an Oral Tradition which they themselves had not put in writing They do sometimes refer themselves to such things as they had delivered to particular Churches but by Tradition in the Apostles days and for some Ages after it is very clear that they meant only the conveyance of the Faith and not any unwritten Doctrines They reckoned the Faith was a sacred depositum which was committed to them and that was to be preserved pure among them But it were very easy to shew in the continued Succession of all the first Christian Writers That they still Appealed to the Scriptures That they Argued from them That they Condemned all Doctrines that were not contained in them and when at any time they brought human Authorities to justify their Opinions or Expressions they contented themselves with a very few and those very late Authorities So that their design in vouching them seems to be rather to clear themselves from the Imputation of having innovated any thing in the Doctrine or in the ways of expressing it than that they thought those Authorities were necessary to prove them by For in that case they must have taken a great deal more pains than they did to have followed up and proved the Tradition much higher than they went We do also plainly see that such Traditions as were not founded on Scripture were easily corrupted and on that account were laid aside by the succeeding Ages Such were the Opinion of Christ's Reign on Earth for a Thousand years The Saints not seeing God till the Resurrection The necessity of giving Infants the Eucharist The Divine Inspiration of the 70 Interpreters besides some more important Matters which in respect to those Times are not to be too much descanted upon It is also plain That the Gnosticks the Valentinians and other Hereticks began very early to set up a Pretension to a Tradition delivered by the Apostles to some particular persons as a Key for understanding the secret meanings that might be in Scripture in opposition to which both Irenaeus Tertullian and others Iren. I. 3. c. 1 2 3 4 5. Tertul. de presc Cap. 20 21 25 27 28. make use of Two sorts of Arguments The one is the Authority of the Scripture it self by which they confuted their Errors The other is a Point of Fact That there was no such Tradition In asserting this they appeal to those Churches which had been founded by the Apostles and in which a Succession of Bishops had been continued down They say in these we must search for Apostolical Tradition This was not said by them as if they had designed to establish Tradition as an Authority distinct from or equal to the Scriptures But only to shew the falshood of that pretence of the Hereticks and that there was no such Tradition for their Heresies as they gave out When this whole Matter is considered in all its parts such as 1 st That nothing is to be believed as an Article of Faith unless it appears to have been Revealed by God 2 dly That Oral Tradition appâ—ars both from the Nature of Man and the Experience of former Times to be an incompetent conveâ—er of Truth 3 dly That some Books were written for the conveyance of those Matters which have been in all Ages carefully preserved and esteemed sacred 4 thly That the Writers of the First Ages do always Argue from and Appeal to these Books And 5 thly That what they have said without Authority from them has been rejected in succeeding Ages the Truth of this Branch of our Article is fully made out If what is contain'd in theScripture in express words is theObject of our Faith then it will follow That whatsoever may be proved from thence by a just and lawful consequence is also to be believed Men may indeed Err in framing these Consequences and Deductions they may mistake or stretch them too far but though there is much Sophistry in the World yet there is also true Logick and a certain Thread of Reasoning And the sense of every Proposition being the same whether expressed always in the same or in different words then whatsoever appears to be clearly the sense of any place of Scripture is an Object of Faith tho it should be otherwise expressed than as it is in Scripture and every just Inference from it must be as true as the Proposition it self is Therefore it is a vain cavil to ask express words of Scripture for every Article That was the Method of all the Anciâ—nt Hereticks Christ and his Apostles Argued from the words and passages in the Old Testament to prove such things as agreed with the true sense of them and so did all the Fathers and therefore so may we do The great Objection to this is That the Scriptures are dark That the same place is capable of different Senses the Literal and the Mystical And therefore since we cannot understand the true Sense of the Scripture we must not Arguefrom it but seek for an Interpreterofit on whom we may depend All Sects Argue from thence and fancy that they find their Tenets in it And therefore this can be no sure way of finding out sacred Truth since so many do err that follow it In Answer to this it is to be considered That the Old Testament was delivered to the whole Nation of the Iews that Moses was read in the Synagogue in the hearing of the Women and Children that whole Nation was to take their Doctrine and Rules from it All Appeals wâ—re made to the Law and to the Prophets among them And though the Propâ—â—cies of the Old Testament were in their Stile and whole Contexture dark and hard to be understood yet when so great a Question as this Who was the true Messias came to be examined the proofs urged for it were Passages in the Old Testament Now the Question was How these were to be understood No Appeal was here made to Tradition or to Church-Authority but only by the Enemies of our Saviour Whereas he and his Disciples urge these passages in their true sense and in the consequences that arose out of them They did in that Appeal to the rational Faculties of those to whom they spoke The Christian Religion was at first delivered to poor and simple Multitudes who were both illiterate and weak the Epistles which are by much the hardest to be understood of the whole New Testament were Addressed to the whole Churches to all the Faithful or Saints that is to all the Christians in those Churches These were afterwards read in all thâ—ir Assemblies Upon this it may reasonably be asked Were these Writings clear in that Age or were they not If they were not it is unaccountable why they were addressed to the whole Body and how they came to be received and entertained as they were It is the End of Speech and Writing to make things to be understood and it is not supposable That Men Inspired by the Holy Ghost either could not or would
We must be then well assured in whom this great Privillege is vested before we can be bound to acknowledge it or to submit to it So here a great many things must be known before we can either argue from or apply those Passages of Scripture in which it is pretended that Infallibility is promised to the Church And if private Judgment is to be trusted in the Inquiries that arise about all these particulars they being the most important and most difficult matters that we can search into then it will be thought reasonable to trust it yet much further It is evident by their proceeding this way that both the Authority and the Sense of the Scriptures must be known antecedently to our acknowledging the Authority or the Infallibility of any Church For it is an Eternal Principle and Rule of Reason never to prove one thing by another till that other is first well proved Nor can any thing be proved afterwards by that which was proved by it This is as impossible as if a Father should beget a Son and should be afterwards begotten by that Son Therefore the Scriptures cannot prove the Infallibility of the Church and be afterwards proved by the Testimony of the Church So the one or the other of these must be first settled and proved before any use can be made of it to prove the other by it The last way they take to find out this Church by is from some Notes that they pretend are peculiar to her such as the Name Catholick Antiquity Extent Bellar. Contr. Tom 2. l. 4. Duration Succession of Bishops Vnion among themselves and with their Head Conformity of Doctrine with former times Miracles Prophecy Sanctity of Doctrine Holiness of Life Temporal Felicity Curses upon their Enemies and a constant Progress or Efficacy of Doctrine together with the Confession of their Adversaries And they fancy that wheresoever we find these we must believe that Body of Men to be Infallible But upon all this endless Questions will arise so far will it be from ending Controversies and settling us upon Infallibility If all these must be believed to be the Marks of the Infallible Church upon the account of which we ought to believe it and submit to it then two Enquires upon every one of these Notes must be discussed before we can be obliged to acquiesce in the Infallibility First Whether that is a true Mark of Infallibility or not And next Whether it belongs to the Church which they call Infallible or not And then another very intricate Question will arise upon the whole Whether they must all be found together or How many or which of them together will give us the entire Characters of the Infallible Church In discussing the Questions Whether every one of these is a true Mark or not no use must be made of the Scriptures for if the Scriptures have their Authority from the Testimony or rather the Decisions of the Infallible Church no use can be made of them till that is first fixed Some of these Notes are such as did not at all agree to the Church in the best and purest Times for then she had but a little Extent a short-liv'd Duration and no Temporal Felicity and she was generally reproached by her Adversaries But out of which of these Topicks can one hope to fetch out an Assurance of the Infallibility of such a Body Can no Body of Men continue long in the constant Series and with much Prosperity but must they be concluded to be Infallible Can it be thought that the assuming a Name can be a Mark Why is not the Name Christian as solemn as Catholick Might not the Philosophers have concluded from hence against the First Christians That they were by the confession of all Men the true Lovers of Wisdom since they were called Philosophers much more unanimously than the Church of Rome is called Catholick If a Conformity of Doctrine with former times and a Sanctity of Doctrine are Notes of the Church these will lead men into Enquiries of such a nature that if they are once allowed to go so far with their private Judgment they may well be suffered to go much further Some Standard must be fixed on by which the Sanctity of Doctrine may be examined they must also be allowed to examine what was the Doctrine of former times and here it will be natural to begin at the first times the Age of the Apostles It must therefore be first known what was the Doctrine of that Age before we can examine the Conformity of the present Age with it A Succession of Bishops is confessed to be still kept up among corrupted Churches An Union of the Church with its Head cannot be supposed to be a Note unless it is first made out by some other Topicks That this Church must have a Head and that he is Infallible For unless it is proved by some other Argument That she ought to have a Head she cannot be bound to adhere to him or to own him and unless it is also proved that he is Infallible she cannot be bound absolutely and without restrictions to adhere to him Holiness of Life cannot be a Mark unless it is pretended that those in whom the Infallibility is are all holy A few holy men here and there are indeed an Honour to any Body but it will seem a strange Inference That because some few in a Society are eminently holy that therefore others of that Body who are not so but are perhaps as eminently vicious should be Infallible Somewhat has been already said concerning Miracles The pretence to Prophecy falls within the same Consideration The one being as wonderful a Communication of Omniscience as the other is of Omnipotence For the Confession of Adversaries or some Curâ—es on them these cannot signifie much unless they were Universal Fair Enemies will acknowledg what is good among their Adversaries But as that Church is the least apt of any Society we know to speak good of those who differ from her so she has not very much to boast as to others saying much good of her And if Signal Providences have now and then happened these are such things and they are carried on with such a depth that we must acquiesce in the Observation of the wisest Men of all Ages That the race is not to the swift nor the battel to the strong Eccl. 9.11 But that time and chance happeneth to all things And thus it appears That these pretended Notes instead of giving us a clear Thread to lead us up to Infallibility and to end all Controversies they do start a great variety of Questions that engage us into a Labyrinth out of which it cannot be easy for any to extricate themselves But if we could see an end of this then a new set of Questions will come on When we go to examine all Churches by them Whether the Church of Rome has them all And if she alone has them so that no
