profess to hold the Yesterdays Faith when all the World must see and every man 's own Heart must tell him the contrary Which is the highest Impossibility Luther alter'd Calvin alter'd so did many others but none of them had the face to say they still adher'd to Tradition or the Faith deliver'd immediately before and that they had not alter'd 4. Men fall into Sins through Temptations and Temptations are various according to mens Tempers and Circumstances whence it happens that one falls into one sort of Sin others into another as things light But 't is impossible there should have been Causes laid in the World so Universal as to reach a whole Body of men consisting of so many Millions of different Countries Tempers and Circumstances so as to impel them effectually to fall into the same Individual sort of sin and this such a horrid and shameful one viz. The Altering the Faith they hop'd to be sav'd by and this so suddenly The Nature of the thing shows evidently 't is above Chance and the very Interest of the World would forbid such a Conspiracy were there neither Religion Conscience nor Common Humanity in it Their very Passions Disaffections and Enmity to one another would make them disagree in carrying on such a wicked Project Their Natural Tempers abstracting from their Common Propension to Truth and the care of preserving their Credits utterly lost by speaking such open and pernicious falshoods would render them apt out of a meer Antipathy of Humour to oppose one another and all this supposing there were no Goodness at all in the World to suppose which evacuates all Christian Motives and their Efficacy and makes our dear Saviour preach and dye in vain especially since there never wanted no not even in the worst times a fair Degree of Disciplin to apply those Motives Nay State-Interest or the Quarrels of Princes would make them glad to take hence an Advantage against their emulous Neighbours and to think it the best Policy to lay hold on such an occasion to fight in behalf of Faith and Common Honesty against a pack of shameless Lyars and Deserters both of Religion and Human Nature who car'd not what became of their own Salvation or that of others Lastly Thâ—se Causes thwarting the Universal Alteration of Faith while Christians proceeded on the former Rule of Tradition and full as much hindring the taking up a New Rule in opposition to the Testimony of the Universal Church as there could be no Cause to make men conspire to alter the Yesterdays Faith so Christian Motives which contain the greatest Hopes and Fears imaginable the Hopes of never-ending Bliss and Fears of Eternal and Intolerable Misery which were believ'd and apply'd to the generality of Christians could not on the contrary side but influence them most powerfully to preserve unchanged and inviolate both the Rule and the Faith. 'T is as Certain then that a very Great Body of Adherers to Tradition and consequently to the first deliver'd Faith would still remain on Foot in the World as that Effects could not be without Proper Causes or that Motives which are the Proper Causes to work upon Rational Nature will produce their Effect I mean such Motives as engage their very Nature Add That such a Change must needs have been publickly known and so have excited the Pens Tongues Interests perhaps Swords too of the Traditionary and Innovating Party one against another at the time of the Change as we see has happen'd in our late Alterations or Reformations Yet no such thing was ever mentioned in History or come to us by Tradition or any thing alledg'd but some differences amongst particular Spectators and their Adherents siding with them which amounts to nothing comparable to that Universal and most Memorable Concussion such a vast Change as this we speak of must needs have made in the whole Body of the Church 46. Summing up then this Discourse 't is manifest you have no way to answer our Argument but by supposing there was a time the Lord knows when in which there were no considerable Body of Men in the World either good Christians honest men or valuing their Credit but only a company of brutish Godless Lying Ruffians without the least Degree of Grace or Shame in them Unfortunate Confuter Aristotle lookt upon things as they were Plato on things as they should be but to make a show of an Answer to our Argument you would have your Readers look upon the Christian World as it neither is was should be or can be 47. But you object What if all Sons did not understand aright all that Fathers had Taught them Answer If All did not most of the Intelligent and Pastours who were of greater Authority than those some less-understanding Persons and ty'd by their Duty and Office to instruct their Ignorance would and could easily do it when the Doctrin open Practice and Disciplin of the Christian Church was settled and made it both so obligatory and so easie 2. What if some Sons were so negligent as to take no care either to remember or teach what they had been taught by their Fathers Answ. If only some were so then those who were diligent to do this would reprehend them and see to have things amended and those careless Persons especially if Pastours reduc'd to their Duty there being Orders on foot in the World to oblige them to it Besides 't is an unheard-of Negligence not to know or remember the next day the Faith they held the day before nor did it require that care you pretend to retain the remembrance of it four and twenty hours 3. What if some through Ambition Vain-Glory and Popularity set a broach New Doctrines and taught them for Apostolical Tradition Answ. If only some were so then those others who were good Men and free from those Vices would set themselves to oppose them make known their false pretences and lay open their Novelties Both Reason assuring us that Good men use not to be so stupidly careless in such Sacred Concerns and History informing us they were ever very zealously vigilant to oppose Hereticks when ever they began to vent their Pestilent Doctrins 4. What if others to save themselves from Persecution conceal'd part and corrupted more of the Doctrin of Christ by their own Traditions taken not from Christ but from their Forefathers Iews or Gentiles Then those who were out of Persecution or valu'd it not so much as they did their Conscience would oppose their Unchristian Proceedings Then the Fathers Doctors and Pastours of the Church would reveal what they had conceal'd restore what they had corrupted and manifest that their Pretences and Subterfuges were False and that the Doctrin they subintroduc'd had not descended by the open Channel of the Christian Church's Tradition 5. What if some through a blind Zeal ignorant Devotion Superstitious Rigour and vain Credulity added many things to the Doctrin of Christ which by degrees grew into more general esteem
Pelagianism to conclude that Human Motives which are Preliminaries to Faith and on which the assuredness of Faith it self depends as to us are Truly Certain And Might you not with as much reason say the same if one should maintain the Absolute Certainty of our Senses which is one of those Preliminaries How strangely do you misrepresent every thing you are to meddle with How constantly do you make your voluntary mistake of every Point serve for a Confutation of it 'T is confest ever was That the Human Authority of the Church or Tradition begets only Human Faith as its immediate Effect but by bringing it up to Christ it leads us to what 's Divine yet not by its own force but by Vertue of the Supposition agreed upon That Christ's Doctrin is such Is it Pelagianism to say we must use our Reason to come to Faith or do you pretend all the World must be the worst of Phanaticks and use none Or does it trouble you we offer to justifie that the Reasons we bring to make good that Preliminary which in our way of Discoursing is to introduce Faith are not such as may deceive us And that we do not confess they are Fallible or may deceive us as you grant of your Interpretations of Scripture which ground your Belief No surely we shall not quit the Certainty we have because you have none For if it be not Certain such Doctrines are indeed Christ's who is our Law-giver we cannot be sure they are True their Truth depending on his Authority and would you have us for fear of Pelagianism confess all our Faith may perhaps be but a story But into what an unadvisedness does your Anger transport you to run the Weapon through your own Side to do us a Mischief You bore us in hand First Letter p. 7. that you had a larger and firmer Tradition for Scripture than we have for what we pretend to Yet this Tradition could cause no more but Human Faith for I do not think you will say you had Divine Faith before you were got to your Rule of Divine Faith. By your Discourse then your self are an Arrant Pelagian too Perhaps worse than we because you pretend to a larger and firmer Human Tradition than you say we have nay you pretend it to be Absolutely Certain too which is a dangerous Point indeed Pray have a care what you do for you are upon the very brink of Pelagianism The knowing you have the true Books of Scripture is a most necessary Preliminary to your Faith for without knowing that you cannot pretend to have any Faith at all and if it be Pelagianism in us to hold such Preliminaries absolutely Certain I fear the danger may come to reach you too Yet you have one Way and but one to escape that damnable Heresy which is that you do not go about to demonstrate the Absolute Certainty of Your