A man of credit or an impudent Liar Both may be equal in confident asserting and in the plausibility of the narrative Meer humane belief therefore must be uncertain From whence we see the pitiful case of the subjects of the King of Rome for so I must rather call him than a Bishop Why doth a Lay-man believe Transubstantiation or any other Article of their Faith Because the Church faith it is Gods Word What is the Church that saith so It is a faction of the Popes perhaps at Laterane or forty of his Prelates at the Conventicle of Trent How doth he know that these men do not lie Because God promised that Peters Faith should not fail and the Gates of Hell should not prevail against the Church and the Spirit should lead the Apostles into all truth But how shall he know that this Scripture is Gods Word And also that it was not a total failing rather than a failing in some degree that Peter was by that promise freed from Or that the Spirit was promised to these Prelates which was promised to the Apostles Why because these Prelates say so And how know they that they say true Why from Scripture as before But let all the rest go How knoweth the Lay-man that ever the Church made such a decree That ever the Bishops of that Council were lawfully called That they truely represented all Christs Church on Earth That this or that Doctrine is the decree of a Council or the sence of the Church indeed Why because the Priest tells him so But how knoweth he that this Priest saith true or a few more that the man speaketh with there I leave you I can answer no further but must leave the credit of Scripture Council and each particular Doctrine on the credit of that poor single Priest or the few that are his companions The Lay-man knoweth it no otherwise Q. But is not the Scripture it self then shaken by this seeing the History of the Canon and incorruption of the Books c. dependeth on the word of Man Ans No. 1. I have elsewhere fully shewed how the Spirit hath sealed the substance of the Gospel 2. And even the matters of fact are not of meer humane Faith. For meer humane Faith depends on the meer honesty of the reporter but this Historical Faith dependeth partly on Gods attestation and partly on Natural proofs 1. God did by Miracles attest the reports of the Apostles and first Churches 2. The consent of all History since that these are the same writings which the Apostles wrote hath a Natural Evidence above bare humane Faith. For I have elsewhere shewed that there is a concurrence of humane report or a consent of history which amounteth to a true Natural Evidence the Will having its Nature and some necessary acts and nothing but necessary ascertaining causes could cause such concurrence Such Evidence we have that K. James Q. Elizabeth Q. Mary lived in England that our Statute books contain the true Laws which those Kings and Parliaments made whom they are ascribed to For they could not possibly rule the Land and over-rule all mens interests and be pleaded at the Bar c. without contradiction and detection of the fraud if they were forgeries though it 's possible that some words in a Statute Book may be misprinted There is in this a Physical Certainty in the consent of men and it depends not as humane Faith upon the honesty of the reporter but Knaves and Liars have so consented whose interests and occasions are cross and so is it in the case of the history of the Scripture Books which were read in all the Churches through the World every Lords day and contenders of various opinions took their Salvation to be concerned in them VIII Those things must needs be uncertain to any man as to a particular Faith or Knowledge which are more in number than he may possibly have a distinct understanding of or can examine their Evidence whether they be certain or not For instance the Roman Faith containeth all the Doctrinal decrees and their Religion also all the Practical decrees of all the approved General Councils that is of so much as pleased the Pope such power hath he to make his own Religion But these General Councils added to all the Bible with all the Apocrypha are so large that it is not possible for most men to know what is in them So that if the question be whether this or that Doctrine be the Word of God and the proof of the affirmative is because it is decreed by a General Council this must be uncertain to almost all men who cannot tell whether it be so decreed or no Few Priests themselves knowing all that is in all those Councils So that if they knew that all that is in the Councils is Gods Word they know never the more whether this or that Doctrine e. g. the immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary c. be the Word of God. And if a Heathen knew that all that is in the Bible is the Word of God and knew not a word what is in it would this make him a Christian or Saint him You may object that most Protestants also know not all that is in the Scripture Ans True nor any one And therefore Protestants say not that all that is in the Scripture is necessary to be known to Salvation but they take their Religion to have essential parts and integral parts and accidents And so they know how far each is necessary But the Papists deride this distinction and because all truths are equally true they would make men believe that all are equally Fundamental or Essential to Christianity But this is only when they dispute against us at other times they say otherwise themselves when some other interest leads to it and so cureth this impudency It were worthy the enquiry whether a Papist take all the Bible to be Gods Word and de fide or only so much of it as is contained particularly in the decrees of Councils If the latter then none of the Scripture was de fide or to be particularly believed for above 300 years before the Council of Nice If the former then is it as necessary to Salvation to know how old Henoch was as to know that Jesus Christ is our Saviour IX Those things must needs be uncertain which depend upon such a number of various circumstances as cannot be certainly known themselves For instance the common rule by which the Papist Doctors do determine what particular Knowledge and Faith are necessary to Salvation is that so many truths are necessary as are sufficiently propounded to that person to be known and believed But no man living learned nor unlearned can tell what is necessary to the sufficiency of this proposal Whether it be sufficient if he be told it in his Childhood only and at what Age Or if he be told it but once or twice or thrice or how oft whether by a Parent or
A TREATISE OF Knowledge and Love COMPARED In two Parts I. Of Falsly Pretended Knowledge II. Of True Saving Knowledge and Love. I. Against Hasty Judging and False Conceits of Knowledge and for necessary Suspension II. The Excellency of Divine Love and the Happiness of being Known and Loved of God. Written as greatly needful to the Safety and PEACE of every Christian and of the Church The only certain way to escape false Religions Heresies Sects and Malignant Prejudices Persecutions and Sinful Wars All caused by falsly pretended Knowledge and hasty Judging by Proud Ignorant men who know not their Ignorance By RICHARD BAXTER Who by God's blessing on long and hard Studies hath learned to know that he knoweth but little and to suspend his Judgment of Uncertainties and to take Great Necessary Certain things for the food of his Faith and Comforts and the Measure of his Church-Communion Prov. 14 16. A wise man feareth and departeth from evil But the FOOL RAGETH and is CONFIDENT 2 Cor. 11.3 But I fear lest by any means as the Serpent beguiled EVE by his subtilty so your minds should be CORRVPTED from the SIMPLICITY which is in Christ 1 Cor. 1.25 The foolishness of God is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men v. 20. Hath not God made fâ—oliâ—h the wisdom of this world c. 2.6 We speak wisdom among them that are perfect yet not the wisdom of this world 2 Tim. 2.15 Study to shew thy self approved to God a workman that needed not be ashamed rightly DIVIDING the word of Truth 16. But shun profane and vain oâ—â—lings for they will increase unto more ungodliness August Enchirid. cap. 59. De Corporibus Angelorum Cum ista queruntur a sicut potest quisque conjectat non inutiliter exercentur ingenia si adhibeatur disceptantia moderata absit error opinantium se scire quod nesciunt Quod enim opes est ut hec hujusmodi affirmentur vel negentur vel definiantur cum disâ—rimine quando sine crimine nesciuntur LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns at the lower end of Cheapside near Mercers Chapel 1689. TO THE Right Worshipful Sir HENRY ASHHURST AND THE Lady DIANA HIS WIFE SIR YOur Name is not prefixed to this Treatise either as accusing you of the Sin herein detected or as praising you for those Virtues which good Men are more pleased to possess and exercise than to have proclaimed though they be as Light that is hardly hid But it is to vent and exercise that Gratitude which loveth not the concealment of such Friendship and Kindness as you and your Lady Eminently and your Relatives and Hers the Children of the Lord Paget have long obliged me by And it is to Posterity that I record your Kindness more than for this Age to which it hath publickly notified it self during my publick Accusations Reproaches Sentences Imprisonments and before and since Who knoweth you that knoweth not hereof And it is to renew the record of that Love and Honour which I owed to your deceased Father formerly pthough too slenderly recorded to be the Heir and Imitater of whose Faith Piety Charity Patience Humility Meekness Impartiality Sincerity and Perseverance is as great an Honour and Blessing as I can wish you next to the conformity to our highest pattern And though he was averse to worldly Pomp and Grandeur and desired that his Children should not affect it yet God that will honour those that honour