the Scriptures Ibid. The Form of Swearing among the Jews 394 Our Saviour's words and St. James's against all Swearing explained 395 When Oaths may be lawfully taken 396 The End of the Table of the Contents AN EXPOSITION OF THE XXXIX ARTICLES OF THE Church of England TITLE Articles whereupon it was agreed by the Archbishops and Byshops of both Provinces and the whole Cleargie in the Convocation holden at London in the yeare of our Lorde GOD 1562. according to the computation of the Church of Englande for the avoiding of the diversities of opinions and for the stablishing of consent touching true Religion Put forth by the Queens authoritie The INTRODUCTION THE Title of these Articles leads me to consider 1. The Time the Occasion and the Design of Compiling them 2 dly The Authority that is stampt upon them both by Church and State and the Obligation that lies upon all of our Communion to Assent to them and more particularly the Importance of the Subscription to which the Clergy are obliged As to the 1 st It may seem somewhat strange to see such a Collection of Tenets made the Standard of the Doctrine of a Church that is deservedly valued by reason of her Moderation This seems to be a departing from the Simplicity of the First Ages which yet we pretend to set up for a Pattern In those times the owning the Belief of the Creeds then received was thought sufficient And when some Heresies had occasioned great Enlargements to be made in the Creeds the Third General Council thought fit to set a Bar against all further Additions and yet all those Creeds one of which goes far beyond the Ephesine Standard make but One Article of the Thirty nine of which this Book consists Many of these do also relate to subtile and abstruse Points in which it is not easy to form a clear Judgment and much less can it be convenient to Impose so great a Collection of Tenets upon a whole Church to Excommunicate such as affirm any of them to be erroneous and to reject those from the Service of the Church who cannot Assent to every one of them The Negative Articles of No Infallibility No Supremacy in the Pope No Transubstantiation No Purgatory and the like give yet a further Colour to Exceptions since it may seem that it was enough not to have mentioned these which implied a tacit rejecting of them It may therefore appear to be too rigorous to require a positive condemning of those Points for a very high degree of Certainty is required to affirm a Negative Proposition In order to the explaining this matter it is to be confessed that in the beginnings of Christianity the Declaration that was required even of a Bishop's Faith was conceived in very general Terms There was a Form setled very early in most Churches This St. Paul in one place calls The Form of Doctrine that was delivered in another place The Form of Sound Words Rom. 6.17 1 Tim. 4.6 6 3. 2 Tim. 1.13 which those who were fixed by the Apostles in particular Churches had received from them These words of his do import a Standard or fixed Formulary by which all Doctrines were to be examined Some have inferred from them that the Apostles delivered that Creed which goes under their Name every where in the same Form of Words But there is great reason to doubt of this since the first Apologists for Christianity when they deliver a short Abstract of the Christian Faith do all vary from one another both as to the Order and as to the Words themselves which they would not have done if the Churches had all received one setled Form from the Apostles They would all have used the same Words and neither more nor less It is more probable That in every Church there was a Form setled which was delivered to it by some Apostle or Companion of the Apostles with some Variation of which at this distance of time considering how defective the History of the First Ages of Christianity is it is not possible nor very necessary for us to be able to give a clear Account For Instance In the whole Extent or Neighbourhood of the Roman Empire it was at first of great Use to have this in every Christian's mouth That our Saviour suffered under Pontius Pilate because this fixed the Time and carried in it an Appeal to Records and Evidences that might then have been searched for But if this Religion went at first far to the Eastward beyond all Commerce with the Romans there is not that reason to think that this should have been a part of the shortest Form of this Doctrine it being enough that it was related in the Gospel These Forms of the several Churches were preserved with that Sacred Respect that was due to them This was esteemed the Depositum or Trust of a Church which was chiefly committed to the keeping of the Bishop In the First Ages in which the Bishops or Clergy of the several Churches could not meet together in Synods to examine the Doctrine of every new Bishop the Method upon which the Circumstances of those Ages put them was this The New Bishop sent round him and chiefly to the Bishops of the more Eminent Sees the Profession of his Faith according to the Form that was fixed in his Church And when the Neighbouring Bishops were satisfied in this they held Communion with him and not only owned him for a Bishop but maintained such a Commerce with him as the state of that Time did admit of But as some Heresies sprung up there were Enlargements made in several Churches for the condemning those and for excluding such as held them from their Communion The Council of Nice examined many of those Creeds and out of them they put their Creed in a fuller Form The Addition made by the Council of Constantinople was put into the Creeds of some particular Churches several Years before that Council met So that though it received its Authority from that Council yet those Fathers rather confirmed an Article which they found in the Creeds of some Churches than made a New one It had been an unvaluable Blessing if the Christian Religion had been kept in its first Simplicity The Council of Ephesus took care that the Creed by which men profess their Christianity should receive no new Additions but be fixed according to the Constantinoplitan Standard yet they made Decrees in Points of Faith and the following Councils went on in their steps adding still new Decrees with Anathematisms against the contrary Doctrines and declaring the Asserters of them to be under an Anathema that is under a very heavy Curse of being totally excluded from their Communion and even from the Communion of Jesus Christ. And whereas the New Bishops had formerly only declared their Faith they were then required besides that to declare That they received such Councils and rejected such Doctrines together with such as favoured them who were sometimes meâ—tioned by
above all the Presence of God which appeared in the Cloud of Glory and in those Answers that were given by the Urim and Thummim all which must be confessed to be advantages on the side of Tradition vastly beyond any that can be pretended to have been in the Christian Church Yet notwithstanding all these God commanded Moses to write all their Law as the Ten Commandments were by the Immediate Power or Finger of God writ on Tables of Stone When all this is laid together and well considered it will appear That God by a particular Oeconomy intended then to secure Revealed Religion from the doubtfulness and uncertainties of Oral Tradition It is much more reasonable to believe That the Christian Religion which was to be spread to many remote Regions among whom there could be little Communication should have been fixed in its first beginnings by putting it in Writing and not left to the looseness of Reports and Stories We do plainly see That though the methods of knowing and communicating Truth are now furer and better fixed than they have been in most of the Ages which have passed since the beginnings of this Religion yet in every Matter of Fact such additions are daily made as it happens to be Reported and every Point of Doctrine is so variously stated that if Religion had not a more assured bottom than Tradition it could not have that Credit paid to it that it ought to have If we had no greater certainty for Religion than Report we could not believe it very firmly nor venture upon it So in order to the giving this Doctrine such Authority as is necessary for attaining the great ends proposed in it the conveyance of it must be clear and unquestionable otherwise as it would grow to be much mixed with Fable so it would come to be looked on as all a Fable Since then Oral Tradition when it had the utmost Advantages possible of its side failed so much in the conveyance both of Natural Religion and of the Mosaical we see that it cannot be relied on as a certain method of preserving the Truths of Revealed Religion In our Saviour's Time Tradition was set up on many occasions against him but he never submitted to it On the contrary he reproached the Iews with this That they had made the Laws of God of no effect by their Traditions Mat. 15.3 6 9. Joh. 5.39 and he told them That they worshipped God in vain when they taught for Doctrines the Commandments of men In all his Disputes with the Pharisees he appealed to Moses and the Prophets he bade them search the scriptures for in them said he ye think ye have eternal life and they testify of me Ye think is by the Phraseology of that time a word that does not refer to any particular Conceit of theirs but imports That as they thought so in them they had Eternal Life Our Saviour justifies himself and his Doctrine often by words of Scripture but never once by Tradition We see plainly That in our Saviour's Time the Tradition of the Resurrection was so doubtful among the Iews that the Sadducees a formed Party among them did openly deny it The Authority of Tradition had likewise imposed two very mischievous Errors upon the strictest Sect of the Iews that adhered the most firmly to it The one was That they understood the Prophecies concerning the Messias sitting on the Throne of David literally They thought that in imitation of David he was not only to free his own Country from a Foreign Yoke but that he was to subdue as David had done all the Neighbouring Nations This was to them a Stone of Stumbling and a Rock of Offence so their adhering to their Traditions proved their ruin in all Respects The other Error to which the Authority of Tradition led them was their preferring the Rituals of their Religion to the Moral Precepts that it contained This not only corrupted their own Manners while they thought that an Exactness of Performing and a Zeal in Asserting not only the Ritual Precepts that Moses gave their Fathers but those Additions to them which they had from Tradition that were accounted hedges about the Law That this I say might well excuse or atone for the most heinous Violations of the Rules of Justice and Mercy But this had yet another worse effect upon them while it possessed them with such prejudices against our Saviour and his Apostles when they came to see that they set no value on those practices that were recommended by Tradition and that they preferred pure and sublime Morals even to Mosaical Ceremonies themselves and set the Gentiles at liberty from those observances So that the ruin of the Iews their rejecting the Messias and their persecuting his followers arose chiefly from this Principle that had got in among them of believing Tradition and of being guided by it The Apostles in all their Disputes with the Iews make their Appeals constantly to the Scriptures they