Selected quad for the lemma: conscience_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A67675
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An apology for the Discourse of humane reason, written by Ma. Clifford, esq. being a reply to Plain dealing, with the author's epitaph and character.
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Warren, Albertus.
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1680
(1680)
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Wing W950; ESTC R38948
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54,049
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168
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trouble it self with humane Affairs but if Providence had been exploded out of the minds of men it had been impossible to have persuaded us that God was ever displeas'd at the Fall of Aâ—an and consequently there would have appear'd no need at all of Restauration by Christ But the Gent. flyeth yet higher in the very same page by charging the Author that he hath busied himself to prove Humane Reason may with Safety to eternal Happiness tolerate Atheism it self and consequently all kind of Lusts and Wickedness whatsoever Really a most irrational and degenerous Objection such an Objection as no man who pretendeth to be a Gentleman but would blush to make to cancel which I need do no more than repeat the Author 's own Words pag. 31. which are these I believe first that Reason it self will declare to every man in the World that he ought to adhere to the Christian rather than to any other Religion in the World Now if Christian Religion ought to be adhered to it followeth necessarily that Vertue ought to be embrac'd and Vice detested because that Religion doth engage men to Holiness without the Practise whereof none can be happy according to the very Elements of that Religion The next things quarrell'd at are those Positive and undeniable Arguments which the Author propoundeth to establish the Excellency of Humane Reason taking it with it's due Helps that is by comparing it with other Guides standing in Competition with it in the Prosecution whereof how learnedly accurately and judiciously the Author hath particularly demonstrated the Uncertainty of many other pretended Guides and the Improbability of their being able to satisfie a solid Inquisition after Truth and which we are commanded to make and for which the Bereans were called noble appeareth so clearly from the 62 pag. of his book to pag. 64. that I dare say no unprejudiced Reader having considered them will suppose less than this that his Arguments need not any other Proof but the bare Prolation But however to give the Gent. fair Play I will go back a little to the Author's page 63. where he proveth Authority less safe than humane Reason out of which the Gent. would very fain squeeze something like a Face of Contradiction to which I answer He that believeth any thing because enjoyned by Authority is not nor cannot in his own Conscience be so fase as he that believeth and obeyeth Authority because he is rationally convinc'd he ought to obey it having commanded a rational thing As to the Gentleman's Instance of the Judges passing Sentence Secundum allegata probata he is mistaken for our Judges do not so judge nor will our municipal Law bear it nor is it any thing pertinent to the Business in hand for it is the Jury that groundeth the Sentence here the Judge only pronouncing it And touching the Gentleman's Instance about Adam's Fall from want of following of the Dictates of his own Reason asserted by the Author and which the Gent. would elude by saying that Adam's Crime was for believing Eve rather than his own Reason insisting that the Inhibition was not a Law of Nature or Reason but a mere positive Law I answer if the Law were merely positive Adam had the greater Reason to observe it and therefore it was irrationally done to follow the Persuasions of his Wife you may call it Authority if you please considering our Wives now in England before the Command of his Maker and indeed a thing altogether unbecoming his masculine Superiority and by the Gentleman's Favour Eve did not plead the Authority but Fraud of the Serpent which beguiled her nor did the Serpent pretend to any Dominion over her But I see the Gent. groweth angry by his Excursions in the upper part of his 96. pag. being nothing civil at all to the Author nor indeed pertinent to the Controversie which for the Gentleman 's own sake because possibly 't was but the effect of mere Passion I shall forbear to mention here particularly and now I must look backwards To what is objected against the Author's Words which are That they who commit themselves to the Guidance of their own Reason if they do commit themselves wholly to it are as safe on the Left band as on the Right as secure of Happiness in their Errors as others are who are otherwise guided ev'n in the Truths which they happ'n to fall into I suppose it is no more than if he had said that Councils Doctors Fathers Schoolmen Churches c. have erred both ways and therefore I am in as great Danger in submitting to such fallible and blind Guides every whit nay greater than if I happ'n to err after having searcht with all the imaginable