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A54460 A sermon preach'd before the King and Queen in Their Majesties chappel at Windsor, on Trinity-Sunday, May 30. 1686 by the Reverend Father John Persall ... Persall, John, 1633-1702. 1686 (1686) Wing P1651; ESTC R11064 11,103 35

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Reason yet it confirms true Reason for Almighty God only exacts of us to believe when we have reason to believe then we must make Reason stoop to Faith when we have reason so to do We are to understand then that there is in us a twofold Reason one direct coming from the Objects we discourse on the other reflex reflecting upon Reason and considering how far it can go this often forces us to submit our direct Reason even to Humane Authority So an ignorant Peasant looking upon the Stars in a clear Night according to direct Reason rising from his Senses judges them not an Inch Diameter and that ten or twenty of them joyn'd together would scarce equal a Full-Moon but he hears all Mathematicians and Learned Men agree that each Star far exceeds the Moon nay and the whole Globe of the Earth he submits his direct Reason to this Authority and by reflex Reason discourses thus I who am an ignorant Man may well be deceived therefore these learned Men all agreeing I must in prudence yield So he submits his direct Reason even to Humane Authority and is taught so to do by reflex Reason and the very Light of Nature This is more evident in the Mysteries of our Faith Direct Reason tells us a Trinity in a perfect Unity is impossible but reflex Reason corrects this Errour discoursing thus My Vnderstanding is but Finite and Limited Almighty God is Infinite and would not be God if he were not in himself more than my weak and feeble Capacity can conceive If then I have a moral certainty that my Great God has reveal'd himself to be Three and One if his Holy Church which put into my Hands the Scripture it self assuring me that it is the Word of God interprets these Words These three are one St. John 's first Epist c. 5. v. 7. and these other I and my Father are one St. John's Gospel c. 10. v. 30. If I say this Church interprets these Words in a real strict sense which otherwise might bear a more easie Interpretation in a metaphorical or figurate sense I must and will believe it tho' it cost me the last drop of my Blood what seeming Impossibilities soever Sense and direct Reason objects against it and this I am taught by reflex Reason and the Light of Nature it self this is a Duty I owe to my Great God to acknowledge that I ought to believe more than I can understand From this Discourse I hope it appears clear enough how rational the Mysteries of our Faith are and how irrational it is to discredit them upon this account that we cannot understand them This is a Principle which ought to be the Ground of our Belief viz. That God can reveal more than we can understand and that many things to our Weakness seem impossible which to our Great God are very feasible this the Light of Nature teaches us and it must carry us through all the profound hard Mysteries of our Faith To deny a thing upon this account that it contradicts Sense and direct Reason is irrational injurious to Almighty God and destructive to Christianity It is irrational for Reason teaches us that our Senses and direct Reason are often mistaken How often do's the Mathematician and Natural Philosopher at first think that a Demonstration which afterwards he finds either by his own Study or anothers Discovery to be a Paralogism 'T is injurious to God because it limits his Omnipotency to our Weakness 't is destructive to Christianity because it destroys the two chief Mysteries of Christianity the Trinity and Incarnation both which seemingly contradict direct Reason I do not believe Christ to be a Natural Door tho' I hear him say I am a Door John c. 10. v. 9. nor a Natural Vine tho' I hear him say I am the True Vine John c. 15. v. 1. but God forbid I should deny either upon this account that I cannot understand how it can possibly be done but I deny it because the Church teaches me that I must understand these words in a Metaphorical Sense There have been Heresies from the Apostles times downwards to to our Age and many have died obstinate in their Heresie but I verily believe that both their Heresie and Obstinacy proceeded from a want of this Principle That God can reveal more than we can understand Let us then pay this duty to our great God an humble acknowledgment of our Weakness and his Power that he can reveal more infinitely more than we are able to conceive And so much for my first Part of the Trinity as it is the Object of our Faith Let us now lanch forth into a Sea of Love and consider this great Mystery as the thrice happy Object of our Affections The Almighty Architect created Man according to his perfect Image with intent to make him happy for an Eternity in the perfect Enjoyment of his God and therefore has imprinted in his Soul so violent an Appetite and Desire of that blessed Fruition that let a thousand Worlds joyn their Stocks together let Men and Angels and all that is created conspire to regale him his capacious Heart will never be perfectly satiated never at rest and quiet but in the Divine Embraces of an Omnipotent Immense Eternal Trinity the Fountain of all Beauty and Amability O you young Gallants of the World who spend your Time Fortunes Life and all in the pursuit of a fading Beauty a Rose surrounded with so many pricking Thorns of Cares and Solicitude a Flower so soon withered with Time so often blasted with Sickness so easily cropped by Death stop this your unadvis'd Career and know that you are far out of your Way if you pretend to look for Happiness in the Enjoyment of Mortal Beauty 'T is true your Souls were created to love and enjoy a Beauty but a True and Infinite one for an Eternity not a false Representation thereof for a Moment 't is the blindness of your Understandings and pravity of your Wills the sad Effects of Original Sin that make you thus mistake the Object of your Happiness and apply your natural or innate Appetite to Creatures which in reality seeks only the Creator One in Substance and Three in Persons Let us then raise our Thoughts as high as Faith can carry them to the Contemplation of this all-beatifying Object which will be our eternal Bliss if we make not our selves so miserable as eternally to perish First then Each Person is Omnipotent Eternal Immense All-knowing Infinite in Wisdom Goodness and all Perfections from the Complex of which arises so great an Amability and Beauty that no Rational Creature can behold it and not presently fall in love with it so far that whilst the happy Soul enjoys this Vision no created Beauty tho' never so exact and charming can make any Impression in her but only as she sees it clearly represented in the Divine Idea's and supereminently contain'd in the Object she above all admires and loves Nay