set a high Character on those of Berea for examining them and comparing the Doctrine that they preached Act. 17.11 with them In the Epistles to the Romans Galatians and Hebrews in which they pursue a thread of Argument with relation to the Prejudices that the Iews had taken up against Christianity they never once argue â—rom Tradition but always from the Scriptures They do not pretend only to disparage Modern Tradition and to set up that which was more Ancient They make no such distinction but hold close to the Scriptures When St. Paul sets out the Advantages that Timothy had by a Religious Education he mentions this That of a Child he had known the holy Scriptures 2 Tim. 3 15 16. which were able to make him wise unto Salvation through Faith which was in Christ Iesus That is the Belief of the Christian Religion was a Key to give him a right understanding of the Old Testament and upon this occasion St. Paul adds All Scripture that is the whole Old Testament is given by Divine Inspiration or as others render the words All the divinely Inspired Scripture is profitable for Doctrine for Reproof for Correction for Instruction in Righteousness that the man of God may be perfect throughly furnished unto all good works The New Testament was writ on the same design with the Old that as St. Luke expresses it We might know the certainty of those things wherein we have been instructed â—uk 1.4 John 20 31. These things were written saith St. Iohn that ye might believe that Iesus is the Christ the Son of God and that believing ye might have life through his Name When St. Peter knew by a special Revelation that he was near his End he writ his Second Epistle 2 Pet. 1 15. that they might have that as a mean of keeping those things always in remembrance after his death Nor do the Apostles give us any hints of their having left any thing with the Church to be conveyed down by
other Church has them equally with her or beyond her If all these must be discussed before we can settle this Question Which is the true Infallible Church A Man must stay long e're he can come to a point in it Therefore there can be no other way taken here but to examine first What makes a particular Church And then since the Catholick Church is an united Body of all particular Churches when the true Notion of a particular Church is fixed it will be easy from that to form a Notion of the Catholick Church It would seem reasonable by the Method of all Creeds in particular of that called the Apostles Creed that we ought first to settle our Faith as to the great Points of the Christian Religion and from thence go to settle the Notion of a true Church And that we ought not to begin with the Notion of a Church and from thence go to the Doctrine The Doctrine of Christianity must be first stated and from this we are to take our measures of all Churches and that chiefly with respect to that Doctrine which every Christian is bound to believe Here a distinction is to be made between those Capital and Fundamental Articles without which a Man cannot be esteemed a true Christian nor a Church a true Church And other Truths which being delivered in Scripture all Men are indeed obliged to believe them yet they are not of that nature that the Ignorance of them or an Error in them can exclude from Salvation To make this sensible It is a Proposition of another sort That Christ died for Sinners than this That he died at the Third or at the Sixth Hour And yet if the Second Proposition is expresly revealed in Scripture we are bound to believe it Since God has said it though it is not of the same nature with the other Here a Controversie does naturally arise that wise People are unwilling to meddle with What Articles are Fundamental and what are not The defining of Fundamental Articles seems on the one hand to deny Salvation to such as do not receive them all which Men are not willing to do And on the other hand it may seem a leaving Men at liberty as to all other particulars that are not reckoned up among the Fundamentals But after all the Covenant of Grace the Terms of Salvation and the Grounds on which we expect it seem to be things of another nature than all other truths which though revealed are not of themselves the Means or Conditions of Salvation Wheresoever true Baptism is there it seems the Essentials of this Covenant are preserved For if we look on Baptism as a Foederal admission into Christianity there can be no Baptism where the Essence of Christianity is not preserved As far then as we believe that any Society has preserved that so far we are bound to receive her Baptism and no further For unless we consider Baptism as a sort of a Charm that such words joined with a washing with Water make one a Christian which seems to be expresly contrary to what St. Peter says of it 1 Pet. â— 21 That it is not the washing away the filth of the flesh but the answer of a good Conscience towards God that saves us We must conclude That Baptism is a Foederal thing in which after that the Sponsions are made the Seal of Regeneration is added From hence it will follow That all who have a true Baptism that makes Men Believers and Christians must also have the true Faith as to the Essentials of Christianity The Fundamentals of Christirnity seems to be all that is necessary to make Baptism True and Valid And upon this a distinction is to be made that will discover and destroy a Sophism that is often used on this occasion A True Church is in one sense a Society that preserves the Essentials and Fundamentals of Christianity In another sense it stands for a Society all whose Doctrines are true that has corrupted no part of this Religion nor mixed any Errors with it A true Man is one who has a Soul and a Body that are the Essential Constituents of a Man Whereas in another sense a Man of Sincerity and Candor is called a true Man Truth in the one Sense imports the Essential Constitution and in the other it imports only a Quality that is accidental to it So when we acknowledge that any Society is a true Church we ought to be supposed to mean no other than that the Covenant of Grace in its Essential Constituent parts is preserved entire in that Body and not that it is true in all its Doctrines and Decisions The Second thing to be considered in a Church is their Association together in the use of the Sacraments For these are given by Christ to the Society as the Rites and Badges of that Body That which makes particular Men Believers is their receiving the Fundamentals of Christianity so that which constitutes the Body of the Church is the Profession of that Faith and the use of those Sacraments which are the Rites and Distinctions of those who profess it In this likewise a distinction is to be made between what is Essential to a Sacrament and what is the exact observance of it according to the Institution Additions to the Sacraments do not annul them though they corrupt them with that adulterate mixture Therefore where the Sponsions are made and washing with Water is used with the words of Christ there we own that there is a true Baptism Though there may be a large Addition of other Rites which we reject as Superstitious though we do not pretend that they null the Baptism But if any part of the Institution is cut off there we do not own the Sacrament to be true Because it being an Institution of Christ's it can no more be esteemed a true Sacrament than as it retains all that which by the Institution appears to be the main and essential parts of the Action Upon this account it is That since Christ appointed Bread and Wine fo his other Sacrament and that he not only blessed both but distributed both with words appropriated to each kind we do not esteem that to be a true Sacrament in which either the one or the other of these kinds is w ithdrawn But in the next place there may be many things necessary in the way of Precept and Order both with relation to the Sacraments and to the other publick Acts of Worship in which tho' Additions or Defects are Erroneous and Faulty yet they do not annul the Sacraments We think none ought to Baptize but Men dedicated to the Service of God and Ordained according to that Constitution that was settled in the Church by the Apostles and yet Baptism by Laicks or by Women such as is most commonly practiced in the Roman Church is not esteemed null by us nor is it repeated Because we make a difference between what is Essential to a Sacrament and what is
not true No consequences can be worse than the Corruption that is in the World and the Damnation that follows upon sin and yet God permits it because he has made us free Creatures Nor can any reason be given why we should be less free in the use of our understanding than we are in the use of our Will or why God should make it to be less possible for us to fall into Errors than it is to commit Sins The Wrath of God is as much denounced against Men that hold the Truth in unrighteousness as against other Sins Rom. 1.18 24 26. 2 Thes. 2.11 and it is reckoned among the heaviest of Curses to be given up to strong delusions to believe a lye Upon all these reasons therefore it seems clear that our Understandings are left free to us as well as our Wills and if we observe the Stile and Method of the Scriptures we shall find in them all over a constant Appeal to a Man's Reason and to his Intellectual Faculties If the mere dictates of the Church or of Infallible Men had been the resolution or foundation of Faith there had been no need of such a long Thread of Reasoning and Discourse as both our Saviour used while on Earth and as the Apostles used in their Writings We see the way of Authority is not taken but Explanations are offered Proofs and Illustrations are brought to convince the Mind which shews that God in the clearest Manifestation of his Will would deal with us as with reasonable Creatures who are not to believe but upon Persuasion and are to use our Reasons in order to the attaining that Persuasion And therefore upon the whole matter we ought not to believe Doctrines to be true because the Church teaches them but we ought to search the Scriptures and then according as we find the Doctrine of any Church to be true in the Fundamentals we ought to believe her to be a true Church and if besides this the whole Extent of the Doctrine and Worship together not only with the essential parts of the Sacraments but the whole Administration of them and the other Rituals of any Church are pure and true then we ought to account such a Church true in the largest Extent of the word true and by consequence we ought to hold Communion with it Another question may arise out of the first words of this Article concerning the Visibility of this Church Whether it must be always Visible According to the distinction hitherto made use of the resolution of this will be soon made There seem to be Promises in the Scriptures of a perpetual Duration of the Christian Church I will be with you always Matth. 28.20 Matth. 