Tradition as we do of Ours That that is the very Venom of Pelagianism But take comfort Sir my life for yours you will never fall so abominably into the mire as to demonstrate or conclude any thing For what Idaea soever you may frame of it we mean no more by Demonstrating but plain honest Concluding Your way of Discoursing does not look as if it intended to conclude or demonstrate 'T is so wholly pass for as great a Man as you will made up of mistakes misrepresentations petty cavils witty shifts untoward explications of your own Words constant prevarications and many more such neat dexterities that whatever fault it may through human frailty provok't by powerful Necessity be liable to I dare pawn my life it will never be guilty of that hainous Crime of demonstrating or concluding any thing no not the Absolute Certainty of your firmer Tradition And yet unless you can prove or conclude 't is thus Certain 't is a Riddle to us how can you either hold or say 't is such 13 Pray be not offended if on this occasion I ask You a plain downright Question Is it not equally blamable to Falsify your Adversaries Tenet perpetually as 't is to falsify his Words Nay is it not worse being less liable to discovery and so more certainly and more perniciously Injurious And can any thing excuse You from being thus faulty but Ignorance of our Tenet I fear that Plea will utterly sail you too and leave you expos'd to the Censure of every sincere Reader when I shew him to his Eye that You could not but know all this before For in Error Non-plust p. 121. Sect. 8. You must needs have read the quite contrary Doctrine and how those who maintain Tradition do resolve their Faith. There is no necessity then of proving this Infallibility viz. Of the Church meerly by Scripture interpreted by Virtue of this Infallibility Nor do the Faithful or the Church commit a Circle in believing that the Church is Infallible upon Tradition For they believe onely the supernatural Infallibility built on the Assistance of the Holy Ghost that is on the Church's Sanctity and this is prov'd by the Human Authority of the Church to have been held ever from the Beginning and the force of the Human Testimony of the Church is prov'd by Maxims of meer Reason The same is more at large deliver'd in the foregoing Section and in divers other places Now this Book was Writ against your self and so 't is as hardly Conceiveable you should never have read it as 't is Unconceiveable how you should ever answer it And if you did read it what was become of your sincerity when you counterfeited your Ignorance of our Tenet All is resolv'd say you here p. 9. into meer Human Faith which is the unavoidable consequence of the Doctrin of Oral Tradition How shrewdly positive you are in your Sayings how modest and meek in your Proofs Nothing can be more manifest from our constantly avow'd Doctrin and your own opposing it too than 't is that Tradition resolves all into Christ's and the Apostles Teaching And pray do you hold that Christ is a meer man or that the Believing Him is a meer human Faith or that the Doctrin taught by Him and Them is meerly Human If this be indeed your Tenet I am sorry I knew it not before for then I should have thought fit to begin with other Principles to confute you And I pray God by your impugning known Truths you may never need e'm I see I had reason to alledge in Faith Vindicated that the Grace of God was requisit to make men assent to a Natural Conclusion when it came very cross to their Interest For it appears too plain 't is exceedingly needful to assist you here in a meer Point of Common Morality which is to enable you not to speak and represent things directly contrary to your own knowledge And I am sorry I must tell you and too evidently prove it that the greatest part of your Writings against Catholicks when the Point is to be manag'd by Reason
sight talk in Common name great Authors for his Vouchers but never shew how they savour him by applying them And then he 's safe by virtue of a great noise fine Raree shows He ends with railing at the rate of a man at his Wits End I desire him to pacify his spleen for no man that knows me and my circumstances does or can think I write to raise my self or to be caressed as he phrases it by any man. I will never court any man's favour or fear his frowns when I am defending Truth 53. But the Scene is chang'd all of a sudden I am almost asham'd to reflect as it deserves on what follows in his two next Paragraphs 'T is so purely A-la-Mode of Merry Andrew Never did Grave Man make such a Fop of himself But his Reason was Nonplust and his Fancy was over-heated and this must plead his excuse for what could he do better in such ill circumstances To set right what his Raillery has so ravell'd I declar'd my Tenet was that every man is to use his Iudgment of Discretion or his Reason in finding out a Rule which could ascertain him of all the several Points taught by Christ Since the Rule of Faith being antecedent to Faith must consequently be the Object of pure Reason That by this Rule he was to judge for his Salvation and of all Controverted Points For if this Rule gave him Absolute Assurance that all those determinate Points were indeed taught by Christ then since he acknowledg'd Christ's Doctrin to be from God they were to be held by him to be Divine and True If it give him no such assurance of this being in it self Fallible then they are not to be held Divine nor True nor Faith nor the way to Salvation since in that case they might perhaps be Diabolical False Heresy and the way to Damnation Now no such Rule does he assign us but leaves it to the Iudgment of his sober Enquirers to find out those determinate Points in Scripture's Letter which in those Articles of so profound a sense is obscure to them Our Judgment of Discretion is to find out a Certain Light to walk by in those sublime passages in which the Light of our own Reason is very dim His is to do as well as he can in penetrating the Sense of the Scripture in such high passages tho' he sees he may fall into Error every step That is his way is indeed to be a Rule to our selves and scorn to be led by the Church tho' there be all the Reason in the world to think Her wiser than our selves in that affair What says the pleasant Dr to this Or how does he make good his judgment of Discretion or overthrow ours why First he laughs heartily over and over that I come closer to take a view of his Judgment of Discretion after 99. pages As if my whole Book had been to treat meerly concerning that one point and I had never handled it till now whereas his Conscience knows but that necessity has forc't him to bid it Farewell and every Reader sees that above forty other Points were to be handled as they lay in my way and that this concerning the Iudgment of Discretion was the very last I was to speak to What pityfull Trifling is this Then comes in the Game at Cards blew apron and Tub over and over That I yield to his Sober Enquirer what he aim'd at that I make the Fanaticks Catholiques and his Sober Enquirer a Iudge of Controversies and would have him judge without his Rule Which is a continu'd Series of willfull and ridiculous Forgeries For I allow him to judge of never a Point of Faith but by his Rule and affirm that he is to find out his Rule by his Reason or Judgment of Discretion But this clear Method he casts a Mist over all the way and finding that Seriousness would gravell him he has recourse to his beloved and still-assisting Friend Drollery Next he asks what if the matter propos'd by this Certain Authority which I have found out by my Reason be very much against Reason And I ask whether the Matter under Consideration be the Object of Naturall Reason or no If it be not then Reason is to concern it self in judging of the Humane Authority of the Church attesting it to be Christ's Doctrin which is Subject to Reason and not with the Other which is confessedly above Reason He knows I still speak of the High Mysteries and Articles of our Christian Belief which are Supernaturally reveal'd or taught by Christ and his Apostles and will he have the profound Judgment of discretion of his Sober Enquirers scan them by their Reason This savors too strong of the Socinian Yet he sticks not to say the same that is Natural Reason helps men to Iudge of the Matters propos'd by this Certain Authority It makes yet worse for his Credit that whereas I instance all along in the Tenets of the Blessed Trinity and the Godhead of Christ he stills recurrs to Points necessary to Salvation by counterposing which he seems to think those Mysteries not necessary to Salvation But who set the bounds of Reason why God and Nature by alotting Reason for its Sphere Naturall Objects and by so doing precluding her from attempting to sound the Profound Depth of Supernatural ones by her Shallow Line He is angry that as soon as this Certain Authority is discover'd we then cry Good night Reason I have no more use of you This savours yet more strongly then the former Would he have us after this Certain Authority has assur'd us 't is Christ's Doctrin still to suspend our Belief till we have examin'd the Mysteries themselves by our naturall Reason I am loath to name what this signifies I omit to insist on his bad Logick shall I say or want of Common Sense who tho' a Certain Authority were suppos'd yet discourses all along as if the things it proposes may still be false or need the Examination of Reason whether they be false or no. But this argues he has not once in his thoughts the Notion of True Certainty but means some Mock-Certainty or Probability by that word otherwise 't was impossible such a Fancy should have a seat in his Mind For the most obvious and Common Light of Reason tells him that what 's Truly Certain as what 's built on a Certain Authority is cannot be False nor can need any further Scrutiny whether it be or no. 54. Next he asks Are all People Capable of this Certain Reason They are or may be made so according to their pitch so Tradition be rightly represented and not Perverted as it was by him throughout his Sermon For nothing is more sutable to the Capacity of every one then is the Force of a vast Witnessing Authority And tho' they were not yet being in it self Certain it preserves even those who are uncapable of seeing the reason for its Certainty
