Apostles and of those who tell us that the first Churches witness that they saw such things The certainty cannot exceed the weakest of the Premises And this is the argument The Doctrine which was attested by Miracles is of God But the Christian Doctrine was attested by Miracles Proved The spectators averred it to others who have transmitted the Testimony down to us So that you are no surer of the Doctrine than of the Miracles and no surer of the Miracles than of the Humane Testimony which hath delivered it to you Ans If you will be at the labour to read over what I have written before you shall finde a threefold testimony to Christ besides this of Miracles And you shall finde the Apostles testimony of Christs Miracles and Resurrection attested by more than a
duration yet it is after God in order of being as caused by Him as the shadow is after the substance and as the beams and light are after the Sun or rather as the leaves would be after the life of the Tree if they were conceived to be both eternal One would be an eternal Cause and the other but an eternal Effect 2. It is certain that this present World containing the Sun and Moon and Heavens and Earth which are mentioned Genes 1. is not from Eternity And indeed Reason it self doth make that at least very probable as Revelation makes it certain Which will appear when I have opened the Philosophers opinions on the other side 2. Among your selves there are all these differences and so we have several Cases to state with you 1. Some think that this present Systeme of compounded beings is from Eternity 2. Others think that only the Elements and Heavens and all simple Beings are from Eternity 3. Others think that Fire or Aether only as the Active Element is from Eternity or the incorruptible matter of the Heavens 4. Others think that matter and motion only were from Eternity 5. Others think that only spiritual purer beings Intelligences or Mindes were from Eternity and other things produced immediately by them 6. And there have been those Heathen Philosophers who held that only God was from Eternity Among all this variety of opinions why should any one think the more doubtfully of Christianity for denying some of them which all the other deny themselves Is it a likely thing that any individual mixt body should be eternall when we know that mixt bodies incline to dissolution and when we see many of them oriri interire daily before our eyes And if Man and Beast as to each individual have a beginning and end it must be so as to the beginning of the species for the species existeth not out of the Individuals and some individual must be first And as Bp. Ward argueth against Mr. Hobs If the World be eternal there have infinite dayes gone before e. g. the birth of Christ and then the whole is no greater than the parts or infinity must consist of finite parts The Heavens and the Earth therefore which are compounded beings by the same reason are lyable to dissolution as man is and therefore had a beginning So that the truth is there is no rational probability in any of your own opinions but those which assert the Eternity of some Simple Beings as Matter or Intelligences or an Anima Vniversalis Now consider further that if ever there was a moment when there were no Individuals or mixt Beings but only some universal Soul or Matter then there was an Eternity when there was nothing else For Eternity hath no beginning And then will it not be as strange to your selves to think that God should from all Eternity delight himself in Matter unformed if that be not a contradiction or in an Anima simplex unica without any of all the variegated matter and beings which we now finde besides in Nature as that he should eternally content himself with Himself alone If all individuals of compound beings were not from Eternity what was Either the Egge or the Hen must be first as the old instance is If you will come to it that either Anima unica or Atoms unformed were eternal why should not God as well be without these as be without the formed Worlds What shall a presumptuous minde now say to all these difficulties why return to modesty Remember that as the Bird hath wit given her to build her nest and breed her young as well as man could do it and better but hath no wit for things which do not concern her so man hath reason for the ends and uses of reason and not for things that are not profitable to him and that such looks into Eternity about things unrevealed do but over-whelm us and tell us that they are unrevealed and that we have not one reason for such employments And what is the end of all that I have said Why to tell you that our Religion doth not only say nothing of former worlds but 2. that it also forbiddeth us to say Yea or Nay to such questions and to corrupt our minds with such presumptuous searches of unrevealed things And therefore that you have no reason to be against the Scripture on this account for it doth not determine any thing against your own opinion if you assert not the eternity of this present world or system but it determineth against your presumption in medling with things which are beyond your reach And withall it giveth us a certainty that as in one Sun there is the Lux Radii Lumen so in one God there is Father Son and holy Spirit eternally existent and self-sufficient which quieteth the mind more than to think of an eternity of an Anima or Materia which is not God All this I have here annexed because these Philosophical self-deceivers are to be pitied and to have their proper help And I thought it unmeet to interrupt the discourse with such debates which are not necessary to more sober Readers but only for them who labour of this disease and I know that when they read the first leafe of the book which proveth that man hath a Soul or Mind they will rise up against it with all the objections which Gassendus Mr. Hobs c. assault the like in Cartesius with and say You prove not this Mind is any thing but the subtiler part of Matter and the temperament of the whole To whom I now answer 1. That it is not in that place incumbent on me nor seasonable to prove any more than I there assert 2. But I have here done it for their sakes more seasonably though my discourse is entire and firm without it And I desire the unbelieving Reader to observe that I am so far from an unnecessary incroaching upon his liberty and making him believe that Christianity condemneth all those conjectures of Philosophers which it asserteth not it self that I have taken the liberty of free conjecturing in such cases my self not going beyond the evidence of probability or the bounds of modesty and that I think them betrayers of the Christian cause or very injurious to it who would interess it in matters with what it medleth not and corrupt it by pretending that it condemneth all the opinions in Philosophy which themselves are against Nor am I one that believe that Christianity will allow me that zeal which too hastily and peremptorily condemneth all that in such points do hold what I dislike I do not anathematize as Hereticks all those who hold those opinions which either Stephanus or Guilielm Episc Parisienses condemned in their Articul Contra varios in fide errores though I think many of them dangerous and most very audacious e. g. Quod intelligentia motrix coeli fluit in animas rationales sicut