him hath advanced his Children I believe partly for his sake But I intreat you all and some other of my Friends whom God hath raised as a Blessing to their Pious and Charitable Parents and themselves to watch carefully lest the deceitful World and Flesh do turn such Blessings into Golden Fetters and to be sure to use them as they would find at last on their account And as you are a Member of the present House of Commons I think the Subject of this Treatise is not unnecessary to your consideration and daily care That when proof and notorious and sad Experience telleth us what distractions have befaln Church and State by Mens self-conceited erroneous rushing upon sin and falshood as if it were Certainly Good and True and how little Posterity feareth and avoideth this confounding Vice though History tell us that it hath been the Deluge that in all Ages hath drowned the peace and welfare of the World you may be wary and try before you venture in doubtful cases especially where the Sacred and Civil Interest of this and many other Lands doth probably lye on the determination Do you think all that ventured upon the Actions and Changes that have tost up and down both Churches and Kingdoms by Divisions Persecutions and Wars had not done better to suspend their Judgments till they could have more certainly determined Who should proceed more cautelously than Bishops And where rather than in Councils And in what rather than about Faith and Publick Government and Order And had Bishops and Councils torn the Church and Empires and Kingdoms as they have done by aspiring after Superiority and by contentious Writings and condemning each other and by contradictory and erroneous and persecuting Canons or by raising Wars and Deposing Princes ever since 400 or 500 or 600 years after Christ if not sooner if they had known their ignorance and suspended in such dangerous cases till they were sure I know you are none of them who dare pretend to a Certain Knowledge that all those Oaths Declarations Covenants Practices imposed by Laws and Canons on Ministers and People in this Land in the Act of Uniformity the Corporation Act the Vestry Act the Militia Act the five Mile Act of Banishment c. are so Good and Lawful as will justifie the Execution of them and the silencing ejecting ruining and judging to lye from six Months to six in the common Jails till they die 2000 as faithful Ministers of Christ as any Nation hath under Heaven unless they forbear to Preach the Gospel to which they are vowed or venture their Souls on that which they fear to be sins so great as they are loth to name When Christ will sentence them to Everlasting punishment who did not visit feed clothe him in the least of them whom he calls his Brethren Before Men silence conditionally the whole Ministry of such a Kingdom and actually 2000 such while the wounding dividing consequents may be so easily foreseen and before men deliberately and resolutely continue and keep up such Battering Engines on pretence of Uniformity and Obedience to Men and before they venture to own this to that Lord who hath made other terms of Church Unity and Peace it nearly concerneth them to think and think on it a thousand times A suspended judgment is here safer than prefidence and confident rage And also they that desire an Abolition of Episcopacy should a thousand times bethink them first what True and Primitive Episcopacy is
you must be damned by the Censures of many And if you can bear it from all the Sects save one why not from that one also 4. But I pray you ask these damning Sectaries Is it believing your Word and being of your Opinion that will save me Or must I also know by scientifical Evidence that you say true and that God himself hath said what you say If he say that believing him and his party though he call it the Church is enough to save you you have then less reason to believe him For unless he can undertake himself to save you he cannot undertake that believing him shall save you If he say God hath promised to save you if you believe me believe that when he hath proved it to you But if it be Knowledge and Divine Faith which he saith must save you it is not your believing his Word or Opinion that will help you to that I would tell such a man Help me to Knowledge and Faith by Cogent or Certifying Evidence and I will learn and thank you with all my Heart But till I have it it is but mocking my self and you to say that I have it Obj. But the Papists herein differ from all other Sects For they will say That if I believe the Church concerning Divine Revelations and take all for Divine Revelation which the Church saith is so and so believe it then I have a Divine Faith. Ans 1. And is this to you a Certifying Evidence that indeed God revealed it because their Church saith so If their Church agree with Greeks Armenians Syrians Copties Abassines Protestants and all other Christian Churches then it will be no part of the contest in question and it is a stronger Foundation of the two to believe it because all say it than because they say it But if they differ from the rest know their proof that their Church can tell Gods mind and not the rest of the Christian World. And that about a third part of the Christians in the World have such a promise which all the rest have not 2. And how doth their Church know that it is Gods Word Is it by any certifying Evidence or by Prophetical Inspiration If by Evidence let it be produced Is it not revealed to others as well as to them Must not we have a Faith of the same kind as the Church hath If so we must believe by the same Evidence as that Church believeth And what is that It is not their own words Doth a Pope believe himself only or a Council believe themselves only Or hath God said You shall be saved if you will believe your selves and believe that I have said all that you say I have said Where is there such a promise But if Pope and Council be not saved for believing themselves how shall I know that I shall be saved for believing them and that one kind of Faith saveth me and another them I ask it of each particular Bishop in that Council Is he saved for believing himself or the rest If no man be saved for believing himself why should another be saved for believing him And the Faith of the Council is but the Faith of the Individual Members set together Obj. But they are saved for believing themselves as consenters and not singly Ans All Consenters know nothing as Consenters but what they know as Individuals And what is the Evidence by which they know and are brought to consent Must not that Evidence convince us also Obj. But the present Church are saved for believing not themselves but the former Church Ans Then so must we It is not the present Church then that I must believe by a saving Faith But why then was the last Age saved and so the former and so on to the first Is any thing more evident than that all men must be saved for Believing God And that his Word must be known to be his Word by the same Evidence by one man and another And that Evidence I have proved in several Treatises to be another kind of thing than the Decree of a Pope and his Council But if it be not Evidence but Prophetical Inspiration and Revelation by which the Council or Church knoweth Gods Word I will believe them when by Miracles or otherwise they prove themselves to be true Prophets till then I shall take them for Phanaticks and hear them as I do the Quakers Should I here stay to bid you ask them as before How you shall be sure that their Council was truly General and more Authentick and Infallible than the second at Ephesus or that at Ariminum or that at Constance and Basil c. And whether the more General Dissent of all the other Christians from them be not of as great Authority as they that are the smaller part and how you shall be sure of that And also how but on the word of a Priest you can know all that the Church hath determined with abundance such Questions of the Meaning of each Council the ambiguity of words the Errour of Printers the forgery of Publishers c. I should help you to see that saying as a Priest saith Is not Knowing the thing nor Believing God. Stop therefore till you have Evidence Follow no Party as a Party in the dark Or if probability incline you more to them than to others call not this Certainty Religion Divine Faith. Thus your Faith will be Faith indeed and you will escape all that would corrupt and frustrate it The business is great God requireth you to refuse no Light But withal he chargeth you to believe no falshood nor put darkness for light Much less to father mens Lies or Errours or Conceits on God and to lay your Salvation on it that they are all God's Word How dreadful a thing is this if it prove false Is it not blaspheming God No man in his wits then but a partial designer can look that you should make haste or go any further than you have assuring or convincing Evidence If you Know that any Sect doth Err you need no Preservative If you do not tell them I am ignorant of this matter I will learn as fast as I can not neglecting greater matters and I will be neither for you nor against you further than I can know And as to the former Objection of being still Infants I further answer that as feigned knowledge is no knowledge so Manhood consisteth not in being of many uncertain Opinions no not so much in knowing many little controverted things as in getting a clearer more affecting powerful practical Knowledge and belief of our Christianity and the great and sure things which we know already and in Love and Obedience practising of them He is the strongest Christian who loveth God best and hath most Holiness and he knoweth God better than any others do By this much you may see that the world is full of counterfeit Faith and Knowledge and Religion even fancy and belief of