Kindness for his Friend whom he suffers to Write on this manner If he were not they will suspect his Friends have as little Kindness for him and less Regard who manage his Cause without his Privity However it be the Answer affords no work for a Replier but the most ungrateful one in the World to be perpetually telling men of their Faults without the least hopes of doing them good or contributing to their amendment They being of such a nature that they are our Adversaries most necessary supports in their unlucky circumstances And indeed the whole Piece seems to have no other Design but to bring the Dispute into a Wrangle Yet this Profit may be hoped that every moderate Iudgment will see by the very methods we take which side desires and sincerely endeavours that Truth may appear It would be much a greater if Dr. St. or whom he pleases to employ would plainly shew the Absolute Certainty which he says they have or else plainly confess they have it not But this is not to be hoped Yet I entreat the Reader because I distrust my own Credit to sollicit him if he thinks it not too dangerous for him to do the one or the other and in doing it to use as much Reason as he will and as little Laughing as he can We are sufficiently satisfy'd of his faculty of Risibility and would be glad to see a touch or two of his Rationality REFLECTIONS ON Dr. St's Reflecters Defence Addrest to Himself 1. I Enquire not Sir since it concerns me not to know why you would needs become a Party or rather an Advocate in a Cause depending between Dr. St. and another If it were desir'd of you you are to be excus'd so you perform well what you undertook that is to defend the Dr. especially his Logick and his Absolute Certainty But if you had nothing to draw you in besides the Weight of what you had to say I think you might very well have kept out You begin like a man of Art with prepossessing your Reader against your Adversary and in favour of your self and so would have me pass for a pleasant artificial deluding Companion and your self for a man Godly even to scruple and who cannot barely repeat the Metaphor of holding ones Cards without asking Pardon The Reader will find by your writing to which of us your former Character is most like In the mean time I own the Confidence of talking of Self-evidence and Absolute Certainty and Infallibility and bless the Mercy of God for making me of a Communion in which that Language is Proper and humbly pray Him to preserve me from the Face if I must not say Confidence of setting up for a Guide without them For between a blind Guide and one who sees not his way I think the difference is not great Much good may your Modesty do you your Obscurity your Vncertainty and Fallibility If your Conscience perswade you these are the best qualifications of Christan Doctrin and best Security which God would provide for the Souls of men mine would sooner use Twenty Metaphors than perswade People to venture their Eternity upon them But at worst it is no greater fault in me sure than in Dr. St. to talk of Absolute Certainty Unless he perhaps repent and would be content an unfortunate Word inconsiderately blurted out should be retracted for him by another which 't is not so handsome to retract himself whereas I like a man of Confidence meant what I said and stand to it and can have no good opinion of those modest men that say and unsay as sutes with the occasion 2. To fall to our Business your Discourse has Three Parts The First reflects on what I said of turning Proof over from your Protestants to Catholicks The Second pretends to answer my Argument And the Third Mr. G's Some Gleanings in your Language there are besides but this is the main Crop. Upon the first Point since Proof does or does not belong to Protestants there is nothing more to be said to purpose but either to shew that Proof does not belong to them or to bring it if it does But let us see how you handle the matter 3. I had exprest my self to grieve and wonder there should be so little value for Souls among your Party as to send Men to the Tribunal of God without furnishing them with assurance that they can justifie their Accounts themselves But if say you they may be assured they can give up a good account may they not be assur'd that they have the Grace of God and of their Iustification and Salvation And then what becomes of the Council of Trent Of what Account do you speak I beseech you If as I did of an Account of Faith I hope you will not perswade us a man cannot know why he believes without knowing whether he be in the State of Grace or sure of his Salvation and therefore I hope you will not persist to think it hard to conceive how the bare assurance of the Truth of what is taught should enable a man to justifie his account without an Assurance of Grace too since his very Assurance of the Truth which he believes is a Iustification of his Account for believing it If you speak of an Account of our whole lives it becomes you huge well to talk of my Confidence who have your self the Confidence to turn things against the plain Scope of my Discourse against my plain Words and I much fear against your own Knowledge For where the only Question was of the Certainty of Protestant Faith or which is all one of Christian Faith upon your Protestant Grounds an Account why your Protestants believe who cannot tell whether Christ taught it was the only Account that belongs to that Question But what needs more Are not you I too fully perswaded while we are writing this very Controversie that we maintain the Truth of our Faith by such arguments as can justifie us not to have fail'd of that Duty and if we do so cannot both us justifie our selves in that particular and all who assent upon them to God as well as man And cannot either of us bring a solid Argument to prove that Christ Taught what we hold without being assur'd before-hand we are in the state of Grace and shall be sav'd Or Is this any thing to the Council of Trent as you pretend What paltring is this then to pretend that no Controvertist can bring a Proof that concludes Christ Taught such a Doctrin and so justifies them that adhere to the Truth it evinces for fear forsooth of making men sure of their Iustification and Salvation and of contradicting the Council of Trent A pretty fetch to excuse your selves from bringing any Arguments worth a Straw to justifie your Followers for believing upon them Alas you have store enough of them but out of pure Conscience we must think dare not produce them for fear of enabling your People
may make false Construction and yet the Rule be a good Rule Tho' you should go thither for your Notion of a Rule we should be but where we were For as the Grammar-Rule let it be never so ill understood will make good Construction in case it be us'd so the Scripture-Rule if it be as you put it us'd must needs produce right sense But the truth is a Grammar-Rule is not a Rule till it be understood for he who understands not what 't is for Cases and Verbs to agree has no Rule to make them agree And then if you will make the Letter of Scripture such a Rule you will make the Letter first understood to be the Rule of understanding it and people misunderstand what they understand and the misunderstood Rule be a Rule which is only a Rule by being understood In short turn it which way you will you will to borrow an Expression be much beholden to the Reader to make Sense of what you say 22. You question on Must a Way be a wrong Way because some that take it will not keep it Riddle my Riddle again Pray who are or can be those some who take it and will not keep it As long as they take it they keep it I think and they keep it not against their Wills sure He who has no Will to keep it may when he pleases go out of it but then he does no longer take it and is none of the some of whom the Question speaks for they all take it and so we have nothing to do with him When all is done the Will here is to no more purpose than the Vnderstanding before For he who takes the Way shall certainly arrive at his Journeys end let him Will what he pleases and the Way must needs be a wrong way if he do not 'T is great pity you are not in the right You would save more men than the Benefit of their Clergy For the Thief in a Cart upon the Way to Tyburn would never come there if willing not to keep that Way would keep him from it But by affirming that some take the Way who yet will not keep it you affirm that some do and do not Take it And so Dr. St. is well holp up with a Reflecter who imagins we are talking of one who only takes the Way at first and afterwards leaves it whereas 't is plain the Argument proceeds of such as make the Way their Choice and persist to follow no other to their