Man who liveth where Christianity is profess'd and refuseth to submit his Judgment to the Infallibilty of any Guide on Earth and particularly to the Church or Bishop of Rome hath notwithstanding that refusal sufficient means still left him whereby he may arrive at certainty in those Doctrines which are generally necessary to the Salvation of a Christian Man Satisfaction in this Inquiry is of great Moment For it relateth to our great end and to the way which leads to it And it nearly concerneth both the Romanists and the Reformed If there be not such a Guide the Estate of the Romanists is extreamly dangerous For then the Blind take the Blind for their unerring Leaders and being once misled they wander on without correcting their Error having taken up this first as their fixed Principle that their Guide cannot mistake the way On the other hand If God hath set up in his Church a Light so very clear and steddy as is pretended the Reformed are guilty of great presumption and expose themselves to great uncertainty by shutting their Eyes against it Now there lyes before Men a double Temptation to a belief of the being of such a Guide in the Christian Church Sloth and Vitious Humility of Mind Sloth inclineth Men rather to take up in an Implicit Faith than to give themselves the trouble of a strict Examination of things For there is less Pain in Credulity then in bending of the Head by long and strict Attention and severe Study Also there is a Shew of Humility in the deference which our understandings pay unto Authority especially to that which pretends to be under Christ Supreme on Earth Although in the paying of it without good reason first understood Men are not Humble but Slavish But these Temptations prevail not upon honest and considerate Minds which inquire without prejudice after Truth and submit to the Powerful Evidence of it Such will resolve the Question in the Affirmative and they may reasonably so do by considering these Propositions which I shall treat of in their order First The Christian Church never yet wanted nor shall it ever want either the Doctrines of necessary Faith or the Belief and Profession of them Secondly Wheresoever God requireth the Belief of them he giveth means sufficient for Information and unerring Assent Thirdly Whatsoever those means are every Man 's Personal reason giveth to the Mind that last Weight which turneth Deliberation into Faith Fourthly The means which God hath given us towards necessary Faith and the certainty of it is not the Authority of any Infallible Guide on Earth Yet Fifthly All Ecclesiastical Guidance is not to be rejected in our pursuance of the Doctrines of Christian Faith in the finding out or stating of which it is a very considerable help Sixthly By the help of it and Principally as it offers to us the Holy Scriptures in the Quality of the Rule of Faith we have means sufficient to lead us to certainty in that Belief which is necessary to Life Eternal First The Acknowledgment and Profession of the necessary Doctrines of the Christian Faith are annexed inseparably to the Christian Church There is but one Faith and according to the saying of Leo the great If it be not one it is not at all For it cannot be contrary to it self And though it be but one yet Men of differing Creeds pretend to it as the Merchants of Relicks in the Church of Rome shew in several places the one seamless Coat of Christ This one Faith never did nor ever shall in all places fail The Apostles were themselves without error both in their own assent to the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith and in the delivery of them They heard the Oracles of Christ from his own mouth and they were Witnesses of his Resurrection And they spake what they had seen and heard And they gave to the World Assurance of the Truth by the miraculous signs of their Apostolical Office And if they had not had such Assurance themselves and could not have given proof to others of their mission there would have been a defect in the first promulgation of the Gospel and such as could not afterwards have been amended That which at first had been delivered with uncertainty would with greater uncertainty have been conveighed down to after Ages and Men who in process of time graft error upon certain Truth would much more have grafted error upon uncertain Opinion Ever since the Apostles times there has been True Faith and the Profession of it in the Catholick Church And it will be so till Faith shall expire and Men shall see him on whom they before believ'd For a Church cannot subsist without the Fundamentals of Christianity And Christ hath Sealed this Truth with his promise that there shall be a Church as long as this World continues I mean by a Church a visible Society of Christians both Ministers and People for publick Worship on Earth cannot be invisible But the True Faith and the Profession of it is not fixed to any place or to any succession of Men in it God's Providence has written the contrary