16.18 even to the end of the world And the gates of Hell shall not prevail against the Church The Iewish Religion had a Period perfixed in which it was to come to an end but the Prophecies that are among the Prophets concerning the new Dispensation seem to import not only its Continuance but its being continued still Visible in the World But as the Iewish Dispensation was long continued after they had fallen generally into some very gross Errors so the Christian Church may be Visible still though not Infallible God may preserve the Succession of a true Church as to the Essentials and Fundamentals of Faith in the World even though this Society should fall into Error So a Visible Society of Christians in a true Church as to the Essentials of our Faith is not controverted by us We do only deny the Infallibility of this true Church And therefore we are not afraid of that Question Where was your Church before Henry the Eighth We Answer It was where it is now here in England and in the other Kingdoms of the World only it was then corrupted and it is now pure There is therefore no sort of Inconvenience in owning the constant Visibility of a constant Succession and Church of true Christians true as to the Essentials of the Covenant of Grace though not true in all their Doctrines This seems to be a part of the Glory of the Messias and of his Kingdom That he shall be still visibly worshipped in the World by a Body of Men called by his Name But when Visibility is thus separated from Infallibility and it is made out that a Church may be a true Church though she has a large Allay of Errors and Corruptions mixed in her Constitution and Decisions there will be no manner of Inconvenience in owning a constant Visibility even at the same time that we charge the most eminent part of this Visible Body with many Errors and with much Corruption So far has the first part of this Article been treated of From it we pass to the second which affirms That as the other Patriarchal and Apostolical Churches such as Ierusalem Alexandria and Antioch have erred so the Church of Rome has likewise erred and that not only in their living and manner of Ceremonies but also in matters of Faith It is not questioned but that the other Patriarchal Churches have erred both that where our Saviour himself first taught and which was governed by two of the Apostles successively and those which were founded by St. Peter in Person or by Proxy as Church History represents Alexandria and Antioch to have been Those of the Church of Rome by whom they are at this day condemned both of Heresy and Schism do not dispute this Nor do they dispute that many of their Popes have led bad and flagitious Lives They deny not that the Canons Ceremonies and Government of the Church are very much changed by the Influence and the Authority of their Popes But the whole question turns upon this Whether the See of Rome has erred in matter of Faith or not In this those of that Communion are divided Some by the Church or See of Rome mean the Popes personally so they maintain That they never have and never can fall into Error Whereas others by the See of Rome mean that whole Body that holds Communion with Rome which they say cannot be tainted with Error and these separate this from the Personal Infallibility of Popes for if a Pope should err they think that a General Council has Authority to proceed against him and to deprive him And thus though he should err the See might be kept free from Error I shall upon this Article only consider the first Opinion reserving the Consideration of the second to the Article concerning General Councils As to the Popes their being subject to Error that must be confessed unless it can be proved that by a clear and express Privilege granted them by God they are excepted out of the common condition of Human Nature It is further highly probable that there is no such Privilege since the Church continued for many Ages before it was so much as pretended to and that in a time when that See was not only claiming all the Rights that
to what was set out in its proper Place And although we set a due value upon some of the Apocryphal Books yet others are of a lower Character The First Book of Maccabees is a very grave History writ with much exactness and a true Judgment but the Second is the Work of a mean Writer He was an Abridger of a larger Work and as he has the Modesty to ask his Readers Pardon for his Defects so it is very plain to every one that reads him that he needs often many grains of allowance So that this Book is one of the least valuable Pieces of the Apocrypha and there are very probable Reasons to question the Truth of that Relation concerning those who were thus prayed for But because that would occasion too long a Digression we are to make a difference between the Story that he relates and the Author 's own Reflections upon it for as we ought not to make any great Account of his Reflections these being only his private Thoughts who might probably have imbibed some of the Principles of the Greek Philosophy as some of the Iews had done or he might have believed that Notion which is now very generally received by the Iews that every Iew shall have a share in the World to come but that such as have lived ill must be purged before they arrive at it It is of much more importance to consider what Iudas Maccabeus did 2 Maccab. 12.40 which even by that Relation seems to be no more than this That he finding some things Consecrated to the Idols of the Iamnites about the Bodies of those who were killed concluded that to have been the cause of their Death And upon this he and all his Men betook themselves to Prayer and besought God that the Sin might be wholly put out of remembrance He exhorted his People to keep themselves by that Example from the like Sin and he made a Collection of a Sum of Money and sent it to Ierusalem to offer a Sin-offering before the Lord. So far the matter agrees well enough with the Iewish Dispensation It had appeared in the days of Ioshua how much guilt the Sin of Achan though but one Person had brought upon the whole Congregation and their Law had upon another Occasion prescribed a Sin-offering for the whole Congregation to expiate Blood that was shed when the Murderer could not be discovered That so the Judgments of God might not come upon them by reason of the cry of that Blood And by a parity of Reason Iudas might have ordered such an Offering to free himself and his Men from the guilt which the Idolatry of a few might have brought upon greater Numbers such a Sacrifice as this might according to the nature of that Law have been offered But to offer a Sin-offering for the Dead was a new thing without ground or any intimation of any thing like it in their Law So there is no reason to doubt but that if the Story is true Iudas offered this Sin-offering for the Living and not for the Dead If they had been alive then by their Law no Sin-offering could have been made for them for Idolatry was to be punished by cutting off and not to be expiated by Sacrifice What then could not have been done for them if alive could much less be done for them after their death So we have reason to conclude that Iudas offered this Sacrifice only for the Living And we are not much concerned in the Opinion which so slight a Writer as the Author of that Book had concerning it But whatever might be his Opinion it was far from that of the Roman Church By this Instance of the Maccabees Men who died in a State of mortal Sin and that of the highest nature had Sacrifices offered for them Whereas according to the Doctrine of the Church of Rome Hell and not Purgatory is to be the Portion of all such So this will prove too much if any thing at all that Sacrifices are to be offered for the Damned The design of Iudas his sending to make an Offering for them as that Writer states it was that their Sins might be forgiven and that they might have a happy Resurrection Here is nothing of Redeeming them out of Misery or of shortening or alleviating their Torment So that the Author of that Book seems to have been possessed with that Opinion received commonly among the Iews That no Iew could finally perish as we find S. Ierom expressing himself with the like partiality for all Christians But whatever the Author's Opinion was as that Book is of no Authority it is highly probable that Iudas's design in that Oblation was misunderstood by the Historian and we are sure that even his sense of it differs totally from that of the Church of Rome A Passage in the New Testament is brought as a full proof of the Fire of Purgatory 1 Cor. 3. from V. 10. to 16. When St. Paul in his Epistle to the Corinthians is reflecting on the Divisions that were among them and on that diversity of Teachers that formed Men into different Principles and Parties he compares them to different Builders Some raised upon a Rock an Edifice like the Temple at Ierusalem of Gold and Silver and noble Stones called precious Stones whereas others upon the same Rock raised a mean Hovel of Wood Hay and Stubble of both he says every man's work shall be made manifest For the day shall reveal it because it shall be revealed by fire for the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is And he adds If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon he shall receive a reward and if any man's work shall be burnt he shall suffer loss but he himself shall be saved yet so as by fire From the first view of these words it will not be thought strange if some of the Ancients who were too apt to Expound places of Scripture according to their first appearences might fancy that at the last day all were to pass through a great Fire and to suffer more or less in it But it is visible that that Opinion is far enough from the Doctrine of Purgatory These words relate to a Fire that was soon to appear and that was to try every Man's work It was to be revealed and in it every Man's work was to be made manifest So this can have no relation to a secret Purgatory Fire The meaning of it can be no other but that whereas some with the Apostles were building up the Church not only upon the Foundation of Jesus Christ and the Belief of his Doctrine but were teaching Men Doctrines and Rules that were Vertuous Good and Great Others at the same time were daubing with a profane mixture both of Judaism and Gentilism joining these with some of the Precepts of Christianity a day would soon appear which probably is meant of the destruction of Ierusalem and of the Iewish Nation or
it may be applied to the Persecution that was soon to break out in that day those who had true Notions generous Principles and suitable Practices would weather that Storm Whereas others that were entangled with weak and superstitious Conceits would then run a great risk though their firm believing that Jesus was the Messias would preserve them Yet the weakness and folly of those Teachers would appear their Opinions would involve them in such danger that their escaping would be difficult like one that gets out of a House that is all on fire round about him So that these words cannot possibly belong to Purgatory but must be meant of some signal discrimination that was to be made in some very dreadful appearances which would distinguish between the true and the false Apostles and that could be no other but either in the destruction of Ierusalem or in the persecution that was to come on the Church though the first is the more probable It were easy to pursue this Argument further and to shew that the Doctrine of Purgatory as it is now in the Roman Church was not known in the Church of God for the first six hundred Years that then it began to be doubtfully received But in an ignorant Age Visions Legends and bold Stories prevailed much yet the Greek Church never received it Some of the Fathers speak indeed of the last probatory Fire but though they did not think the Saints were in a state of consummate Blessedness enjoying the Vision of God yet they thought they were in a state of ease and quiet and that in Heaven St. Austin speaks in this whole matter very doubtfully he varies often from himself Aug. de Civit. Dâ—i l. 21. c. 18. ad 22. Enâ—â—â—r c. 67 68 69. Ad Dulcid 〈◊〉 primâ— he seems sometimes very positive only for two States at other times as he asserts the last probatory Fire so he seems to think that good Souls might suffer some grief in that sequestred state before the last Day upon the account of some of their past Sins and that by degrees they might arise up to their Consummation All these Contests were proposed very doubtfully before Gregory the Great 's days and even then some Doubts seem to have been made But the Legends were so copiously plaid upon all those Doubts that this Remnant of Paganism got at last into the Western Church Tertul. de Câ—r mil. c. â— de Ex. 