lifes End. 23. Lastly You tell us that Till it be prov'd God has left such a Way or Rule as no man can possibly err out of it mistake it or abuse it c. For you must permit me to stop by the way I am too short breath'd to run over the long period at a loose But let you alone to make all sure You are safe enough if all must go on your side till some body prove to you that no man can err out of the Way left by God mistake or abuse it that is till some body prove that Ways are Prisons out of which there is no escaping or that the man cannot possibly fall into Errour who is out of the Way to Truth As many as leave the Catholick Church leave the Way left by God and you like a right pleasant man would have it prov'd that the thing cannot possibly be done which we see is done by millions and would have us who say they all do err and mistake prove they cannot All this while I a little suspect you mean otherwise than you say and that by your words Errour and Mistake and Abuse of the Way you understand missing the End of the Way Truth But let us see what you will make of it What would you have prov'd next Why That it is not enough that God has left us such a Way or Rule as men may understand and observe if they be not wanting to themselves What do you call being wanting to themselves I understand how a man that will not travel or leaves a right and takes a wrong way is wanting to himself but he who puts himself upon the Way continues on in it and changes not his Road is not wanting to himself in any thing I can imagin which belongs to the Way And the way of this Traveller I maintain against you has not enough to be a Way if it barely may and yet may not bring him to his Journeys End. What will this come to at last Why till these things be prov'd It will not follow that the Scripture's Letter in the sense you have own'd it is not the Way tho' not only Presbyterians and Socinians but the greater number of Mankind should own it and yet differ about Fundamental Points contain'd in it What you call the Sense which you own of the Letter of Scripture will come by and by But will not that follow which you say here will not Will it not follow that the Way by which a man that goes in it comes to Errour is not the Way to Truth Will it not follow that he who at his Journeys End finds himself at York did not go the Way to London Pray what 's the Way to a Place Is it not that Passage that he who has past it finds himself at that Place And so the Way to know the Doctrin of Christ and his Apostles is it not the Means which he who has us'd knows that Doctrin Why then since Presbyterians and Socinians both interpret by their private Judgments and one side knows not the Doctrin of Christ it follows as unavoidably that the Way of private Interpretation is no sure way to know it as that he who has gone through the Strand and finds himself at Charing Cross has not gone the way to Moorfields That is as certainly as that a Way is a Way or Means to bring a man to such a Place 24. What do you talk then of erring for and mistaking and abusing the Way Or what do you mean 'T is true those erring men do mistake the true Way and for that reason err But they mistake not the Way which you say is the true Way They do interpret by their private Judgment and so take not mistake it use not abuse it Sure you mean that they mistake the Doctrin of Christ and so by mistaking the Way you very wisely understand mistaking the End. And then what a man are you to contend their way is a Way and a sure Way too to bring them to the Knowledge of Christ's Doctrin when they pursue it and are not brought to that Knowledge And what Eyes have you who perceive not that therefore it cannot be a sure way Again to what purpose do you tell us that men may understand and observe as if Observing concern'd our Question of Knowing if they be not wanting to themselves when they who take a right Way not only may but must and cannot possibly fail of coming whither
distance with the true Sense of what was deliver'd by the Founders of the Church in the beginning without danger of losing it by the way which cannot be imagin'd as long as Tradition is held to the same believ'd to day which was held yesterday or that the immediately succeeding Fathers still deliver'd the same Doctrin To do which there wanted no Power as has been lately shewn to the full nor Will to use that Power being oblig'd to it by the greatest Penalties GOD himself could inflict the Damning Themselves and their Posterity 4. But say you pag. 8. If the Church may explain the Sense and Meaning of Tradition so as to oblige men to believe that by Virtue of such Explication which they were not oblig'd to before then 't is impossible the Infallibility of Tradition should ly in a constant Tradition from Father to Son for they have no Power to oblige to any more than they received How Plausibly and smoothly this Discourse runs and how shrewdly it seems to conclude Would any well-meaning Reader imagin that it were perfect Non-sense all the while and wholly built on your own Liberality giving us another sort of Tradition which is no Tradition This malignant word Tradition must not be taken in its right sense that 's resolv'd for then it would grow too troublesom but take it in any other sense that is mistake it and then have at it For when you speak of explaining the sense and meaning of Tradition you do not take Tradition as you know well we do and as the word plainly imports for the Delivery of Doctrin but for Doctrins Delivered and so again we have once more lost the Question For what can these words mean If the Church may explain the sense and meaning of Tradition that is of the Method of conveying down Christs Doctrin The Method of Delivery is the very Signification of that Doctrin from Age to Age and how can one Explain the Sense and meaning of a signification of Christ's sense when it 's self is that very Explication of it This gives me occasion to reflect how oddly you have hamper'd our Tradition hitherto instead of handling it P. 9. You seem to doubt by your If no more were meant c. Whether it does not mean Tradition for the Books of Scripture and this you knew well enough before was none of our Tradition in dispute here which as may be seen by Mr. G's Demonstration put down by your self First Letter p. 4. and 5. is confest to be Tradition for matters of Faith or Doctrin Now in this new sense you give us there of Tradition you kindly grant it for 't is your own not that which we here mean by that word Next comes another If and makes it seem to signify Articles and Power And this is no Tradition at all neither ours nor yours nor any body's For neither those Articles nor that Power you speak of p. 10. are or can be the Delivery of Christ's Doctrin from day to day for that speaks such a Method of bringing down things not the things brought down And this you very gravely deny And so you may with my good leave either deny or expunge or condemn it to what doom you please for certainly it comes with a felonious Intention to draw the Reader out of his Road into a Labyrinth of Non-sense and then robb him of his Reason Again p. 7. you make it a Delivery of bare Words at best with a general impossible sense and perhaps a Heretical one too into the bargain whereas you cannot but know Tradition as We mean it is a Delivery of the sense of Christian Tenets and this a particular sense too and such a one as cannot possibly be Heretical while this Rule is adher'd to unless the First-Taught Faith were Heretical which is Blasphemy to imagin And here again p. 8. you make Tradition or Delivery to mean the Point delivered and would have us give you the signification and Explication of That which is it's self the signification and Explication of Christ's Faith and this too the very best that can be imagin'd Is it possible to deform Tradition more untowardly or wrest it into more misconstructions than has been done already After a serious manner certainly 't is impossible But Drollery is now to act its part And to cheer your spirits which droop't under the difficulty of answering the Argument for Tradition you put your self in masquerade and would make the Relation of perhaps two or three it may be partial Friends of yours concerning Mr. G's Discourse about You a perfect parallel to our Rule of Faith and that if they can mistake or misrepresent down goes Tradition Which amounts to this that sooner may all the Christian Fathers in any Age consisting of many millions and those disperst in far-distant Parts of the World be mistaken in their Faith which it imported them no less than their Salvation to know sooner may all of them conspire to deliver to their Children another Doctrin than that which they held the way to Heaven than that a very few of your own Party should to gratify you tell you a false Story or Aggravate tho' all of them were besides profest Adversaries to the Person against whom they witnest and indeed Witnesses in their Own Common Cause I beseech you Sir tho' you be never so much to seek for a solid Answer yet speak at least plausible things and do not thus expose your Credit while you affect to play the Wit. Poor Tradition what has it done to be thus misrepresented Did it deserve no better for bringing down the Book of Scripture but to be expos'd in so many aukward Vizards when it was to come upon the Stage and not once suffer'd to shew it's true face but still travestee'd into another Form and put in all shapes but its own This Carriage of yours is enough to make the Reader think you apprehend it to be some terrible Gorgons Head or some Basilisk and that the very sight of it unless it came thus muffled up would undo you At least he will suspect from such an untoward broken Scene that the Dramma is not like to be regular Indeed you shift too often and to catch and confute you I must travel thro' the whole Compass for no sooner can a man steer one way but your Discourse like the Wind whips straight into another quarter and about we must tack or we must not make forwards at all But I will insist no more at present on this dexterity of yours you will afford your Friends many fresh Instances of it through the whole course of this Letter hereafter Onely I must note your forgetfulness or what else may I call it For you took the Notion of Tradition very right First Letter p. 7. where you alledg'd you had a larger and firmer Tradition for Scripture than we had for us You did not there take Tradition of that Book for the Book delivered