Strength of my Reason for Truth for saith the Author There is no danger of perishing but for Disobedience to what to God's Commands and I am commanded to offer a reasonable Service I am to give a reason of my Faith and that Hope which is in me and doth it look like a good Plea to say that I did search and pray'd to God to direct me in that Search by his Spirit or is it better to say and more tolerable that I believ'd as the Church believ'd and rested there as safe I thought as a Thief in a Mill but this last Plea can never hold for me to pretend I did so with other men's Eyes when God hath giv'n me Eyes of mine own and this made Luther stir and H. 8. too who being King of a Kingdom independent of Rome properly though many ways usurpt by the Pope was not à parte rei obliged to refer himself to the Decision of any foreign Potentate about that which he alledg'd troubl'd his Conscience or if it were from any other Motive yet it was generously done upon the main and God can bring Good out of Evil whence the Author's Assumption that there is in man a natural Ability of searching for spiritual Truths and that it can be nothing else but the Vnderstanding neither to any thing else can the Command of searching be directed c. cannot be shaken by what is objected besides that the Author has the Suffrage of the best learned in all Ages to back him As to what fell in betwixt the Author and Master Hobbs it doth not much concern me to meddle with in this place T. H. will shift for himself but I will tell the Gent. he is the first Christian that ever interpreted the fifth of Matthew Let your Light so shine before men that they may see your good works to warrant the Necessity of Obedience to external Worship nor will the Scope of that Chapter bear it the Apostle intending to explain thereby the blessed State of Christianity in Suffering for Christ c. And that it is impossible Humane Reason so guided as the Author hath told us should lead men into those Sins of Theft Murder c. and all other Villanies appeareth from this that nothing else besides it
Gent. has offer'd against Humane Reason Upon Review of his Answer I am oblig'd to say once more that one part of three in it swells with illogical Consequences and is against constant Experience for he undertakes to shew what mischiefs must come to pass if Liberty of Conscience were permitted as to that 't is plainly otherwise for since Liberty has been generally assum'd the Nation has been very peaceable and obedient every way otherwise this I say is another experimental confutation of the main part of his Answer Therefore I would not have the Gent. spoil the Tone of his Stomach by Choler if I do discomply with him in not granting the not so horrible consequences of such a Liberty as he presumes contrary to Reason and Experience For if the Gent's desire had been seconded with Execution rigorously against the Dissenters it might have hazarded the putting of the English Nation into great Disorder by this time his words being Pag. 152 of Plain Dealing That if the Nobility and Gentry will not suppress the Sectaries by the Execution of the Laws they will soon arrive at that height that the Sword must do it or else there will be no Government at all in our Nation but what if it be impracticable to suppress them because the People will not accuse one another 'T is true Reason of State has been forc'd to strike smartly that other sort of men who by their barbarous and impolitick Actions have dared to confront the Government but I hope they will be made wiser hereafter by the late Examples of publick and infamous Inflictions for it seems the Common Law is in many Cases in the breasts of the Judges de Modo Poenae And let the Event be what it will to use the Gent's own words in the close of his Answer I must also with him profess that I have fully satisfi'd not only my Conscience but my Reason also which is the surer way and from better motives in this Reply by shewing my self according to my Duty a sincere Lover of Peace of Religion in general and of that particular Religion the support whereof I have asserted to be the true Interest of England and was alwayes so esteem'd since the Reformation And I will add my promise to the Gent. and that upon the word of a Gentleman which ought to be as sacred as that of a Priest that if he shall please to give me a Rejoynder without departure from his first Plea I will not demurr for want of Form but leave the Dispute to the Censure of indifferent Judges upon the whole Argument viz. Whether Humane Reason be not the best and safest Guide with its due helps beyond Popes Councils Fathers Canons and all Books whatsoever the Scripture excepted which yet if any man will ask me how I think to understand I can give him no other Answer but this that I must do it by Reason which is the only Talent God has indu'd me with for my preservation here and hereafter and by which and no other mediation it 's possible for a man of good Vnderstanding and not clogg'd with false Principles to be satisfy'd that the natural Dictates of God Reason carry no repugnancy to the Law and Will of God revealed in the Scripture the study of which Learning is the foundation of all true Ratiocination and the most generous and most useful