〈◊〉 c. 13. â—â—prian 〈◊〉 34.37 〈…〉 75. l. 3. â—3 It was no wonder that the Opinions formerly mentioned which began to appear in the Second Age had preduced in the Third the practice of Praying for the Dead of which we find such full evidence in Tertullain and St. Cyprian's Writings that the matter of Fact is not to be denied This appears also in all the Antient Liturgies And Epiphanius charges Aerius with this of rejecting all Prayers for the Dead asking why were they prayed for The Opinions that they fell into concerning the State of departed Souls in the Interval between their Death and the Day of Judgment gave occasion enough for Prayer they thought they were capable of making a Progress and of having an early Resurrection They also had this Notion among them That it was the peculiar Priviledge of Jesus Christ to be above all our Prayers but that no Men not excepting the Apostles nor the Blessed Virgin were above the Prayers of the Church They thought this was an Act of Church-Communion that we were to hold even with the Saints in Heaven to pray for them Thus in the Apostolical Constitutions in the Books of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy and in the Liturgies that are ascribed to St. Basil and St. Chrysostom Dion de Eccl. Hierar Cap. 7. they offer unto God these Prayers which they thought their reasonable Service for those who were at rest in the Faith their Forefathers Fathers Patriarchs Prophets and Apostles Preachers Evangelists Martyrs Confessors Religious Persons and for every Spirit pâ—rfected in the Faith especially for our most Holy Immaculate most Blessed Lady the Mother of God the ever Virgin Mary Particular Instances might also be given of this out of St. Cyprian St. Ambrose Nazianzen and St. Austin Aug. Conf. l. 9. c. 19. who in that famous and much cited Passage concerning his Mother Monica as he speaks nothing of any Temporal Pains that she suffered so he plainly intimates his belief that God had done all that he desired Thus it will appear to those who have examined all the Passages which are brought out of the Fathers concerning their Prayers for the Dead that they believed they were then in Heaven and at rest and by consequence though these Prayers for the Dead did very proâ—ably give the chief rise to the Doctrine of Purgatory yet as they then made them they were utterly inconsistent with that Opinion Tertullian who is the first that is cited for them says we make Oblations for the Dead Supra and we do it for that Second Nativity of theirs Natalitia once a year The Signification of the word Natalitia as they used it was the Saint's Days of Death in which they reckoned he was born again to Heaven So though they judged them there yet they offered up Prayers for them And when Epiphanius brings in Aerius asking Why those Prayers were made for the Dead Though it had been very natural and indeed unavoidable if he had believed Purgatory to have answered that it was to deliver them from thence yet he makes no such answer but only asserts that it had been the Practice of the Church so to do The Greek Church retains that Custom though she has never admitted of Purgatory Here then an Objection may be made to our Constitution that in this of praying for the Dead we have departed from the practice of the Ancients We do not deny it both the Church of Rome and we in another Practice of equal Antiquity of giving the Eucharist to Infants have made changes and let that Custom fall The Curiosities in the Second Century seem to have given rise to those Prayers in the Third and they gave the rise to many other Disorders in the following Centuries Since therefore God has commanded us while we are on Earth to pray for one another and has made that a main Act of our Charity and Church-Communion but has no where directed us to pray for those that have finished their Course and since the only pretence that is brought from Scripture of St Paul's praying that Onesiphorus might find mercy in the day of the Lord cannot be wrought up into an Argument for it cannot be proved that he was then Dead and since the Fathers reckon this of praying for the Dead only as one of their Customs for which they vouch no other Warrant but Practice since also this has been grosly abused and has been applied to support a Doctrine totally different from theirs we think that we have as good a Plea
Body Here then was the Tradition and Practice of the Church falsified which is no small Prejudice against those that support the Doctrine as well as against the Credit of that Council About thirty Years after that Council Paschase Radbert Abbot of Corby in France did very plainly assert the corporal Presence in the Eucharist He is acknowledged both by Bellarmin and Sirmondus to be the first Writer that did on purpose advance and explain that Doctrine He himself values his Pains in that Matter and as he laments the slowness of some in believing it so he pretends that he had moved many to assent to it But he confesses that some blamed him for ascribing a Sense to the Words of Christ that was not consonant to Truth There was but one Book writ in that Age to second him the Name of the Author was lost till Mabillon discovered that it was writ by one Herigerus Abbot of Cob. But all the Eminent Men and the great Writers of that time wrote plainly against this Doctrine and affiâ—med that the Bread and Wine remained in the Sacrament and did nourish our Bodies as other Meats do Those were Rabanus Maurus Archbishop of Mentz Amalarius Archbishop of Triers Heribald Bishop of Auxerre Bertram or Ratramne Iohn Scot Erigena Walafridus Strabus Florus and Christian Druthmar Three of these set themselves on purpose to refute Paschase Rabanus Maurus in an Epistle to Abbot Egilon wrote against Paschase for saying that it was that Body that was born of the Virgin that was crucified and raised up again which was daily offered up And though that Book is lost yet as he himself refers his Reader to it in his Penitential so we have an Account given of it by the Anonymous defender of Paschase Ratramne was commanded by Charles the Bald then Emperour to write upon that Subject which he in the beginning of his Book promises to do not trusting to his own Sense but following the Steps of the Holy Fathers He tells us that there were different Opinions about it Some believing that the Body of Christ was there without a Figure Others saying that it was there in a Figure or Mystery Upon which he apprehended that a great Schism must follow His Book is very short and very plain He asserts our Doctrine as expresly as we our selves can do He delivers it in the same Words and proves it by many of the same Arguments and Authorities that we bring Raban and Ratramne were without dispute reckoned among the first Men of that Age. Iohn Scot was also commanded by the same Emperour to write on the same Subject He was one of the most Learned and the most Ingenious Men of the age and was in great Esteem both with the Emperour and with our King Alfred He was reckoned both a Saint and a Martyr He did formally refute Paschase's Doctrine and assert ours His Book is indeed lost but a full Account of it is given us by other Writers of that Time And it is a great Evidence that his Opinion in this Matter was not then thought to be contrary to the general Sense of the Church in that Age For he having writ against St. Augustin's Doctrine concerning Predestination there was a very severe Censure of him and of his Writings published under the Name of the Church of Lions In which they do not once reflect on him for his Opinions touching the Eucharist It appears from this that their Doctrine concerning the Sacrament was then generally received Since both Ratramne and he though they differ'd extreamly in that Point of Predestination yet both agreed in this It is probable that the Saxon Homily that was read in England on Easter-day was taken from Scot's Book which does fully reject the corporal Presence This is enough to shew that Paschase's Opinion was an Innovation broached in the Ninth Century and was opposed by all the Great Men of that Age. The Tenth Century was the blackest and most ignorant of all the Ages of the Church There is not one Writer in that Age that gives us any clear Account of the Doctrine of the Church Such remote Hints as occur do still savour of Ratramne's Doctrine All Men were then asleep and so it was a fit time for the Tares that Paschase had sown to grow up in it The Popes of that Age were such a Succession of Monsters that Baronius cannot forbear to make the saddest Exclamations possible against their Debaucheries their Cruelties and their other Vices About the middle of the Eleventh Century after this Dispute had slept almost two hundred Years it was again revived Bruno Bishop of Angiers and Berengarius his Archdeacon maintained the Doctrine of Ratramne Little mention is made of the Bishop but the Archdeacon is spoken of as a Man of great Piety So that he past for a Saint and was a Man of such Learning that when he was brought before Pope Nicolaus no Man could resist him He writ against Paschase and had many followers The Historians of that Age tell us that his Doctrine had overspread all France The Books writ against him by Lanfranc and others are filled with an impudent corrupting of all Antiquity Many Councils were held upon this Matter and these together with the Terrours of Burning which was then beginning to be the common Punishment of Heresy made him renounce his Opinion But he returned to it again yet he afterwards renounced it Though Lanfranc reproaches him that it was not the Love of Truth but the Fear of Death that brought him to it And his final Retracting of that renouncing of his Opinion is lately found in France as I have been credibly informed Thus this Opinion that in the Ninth Century was generally received and was condemned by neither Pope nor Council was become so odious in the Eleventh Century that none durst own it And he who had the Courage to own it yet was not resolute enough to stand to it For about this Time the Doctrine of extirpating Hereticks and of deposing such Princes as were Defective in that Matter was universally put in Practice Great Bodies of Men began to separate from the Roman Communion in the Southern Parts of France and one of the chief Points of their Doctrine was their believing that Christ was not corporally Present in the Eucharist and that he was there only in a Figure or Mystery But now that the contrary Doctrine was established and that those who denied it were adjudged to be burnt it is no wonder if it quickly gained Ground when on the one hand the Priests saw their Interest in promoting it and all People felt the Danger of denying it The Anathema's of the Church and the Terrours of Burning were infallible Things to silence Contradiction at least if not to gain Assent Soon after this Doctrine was received the Schoolmen began to refine upon it Lib. 4. Dist. 11. as they did upon every thing else The Master of the Sentences would not determine how Christ was Present
so clear aâ—d so inseparable a Relation to the only True God as its proper Object that it is scarce possible to apprehend how it should be separated from him and given to any other And as this seems evident from the Nature of things so it is not possible to imagine how any thing could have been prohibited in more express and positive and in more frequently-repeated Words and longer Reasonings than the offering of Divine Worship or any part of it to Creatures The chief design of the Mosaical Religion was to banish all Idolatry and Polytheism out of the Minds of the Iews and to possess them with the Idea of One God and of One Object of Worship The Reasons upon which those Prohibitions are founded are universal which are The Unity of God's Essence and his Jealousy in not giving his Honour to another It is not said that they should not worship any as God till they had a Precept or Declaration for it There is no Reserve for any such time but they are plainly forbid to worship any but the Great God Matth. 