tho' a private person can discover those Explicit Points and I suppose may declare them too to as many as he pleases for how can he in Charity do less But alas The silly insignificant Church can do nothing at all she must submit to the wondrous Gifts you have bestow'd upon the Rabble and her Governors and Pastors be accounted Tyrants if they shall dare to encroach upon their high Prerogatives or presume to share in their Priviledges of being able to unfold or know the Explicit Meaning of Scripture-Texts For in case they can know this and this Knowledge be good for the Faithful as it is being as you say necessary to Salvation 't is without question they may declare them or make them known to others nay and use their Authority too if you will vouchsafe to allow them any to edify the Faithful by making this Knowledge sink into them Nor can it prejudice their Reason that the Church obliges them to believe them for this is no more than obliging them to act according to Reason which tells them that since they must either trust themselves or their Pastours in such things and the Pastours must be incomparably better qualify'd than themselves are for the discovering of such mysterious Truths and withall appointed by God to teach them 't is far more Rational to submit to their Judgments in such things than to use their own But indeed you have reason to stand up for your Sober Enquirer for all Ring-leaders of any Heresy or Faction against the Church took this very Method in their proceedings The Spirit of Pride which possest them principled them with these Rational and Peaceable Maxims that they had Authority to judge their Judges teach their Teachers direct their Guides and that their own Wit excell'd that of all the World before them But when a Faction was form'd into a good lusty Body the Scripture-Rule was laid aside again so that 't is doubtful whether we have had ever a Sober Enquirer since as was shewn in my First Letter Sect. 25. 33. You desire to see this Power of the Church in Scripture in Express Terms and we tell you we need not let you see it in Scripture at all for Tradition even Common Sense tells us that the Church has Power to feed and instruct her Flock and enlighten them in what she knows and they are ignorant of If you demand how the Roman Church came by this knowledge of making Implicit Points Explicit I answer by Tradition giving her the Sense of Christ's whole Law and each Intire point of it and by the Light of Nature purify'd by supernatural knowledges antecedently as also by her Application when occasion required to reflect upon and penetrate deeply into that Sense which enables her to explicate her own thoughts or the Points of Faith more clearly now which she had indeed before but did not so distinctly look into them or set her self to explain them But pray what express Scripture has your Sober Enquirer for his Power to make the Implicit Points Explicit You reckon up diverse agreeablenesses p. 21. why this should be but not one word of express Scripture do you pretend to for it And if himself pretend to any such Power besides that it will look a little odd that God should take more care of private men than of his Church let him either shew us he has better means Natural or Supernatural to do this than the Church has or he discovers his Pride and Folly both to pretend to it You say p. 21. that the Church of Rome has no where declar'd in Council it has any such Power viz. to declare explicitly Points imply'd in Scripture But First you may please to know It has made such a declaration Sect. 4. where it defines that it belongs to the Church judicare de vero sensu et interpretatione Scripturarum to judge of the true sense and Interpretation of Scripture Next It accordingly proceeds upon this Power as I shall manifest by three several Instances One Sess. 13. cap. 4. where it explains those Texts Luc. 22. Io. 6. and 2 Cor. 11. to be meant of being truly Christ's Body and declares thence that the Church was ever perswaded of the Doctrin of Transubstantiation Another Sess. 14. cap. 7. Where it declares the Text 1 Cor. 1. Let a man examin himself c. to be understood by the Custome or Practice of the Church of Sacramental Confession necessary to be us'd before receiving the Sacrament by all those who are conscious to themselves of mortal sin The Third Sess. 14. cap. 1. where it interprets that Text of S. Iames cap. 5. to be by Apostolical Tradition understood of the Sacrament of Extreme Vnction Which places you do not judge so much as implicitly to contain that Sense but hold that they contain another thing How the Churches declaring explicitly Points descending by Tradition makes no new Articles of Faith is discours't above Sect. 4 5 6 7. By which you may see that Mr. G. and Mr. M. whom pag. 22. you will needs set at variance are notwithstanding very good Friends For if the Church knew the the sense which is contain'd in that place before the Doctrin is Old tho' the declaring it to be signifi'd by that particular Text be perhaps New. I say perhaps for in some signal passages much in use in the Churches Preaching Catechisms and Practise I doubt not but that not only the particular Doctrin but also that 't is signifi'd by such a Text comes down by Tradition in the Ecclesia docens Notwithstanding the agreeableness of these two Positions you triumph mightily here p. 23. that Thus Mr. M. has answer'd Mr. G 's Demonstration As much as to say I know not for my life what to say to it my self and therefore would gladly shift it off upon any Body so I could handsomely rid my Hands of it Thus you make for you can make any thing by your Method of mistaking every thing the Council of Trent clash with the Church of Rome a hard Task one would think by pretending to interpret Scripture according to the unanimous sense of the Fathers which you judge contradicts the making known and obliging Men to believe that explicitly now which they were not oblig'd to by any precedent Sense or Explication What mean the words Men and They If they signify all men and intend to signify that no man knew those imply'd Points before but all might hap to contradict them you mistake our Tenet for we judge it absolutely impossible that none of the Fathers should reflect more attentively on the full sense of the Points deliver'd or look into their own thoughts as Faithful and therefore it was much more impossible they should unanimously contradict those Points And unless they did so the Council of Trent and the Church of Rome may by the Grace of God very well correspond in their Doctrin for all your mistake For the Intention of the Fathers in
be the Letter of Scripture he would have had recourse to some exacter Copy correcting their faulty one and so have born up still to that Rule But 't is evident he does not thus He makes then the Sense of the Church or Tradition the Rule both to know our Faith and also to correct the faultiness of the Letter Whether this sutes better with the Drs. Principles or ours is left to your selves or any man of reason to judg and determine § 30. Thus comes off this famous Sermon which makes such a noise for a Confutation of the Traditionary Doctrin The Sum of it is 1. The Dr. takes no notice of the main Question betwixt us which is about the Absolute-Certainty that our Faith is Truly Christian or taught by Christ nor attempts to shew his is thus Certain but Preaches to you Stedfastness and a well-setled Resolution to continue in it yet avoids the giving you any Grounds to make you Stedfast and Well-setled in that resolution 2. He conceals every Advantage Christian Tradition has or is pretended to have that is he would perswade you to Hate it before you See it and to compare it to Scripture before you know what kind of thing it is which is yet worse he shews you another thing for It and through all his Discourse pretends 'tis It which is nothing at all to It but utterly unlike It viz. Particular Traditions both before and after that Vniversal Tradition only which we defend was setled 3. He fixes a false date upon the beginning of the Tradition we speak of that the vast source of it which with the Circumstances annext was able to continue the Current strong and the Derivation of Christ's Doctrin both Certain and Perpetual might not be reflected on To deform it the more he makes it meerly Verbal as if it were nothing but the telling some dry story by surpressing it's Practicalness in which consists it's chiefest Vertue 4. He hides from your consideration all the most Incomparable and most Powerful Motives which enforce its Continuance and oblige the Church never to forsake the first deliver'd Doctrin 5. He never regards even in those Particular Traditions whether they fail'd the Persons or the Persons fail'd Them but supposes still the Tradition was in all the fault without attempting to shew it 6. He would have you imagin the Church in the first Age consisting of Pastors and People lost all their Memory and Grace too assoon as ever the Apostles were dead lest it should be held Able and Willing to testify Christ's Doctrine to the Next Age which by Parity would Establish it a Rule for all succeeding Ages to the End of the World. 