Layman that can not tell him what is in the Councils or by a Priest that never read the Councils and whether the variety of natural capacities bodily temperaments education and course of Life before do not make as great variety of proportions to be necessary to the sufficiency of this Proposal And what mortal man can truly take the measure of them And how then can any man be Certain what those points are which are necessary for him to believe X. Those things are uncertain which depend upon an uncertain Author or Authority For instance the Roman faith dependeth on the exposition of the Scriptures by the consent of the Fathers and on the Tradition of the Church and the decrees of an authorized Council And here is in all this little but uncertainties 1. It is utterly uncertain who are to be taken for Fathers and who not Whether Origen Tatianus Arnobius Lactantius Tertullian and many such be Fathers or not Whether such a man as Theophilus Alexandrinus or Chrysostom was the Father when they condemned each other Whether such as are justly suspected of Heresy as Eusebius or such as the Romanists have cast suspicions on as Lucifer Calaritanus called a Heretick Socrates Sozomens falsly called Novatians Hilary Arelatensis Condemned by the Pope Leo and Claud. Turovens Rupertus Tuitiens and such others When the ancients renounced each others Communion as Martin did by Ithacius and Idacius and their Synod when they describe one another as stark Knaves as Socrates doth Theophil Alexandrin and Sulpitius Severus doth Ithacius which of them were the Fathers 2. How shall we know certainly which are the true uncorrupted writings of these Fathers among so many forgeries and spurious Scripts 3. How shall it be known what exposition the Fathers consented on when not one of a multitude and but few in all have commented on any considerable parts of the Scripture and those few so much often differ 4. When in the Doctrine of the Trinity it self Petavius largely proveth that most of the writers of the three first Centuries after the Apostles were unsound and others confess the same about the Millennium the corporeity of Angels and of the Soul and divers other things doth their consent bind us to believe them If not how shall we know in what to believe their consent according to this Rule 2. And as to the Church they are utterly disagreed among themselves what that Church is which hath this authority 1. Whether the Pope alone 2. Or the Pope with a Provincial Council 3. Or the Pope with a General Council 4. Or a General Council without the Pope 5. Or the universality of Pastors 6. Or the universality of the people with them 3. And for a Council 1. There is no certainty what number of Bishops and what consent of the Comprovincial Clergy is necessary to make them the true representatives of any Church 2. And more uncertain in what Council the Bishops had such consent 3. And uncertain whether the Popes approbation be necessary The great Councils of Constance and Basil determining the contrary 4. And uncertain which were truly approved 5. And most certain that there never was any General Council in the world unless you will call the Apostles a General Council but only General Councils of the Clergy of one Empire with now and then a stragling Neighbour even as we have General Assemblies and Convocations in this Kingdom And who can be certain of that faith which dependeth upon all or any of these uncertainties XI That must needs be an uncertainty which dependeth on the unknown thoughts of another man. For instance with the Papists the Priests intention which is the secret of his heart is necessary to the being of Baptism and Transubstantiation And so no man can be certain whether he or any other man be baptized or not Nor whether it be Bread or Christs Body which he eateth We confess that it is necessary to the being of a Sacrament that the Minister do seem or profess to intend it as a Sacrament But if the reality of his intent be necessary to the being of it no man can be certain that ever he had a Sacrament XII It is a hard thing to be certain on either side in those controversies which have multitudes and in a manner equal strength of Learned Judicious Well-studyed Godly Impartial men for each part I deny not but one clear-headed man may be certain of that which a multitude are uncertain of and oppose him in But it must not be ordinary men but some rare illuminated person that must get above a probability unto a Certainty of that which such a company as aforesaid are of a contrary mind in XIII There is great uncertainty in matters of private impulse When a man hath nothing to prove a thing to be Gods will but an inward perswasion or impulse in his own Breast let it never so vehemently incline him to think it true it 's hard to be sure of it For we know not how far Satan or our own distempered Phantasies may go And most by far that pretend to this do prove deceived That which must be certain must be somewhat equal to Prophetical Inspiration Which indeed is its own Evidence But what that is no man can formally conceive but he that hath had it Therefore we are bid to Try the Spirits XIV It is a hard thing to gather certainties of Doctrinal conclusion from Gods Providences alone Providential changes have their great use as they are the fulfilling or execution of the word But they that will take them instead of the Scripture do usually run into such mistakes as are rectifyed to their cost by some contrary work of Providence ere long These times have fully taught us this XV. It is hard to gather Doctrinal certainties from Godly mens Experiences alone Even our Experimental Philosophers and Physicians find that an experiment that hits oft-times quite misseth afterwards on other Subjects and they know not why A course of effects may oft come from unknown causes And it 's no rare thing for the common Prejudices Selfconceitedness or corruption of the weaker and greater number of good people which needeth great repentance and a cure to be mistaken for the Communis Sensus Fidelium the Inclination and Experience of the Godly Especially when consent or the honour of their Leaders or Themselves hath engaged them in it In my time the common sense of the strictest sort was against long hair and taking Tobacco and other such things which now their common practice is for In one Countrey the common consent of the strictest party is for Arminianism In another they are zealously against it In Poland where the Socinians are for sitting at the Sacrament the Godly are generally against it In other places they are for it In Poland and Bohemia where they had holy humble perswading Bishops the generality of the Godly were for that Episcopacy as were all the ancient Churches even the Novatians
they be the Word of God as of Ruth Judges Joshua Chronicles c. Yea if he doubted of all the Old Testament and much of the New yet if he believe so much as containeth all the Covenant of Grace and the foresaid Summaries though he sin and lose much of his helps yet he may and will be saved if he sincerely receive but this much The reason is before given Though no man can believe any thing truly who believeth not all that he knoweth to be Gods Word yet a man may doubt whether one thing be Gods Word who doubteth not of another by several occasions And here you see the Reason why a particular or explicite Belief of all the Scripture it self was never required of all that are baptized nor of all or any man that entered into the Ministry For the wisest Doctor in the world doth not attain so high For no man hath a particular explicite Belief of that which he doth not understand For it is the matter or sence that we believe and we must first know what that sence is before we can believe it to be true And no man in the World understandeth all the Scripture Yea more it is too much to require as necessary to his Ministry a subscription in General that he implicitely believeth all that is in that Bible which you shall shew him For 1. Many faults may be in the Translation if it be a Translation 2. Many errors may be in the Copy as aforesaid Nay such a subscription should not as absolutely necessary be required of him as to all the real Word of God. For if the man by error should doubt whether Job or the Chronicles or Esther were Canonical and none of the rest I would not be he that should therefore forbid him to Preach Christs Gospel I am sure the ancient Church imposed no such terms on their Pastors when part of the new Testament was so long doubted of and when some were chosen Bishops before they were Baptized and when Synesius was chosen a Bishop before he believed the Resurrection I would not have silenced Luther Althamer or others that questioned the Epistle of James What then shall we say of the Roman insolence which thinketh not all the Scripture big enough but Ministers must also subscribe to many additions of their own yea and swear to Traditions and the Expositions of the Fathers and take whole Volumes of Councils for their Religion No wonder if such men do tear the Churches of Christ in pieces 1. By this time I hope you see to what use Baptism and the Summaries of Religion are 2. And of how great use Catechizing is 3. And that Christianity hath its essential parts 4. And how plain and simple a thing true Christianity is which constituteth the Church of Christ And how few things as to knowledge are necessary to make a man a Christian or to Salvation Multitudes of opinions have been the means of turning Pastors and People from the holy and diligent improvement of these few truths in our practice where we have much to do which might take up all our minds and time Chap. VIII Inference 2. Of the use of Catechizing THough it be spoken to in what is said I would have you more distinctly here note the use of Catechizing 1. It collecteth those few things out of many which the Ignorant could not themselves collect 2. It collecteth those necessary things which all must know and believe that will be saved 3. It