in the very Ashes of the Seven Churches of the lesser Asia Neither is any particular Church though so far infallible in Fundamentals as to be preserved from actual error an infallible Rule to all other Christians If they follow the Doctrine of it they err not because it is true but if they follow that Church as an unerring Guide or Canon they mistake in the Rule and Motive of their Faith For that particular Church which Teacheth Truth might possibly have err'd and the Church which errs might have shined with the True Light But the whole Church cannot so err in any Age for then the very being of a Church would cease Neither doth it hence follow that the Faith of the Roman Church when Luther arose was the only true and certain Doctrine For that Church was not then the only visible Church on Earth The Greek Church for instance sake was than more visible than now it is and more Orthodox The Rich Papacy having much prevailed upon the necessities of it by Arguments guilded with Interest That Church did not err in Fundamental Points the Article of the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father by the Son which the Romans accuse of Heresie being easily acquitted of it if Men agreeing in the sense forbear contention about the Phrases Besides if our Fore-Fathers under the Papacy embraced the True Faith we have it still the Faith not being removed but the Corruption Their Question therefore Where was your Religion before Luther is not more pertinent amongst Disputers than this is amongst Husbandmen Where was the Corn before it was weeded We have seen that necessary Faith is perpetual and it is as manifest that wheresoever God requireth the belief of it he vouchsafeth sufficient means for information and unerring Assent Of all he does not
The same course was taken with the Remonstrants in the Synod of Dorâ— Wherefore Protestants ought not to detract from the Authority of general Councils whilst they assume to themselves so great a Power in their particular Synods The force of this Objection is thus removed Every Church hath Power of admitting or excluding Members else it hath not means sufficient to its end the order and concord of its Body Every particular Church ought to believe that it does not err in its definitions for it ought not to impose any known error upon its Members But though it believes it does not err it does not believe it upon this reason because God hath made it an infallible Guide but rather for this because it hath sincerely and with Gods assistance followed a rule which is infallible And upon this supposition it imposeth Doctrines and excludeth such as with contumacy dissent from them 4. This Guide is not the present Church declaring to particular Christians the sense of the Church of former Ages How can this declaration be made seeing Churches differ and each Church calls it self the true one and pretendeth to the Primitive pattern The Church of Rome hath on her side the suffrages of all the Councils and Fathers the first the middle the last if Campian the Jesuite may be believed On the other hand Monsieur Larroque hath Written a Book of the Conformity of the Protestant Churches in France with the Discipline of the Christian Ancient Church taking it for granted that their Doctrine was Catholick And we likewise pretend both to the Doctrine and Discipline of it All of us cannot be in the right The Roman Church without any proof calleth her self the Church Catholick and she pretendeth to conveigh to us the sense of the Ancient Fathers and Councils which sense was that they understood formerly by the word Tradition And in this sense a Romanist said of Pope Honorius that he had broken the rule of Tradition But how can we esteem that Church a faithful representer of the sense of the Ancients whilst the Reformed consult the Ancients with equal ability and find a contrary sense in them Whilst the Church of Rome by a kind of Ecclesiastical Coinage stampeth Divine Authority upon Books esteemed by the Councils and Fathers to be Apochryphal Whilst it hath forged decrees of Popes and like a deceitful Gibeonite rendred that which was really new in appearance old and mouldy on purpose to promote imposture How doth it give us the sense of the Ancients when it owneth what it formerly disowned as Canonical the Epistle to the Hebrews When it taketh away the Cup which Pope Gelasius called a grand Sacrilege When it now rejecteth the Communicating of Infants which in former times was esteemed by many a very necessary point When a former Pope Gregory condemns the Title of Universal pastor as Anti-Christian and a latter insists upon it as the choicest flour in the papal Prerogative When St. Austin and from him the very Breviary shall expound Christs promise of being always with his Church of the presence of his Divinity and of his Spirit and not of his Body And Pope Innocent the third shall interpret them as meant also of his corporal presence And if the Roman Church falsifyeth written Tradition