4.10 because he was One and was Jealous of his Glory The New Testament is writ in the same Strain Christ when tempted of the Devil answered Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God Acts 14.15 Acts 17.29 1 Thes. 1.9 Rev. 19 1â— and him only shalt thou serve The Apostles charged all Idolaters to forsake those Idols and to serve the living God The Angel refused St. Iohn's Worship commanding him to worship God The Christian Faith does in every particular raise the Ideas of God and of Religion to a much grâ—ater Purity and Sublimity than the Mosaical Dispensation had done so it is not to be imagined that in the chief Design of Revealed Religion which was the bringing men from Idolatry to the Worship of One God it should make such a Breach and extend it to a Creature All this seems fully to prove the first Proposition of this Argument That God is the only proper Object of Adoration The next is That Christ is proposed in the New Testament as the Object of Divine Worship I do not in proof of this urge the Instances of those who fell down at Christ's Feet and worshipped him while he was on Earth for it may be well answered to that That a Prophet was worshipped with the civil Respect of falling down before him among the Iews as appears in the History of Elijah and Elisha nor does it appear that those who worshipped Chrisâ— had any apprehension of his being God they only considered him as the Messias or as some eminent Prophet But the mention that St. Luke makes in his Gospel Luke 24.52 of the Disciples worshipping Christ at his Ascension comes more home to this matter All those Salutations in the beginning and conclusion of the Epistles in which Grace Mercy and Peace are wished from God the Father and the Lord Iesus Christ are implied Invocations of him It is also plain that it was to him that St. Paul prayed when he was under the Temptations of the Devil as they are commonly understood 2 Cor. 12.8 9 Phil. 2 10. Heb. 1.5 Rev. 5.8 to the end Every knee must bow to him The Anâ—els of God worship him All the hosts in heaven are represented in St. Iohn's Visions as falling down prostrate before him and worshipping him as they worship the Father He is proposed as the Object of our Faith Hope and Love as the Person whom we are to obey to pray to and to praise so that every Act of Worship both External and Internal is directed to him as to its proper Object But the Instance of all others that is the clearest in this Point is in the last Words of St. Stephen who was the first Martyr and whose Martyrdom is so particularly related by St. Luke He then in his last Minutes saw Christ at the right hand of God and in his last Breath he worshipped him in two short Prayers that are upon the matter the same with those in which our Blessed Saviour worshipped his Father on the Cross Lord Iesus receive my spirit Lord lay not this sin to their charge Acts 7.59.60 From this it seems very evident that if Christ was not the True God and Equal to the Father then this Protomartyr died in two Acts that seem not only Idolatrous but also Blasphemous since he worshipped Christ in the same Acts in which Christ had worshipped his Father It is certain from all this deduction of Particulars That his Human Nature cannot be worshipped therefore there must be another Nature in him to which Divine Worship is due and on the account of which he is to be worshipped It is plain that when this Religion was first published together with these Duties in it as a part of it the Iews though implacably set against it yet never accused it of Idolatry though that Charge of all others had served their purposes the best who intended to blacken and blast it Nothing would have been so well heard and so easily apprehended as a just Prejudice against it as this The Argument would have appeared as strong as it was plain And as the Iews could not be ignorant of the Acts of the Christian Worship when so many fell back to them from it who were offended at other parts of it so they had the Books in which it was contained in their hands Notwithstanding all which we have all possible reason to believe that this Objection against it was never made by any of them in the First Age of Christianity Upon all which I say it is not to be imagined that they could have been silent on this head if a mere Man had been thus proposed among the Christians as the Object of Divine Worship The Silence of the Apostles in not mentioning nor answering this is such a Proof of the Silence of the Iews that it would indeed disparage all their Writings if we could think that while they mentioned and answered the other Prejudices of the Iews which in comparison to this are small and inconsiderable matters they should have passed over this which must have been the greatest and the plausiblest of them all if it was one at all Therefore as the Silence of the Apostles is a clear Proof that the Iews were silent also and did not object this and since their silence could neither flow from their Ignorance nor their undervaluing of this Religion it seems to be certain that the first opening of the Christian Doctrine did not carry any thing in it that could be called the Worshiping of a Creature It follows from hence that the Iews must have understood this part of our Religion in such a manner as agreed with their former Ideas So we must examine these They had this settled among them That God dwelt in the Cloud of Glory and that by virtue of that Inhabitation Divine Worship was paid to God as dwelling in the Cloud that it was
that very credible For this we have only the Testimony of the Apostles who did all attest that they saw it being all together in an open Field When Christ was Walking and Discoursing with them and when he was Blessing them he was parted from them They saw him Ascend till a Cloud received him and took him out of their sight And then Two Angels appeared to them and assured them Acts 1. â—1 That he should come again in like manner as they had seen him Ascend Here is a very particular Relation with many Circumstances in it in which it was not possible for the Apostles to be mistaken So that there being no reason to suspect their Credit this rests upon that Authority But Ten days after it received a much clearer Proof When the Holy Ghost was poured out on them in so visible a manner and with most remarkable effects Immediately upon it they spoke with divers Tongues and wrought many Miracles and all in the Name of Christ. They did often and solemnly disclaim their doing any of those wonderful things by any power of their own They owned that all that they had or did was derived to them from Iesus of Nazareth Acts 3.12 16. of whose Resurrection and Ascension they were appointed to be the Witnesses Christ's coming again to judge the World at the last day is so often affirmed by himself in the Gospel and is so frequently mentioned in the Writings of his Apostles that this is a main part of his Doctrine So that his Resurrection Ascension together with the Effusion of the Holy Ghost having in general proved his Mission and his whole Doctrine this is also proved by them Enough seems to be said in Proof of all the parts of this Article it remains only that somewhat should be added in Explanation of them As to the Resurrection it is to little purpose to Enquire whether our Saviour's Body was kept all the while in a compleat Organisation that so by this Miracle it might be preserved in a Natural State for his Soul to re-enter it Or whether by the Course of Nature the vast Number of the inward Conveyances that are in the Body were stopt and if all of a sudden when the time of the Resurrection came all was again put in a vital State fit to be animated by his Soul There must have been a Miracle either way So it is to little purpose to enquire into it The former though a continued Miracle yet seemes to agree more fully to these words Thou wilt not suffer thy Holy One to see corruption It is to as little purpose to enquire how our Saviour's new Body was supplied with Blood Since he had lost the greatest part of it on the Cross. Whether that was again by the power of God brought back into his Veins or whether as he himself had formerly said That Man lives not by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God Blood was supplied by Miracle Or whether his Body that was then of the Nature of a Glorified Body though yet on Earth needed the supplies of Blood to furnish new Spirits for serving the natural Functions He Eating and Drinking so seldom that we may well believe it was done rather to satisfy his Apostles than to answer the Necessities of Nature These are Curiosities that signify so little if we could certainly resolve them that it is to no purpose to enquire about them since we cannot know what to determine in them This in general is certain that the same Soul returned back to the same Body so that the same Man who died rose again and that is our Faith We need not trouble our selves with enquiring how to make out the Three Days of Christ's being in the Grave Days stand in the common acceptation for a Portion of a Day We know the Iews were very exact to the Rest on the Sabbath so the Body was without question laid in the Grave before the Sun-set on Friday so that was the First day the Sabbath was a compleat one and a good part of the Third day that is the Night with which the Iews began to count the day was over before he was raised up As for his stay on Earth forty days we cannot pretend to give an account of it whether his Body was passing through a slow and Physical Purification to be meet for Ascending or whether he intended to keep a proportion between his Gospel and the Law of Moses that as he suffered at the time of their killing the Passover so the Effusion of the Holy Ghost was fixed for Pentecost and that therefore he â—ould stay on Earth till that time was near not to put his Apostles upon too long an expectation without his Presence which might be necessary to animate them till they should be endued with Power from on high As to the manner of his Ascension it is also questioned whether the Body of Christ as it ascâ—nded was so wonderfully changed as to put on the Subtility and Purity of an Ethereal Body or whether it 〈…〉 same Form in Heaven that it had on Earth or iâ— it puâ— on a new one It is more probable that it did and that the wonderful Glory that appeared in his Countenance and whole Person at his Trâ—â—sâ—â—gurâ—tion was a manifestation of that more permanent Glory to which it was to be afterwards exalted It seems probable from what St. Paul says 1 Coâ— 15.50 That flesh and blood shall not inherit the kingdom of God which relates to our glorified Bodies when we shall bear the Image of the second and the heavenly Adam that Christ's Body has no more the modifications of Flesh and Blood in it and that the Glory of the Celestial Body is of another Nature and Texture than that of the Terrestrial It is easily imagined how this may be and yet the Body to be numerically the same Ver. 40. For all Matter being uniform and capable of all sort of Motion and by consequence of being either much grosser or much purer the same Portion of Matter that made a thick and Heavy Body here on Earth may be put into that Purity and Fineness as to be no longer a fit Inhabitant of this Earth or to breath this Air but to be meet to be transplanted into Ethereal Regions Christ as he went up into Heaven so he had the whole Government of this World put into his hands and the whole Ministry of Angels put under his Command even in his Human Nature So that all things are now in subjection to him All Power and Authority is derived from him 1 Cor. 15.27 28. and he does whatsoever he pleases both in Heaven and Earth In him all fulness dwells And as the Mosaical Tabernacle being filled with Glory the Emanations of it did by the Urim and Thummim enlighten and direct that People so out of that Fulness that dwelt Bodily in Christ there is a constant Emanation of his