containeth those Great practical things which we have daily use for and must still live upon which are as Bread and Drink for our food Other things may be well added the more the better which God hath revealed But our Life and our comfort and our Hope is in these 4. And it giveth us the true method or order of holy truths which is a great advantage to understand them Not but that the things themselves have the same orderly respect to one another in the Scripture but they are not delivered in the same order of words Therefore 1. Catechisms should be very skilfully and carefully made The true fundamental Catechism is nothing else but the Baptismal Sacramental Covenant the Creed the Lords Prayer and the Commandments the Summaries of our Belief Desires and Practice And our secondary Catechism must be nothing else but the plain expositions of these the first is a Divine Catechism the second is a Ministerial Expository Catechism And here 1. O that Ministers would be wiser at last than to put their superfluities their controversies and private opinions into their Catechisms and would fit them to the true end and not to the interest of their several sects But the Roman-Trent Catechism and many more of theirs must needs be defiled with their trash and every sect else must put their singularities into their Catechisms so hard is it for the aged decrepit body of the diseased Church for want of a better concoction of the common essentials of Christianity to be free from these heaps of inconcocted crudities and excrementitious superfluities and the many maladies bred thereby I deny not but a useful controversie may be opened by way of Question and Answer But pretend it not then to be what it is not Milk for Babes Him that is weak in the Faith receive but not to doubtful disputations The Servant of the Lord must be apt to teach but must not strive 2. And it is not commonly believed how great skill is needful to make a Catechism that the method may be true and that it may neither be too long for the memory nor too short for the understanding for my part it is the hardest work save one which is the full methodizing and explaining the whole body of Divinity that ever I put my hand to And when all 's done I cannot satisfy my self in it II. Why is not Catechizing more used both by Pastors and Parents I mean not the bare words unexplained without the sence nor the sence in a meer rambling way without a form of words But the words explained O how much fruit would poor Souls and all the Church receive by the faithful performance of this work would God but cure the prophaneness and sloth of unfaithful Pastors and Parents which should do it But I have said so much of this in my Reformed Pastor that I may well forbear more here Chap. IX Inference 3. The true Preservative of puzled Christians from the Errours of false Teachers who vehemently sollicite them to their several parties IT is the common out-cry of the World. How shall we know which side to be on And who is in the right among so many who all with confidence pretend to be in the right Ans Your Preservative is obvious and easie but men usually bestow more labour and cost for Error and Hell than for Truth and Heaven Pretend not to Faith or knowledge before you have it and you are the more safe SUSPEND your judgments
till you have true evidence to establish them 1. It is only Christians that I am now instructing and if you are Christians you have already received the Essentials of Christianity even the Baptismal Covenant the Creed the Lords Prayer and Decalogue And I need not tell you that moreover you must receive all those Truths in Nature and Scripture which are so plain that all these dissenting sects of Christians are agreed in them And when you have all these and faithfully love and practice them you are sure to be saved if you do not afterward receive some contrary Doctrine which destroyeth them Mark then which is the safe Religion As sure as the Gospel is true he that is meet for Baptism before God is meet for pardon of sin and he that truely consenteth to the Baptismal Covenant and so doth dedicate himself to God is made a Member of Christ and is justified and an Heir of Heaven Your Church Catechism saith truly of all such that in Baptism each one is made a Member of Christ a Child of God and an Heir of Heaven So that as sure as the Gospel is true every true Baptized Christian whose Love and Life doth answer that Faith shall certainly be saved Ask all parties and few of them but impudent designers can deny this Well then the Baptismal Covenant expounded in the Creed Lords Prayer and Commandments is your Christian Religion As a Christian you may and shall be saved that a True Christian is saved all confess But whether a Papist be saved is questioned by the Protestants and so is the Salvation of many other sects by others You are safe then if you take in nothing to endanger you And is it not wisdom then to take heed how you go further and on what grounds lest you over-run your safe Religion Obj. But then I must not be a Protestant For the Papists say that they cannot be saved Ans A Protestant is either one that holdeth to the ancient simple Christianity without the Papists manifold additions Or one that positively also renounceth and opposeth those additions In the first sense a Protestant and a meer Christian is all one and so to say that a Protestant cannot be saved is to say that a Christian as such cannot be saved If it be the meer name of a Protestant that the Papist accounteth damnable tell him that you will not stick with him for the name You are contented with the old name of Christian alone But Protestantism in the second sense is not your Religion but the Defensative of your Religion as flying from the Plague is not my Humanity or Life but a means to preserve it And so Protestants are of many sizes Some oppose some points and some others some more some less which the Papists have brought in And yet they are not of so many Religions But whoever condemneth you if Christ save you he doth but condemn himself as uncharitable Christianity is certainly a State of Salvation but whether Popery be or whether the Greek Opinions be or whether this or that difference and singularity stand with Salvation is the doubt Cast not your self then needlesly into doubt and danger Obj. But then you will have us be still but Infants and to learn no more than our Catechisms and not to learn and believe all that God hath revealed in his Word Ans No such matter This is the sum of what I advise you to 1. Hold fast to your simple Christianity as the Certain terms of Salvation 2. Receive nothing that is against it 3. Learn as much more as ever you can 4. But take not mens words nor their plausible talk for Certifying Evidence And do not think if you believe a Priest that this is believing God nor if his Reasons seem plausible to you and you are of his Opinion that this is Divine Knowledge If you do incline to one mans Opinion more than another tell him that you incline to his Opinion but tell him that you take not this for Divine Knowledge or any part of your Religion If you will needs believe one side rather than another about Church History or the matters of their Parties Interest tell them I believe you as fallible men but this is none of my Divine Faith or Religion To learn to know is to learn Scientifical Evidence and not to learn what is another mans Opinions nor whether they are probable or not much less to read a Councils Decrees or the Propositions of a disputing Systeme and then for the mens sake to say This is Orthodox Nor yet because it hath a taking aspect To learn of a Priest to believe God is one thing and to believe him or his party Church or Council is another thing Learn to know as much as you can and especially to know what God hath revealed to be believed And learn to believe God as much as you can And believe all your Teachers and all other men as far as they are credible in that case with such a humane belief as fallible men may justly require And where Contenders do consent suspect them the less But where they give one another the Lie in matters of Fact try both their Evidences of credibility before you trust them and then trust them not beyond that Evidence But still difference your Divine Faith and Religion from your Opinion and Humane Faith. And let men sollicite you never so long take not on you to know or believe till you do that is not beyond the Evidence I do but perswade you against Presumption and Hypocrisie Shall I say SUSPEND TILL YOU HAVE TRUE EVIDENCE and you are safe why if you do not you will know never the more nor have ever the more Divine Faith For I can mean no more than SUSPEND YOUR PRESUMPTIONS and do not foolishly or hypocritically take on you to know what you do not or to have a Faith which you have not If you can know truly do it with fidelity and be true to the Truth whoever offer it or whatever it cost you But suspend your Profession or hasty Opinions and Conceits of what you know not Obj. But every side almost tells me that I am damned if I do not believe as they do Ans 1. By that you may see that they are all deceived at least save one which ever it be while they differ and yet condemn each other 2. Thereby they do but give you the greater cause to suspect them For by this shall all men know Christs Disciples if they love one another Right Christians are not many Masters as knowing that themselves shall have the greater condemnation else for in many things we offend all And the wisdom which hath envy and strife is not from above but from beneath and is earthly sensual and devilish introducing confusion and every evil work Jam. 3.1 15 16. Christs Disciples judge not lest they be judged 3. By this you may see that unless you can be of all mens minds