7. He mingles known Opinions and which he holds himself not to have been Universally deliver'd at first with Points which we All hold to have been first deliver'd Then as to the Matter of Object of Tradition which and only which we pretend it is to bring down with absolute Certainty and deliver Clearly viz. the Dogmatical or Controverted Articles of Christian Faith which are Practical he never mentions it at all with any distinction but tumbles and confounds it with all things imaginable for which it was never pretended and puts upon Tradition a hundred abus'd tasks as never thought of by us so improper oft times impossible in themselves As the deriving down the Ten Commandments Creeds Decrees of Councils set Forms of Words an Infinity of particular passages not at all Practical nay whole Epistles and Gospels Schemes of Doctrin taught by Heathen Philosophers Messages which use to be sent by long Letters Historical Narrations or Actions and in a word every thing he could invent but the right one viz. Those Controverted Points of Faith tho' it lay just before him the very nature of Controversy which we are about determining our Discourses to those Points and nothing else This is his General view of Scripture and Tradition as to the way of conveying down matters of Faith. He means a General view which misrepresents and blinds your sight of it in every Particular In a Word there is much of Reading Conduct and Wit in his Sermon but wholly misemploy'd to speak as handsomely as he could to no purpose and to miss the whole Point in Question with a great deal of Plausibility In which amongst his other Great Abilities justly acknowledg'd to be Excellent consists his most considerable Talent and Dexterity § 31. So he ends his Sermon with good Advice to you to follow Christ's Heavenly Doctrin in your Lives and Conversations Which as he worthily presses upon you so I shall heartily pray that God would vouchsafe you his Grace to follow it I am far from blaming His or any one's Preaching the wholsome Moral Doctrines of Christianity and laying it home to men's Consciences But I ought not if concern'd to suffer that when he pretends to speak to your Understandings and establish you in Faith he should bubble his Auditory with forty impertinent pretences Injurious to his candid Adversaries and to Truth as well as to your selves please and delude your Fancies with a great shew of his Reading and little conjectural Reflexions tack't prettily together and in the mean time send you away empty of knowing any Ground which may render you or any Absolutely Certain that what you hold is indeed Christ's Doctrin that is any Ground of perfect security that is cannot but be indeed his Doctrin without being which it ought not be held True. Whereas yet 't is only this Certainty which can give His or any other Sermon it 's full force and Energy Your Servant in Christ J. S. Advertisement The 2 d. 3 d. Catholick Letters are to be Sold by M. Turner at the Lamb in High-Holbourn THE FIFTH Catholick Letter IN REPLY TO Dr. Stillingfleet's Pretended ANSWER To About the Fortieth Part of I. S's Catholick Letters Addrest to all Impartial Readers By Iohn Sergeant Published with Allowance London Printed and sold by Matthew Turner at the Lamb in High-Holborn 1688. THE PREFACE Addrest to the most Partial of Dr. Stillingfleet's Friends Gentlemen WHen a Person is incomparably qualify'd above all others in any Particular men use to look upon him as a Pattern in that Kind I will not say Dr St. has manifested himself to be such an Exemplar in every respect that can be an Ingredient of an Ill Controvertist This is yet to be shewn and Pretence without Proof signifies nothing Only I may justly fear that while you are reading my Reply to his Answer as he calls it to my Catholick Letters you may be apt to judge that I am rather framing an Idea of what Human Weakness maintaining an insupportably-ill Cause may be obnoxious to than giving a Iust Character of his Performances and that 't is Absolutely Impossible that a Man of his Parts should be Guilty of such and so many Incredible Failings I acknowledge with all due Respect to him his Great Endowments and am heartily glad in
Controversy and consequently treating of Faith precisely as 't is Controverted and there are but Two Points that can be controverted in relation to the Evincing or Defending the Truth of Christian Faith The one that what Christ taught was Divine the other that Christ taught what we now believe the Former of which being granted by all the Deserters of the Church and therefore cannot possibly need to be Prov'd by Me or any in my Circumstances it follows evidently that the later Point is only that which can be debated between me and my Adversaries that is we are only to treat of Faith as it stands under that Abstraction or Consideration that is as it stands under some certain Rule securing us that it was taught by Christ It being agreed on all hands that if he taught it it Is Divine 4. That tho' this and no other can with any sense be our Task yet 't is tedious to stand repeating at every turn this Abstracted Acception of Faith as 't is found or treated in our Controversies or reiterating still this reduplication as taught by Christ but 't is enough to have exprest it at first in Prefaces and the State of the Question and afterwards upon occasion in many signal passages which I did very punctually as appears by my Defences where I instanc't in Sixty three several places I might say I did it in whole Books where I spoke in short as is seen in my Method in which very small Treatise 't is inculcated above twenty times Whence where-ever I use the single word Faith it must necessarily mean Faith as Controverted or according to what is Controverted between us Such a sollicitous Repetition would argue a distrust in me that my Readers wanted Common Sense who could not reflect on what was in hand or keep a heedfull eye upon what was at first and once for all declar'd and signally exprest in those remarkable places Lastly That my treating of what Motives or Rule Christian Faith must have in it self or in its own nature to make good its Truth which is Essential to it as I did particularly in Faith Vindicated does not exceed the bounds of Controversy or treat of Faith as 't is a Theological Virtue or in any Consideration relating to it as such for I still express my self over and over in the Introduction to speak of its Rule or of Faith as proveable by its Rule and tho' I do not there apply it against any Adversary yet in the Inferences at the End I do this against Dr. Tillotson and Himself without any Reply for these Fifteen years Nor have they any Possible way to come off but either by answering Faith Vindicated and shewing there needs no Absolutely Certain Rule to secure us of our having Christian Faith or by shewing that they have some Rule Absolutely securing those from Error who rely on it The same Introduction and the same Answer serves to show how Moral Certainty of the Infallibility of this Rule is and how it is not sufficient For I declare my self there to speak of the Nature of those Motives or Rule in themselves and as laid in Second Causes by Gods Providence to light Mankind in their way to Faith to which the dimness of Eye-sight neglect to look at all or looking the wrong way even in many particular men is Extrinsical and Contingent Moral Evidence then of the Rule of Faith's Certainty nay even less may serve many particular men for they are still secur'd from Errour by adhering to what such a Rule delivers tho' they penetrate not the Grounds of its Certainty with which it well consists that that Rule as laid by God to light or satisfy all Mankind who are in their way to Faith must be in it self more than Morally Certain or must be impossible to be False otherwise it could not perfectly satisfy acute Schollars that what it abets is True nor enable Pastors and Learned men to defend the Truth of Faith as far as it depends on that Rule nor Secure any man Learned or Unlearned from Erring in Faith whereas by being thus Absolutely Certain it secures every man tho' never so weak from Errour while he follows it and preserves inviolable the Truth of Faith it self 7. This last Note fully answers his first pretended Contradiction that my Chief End in that Treatise viz. Faith Vindicated was to settle Christian Faith and yet that I speak not of Faith in it self but as it it controverted For I no where meddle with Faith in it self or as it is a Theological Virtue as School-Divines do but meerly in order to my Opposers With which may well consist that I may write a Book to settle Christian Faith by shewing it must have a Certain Rule before I apply it against my Adversaries by shewing they have no such Rule and so no Certainty of their Faith as I did against Himself and Dr. T. at the End of that Book and do peremptorily Challenge them to clear themselves