how shall we trust her for Oral And how and at what time did that Oral Tradition remove from Greece to Rome where the Greek Church which it alloweth to have been once possessed of the true Tradition is accused of Heresie At the same time I suppose that the Chappel of the Virgin removed from Nazareth to Loretto This principle of Oral Tradition is most uncertain to their Judges and to those to whom they offer it it is most obscure It is a principle on which they can serve a purpose in justifying novel Doctrines as Oral Traditions not known to any but the Roman Church which pretendeth to the custody of them 5. God hath not set up any one Person in the Catholick Church in the Quality of an unerring Guide in the Christian Faith The Bishops of Rome who pretend to this Prerogative do but pretend It is a tender point and the Pope's Legates in the Council of Trent were enjoyned to give forth this Advertisement that the Fathers upon no account whatsoever should touch it or dispute about it They who examine it will soon reject it as false and useless And 1. Whether the Pope be or be not the Guide the Men of the Roman Communion are exposed to dangerous uncertainty For it is not yet determined amongst them whether they are to follow the Pope with or without or against a Council Yet a Pope hath owned a Council which deposed other Popes and by decree set it self above them or rather vindicated the superiority due to it Thus Martin the fifth received the Papal Mitre from the Council of Constance after it had deposed Gregory the twelfth Benedict the thirteenth and John the twenty third Again there have been by the account given us in their own Historians more than twenty formed Schisms in that Church two or more Popes pretending at the same time to the infallible Chair and each of them not being without their followers and giving Holy Orders And at this time there is risen an Apologist for Mauritius Burdin or Gregory the eighth though he was ejected by the Roman Church which received Gelasius into his place Burdin being disliked by them as a Creature of Henry the Emperour This Schism saith St. Bernard distracted that Church and gave it a wound only not incurable And Baluzius professeth that it was then difficult to understand which of the two Gregory or Gelasius was the Legitimate successour of Pope Paschal Now how useless to them is the pretence of a Guide when they want some other Guide who should tell them which of the pretenders they may securely follow Secondly the Popes themselves in their Solemn Profession suppose themselves liable to the misleading of the People even in Matters of Faith For having owned the Faith of the Six general Councils They further profess themselves and others to be subject to an Anatâ—ema if they advance novelty contrary to the aforesaid Evangelical Tradition and the integrity of the Orthodox and Christian Faith Thirdly If the Pope challengeth this Power of infallible Guidance he must lay claim to it by his succeeding of St. Peter in the Chair Apostolical But then by equal reason the successors of each Apostle may challenge the office of an infallible Guide For the Power which Christ gave to St. Peter he gave to the rest It was not special And for the Bishops of Antioch who first succeeded St. Peter they have a much fairer pretence than those of Rome The Truth is Hierusalem was properly the Mother-Church Though Rome was the Imperial City and if by this means the Popes had not
require this belief for to all the Gospel is not preached and where it is preached there are Infants and Persons of Age so distempered in Mind as to remain unavoidably Children in understanding And though the same Sum of Doctrines is generally necessary to Salvation yet the Creed of all Men is not of equal length seeing they have unequal capacities But wheresoever there is a particular Society of Men who call themselves a Church yet err actually in the necessary Articles of the Faith it is certain they were not forced into that error for want of external means For the Just Judge of the World would never have required Unity in the Faith upon pain of his Eternal displeasure if he had not given to Men Power sufficient for such Unity No Tyrant on Earth has been guilty of such undisguised injustice as that is which maketh a Law for the punishment of the Blind because they miss their way The Artâ—cles of Christian Religion come not to the Mind by natural reason but by Faith and Faith comes by hearing or reading and where these means are not offered a Man is rather an Ignorant Person than an Unbeliever Wherefore our Saviour told the perverse Jews that if the Messiah had never been reveal'd to them they had not been answerable for the Sin of Infidelity But that since he was come to them and by them despised their Infidelity was blackned with great aggravation The means then are sufficient wheresoever the end is absolutely required but whatsoever those means are the Act of Assent is to be ultimately resolved into each Mans