men and their own Opinions which go under these names One turneth an Anabaptist and another a Separatist and another an Antinomian and another a Pelagian and another a Papist when if you try them you shall find that they neither understand what they turn to nor what they are against They do but turn to his side who hath the best advantage to perswade them either by insinuating into their affections or by plausible reasonings they talk for one Doctrine and against another when they understand neither much less discern true Evidence of their truth And as for the Papists what wonder is it when their Religion is to believe as the Church believeth And what the Church believeth they know not perhaps but by believing a Priest And then though they know not what the Church believeth some say they are Catholicks and others that this Implicite Faith is that in the virtue of which all the Explicite must proceed And if God may but be allowed to be equal herein with their Church and so that all should be saved who Implicitely believe that all that he saith is true though they know not what he saith at all then I think few Infidels would perish that believe there is a God. Reader I advise thee therefore as thou lovest thy Soul 1. Not to neglect or delay any true knowledge that thou canst attain 2. But not to be rash and hasty in judging 3. Nor to take shews and mens opinions or any thing below a certifying or notifying Evidence of Truth to make up thy Christian Faith and Knowledge 4. And till thou see such Certain Evidence suspend and tell them that sollicite thee that thou understandest not the matter and that thou art neither for them nor against them but wilt yield as soon as Truth doth certainly appear to thee If an Anabaptist perswade thee yield to him as soon as thou art sure that God would not have Believers Children now to be Infant-Members of his Church as well as they were before Christs coming and that the Infants of believing Jews were cut off from their Church State and that there is any way besides Baptism appointed by Christ for the solemn initiating of Church-Members with the rest which in my Treat of Baptism I have produced If thou art sollicited to renounce Communion with other Churches of Christ as unlawful either because they use the Common Prayer and Ceremonies or because that Ministers are faulty if tolerable or the People undisciplined before thou venture thy Soul upon an uncharitable and dividing principle make sure first that Christ hath Commanded it Try whether thou art sure that Christ sinned by Communicating ordinarily with the Jewish Church and Synagogues when the corruption of Priests People and worship was so much worse than ours Or whether that be now a sin to us which in the General Christ did then And whether Pauls compliance and his precept Rom. 14. and 15. was an error And Peters separation Gal. 2. was not rather to be blamed With much more the like Are you sure that notwithstanding all this God would have you avoid Communion with the Churches that in such Forms and Orders differ from you So if a Papist sollicite you yield to him as soon as you are Certain that the Church is the body or Church of the Pope and that none are Christians that are not subject to him and that therefore three or two parts of all the Christian world are unchristened and that when the Roman Emperor made Patriarchs in his own dominion only and there only called General Councils all the world must now take such as the Churches Heads and must be their Subjects When you can be sure that all the senses of all the sound men in the world are by a constant Miracle deceived in taking the consecrated Bread and Wine to be Bread and Wine indeed and that it is none And that the Bread only without the Cup must be used though Christs Command be equal for both when you are Certain truly Certain of these and many other such things then turn Papist If you do it sooner you betray your Souls by Pretending to know and believe Gods word when you do but believe and imbody with a faction Chap. X. Inference 4. What is the Great Plague and Divider of the Christian World. FALSELY PRETENDED KNOWLEDGE and FAITH are the great Plague and Dividers of the Christian world I. As to the Number of Articles and Opinions and Precepts what abundance of things go with many for Certain Truth of which no mortal man hath certainty And abundance which some few rare wits may know must go for Evident certainties to all It is not only our Philosophy books nor only our Philosophical Schoolmens Books which are guilty of this There is some modesty in their Videtur's And indeed if they would not pretend to certainty but profess only to write for the sport and exercise of wit without condemning those that differ from them a man might fetch many a pleasant vagari if not in an over subtile Cajetane who so oft feigneth notions and distinctions yet in a Scotus Ockam Ariminensis with abundance of their disciples and in Thomas and many of his learned followers But their Successors can hardly forbear hereticating one another How many such a wound hath poor Durandus suffered From many for his doctrine of concurse And by others for his pretty device to save the credit of our senses in Transubstantiation that there is still the Matter of Bread but not the Form as being informed by the Soul of Christ as digested bread in us is turned to flesh Which saith Bellarmine is an Heresy but Durandus no Heretick because he was ready to be taught of the Church But no where do these Stinging Hornets so swarm as in the Councils and the Canon Law So that saith the Preface to the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiast Edw. 6. John Fox In quo ipso jure neque ullum modum tenet illius impudentia quin Leges Legibus decreta decretis aciis insuper decretalia aliis alia atque item alia accumulet nec ullum pene statuit cumulandi finem donec tandem suis Clementinis Sixtinis Intra Extravagantibus Constitutionibus Provincialibus Synodalibus Paleis Glossulis Sententiis Capitulis Summariis Rescriptis Breviculis Casibus longis brevibus ac infinitis Rhapsodiis adeo orbem confarcinavit ut Atlas mons quo sustineri coelum dicitur huic si imponeretur oneri vix ferendo sufficeret Which made these two Kings H. 8. and Edw. 6. Appoint that Compendium of Ecclesiastical Laws as their own K. H. first abolishing the Popes Laws whatever some say to the contrary his words being Hajus Potestatem huic cum divino munere sublatam esse manifestum est ut quid superesset quo non plane fractam illius Vim esse constaret Leges omnes decreta atque instituta quae ab authore Episcopo Romano profecta sunt Prorsus abroganda
retractations of some youthful Errours and he that changeth not and retracteth nothing it seems is in his childish Ignorance and Errour still but when natural frailty exposeth us all to much of this disgrace we should not expose our selves to so much more A hasty judger or prefident man must be a very Weathercock or be defiled with a Leprosie of Errour Whereas if men would but be humble and modest and self-suspicious and suspend their presumption and not take on them to know before they know indeed how safely might they walk and how seldom would they need to change their minds or either stick in the sink of Errour or make many shameful Retractations 9. Prefidence and false judging engageth a man in a very life of sin For when falshood goeth for truth with him it will infect his affections and pollute his conversation and all that he doth in the obedience and prosecution of that Errour will be sin Yea the greatest sin that he can but think no sin may be committed as was the Persecution of Christ and Christians by the Jews and Paul and others like them and the Papists bloodiness for their Religion throughout Christendom 10. It disturbeth the Peace of all Societies This is the vice that disquieteth Families Every one is wisest in his own Eyes The Servant thinketh his own way better than his Masters What are all the contentions between Husband and Wife or any in the Family but that in all their differences every one thinketh himself to be in the right His own Opinion is right his own Words and Ways are right and when every one is wise and just and every one is in the right the effects are such as if no one were wise or in the right And in Civil Societies Seditions Rebellions Oppressions Tyranny and all Confusions come from this that men pretend to be sure of what they are not Rulers take up with false reports from idle malicious whisperers and accusers against their inferiours and have not the Justice and Patience to suspend their Judgments till they have searcht out the matter and fully heard men speak for themselves Subjects make themselves Judges of the secrets of â—overnment and of the Councils and Actions of their Rulers of which they have no certain notice but venture to conclude upon deceitful suspicions And the Contentions and Factions amongst Nobles and other Subjects come from misunderstandings through hasty and ungrounded judgings But the wofullest effects are in the Churches where alas whilst every Pastor will be wiser than another and the People wiser than all their Pastors and every Sect and Party much wiser than all that differ from them their divisions their separations their alienations and bitter censurings of each other their obtruding their own Opinions and Rules and â—eremonies upon each other their bitter envyings strife and persecutions of each other do make sober standers-by to ask as Paul Is there not a wise man among you O happy the World happy Kingdoms but most happy the Churches of Christ if we could possibly bring men but to know their Ignorance If the Pastors themselves were not prefident and presumptuous over-valuers of their own apprehensions And if the People knew how little they know But now alas men rage against each other in their dreams and few of them have the grace to awake before death and find to repentance that they were themselves in errour Hear me with that remnant of meekness and humility which