of those Inferences and prove themselves to be Holders of Christs Doctrine or Christians An Instance will shew how weak this Cavil is A Scrivener makes a Pen and his Primary Intention considering him as he is doing that Action is that the Pen should be a good one and his writing taking him precisely as a Pen-maker was Secondary and Occasional And yet writing was for all that his Primary Intention as he was a Scrivener Thus it past with me My Main Primary and if he will precise End in that Treatise was to settle Christian Faith by demonstrating it was to have a sure Foundation and in this was terminated the particular design of that Book Now the doing this was apt to exclude all pretenders to Christianity who had no such Grounds but I did not this till I had ended the Treatise nor stood applying my Discourses or striking my Opposer just then with the Weapon I was but a making Which yet hinders not but the Primary End of writing that whole Treatise was in Order to my Opposers tho' a little more remotely and this is so Evident by my Inferences at the End that none but a Caviller enrag'd that he could not answer them would have made such an Objection 8. Hence his Second which Equivocates in the word Objects is frivolous For I no where treat of the Objects or Mysteries of Faith in themselves or say the Connexion of their Terms must be Evident but only that the Certainty of the Humane Authority of the Church which I make our Rule to know they were taught by Christ must be prov'd from the Objects or things without us viz. the Nature of Mankind and the Nature of the Motives laid to perpetuate Christs Doctrine And I wonder at his Insincerity to alledge this when I had particularly forestall'd it in my Introduction p. 18. and declar'd there once for all that in the following Treatise I only spoke of the Motives to light Mankind in their way to
Make use therefore of what form of Subscription you please I replied Then I will declare that I do Subscribe not retracting my Doctrine but persisting in it which he allow'd and I did it in the self-same terms adding that I persisted in it as being free from Censure and approv'd by very Eminent Personages Which done the Censurers were order'd nay commanded to make me Satisfaction by an Instrument Sign'd by them both declaring that no Proposition in any Book of mine was toucht by their Censure Could there be a greater and more Authentick Clearing my Books and Doctrine from being Censur'd than that was or might not Dr St. by parity of reason as well have pretended that the Scripture teaches Atheism or that King David deserv'd to be Censur'd for saying There is no God as that any Proposition as found in my Books was there Censur'd or Declar'd Heretical 15. And now to lay open some of the Doctor 's Falshoods upon this occasion They are these 1. That the main Design of my Catholick Letters are there declar'd to be no Catholick Doctrine Well bowl'd Doctor Have I a word there pretending to shew the Mysteries of Faith or the Authority of the Church that is believ'd by Faith that is it's Supernatural Infallibility by Assistance of the Holy Ghost to be Demonstrable Is it not shewn you in most express words Third Cath. Letter p. 22.23 and in many other places that we speak only of the Humane Authority of the Church which is to be prov'd by Natural Mediums and not of the other which is believ'd by the Faithfull This then is a meer forg'd pretence against your own Conscience and perfect Knowledge 2. That I was Censur'd and retracted whereas 't is manifest not any thing as it lay in my Books that is indeed nothing of mine was Censur'd nor did I subscribe otherwise than as not Retracting my Doctrine but persisting in it as being free from Censure This the Arch-Bishop of Paris allow'd and the Censurers themselves judged to be Iust and True and upon those terms acquitted me and made me Satisfaction 3. He says that if this the Sense Condemn'd be not Catholick Doctrine he is Infallibly Certain my Letters are far from being Catholick in their Sense Now not one word is there in those Letters which is the Sense Condemn'd as I shew'd lately however I am glad he who has still been so high against all Infallibility in his Writings and deny'd it to the Catholick or any Church owns it at least in Himself I see now what Grounds he went upon when he would not make a Candid Retractation of his Irenicum Certainly this man would persuade us to take his word for our Rule of Faith. But the ill luck is his Infallibility is evidently prov'd already to be willfull Forgery against plain and Authentick matter of Fact. He say the A. B. of D. averrs many fine things already answer'd and that my Plea was ridiculous Which is false for any thing he or I know For that Illustrious Personage deny'd that Book of Lominus to be his or did any man own it but it came out surreptitiously without the Approbation of any man under an unknown name nay without so much as the Printers name to it which was punishable by the Laws there Whence we may judge of our Drs. sincerity In his Second Letter to Mr. G. p. 8. by putting Heresis Blacloana in the Margent over against his Appeal to F. W. He hinted that that Venerable Person was Author of that Book Beat off from that False and Ungrounded pretence he has found us another Author for it and I expect in his next piece we shall have a Third or Fourth according as his fancy so heated now that it has shaken off all regard to Civility shall prompt him Again he shews us how wonderfully ingenuous he is by his quoting against me the railing Book of an unknown Adversary which had besides all the Marks of a Libel in it and over-flipping the Attestation of Eight Worthy Divines of great repute who openly and owning their names did witness that those places in my Books did not bear the Sense in which those words pick't out thence were censur'd Add that Dr. St. knew all these particulars were clear'd satisfactorily since it appears by his quoting them he had read my Defences in which they are printed at large Which Common Sense may assure him I durst not have done in the Life-time of all the Persons mention'd and concern'd without quite losing my Cause Nay I should have expos'd my self to new Accusations as a Falsifier had I not dealt sincerely to a tittle and preserv'd all the Authentick Originals in my own hands for the Justification of my Defences which I yet have I charge the Dr. then to have publisht against me Willfull and Notorious Falshoods which he had reason to know to be such Yet we are still to think he did all this out of his pure Love to Moral Honesty of which he makes such a Saintly Profession I Challenge him moreover to shew me any one Catholique Writer of any Eminency I do profess I do not know so much as one of any degree whatever whoever Censur'd this Position that the Infallibility of the Churches Humane Authority antecedent to Faith and deriving down Christ's Doctrine might be demonstrated which is all I require in my Catholick Letters Whereas the Right Reverend F. W. has named him divers both Ancient and Modern who follow that Method in general and I have quoted divers Eminent Controvertists as occasion serv'd and particularly insisted on two beyond all Exception F. Fisher here in England and Dominicus de Sta Trinitate who writ and printed his Book at Rome and had it approv'd by the Magister Sacri Palatii who take the same way I do almost to a tittle I may add to the Drs. greater confusion the Authority of the Arch-Bishop of D. himself and of all those Eminent Persons who have approv'd my Doctrine as shall be seen hereafter 16. Not a man then has Dr St. on his side but one unknown and altogether unapprov'd Author Lominus and a bitter Adversary to me besides out of whose Falshoods interlarded with his own and by his Concealing my Replyes to all he objects and those such as fully satisfy'd my Judges and Superiours he makes a shift to patch up his Calumnies We will see next whether to his further shame my Books or Doctrin have not had Testimonials of greater weight to approve and authenticate them than that of Lominus was to Condemn them 17. In the first place that Blessed and Glorious Martyr the Illustrious and Eminently Learned Oliver Plunket Arch-Bishop of Armagh and Primate of all Ireland assoon as he heard my Books were oppos'd out of his meer Justice love of Truth and the Esteem he had of my Doctrin unsought to nay unthought of sent me out of Ireland an Approbation of it writ