Science for all men to aspire unto who would know their respective Duties as Christians and Subjects and upon the Presumtion of which Axiome it is that our Law of England if it were well digested into Method certainly the best in the World does say that if any Law shall be enacted contrary to Reason it is void eo instante because contrary to God's undoubted Eternal Law the Law of Reason my Province to maintain wherein if any thing have slipt from my Pen not consistent with the Duty of a good Subject or true Christian I do submissively and heartily beg pardon for it And to compleat my candid and at present sole Design of supporting Reason's Energy and for the justification of H. the Eighth's forsaking the Roman Church and thereby to justifie the Reformed Protestant Religion let the Reader consult the Decretory Council held under and by the Command of Pope Paul the Third 1538 Printed 1609 at London and taken out of Mr. Crashaw's Library then Preacher of the Temple wherein the Abuses of the Roman Ecclesiasticks are manifested under the Certificate of Nine of the most Eminent Cardinals then living whereof Pool was one and Sadolete another to whose Inspection the Inquiry was then referr'd by the said Pope which Abuses the Court of Rome would not then correct nor are they yet corrected the Book being suppress'd by Order of that Church and coming to my hands something late from a worthy Bencher of Grayes Inn which otherwise had sooner been made Use of to prove Reason a safer Guide than that Church which pretends to Infallibility and may serve for Answer to that Romanist who published some weak Reflections upon our Author's Discourse of Humane Reason who if he fail'd in any thing handled in his Book 't was in his a little too slightly referring the Cause of H. the Eighth's deserting of the Roman See to his Wantonness c. For that there were many other concurring motives to his Desertion is very probable from some Speeches I have seen of his in Parliament and from Histories about him who was tho a severe yet withal a very stout and inquisitive Prince and fitted thereby for the Work he so worthily began and whereof the Advantage accrues to us at this time Such are the unsearchable depths of Providence which tho few observe and fewer are willing to resign their Wills unto will do what is best for good men Lastly Because some men are most guided by Book Authorities I think fit to add that Montaigne Erasmus Raymond Sebond Charone Cassauder Chillingworth Cartesius Milton Gell Baxter and Hobbs also with others of Fame as D. Stillingfleet not to forget Bishop Tayler have unanimously approv'd of Reason as the best Guide and favour'd or cooly advis'd a circumscrib'd Toleration I having named Grotius before but I refer the ingenuous Reader once for all to that excellent Discourse of the Rise and Power of Parliaments Laws Courts c. and of Religion printed 1677. by way of Letter to a Parliament-man wherein a Toleration in Religion here for all but the Jesuits and Seculars is argued to be not onely Political but highly Rational and consonant to the Doctrine of the Holy Jesus of which Opinion till I am convinc'd otherwise by Reason I am resolv'd to be and no longer for I cannot Mean time as a Corollary to this Reply I subjoyn with submission that it appears plainly by his Majesties Royal Father 's Golden Book he was not much averrse to it and that ev'n Charles the Fifth during the Interim see Sleydan did allow a kind of Toleration in Germany where I leave the Cause but really unwillingly for further Proofs crowd so fast into me that to forbear venting them is a kind of Disease upon me tho I hope not Mortal Neither do I stand in awe of any Censure upon my Conclusions already publish'd by the future Impressions of any Bigotical Opponent whatsoever Epitaphium Cliffordianum HIC jacet insignis Cliffordi capsula terrae Reddita sed melior pars resoluta Polo Carmine non opus est famam celebrare polite Ni fallor Libro gloria certa micat Humanae Rationis opus munivit ultro Esse ducem vitae subsidiumque viae Si quae praeterea superaddere vota Poēsis Auderet nitida sacrificanda manu Englished HEre snatcht by Death Clifford interr'd does lye Whose Nobler Part is vehicl'd on high There needs no Muse to celebrate his Fame Whose Book eterniz'd has his gen'rous Name He proved Humane Reason's worth so well From other Arts it bears away the Bell. If any Poet superadds to this With impure hands his Holocaust's amiss His Character AS to his Person 't was little his Face rather flat than oval his Eye serious Countenance Leonine his Constitution Cholerick Sanguine tinctur'd with Melancholy of a facetious Conversation yet a great Humorist of quick Parts so of quick Passions and Venereal thence Lazy he was learned very critical positive and proud charitable enough and scorn'd to be rich he had a will to be just would drink to excess sometimes His Religion was that of his Countrey he was always Loyal to his King and a very good Poet. He died 'twixt 50 and 60 at Sutton's Hospital whose Master he then was not much lamented by the Pensioners few knew him well He was a man strangely compos'd 't is question'd whether his Virtues or Vices were most I incline to the last yet he departed peaceably and piously FINIS