thou hast left thou confident bitter censorious man Why must that man needs be taken for a Heretick a Schismatick a refractory stubborn self-willed person an Antichristian carnal formal man who is not of thy Opinion in point of a Controversie of a Form of an Order of a Circumstance or Subscription or such like It 's possible it may be so And its possible thou maist be more so thy self But hast thou so patiently heard all that he hath to say and so clearly discerned the truth on thy own side and that this truth is made so evident to him as that nothing but wilful obstinacy can resist it as will warrant all thy censure and contempt Or is it not an over-valuing of thy own understanding which makes thee so easily condemn all as unsufferable that differ from it Hath not pride made thy silly wit to be as an Idol to which all must bow down on pain of the heat of thy displeasure Do not some of those men whom thou so Magisterially condemnest study as hard and as impartially as thy self Do they not pray as hard for Gods assistance Have they not the same Books and as good Teachers Do they not live as well and shew as much tenderness of Conscience and fear of erring and sinning as thy self why then art thou so hasty in condemning them that are as fair for the reputation of wisdom as thou art But suppose them mistaken hast thou tryed that they are unwilling to be instructed It may be you have wrangled with them by disputes which have but engaged each other to defend his own Opinion But call them to thee in Love and tell them you are ignorant and I am wise I will teach you what you know not and open to them all the Evidence which causeth your own confident apprehensions Wish them to study it and hear patiently what they have to say and I am perswaded that many or most sober men that differ from you will not refuse thus to become as your Scholars so far as to consider all that you have to offer to convince them and thankfully receive as much of the truth as they can discern But alas no men rage so much against others as erroneous and blind as the blind and erroneous and no men so furiously brand others with the marks of Obstinacy Factiousness and Schism as the Obstinate Factious and Schismatical The prouder the Obtruder of his own conceits is the more he condemneth all Dissenters as proud for presuming to differ from such as he and all for want of a humble mind 11. Moreover it is this pretended knowledge which is the cause of all our false Reformations Men are so over-wise that they presently see a Beam in their Brothers Eye which is but a Mote and they magnifie all the imperfections of others Pastors and Churches into Mountains of iniquity Every mis-expression or disorder or inconvenient phrase in a Prayer or a Sermon or a Book is an odious damning intolerable evil O! say such what Idolaters are they that use a Form of Prayer which God did not command What large Consciences have they that can join with a Parish Church that can communicate Kneeling and among bad men or those whose Conversion is not tryed What abundance of intolerable evils do such men find in the Words and Forms and Orders and Circumstances of other mens Worship which God mercifully accepteth through Christ taking all these but for such pardonable imperfections as he mercifully beareth with in all And then
the Reformation must be presently answerable to the apprehension of the evil Yea sometimes the very injudicious sort of zealous people make the cry of the greatness of this or that corruption how Antichristian and intolerable it is And then the Reformation must satisfie this vulgar errour and answer the cry and expectation of the people I would here give instances of abundance of mis-reformings which all need a Reformation both in Doctrine Discipline and Worship but that I reserve it for another Treatise if I live to finish it and can get it printed called Over-doing is Undoing 12. Lastly This Vice of pretended certainty and knowledge hath set up several false terms of Christian Unity and Peace and by them hath done more to hinder the Churches Peace and Unity than most devices ever did which Satan ever contrived to that end by this Church-tearing Vice abundance of falshoods and abundance of things uncertain and abundance of things unnecessary have been made so necessary to the Union and Communion of the Churches and their Members as that thereby the Christian World hath been grinded to powder by the names and false pretences of Unity and Peace Just as if a wise Statesman would advise his Majesty that none may be his Subjects that are not of one Age one Stature one Complexion and one Disposition that so he might have Subjects more perfectly concordant than all the Princes on Earth besides and so might be the most Glorious Defender of Unity and Peace But how must this be done Why command them all to be of your mind But that prevaileth not and yet it is undone Why then they are obstinate self-will'd Persons Well but yet it is undone Why lay Fines and Penalties upon them Well but yet it is undone All the Hypocrites that had no Religion are of the Religion which is uppermost and the rest are uncured Why require more Bricks of them and let them have no Straw and tell them that their Religion is their idleness stubbornness and pride and let your little Finger be heavier than your Fathers Loins But hearken young Counsellors Jeroboam will have the advantage of all this and still the sore will be unhealed Why then Banish them and Hang them that obey not till there be none left that are not of one mind But Sir I pray you who shall do it and who shall that one man be that shall be left to be all the Kingdom You are not such a Fool as to be ignorant that no two men will agree in all things nor be perfectly of the same complexion If there must be One King and but One Subject I pray you who shall that one Subject be I hope not he that counselleth it Neque enim Lex justior ulla est quà m necis artifices arte perire suâ But hark you Sir shall that one Man have a Wife or not If not the Kingdom will die with him if yea I dare prognosticate he and his Wife will not be in all things of a mind If they be take me for a mistaken man. By this Vice of pretended knowledge and certainty it is that the Papacy hath been made the Center of the Unity of the Universal Church Unity we must have God forbid else There is no maintaining Christianity without it But the POPE must be PRINCIPIUM UNITATIS And will all Christians certainly Unite in the Pope Well and Patriarchs must be the Pillars of Unity But was it so to the Unity of the first Churches Or is it certain that all Christians will Unite in Patriarchs But further all the Mass of Gregory the too great and all the Legends in his Dialogues or at least all the Doctrines and Ceremonies which he received and the form of Government in his time must be made necessary to Church Union Say you so But it was not all necessary in the Apostles times nor in Cyprian's times no nor in Gregory's own times much of those things being used arbitrarily And what was made necessary by Canons of General Councils in the Empire mark it was never thereby made necessary in all the rest of the Churches And are you sure that meer Christians will take all these for certain truths Why if they will not Burn and Banish them This is as Tertullian saith solitudinem facere pacem vocare But hark Sir this way hath been tryed too long in vain Millions of Albigenses and Waldenses are said by Historians to be kill'd in France Savoy Italy Germany c. The French Massacre killed about Forty or Thirty Thousand The Irish Massacre in that little Island killed about Two Hundred Thousand But were they not stronger after all these cruelties than before Alas Sir all your labour is lost and your party is taken for a Blood-thirsty Generation and humane Nature which abhorreth the Blood-thirsty ever after breedeth Enemies to your way This is the effect of false Principles and terms of Unity and Peace contrived by proud self-conceited men that think the World should take their Dictates for a Supream Law and obey them as the Directive Deities of Mankind If all this be not enough to tell you what proud pretended certainty is read over the Histories of the Ages past and you shall find it written in Ink in Tears in blood in Mutations in Subversions of the Empires and Kingdoms of the World in the most odious and doleful Contentions of Prelates Lacerations of Churches and Desolations of the Earth And yet have we not experience enough to teach us Chap. XIII The Commodities of a suspended judgment and humble understanding which pretendeth to no more Knowledge or Certainty than it hath THE commodities of an humble mind which pretendeth not to be Certain till he is Certain you may gather by contraries from the twelve forementioned mischiefs of prefidence which to avoid prolixity I leave to your collection Moreover I add 1. Such a humble suspended mind doth not cheat it self with seeming to have a knowledge a Divine Faith a Religion when it hath none It doth not live on air and dreams nor feed on shadows nor is puft up with a tympanite of vain conceits instead of true substantial wisdom 2. He is not prepossessed against the Truth but hath room for Knowledge and having the teachableness of a Child he shall receive instruction and grow in true Knowledge when the proud and inflated wits being full of nothing are sent empty away 3. He entangleth not himself in a seeming necessity of making good all that he hath once received and entertained He hath not so many Bastards of his own Brain to maintain as the prefident hasty judgers have which saveth him much sinful study and strife 4. He is not liable to so much shame of mutability He that fixeth not till he feel firm ground nor buildeth till he feel a Rock need not pull down and repent so oft as rash presumers 5. Unless the World be Bedlam mad in proud obtrudings of their own Conceits methinks such