Deuteronomy The First Book of Chronicles Ecclesiastes or Preacher Ioshua The Second Book of Chronicles Cantica or Song of Solomon Iudges The First Book of Esdras Four Prophets the greater Ruth The Second Book of Esdras Twelve Prophets the less And the other Books as Hierom saith the Church doth read for Example of Life and Instruction of Manners but yet it doth not apply them to Establish any Doctrine Such are these following The Third Book of Esdras The Fourth Book of Esdras The Book of Tobias The Book of Iudith The rest of the Book of Esther The Book oâ— Wisdom Iesus the Son of Syrach Baruch the Prophet The Song of the Three Children The History of Susanna Of Bel and the Dragon The Prayer of Manasses The First Book of Maccabees The Second Book of Maccabees All the Books of the New Testament as they are commonly received we do receive and account them Canonical IN this Article are Two important Heads and to each of them a proper consequence does belong The First is That the Holy Scriptures do contain all things necessary to Salvation The Negative Consequence that ariseth out of that is That no Article that is not either Read in it or that may not be proved by it is to be required to be believed as an Article of Faith or to be thought necessary to Salvation The Second is The settling the Canon of the Scripture both of Old and New Testament and the consequence that arises out of that is The rejecting the Books commonly called Apocryphal which though they may be Read by the Church for Example of Life and Instruction of Manners yet are no part of the Canon nor is any Doctrine to be Established by them After the main Foundations of Religion in General in the belief of a God or more specially of the Christian Religion in the Doctrine of the Trinity and of the Death Resurrection and Ascension of Christ are laid down The next Point to be settled is What is the Rule of this Faith where is it to be found and with whom is it lodged The Church of Rome and We do both agree that the Scriptures are of Divine Inspiration Those of that Communion acknowledge That every thing which is contained in Scripture is true and comes from God but they add to this That the Books of the New Testament were occasionally written and not with the design of making them the full Rule of Faith but that many things were delivered Orally by the Apostles which if they are faithfully Transmitted to us are to be received by us with the same Submission and Respect that we pay to their Writings And they also believe That these Traditions are conveyed down infallibly to us and that to distinguish betwixt true and false Doctrines and Traditions there must be an infallible Authority lodged by Christ with his Church We on the contrary affirm That the Scriptures are a compleat Rule of Faith and that the whole Christian Religion is contained in them and no where else and although we make great use of Tradition especially that which is most Ancient and nearest the Source to help us to a clear understanding of the Scriptures yet as to Matters of Faith we reject all Oral Tradition as an incompetent mean of conveying down Doctrines to us and we refuse to receive any Doctrine that is not either expresly contained in Scripture or clearly proved from it In order to the opening and proving of this it is to be considered what God's design in first ordering Moses and after him all Inspired Persons to put things in Writing could be it could be no other than to free the World from the Uncertainties and Impostures of Oral Tradition All Mankind being derived from one common Source it seems it was much easier in the first Ages of the World to preserve the Tradition pure than it could possibly be afterwards There were only a few things then to be delivered concerning God as That he was one Spiritual Being That he had Created all things That he alone was to be Worshipped and Served the rest relating to the History of the World and chiefly of the first Man that was made in it There were also great advantages on the side of Oral Tradition the first men were very long-liv'd and they saw their own Families spread extreamly so that they had on their side both the Authority which long Life always has particularly concerning Matters of Fact and the credit that Parents have naturally with their own Children to secure Tradition Two Persons might have conveyed it down from Adam so Abraham Methuselah lived above Three hundred years while Adam was yet alive and Sem was almost an hundred when he died and he lived much above an hundred years in the same time with Abraham according to the Hebrew Here is a great period of Time filled up by Two or Three Persons And yet in that Time the Tradition of those very few things in which Religion was then comprehended was so Universally and Intirely corrupted that it was necessary to correct it by immediate Revelation to Abraham God intending to have a peculiar People to himself out of his Posterity commanded him to forsake his Kindred and Country that he might not be corrupted with an Idolatry that we have reason to believe was then but beginning among them We are sure his Nephew Laban was an Idolater And the danger of mixing with the rest of Mankind was then so great that God ordered a Mark to be made on the Bodies of all descended from him to be the Seal of the Covenant and the Badge and Cognisance of his Posterity By that distinction and by their living in a wandring and unfixed manner they were preserved for some time from Idolatry God intending afterwards to settle them in an Instituted Religion But though the Beginnings of it I mean the Promulgation of the Law on Mount Sinai was one of the most amazing things that ever happened and the fittest to be Orally conveyed down the Law being very short and the Circumstances in the delivery of it most astonishing and though there were many Rites and several Festivities appointed chiefly for the carrying down the Memory of it though there was also in that dispensation the greatest advantage imaginable for securing this Tradition all the main Acts of their Religion being to be performed in one Place and by men of one Tribe and Family as they were also all the Inhabitants of a small Tract of Ground of one Language and by their Constitutions oblig'd to maintain a constant Commerce among themselves They having further a continuance of Signal Characters of God's Miraculous Presence among them such as the Operation of the Water of Jealousy the Plenty of the Sixth Year to supply them all the Sabbatical Year and tilâ— the Harvest of the following Year Together with a Succession of Prophets that followed one another either in a constant course or at least soon after one another but
had certainly put the chief strength of their Cause on this That they adhered to the Apostles Creed in opposition to the Innovations of the Nicene Fathers There is therefore no reason to believe that this Creed was prepared by the Apostles or that it was of any great Antiquity since Ruffin was the first that published it It is true he published it as the Creed of the Church of Aquileia but that was so late that neither this nor the other Creeds have any Authority upon their own account Great Respect is indeed due to things of such Antiquity and that have been so long in the Church but after all we receive those Creeds not for their own sakes nor for the sake of those who prepared them but for the sake of the Doctrine that is contained in them because we believe that the Doctrine which they declare is contained in the Scriptures and chiefly that which is the main Intent of them which is to assert and profess the Trinity therefore we do receive them tho we must acknowledge that the Creed ascribed to Athanasius as it was none of his so it was never established by any General Council ARTICLE IX Of Original or Birth-Sin Original Sin standeth not in the following of Adam as the Pelagians do vainly talk but it is the fault or corruption of the nature of every man that naturally is engendred of the Offspring of Adam whereby man is very far gone from Original Righteousness and is of his own nature inclined to evil so that the Flesh lusteth always contrary to the Spirit and therefore in every Person born into the World it deserveth God's Wrath and Damnation And this Infection of Nature doth remain yea in them that are regenerated whereby the Lust of the Flesh called in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which some do expound the Wisdom some Sensuality some the Affection some the Desire of the Flesh is not subject to the Law of God And though there is no Condemnation for them that believe and are baptized yet the Apostle doth confess That Concupiscence and Lust hath of it self the nature of Sin AFter the First Principles of the Christian Religion are stated and the Rule of Faith and Life was setled the next thing that was to be done was to declare the special Doctrines of this Religion and that first with relation to all Christians as they are single Individuals for the directing every one of them in order to the working out his own Salvation which is done from this to the Nineteenth Article And then with relation to them as they compose a Society called the Church which is carried on from the Nineteenth to the End In all that has been hitherto explained the whole Church of England has been all along of one mind In this and in some that follow there has been a greater diversity of Opinion but both sides have studied to prove their Tenets to be at least not contrary to the Articles of the Church These different Parties have disputed concerning the Decrees of God and those Assistances which pursuant to his Decrees are afforded to us But because the Foundation of those Decrees and the Necessity of those Assistances are laid in the Sin of Adam and in the Effects it had on Mankind therefore thâ—se Controversies begin on this Head The Pelagians and the Socinians agree in saying That Adam's Sin was Personal That by it as being the first Sin it is said that Sin entred into the World But that as Adam was made mortal â—om 5 1â— and had died whether he had sinned or not so they think the liberty of Human Nature is still entire and that every man is punished for his own sins and not for the sin of another to do otherwise they say seems contrary to Justice not to say Goodness In opposition to this Iudgment is said to have come upon many to condemnation through one either Man or Sin ver 1â— Death is said to have reigned by one and by one man's offence and many are said to be dead through the offence of one All these Passages do intimate that death is the consequence of Adam's Sin and that in him as well as in all others Death was the Wages of Sin so also that we dye upon the account of his Sin We are said to bear the Image of the first Adam as true Christians bear the Image of the second Now we are sure that there is both a derivation of Righteousness 1 Cor 15.49 and a Communication of Inward Holiness transferred to us through Christ So it seems to follow from thence that there is somewhat both transferred to us and conveyed down throughMankind by the first Adam and particularly that by it we are all made subject to Death from which we should have been freed if Adam had continued in his first state and that by virtue of the Tree of Life Gen. 3.22 in which some think there was a natural Virtue to cure all Diseases and relieve against all Accidents while others do ascribe it to a Divine Blessing of which that Tree was only the Symbol or Sacrament through the words said after Adam's sin as the reason of driving him out of Paradise lest he put forth his hand and take of the Tree of Life and eat and live for ever seem to import that there was a Physical Virtue in the Tree that could so fortify and restore Life as to give Immortality These do also think that the Threatning made to Adam That upon his eating the forbidden Fruit he should surely dye is to be taken literally and is to be carried no further than to a Natural Death This Subjection to Death and to the Fear of it brings men under a slavish Bondage many Terrors and other Passions and Miseries that arise out ofit which they think is a great Punishment and that it is a Condemnation and Sentence of Death passed upon the whole Race and by this they are made sinners that is treated as guilty Persons and severely punished This they think is easily enough reconciled with the Notions of Justice and Goodness in God since this is only a Temporary Punishment relating to mens Persons And we see in the common methods of Providence that Children are in this sort often punished for the sins of their Fathers most men that come under a very ill habit of Body transmit the Seeds of Diseases and Pains to their Children They do also think that the Communication of this liableness to death is easily accounted for and they imagine that as the Tree of Life might be a Plant that furnished men with an Universal Medicine so the forbidden Fruit might derive a slow Poyson into Adam's Body that might have exalted and inflamed his Blood very much and might though by a slower operation certainly brought on death at the last Our being thus adjudged to Death and to all the Miseries that accompany Mortality they think may be well called the wrath of