Personal reason For no Man can believe or assent but upon some ground or motive which appears credible to him He could not believe unless he had some reason or other why he believed When all is done said Mr. Thorndike Men must and will be Judges for themselves I do not quote the saying because it is extraordinary but because that Learned Man said it who was careful to pay to Authority its minutest dues If a Man believes upon Authority he hath a further reason for the believing of it He is not willing to take Pains in examining that which is proposed to him or he thinks himself of less Ability in understanding than those from whom he borrows his Light If he desireth another to judge for him his choice is determined by the Opinion he hath conceived of him Every Man has his reason though it be a weak one and such as cannot justify it self or him Something at last turns the Ballance though it be but a Feather This the Romanists own as well as the Reformed till it toucheth them in the case of a new Convert To induce a Man of another particular Church to embrace their Communion they submit these weighty points to his private Judgment What is a True Church and which are the marks of it What is the Roman Church And whether the marks of the True Church do only belong unto the Roman What Men or what Books speak the sense of that Church They tell us That the Light of a Man 's own reason first serves him so far as to the discovery of a Guide Also that in this discovery the Divine Providence hath left it so clear and evident that a sincere and unbyassed quest cannot miscarry But when once this Guide is found out the Man is afterwards for all other things that are prescribed by this Guide to subject and resign his reason As if it were not as difficult to judge of such a Guide as of his direction It seems the Roman Church is like a Cave into which a Man has Light enough to enter but when once he is entred he is in thick Darkness But how subservient soever our reason may be to our Faith The means which God hath given us towards the certain attaining of it is not the Authority of any infallible Guide on Earth This will not be disbelieved by those who weigh well the following considerations First God did not set up such a constant infallible Guide among the Jews though at first he gave Assurance to them by Miracle that Moses had received his Commission from him and had brought to them the Tables which he had Written for their direction with his own finger Some of the Sanedrim were of the Sect of the Sadduces who erred in the Fundamental point of a future State Most of them erred in the Quality of the Messiah not considering their Scriptures so much as their Traditions And of the errors of the Levitical Priesthood there is in the Old Testament frequent mention and great complaint And the Prophet Malachy as soon as he had said The Priests lips shall preserve Knowledge he adds this reproof but ye are departed out of the way It is true the Israelites were by God directed in difficult cases to an Assembly of Judges But they were not Judges of controversies in Doctrine but in Property To their sentence the People were to submit as to an expedient for Peace though Judgment might be perverted or mistaken It must be also confessed that God spake to them by the Oracle of Vrim and that the voice of it was infallible But its answers concerned not the necessary Rudiments of the Mosaick Law but emergencies in their civil affairs those especially of Peace and War But if we admit that there was under Judaism a living infallible Guide it does not thence follow that it must be so under Christianity For their small precinct the People of which were thrice in a year to come up to the Temple was much more capable of such a judge than the Christian Church which is as wide as the World Also the new Revelation is more clear and distinct than the old one was and stands not in such need of an Interpreter Secondly God hath no where promised Christians such a judge He hath no where said that he hath given such a one to the Christian Church And seeing such a one cannot be had without Gods supernatural assistance the most knowing amongst Men being subject both to Error and to Falshood it is great arrogance whilst the Scripture is silent to say he is in being And to affirm that if there were not such a Guide God would be wanting in means sufficient for the maintenance of Peace and Truth is presumptuously to obtrude the schemes of Mans fancy upon God's Wisdom He can Govern his Church without our methods Now God hath no where promised such a judge to Christian Men though he hath promised help on Earth and assistance from Heaven to Men diligent and sincere in their inquiries after Truths which are necessary for them There are two places of Scripture which are by some taken for Promises of such a nature though they were not by the Divine Wisdom so intended Of these the First is that which was spoken by Christ unto St. Peter The Gates of Hell shall not