a wary humble man should offend but few and better keep both his own and the Churches peace than others Can Persecutors for shame Hang and Burn men for meer Ignorance who are willing to learn and will thankfully from any man receive information What if in Queen Marys days the poor Men and Women had told my Lords of Winchester and London We are not persons of so good understandings as to know what a spiritual body is as Paul describeth it 1 Cor. 15. And seeing most say that the Sun it self is a body and not a spirit and late Philosophers say that Light is a substance or body which yet from the Sun in a moment diffuseth it self through all the surface of the Earth and Air we know not how far locality limitations extension impenetrability divisibility c. belong to the body of Christ and consequently how far it may be really present we can say nothing but that we know not Would my good Lord Bishops have burnt them for I know not Perhaps they would have said You must believe the Church But which is the Church my Lord Why it is the Pope and a General Council But alas my Lord I have never seen or heard either Pope or Council Why but we have and you must believe us Must we believe you my Lords to be Infallible or only as we do other men that may deceive and be deceived Is any Infallible besides the Pope and his Council Truly my Lords we are ignorant people and we know not what the Pope and Councils have said and we are uncertain whether you report them truly and uncertain whether they are Fallible or not but we are willing to hear any thing which may make us wiser Would their Lordships have burnt such modest persons Suppose in a Church where men are put to profess or subscribe to or against the Opinions of Free-will or Reprobation or Predetermination or such like a humble man should say These are things above my understanding I cannot reach to know what Free-will is nor whether all Causes natural and free be predetermined by Divine Premotion c. I can say neither It is so nor It is not They are above my reach would they silence and cast out such an humble person and forbid him to preach the Gospel of Christ Perhaps they would But there are not so many hardened to such inhumanity as there are men that would deal sharply with one that is as confident as they are on the other side And those few that were thus silenced would have the more peace that they procured it not by self-conceited singularities and the silencers of them would be the more ashamed before all sober persons that shall hear it Other Instances I pass by Chap. 14. The Aggravations of this sin of Prefidence THough there be so much evil in this sin of Presumption as I have noted yet is it not in all alike culpable or unhappy But differeth in both respects as I shall tell you I. For culpability it is worst in these sorts and cases following 1. It is a great sin in those who have least reason to think highly of their own understandings and greatest reason to distrust themselves As. 1. In those that are young and unexperienced and must be miraculously wise if they are wiser than old experienced persons caeteris paribus 2. In the unlearned or half-learned who have had but little time or helps for study or at least have made but little use of them 3. In duller wits and persons that in other matters are known to be no wiser than others 4. In those that take up their prefidence upon the slightest grounds as bare surmises and reports from others that were uncertain 5. In those that have been oft deceived already and should by their sad experience have been brought to humble self-suspicion 2. And it is an aggravated sin in those whose place and condition obligeth them to learn from others As for the Wife to be self-conâ—eited of all her apprehensions against her Husband unless he be a fool For the Servant to set his wit against his Masters where he should obey him For Children to think that their wits are righter than their Parents or Masters and Apprentices and Learners to think that they know more than their teachers And for the ignorant people to censure over-hastily the Doctrine and Practice of their Pastors as if they were wiser than they Perhaps they are But it must be some rare person who is fit to be a Teacher himself or the Teacher some sot that hath intruded into the Office or else it must be a wonder For God usually giveth men Knowledge according to the Time and Means and Pains that they have had to get it and not by miraculous infusions without means Doth not the Apostle expresly tell you this Heb. 5.11 12. When for the Time you ought to have been Teachers c. Men should be wise according to Time and Means of Wisdom which they have had 3. It is the greater crime when men will seem wisest in other mens matters and concernments When the Subject will know best what belongeth to a King or Governor and the people will know best how the Pastor should teach them and when he faileth and whom he should receive into the Church or exclude When the Servant will know best his Masters duty and every man his Neighbours and least his own 4. It is the greater crime when men will be the Judges of their own understandings and think highly of them in cases where they should be tryed by others As if an Empyrick or Woman do think that they know better how to cure a disease than the ablest Physicians why do they not offer themselves to the Tryal and before them make good their Skill by reason If an unexperienced young student think himself able to be a Physician he is not to be Judge but must be Tryed and Judged by Physicians If a self-conceited Professor or a young Student think himself fit for the Ministry he must not presently contrive how to get in and how to shift off Examination but freely offer himself to be tried by able Godly Ministers and then by the ordainers who are to judge But when such Persons can think themselves sufficient if no body else do or if but a few ignorant persons do that are unfit to judge this proves their Pride and Presumption to be a great and heinous sin 5. And it is yet more heinously aggravated when to keep up the reputation of their own understandings they use to depress and vilify the wiser even those whom they never knew As he that affecteth to be a Preacher and dare not pass the Examination hath no way to hide his shame but 1. By crying down the Learning which he wanteth as a humane carnal thing And 2. By reproaching those that should judge of him and ordain him as poor carnal persons who understand not the things of the Spirit as he doth
and as proud self-seeking men that will approve of none but those that flatter them and are of their way Some such there may be But sure all are not such Why do you not desire the Judgment of the wisest most impartial men but take up with the applause of unlearned persons that are of your own mind and way and magnify you for humouring them So you shall hear Empyricks and She-Physicians vilify Doctors of Physick as men that have less knowledge than they and are so Proud and Covetous and Dishonest that there is no trusting them When Pretended Knowledge must have so base a Cloak it is the greater sin 6. And it is the heinouser sin when they venture to do heinous mischief by it As a Papist a Quaker or a Separatist will in his confidence be a perverter of others and a Condemner of the Just and a defamer of those that are against him and a troubler of the Church and World. He that in his self-conceitedness dare resist the wisest and his Teachers and Rulers and set Countries on Fire is wickedly presumptuous So in the practice of Physick when people will be self-conceited when the Lives of others lie upon it and a silly Fellow or Woman will venture to purge to let blood to give this or that who know neither the disease nor proper cure 7. It is therefore a heinous sin in Rulers who must judge for the life and death of others or for the peace or misery of thousands about them I mean Pastors and Commanders in Armies and Navies and other Governours on whom the publick welfare of the Church or Army or Navy or Countrey doth depend O how wise should that person be whose errours may cost thousands so dear as their destruction Or if their understandings be not extraordinary how cautelous should they be in judging upon hearing the wisest and hearing dissenters and not only Flatterers or Consenters and hearing men of several minds and hearing all Witnesses and Evidence and hearing every man speak for himself and after all considering throughly of it Specially of Laws and Wars and Impositions in Religion where thousands of Conscience say what you can will expect Satisfaction When a Woman called to Antigonus to hear her cause and do her Justice he told her that he could not have leisure She answered you should not have while to be King then Whereupon he heard her and did her right Had it been to an inferior Judge she had spoken reason 8. Lastly Pretended Certainty is the greater sin when it is falsly fathered on God. But the Pope and Council dare pretend that God hath promised them Infallibility and God hath certified them that the consecrated Bread is no Bread and that our senses are all deceived and God hath made the Pope the universal Ruler of the World or Church and made him and his Council the only Judges by which all men must know what is the word of God. So when Fanaticks will pretend that by Revelation Visions or Inspirations of the Spirit God hath assured them that this or that is the meaning of a Text which they understand not or the truth in such or such a controversy Alas among too many well meaning persons God is pretended for a multitude of sinful errors And they that preach false Doctrine will do it as the old Prophet spake to the young as from the Lord And they that rail at godliness and they that censure backbite cast out or persecute their Brethren will do it as Rabshakeh Hath not God sent me c. Men will not make any