impossible to understand it so we conclude that we are in the Right to understand the whole Period in a mystical and figurative Sense And therefore since a Man born and bred a Iew and more particularly accustomed to the Paschal Ceremonies could not have understood our Saviour's Words chiefly at the time of that Festivity otherwise than of a New Covenant that he was to make in which his Body was to be broken and his blood shed for the remission of Sins and that he was to substitute Bread and Wine to be the lasting Memorials of it in the repeating of which his Disciples were to renew their Covenant with God and to claim a share in the blessings of it this I say was the Sense that must naturally have occurred to a Iew upon all this we must conclude that this is the true Sense of these Words Or that otherwise our Saviour must have enlarged more upon them and expressed his meaning more particularly Since therefore he said no more than what according to the Ideas and Customs of the Iews must have been understood as has been explained we must conclude that it and it only is the true Sense of them But we must next consider the importance of a long Discourse of our Saviour's set down by St. Iohn which seems such a preparation of his Apostles to understand this Institution literally John 6.32 33. that the weight of this Argument must turn upon the meaning of that Discourse The design of that was to shew that the Doctrine of Christ was more Excellent than the Law of Moses that though Moses gave the Israelites Manna from Heaven to nourish their Bodies yet notwithstanding that they died in the Wilderness But Christ was to give his Followers such Food that it should give them Life so that if they did eat of it they should never die Where it is apparent that the Bread and nourishment must be such as the life was and that being Eternal and Spiritual the Bread must be so understood For it is clearly expressed how that Food was to be received he that believeth on me hath everlasting life 40. v. Since then he had formerly said that the Bread which he was to give should make them live for ever and since here it is said that this Life is given by Faith then this Bread must be his Doctrine For this is that which Faith receives And when the Iews desired him to give them evermore of that Bread he answered I am the bread of life he that comes to me shall never hunger 47 48 51. v. and he that believeth on me shall never thirst In these words he tells them that they received that Bread by coming to him and by believing on him Christ calls himself that Bread and says that a Man must eat thereof which is plainly a Figure and if Figures are confessed to be in some Parts of their Discourse there is no reason to deny that they run quite through it Christ says that this Bread was his flesh which he was to give for the life of the world which can only be meant of his Offering himself up upon the Cross for the Sins of the World The Iews murmured at this and said how can this Man give us his flesh to eat To which our Saviour answers That except they did eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man 53 54 55. v. they had no life in them Now if these words are to be understood of a literal eating of his Flesh in the Sacrament then no Man can be saved that does not receive it It was a natural Consequence of the expounding these Words of the Sacrament to give it to Children since it is so expresly said that Life is not to be had without it But the words that come next carry this Matter farther whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life It is plain that Christ is here speaking of that without which no Man can have Life and by which all who receive it have Life if therefore this is to be expounded of the Sacrament none can be damned that does receive it and none can be saved that receives it not Therefore since eternal life does always follow the eating of Christ's flesh and the drinking his blood and cannot be had without it then this must be meant of an Internal and Spiritual feeding on him For as none are saved without that so all are saved that have it This is yet clearer from the words that follow my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed It may well be inferred that Christ's Flesh is eaten in the same Sense in which he says it is meat now certainly it is not literally meat For none do say that the Body is nourished by it and yet there is somewhat Emphatical in this since the word indeed is not added in vain but to give weight to the Expression It is also said He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me and I in him â—6 v. Here the description seems to be made of that eating and drinking of his Flesh and Blood that it is such as the mutual indwelling of Christ and Believers is Now that is certainly only Internal and Spiritual and not Carnal or Literal And therefore such also must the eating and drinking be All this seems to be very fully confirmed from the Conclusion of that Discourse which ought to be considered as the Key to it all for when the Iews were offended at the hardness of Christ's Discourse he said It is the Spirit that quickneth the flesh profiteth nothing v. 6â— The words I speak unto you they are Spirit and they are Life Which do plainly Import that his former Discourse was to be understood in a spiritual Sense that it was a divine Spirit that quickned them or gave them that eternal Life of which he had been speaking And that the Flesh his natural Body was not the conveyer of it All this is confirmed by the Sense in which we find eating and drinking frequently used in the Scriptures according to what is observed by Iewish Writers they stand for Wisdom Learning and all intellectual Apprehensions through which the Soul of Man is preserved by the Perfection that is in them as the Body is preserved by Food So buy and eat eat fat of things drink of wine well refined Maimonides also observes Mâ—râ— Nevochim that whensoever eating and drinking are mentioned in the Book of Proverbs that they are to be understood of Wisdom and the Law And after he has brought several Places of Scripture to this Purpose He concludes that because this acceptation of eating occurs so often and is so manifest as if it were the primary and most proper Sense of the Word therefore hunger and thirst stand for a privation of Wisdom and Vnderstanding And the Caldee Paraphrast turns these Words ye shall draw Water out of the Wells of Salvation thus
that this was a Book fit to serve a Turn but only that this Book was necessary at that time to instruct the Nation aright and so was of great use then But though the Doctrine in it if once true must be always true yet it will not be always of the same necessity to the People As for Instance There are many Discourses in the Epistles of the Apostles that relate to the Controversies then on foot with the Judaizers to the Engagements the Christians then lived in with the Heathens and to those Corrupters of Christianity that were in those days Those Doctrines were necessary for that time but though they are now as true as they were then yet since we have no Commerce either with Iews or Gentiles we cannot say that it is as necessary for the present time to dwell much on those matters as it was for that time to explain them once well If the Nation should come to be quite out of the danger of falling back into Popery it would not be so necessary to insist upon many of the Subjects of the Homilies as it was when they were first prepared ARTICLE XXXVI Of Consecration of Bishops and Ministers The Book of Consecration of Archbishops and Bishops and ordering of Priests and Deacons lately set forth in the time of Edward the Sixth and confirmed at the same time by Authority of Parliament doth contain all things necessary to such Consecration and Ordering neither hath it any thing that of it self is superstitious and ungodly And therefore whosoever are Consecrated and Ordered according to the Rites of that Book since the Second Year of the aforenamed King Edward unto this time or hereafter shall be Consecrated or Ordered according to the same Rites we decree all such to be rightly orderly and lawfully Consecrated and Ordered AS to the most essential parts of this Article they were already examined when the pretended Sacrament of Orders was explained where it was proved that Prayer and Imposition of Hands was all that was necessary to the giving of Orders and that the Forms added in the Roman Pontifical are new and cannot be held to be necessary since the Church had subsisted for many Ages before those were thought on So that either our Ordinations without those Additions are good or the Church of God was for many Ages without true Orders There seems to be here insinuated a Ratification of Orders that were given before this Article was made which being done as the Lawyers phrase it ex post facto it seems these Orders were unlawful when given and that Error was intended to be corrected by this Article The opening a part of the History of that time will clear this matter There was a new Form of Ordinations agreed on by the Bishops in the Third Year of King Edward and when the Book of Common-Prayer with the last Corrections of it was Authorized by Act of Parliament in the Fifth Year of that Reign the New Book of Ordinations was also enacted and was appointed to be a part of the Common-Prayer-Book In Queen Mary's time these Acts were repealed and those Books were condemned by Name When Queen Elizabeth came to the Crown King Edward's Common-Prayer-Book was of new enacted and Queen Mary's Act was repealed But the Book of Ordination was not expresly named it being considered as a part of the Common-Prayer-Book as it had been made in King Edward's time so it was thought no more necessary to mention that Office by Name than to mention all the other Offices that are in the Book Bishop Bonner set on foot a Nicety That since the Book of Ordinations was by name condemned in Queen Mary's time and was not by name revived in Queen Elizabeth's time that therefore it was still condemned by Law and that by consequence Ordinations performed according to this Book were not legal But it is visible that whatsoever might be made out of this according to the Niceties of our Law it has no relation to the Validity of Ordinations as they are Sacred Performances but only as they are Legal Actions with relation to our Constitution Therefore a Declaration was made in a subsequent Parliament That the Book of Ordination was considered as a part of the Book of Common-Prayer And to clear all Scruples or Disputes that might arise upon that matter they by a Retrospect declared them to be good and from that Retrospect in the Act of Parliament the like Clause was put in the Article The chief Exception that can be made to the Foâ—m of giving Oâ—deâ—s amongst us is to those words Receive ye the Holy Ghost which as it is â—o Antient Form it not being above Five hundred Years old so it is taken from Words of our Saviour's that the Church in her besâ— times thought were not to be applied to this It was proper to him to use them who had the Fulness of the Spirit to give it at pleasure He made use of it in constituting his Apostles the Governours of his Church in his own stead and therefore it seems to have a Sound in it that is too bold and assuming as if we could convey the Holy Ghost To this it is to be answered That the Churches both in the East and West have so often changed the Forms of Ordination that our Church may well claim the same Power of appointing New Forms that others have done And since the several Functions and Administrations that are in the Church are by the Apostle said to flow from one and the same Spirit all of them from the Apostles down to the Pastors and Teachers we may then reckon that the Holy Ghost though in a much lower degree is given to those who are inwardly moved of God to undertake that Holy Office So that though that extraordinary Effusion that was poured out upon the Apostles was in them in a much higher degree and was accompanied with most amazing Characters yet still such as do sincerely offer themselves up on a Divine Motion to this Service receive a lower Portion of this Spirit That being laid down these Words Receive ye the Holy Ghost may be understood to be of the nature of a Wish and Prayer as if it were said May thou receive the Holy Ghost and so it will better agree with what follows And be thou a faithful Dispenser of the Word and Sacraments Or it may be observed That in those Sacred Missions the Church and Church-men consider themselves as acting in the Name and Person of Christ. In Baptism it is expresly said I baptize in the Name of the Father c. In the Eucharist we repeat the Words of Christ and apply them to the Elements as said by him So we consider such as deserve to be admitted to those Holy Functions as Persons called and sent of God and therefore the Church in the Name of Christ sends them and because he gives a Portion of his Spirit to those whom he sends therefore the Church in his Name