snares for the Church or their Brethrens Consciences but in the name of God They will not divide the Church nor cast out Infants nor refuse Communion with their Brethren but in the name of God. One man saith God forbiddeth him all Book Prayers or all Imposed Forms of Prayer And another saith God forbiddeth him all but such And all bely God and add this heinous abuse of his holy word and name unto their sin Chap. 15. Some special aggravations more of this sin in Students and Pastors which should deter them from pretended Knowledge or prefidence TO such I will suppose that to name the Evils may suffice on my part without sharp amplifications Though I have spoken to you first in what is said I will briefly add 1. That this sin will make you slothful students Few study hard who are quickly confident of their first conceptions 2. While you do study it keepeth out Knowledge You are too full of your selves to receive easily from others 3. It is the Common Parent of Errour and Heresy Ignorance is the Mother and Pride the Father of them all And Prefidence and Pretended Knowledge is but Proud Ignorance in another name 4. What a life of precious time will you waste in following the erroneous thoughts of your bewildred minds 5. As food altereth the temperament of the body which it nourisheth so the very temperament of your minds and wills and affections will become vain and frothy and shadowy or malignant and perverse according to the quality of your Errour 6. It is the common Parent of Superstition It defileth God's Worship with Humane Inventions with duties and sins of our own making All such mens dreams will seem to them to be the Laws of God. 7. It will entail a corrupt Education of Youth upon us and consequently a corrupt degenerate kind of Learning and so a degenerate Ministry on the Churches When Youths are possessed with abundance of Uncertainties under the name of Learning and Religion it will grow the custom to Teach and Talk and Live accordingly Do I say It will do If the Schoolmens Errour in this deserve but half as much as Faber Valla Hutten Erasmus charge upon them you should hear and take warning Not to avoid the most accurate knowledge by the hardest studies but to avoid pretending that you know what you do not 8. And you will make vain strife and contention about vanity your very trade and business when you come abroad in the world They that make Uncertainties or Errours to be their studies and honourable Learning must keep up the honour of it by Living as they Learnt and talking vainly for the vanities of their minds 9. And you are like hereby to become the chiefest Instruments of Satan to trouble the Church either with Heresies Schisms or Persecutions 10. And truly it should much turn your hearts against it to know that it is a continual habit or exercise of Pride And Pride the Devil's sin is one of the most heinous and odious to God. If you hate any sin you should hate Pride And it is one of the worst sorts of Pride too As Nature hath three Principles active Power Intellect and Will and Man three Excellencies Greatness Wisdom and Goodness so Pride hath these three Great Objects Men are proud that they are Greater or Wiser or Better than others That is They think themselves Greater or Wiser
that he will love me who hath loved me while I was his Enemy and called me home when I went astray and mercifully received me when I returned Who hath given me a life full of precious mercies and so many experiences of his love as I have had Who hath so often signified his love to my Conscience So often heard my prayers in distress and hath made all my life notwithstanding my sins a continual wonder of his mercies O unthankful Soul if all this will not persuade thee of the love of him that gave it I that can do little good to any one yet have abundance of friends and hearers who very easily believe that I would do them good were it in my power and never fear that I should do them harm And shall it be harder to me to think well of Infinite Love and Goodness than for my neighbours to trust me and think well of such a wretch as I What abundance of love-tokens have I yet to shew which were sent me from Heaven to perswade me of my Fathers love and care 7. Shall I not easily believe and trust his love who hath promised me eternal glory with his Son with all his holy ones in Heaven Who hath given me there a great Intercessor to prepare Heaven for me and me for it and there appeareth for me before God Who hath already brought many millions of blessed Souls to that glory who were once as bad and low as I am And who hath given me already the Seal the Pledge the Earnest and the First-fruits of that Felicity Therefore O my Soul if men will not know thee if thou were hated of all men for the cause of Christ and Righteousness If thine uprightness be imputed to thee as an odious crime If thou be judged by the blind malignant World according to its gall and interest If friends misunderstand thee If Faction and every evil cause which thou disownest do revile thee and rise up against thee It is enough it is absolutely enough that thou art known of God God is All and All is nothing that is against him or without him If God be for thee who shall be against thee How long hath he kept thee safe in the midst of dangers and given thee peace in the midst of furious Rage and Wars He hath known how to bring thee out of trouble and to give thee tolerable ease while thou hast carried about thee night and day the usual causes of continual torment His loving kindness is better than life Psal 63.3 but thou hast had a long unexpected life through his loving kindness In his favour is life Psal 30. And life thou hast had by and with his favour Notwithstanding thy sin while thou canst truly say thou lovest him he hath promised that all shall work together for thy good Rom. 8.28 And he hath long made good that promise Only ask thy self again and again as Christ did Peter whether indeed thou love him And then take his love as thy full and sure and everlasting portion which will never fail thee though flesh and Heart do fail For thou shalt dwell in God and God in thee for evermore 1 Joh. 4.12 15 16. Amen FINIS A Catalogue of Books Printed for and Sold by Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside near Mercers Chapel A Christian Directory or Body of practical Divinity 1. Christian Ethicks 2. Oeconomicks 3. Ecclesiasticks 4. Politicks Resolving multitudes of Cases on each Subject By Rich. Baxter Folio Mr. Baxters Catholick Theology Folio Mr. Baxters Methodus Theologiae Christianae Folio A Third Volume of Sermons Preached by the late Reverend and Learned Tho. Manton D.D. In two parts Folio A Hundred Select Sermons on several Texts of Fifty on the Old Testament and Fifty on the New. Folio Choice and Practical Expositions on four Select Psalms Folio Both by the Reverend and Learned Tho. Horion D.D. late Minister of St. Hellens London The true Prophecies and Prognostications of Michael Nostrodamus Physician to Henry the Second Francis the Second and Charles the Ninth Kings of France and one of the Best Astronomers that ever were Folio Sixty one Sermons Preached mostly on publick occasions whereof five formerly Printed by Adam Littleton D.D. Rector of Chelsea in Middlesex Folio The Novels and Tales of the Renowned John Boccasio the first Refiner of Italian Prose containing a hundred curious Novels Folio A Key to open Scripture Metaphors in two Volumes By Benjamin Keach and Tho. Delawn Folio The Saints Everlasting Rest or a Treatise of the Blessed State of the Saints in their Enjoyment of God in Glory 4 to The English Nonconformity as under King Charles II. and King James II. Truly Stated and Argued By Richard Baxter 4to A discourse concerning Liturgies By the Late Learned and Judicious Divine Mr. David Clarkson 8vo A discourse of the saving Grace of God. By the late Reverend and Learned David Clarkson Minister of the Gospel 8vo The Vision of the Wheels seen by the Prophet Ezekiel Opened and Applyed Partly at the Merchants Lecture in Broad-street and partly at Stepney on January 31. 1689. being the Day of Solemn Thanksgiving to God for the great Deliverance of this Kingdom from Popery and Slavery By his then Highness the most Illustrious Prince of Orange Whom God raised up to be the glorious Instrument thereof By Matthew Mead Pastor of a Church of Christ at Stepney 4to A Call to the Unconverted to Turn and Live. 12mo The right Method for settled Peace of Conscience and Spiritual Comfort 8vo The Life of Faith in every State. 4to Alderman Ashursts Funeral Sermon 4to A Key for Catholicks to open the juglings of the Jesuits The first part of answering all their common Sophisms The second against the Soveraignty and necessity of General Councils 4to The certainty of Christianity without Popery 8vo Full and easy satisfaction which is the true Religion Transubstantiation shamed 8vo Naked Popery Answering Mr. Hutchinson 4to Which is the true Church A full Answer to his Reply proving that the General Councils and the Popes Primacy were but in one Empire 4to The History of Bishops and their Councils abridged and of the Popes 4to The Cure of Church Divisions 8to A full Treatise of Episcopacy shewing what Episcopacy we own and what is in the English Diocesan frame for which we dare not swear never to endeavour any alteration of it in our places 4to A search for the English Schismatick comparing the Canoneers and Nonconformists 4to An Answer to Mr. Dodwell and Dr. Sherlock confuting an Universal-humane Church Soveraignty Aristocratical and Monarchical as Church Tyranny and Popery and defending Dr. Iz. Barrows excellent Treatise 4to FINIS Had I been supposed to have written this Book to hide my sloth and ignorance men would not have neglected my Methodus Theologie and Catholick Theology thro' meer sloth and saying That it 's too high and hard for them A Country-man having sent his Son