Certainty in such Tradition I know no Party if Christian that has any Interest to oppose him The stronger any one can make this Faith they have all reason to like it the better By which 't is apparent that he is so far from condemning and censuring the way I take that he declares 't is not the Interest of any Party if Christian to oppose it and that himself and every one ought to like it better than the other way so it could be made good And that it can my best Reason tells me since as appears by my Method it has born the Test of being reduc't even to Self-Evidence and the miserable shifts and Evasions to which the most Learned of our Adversaries are driven to avoid it's force do more and more assure me 't is not at all hard to compass it 22. In the last place to omit many others I shall put the Testimony of that very Reverend Person F. Martin Harney Dr. of Divinity of the University of Lovain and Principal Regent of the General Studies of the Order of St Dominick Who being askt at Rome where he was at the time of the Contest his Judgment of my Doctrin compriz'd in my Method and of the Sense of the three Propositions as they lie in my Books gave under his hand this Testimonial of both I under-written have attentively read the Method writ by Mr John Sergeant and his Vindication of the three Propositions pickt out of his Books and I have found that the Method is sound Doctrin and usefull to reduce many to the Catholick Faith. And in his Vindiciae 'tis plainly demonstrated that the foresaid Propositions as written by the Author do make a Sense altogether Orthodox This Reverend Person I had never seen nor heard of nor could any thing but the love of Truth move him to this Approbation nay he must have lost much Credit with the Sacra Congregatio had my Doctrin been prov'd Vnorthodox or the Propositions in my Book as Infallible Dr. St. affirms Heretical 23. Modesty forbids me to mention the excessive Encomiums of that Eminent Controvertist Mr. Edward Worsley a Father of the Society who though utterly unknown to me took such a Friendship for me upon the reading my Books and in all places where he came extoll'd my poor Endeavours with such immoderate Expressions that to save my blushes in rehearsing them I intreat those who have the Curiosity to read them in my Declaratio from p. 73. to p. 78. I shew'd them to the Right Honourable the Earl of Castlemain who was pleas'd to do me the right to attest them to be his hand-writing The same noble Personage as many as knew F. Worsley will I doubt not do that right to his Memory as to witness for him that as he was Second to none in ability to distinguish between Sound and Tainted Doctrine so his sincere Candour and Integrity set him as far above the humour of Flattery as my Meanness could incline any to it 24. The Sum of my present Defence is this Eight Divines of great Repute appointed by the Arch-Bishop of Paris and admitted by my Adversary himself do unanimously attest that the Sense condemn'd is not in my Books but the contrary My Judge clears me the Censurers are commanded to make me Satisfaction The Highest Tribunal allows my Plea and acquits me Primates Arch-Bishops Bishops the Sorbon Eminent Divines and even those who take another way in their Writings approve and commend my Doctrine and most of them in very high and extraordinary expressions my own Superiour does the same nay even those who were formerly highly prejudic't declar'd themselves satisfy'd in it So that poor Dr. St. is left alone to ballance against all this weighty Authority with one Lominus a meer Utopian or Man in the Moon on whose sole no-Authority he grounds all his sensless Calumnies Was ever weak man so baffled Add that he knew that all these Defences of mine had been made and accepted many years ago and those Authorities alledg'd and my Doctrine thus approv'd and clear'd yet he had not the Candour to let his Reader have the least hint of any of those particulars which argues not too great love of Moral Honesty Nor does he take off any one Answer of those many I had given but only says over again rawly some few things objected reply'd to and printed fourteen Years ago and plays upon a double-sens't word or two by applying them still to wrong Subjects which is in effect to tell the Reader he must either talk insignificantly against evident matter of Fact or say just nothing and to confess in plain terms he is at a perfect Nonplus 25. To close this present business I desire the Reader to reflect that those Judges Approvers and Commenders of my Books and Doctrine liv'd generally in divers and far-distant Nations were of different Faculties and Universities of different Education different Orders and to some degree of different Principles and Interests some of them of slight acquaintance divers utterly unknown to me or I to Them. So that 't is impossible to imagine that any thing but the Force of Truth and the Integrity of my way of proving the Certainty of our Faith as to it 's being taught by Iesus Christ could make them conspire to allow or abet my Writings so heartily and unanimously Nor could there be any Human inducements to make them so partial to a private man every way inconsiderable and of no Esteem at all but what my Writings and Principles gave me Whence though no one Church as Dr. St. weakly objects has ever own'd my Doctrine to give formal Approbations of Controversial or Theological Writings not being a work proper for Churches yet the Dignity of the Persons and all these Circumstances consider'd I conceive it may amount to the full weight of the Judgment of any one particular Church whatsoever that my Doctrin is Sound and Orthodox Nor will he I believe find that any work of a particular Writer hath had more Authentick Testimonials for it than my poor Endeavours have had except that of the never-enough-praised the Bishop of Condom And 't is not the least Confirmation of their Integrity that they have been twice brought to the Tryal at Paris and Rome and nothing unsound found in them Though I must do the Doctor the right to acknowledge he has spoke one and hitherto but one true word but he is to be pardon'd for prevaricating from his constant method of speaking Falshoods for it was at unawares and he knew not he did so The Truth he spoke against his will was this That I hardly escaped Censure at Rome and therefore to make his words good I 'le tell him how it was All my Books were sent thither to Cardinal Barberin and amongst them one written by the Right Honourable my Lord Chancellour Hyde in defence of Dr. St. against Mr. Cressy pretending the Title of this last being torn out they were all writ by
it as I would by a hirco-cervus a four-squar'd Triangle Green Scarlet or whatever such desperate words one may put together to compound strong Nonsense How should I mean any thing by a Compound of two such words which the Goodness of Rational Nature and the aversion which our understanding power has to Contradiction has forbid any man to use ever since the Creation Did the Dr. or any man living hear any Mortal man when he is about to express his Certainty of a thing say I am Fallibly Certain of it Yet how oft has he heard them say I am Infallibly Certain of such a thing whence were the word Infallibly a different Notion from Certain or Difference added to it as to its Genus it would nay must admit the Opposite Difference Fallibly as is done in all such cases which since it does not without straining nature and the Language of Mankind 't is not a different Notion but the same with True Certainty and therefore in proper Speech True Certainty and Infallibility are both one Yet after he has thus abus'd the Language of all Mankind he has the Confidence to tell me I make use of those words in an Improper and unusual Sense This farther appears by this that our Speculators use to add Moral or some other such Epithet to it which are of a diminishing signification when they would express it's deficiency from True Certainty This Logical Demonstration to prove Certainty and Infallibility to be the same was alledg'd in Faith Vindicated p. 37. But we must excuse such slight Talkers from even attempting to give an Answer becoming a Scholar to any such close Proofs tho' it has been prest upon him in Errour Non-plust p. 92. and upon Dr Tillotson in Reason against Raâ—â—â—ery from p. 64. to p. 67. He only tells us what he does own does not own and such sleeveless sayings that is he only says over again his own crude Tenets with the formality of a Distinction or two and places his main hopes to uphold his Credit not in the Strength of his Answers but in the Weakness or Partiality of his Readers The upshot is he owns clearly he has only Fallible Grounds for his Faith having been taught by Christ which is to assert and maintain for it is not to be suppos'd he will allow any others to have surer Grounds than his own that All Christian Faith may be False and the Grounds themselves in more Regards than one most perfect Nonsence 47. He proceeds next to give us his Notion of Absolute Certainty in these words When the Evidence is the highest which in point of Reason the thing is capable of then there is that which I call Absolute Certainty These words Which I call are very Emphatical and precisely True for no man living but himself and Dr. T. that I know of ever call'd it so For suppose the Evidence be but very slight and the Thing as propos'd to us or in our Circumstances can give us no more will this slight glimmering Evidence make us Absolutely Certain of it Again Does he mean in point of True Reason inform'd by the best Maxims to direct and establish it This is Conclusive Evidence or Demonstration and the Conclusion thus deduc't is Infallibly True because the Maxim which legitimates the Consequence is as all Logicians know Infallibly Certain being a Principle of our Understanding and Self-evident Is it this he means No He does not like Conclusive Evidence in the Grounds of his Faith by no means To come closer I ask him Does he mean that True Knowledge conformable to the Thing or object fixes him in that Certainty or in great part his own aiery Apprehension If such a Knowledge then since none can truly know what is not that Knowledge is as Impossible to be False or is as Infallibly True as 't is that the thing must be what it is And if no such Knowledge grounds his Certainty how is it an Absolute or Perfect one Can his apprehending it so make it so Can a man be Absolutely Certain of a Falshood because he apprehends that Falshood to be a Truth or that a thing is so when 't is not so If not then 't is only it 's being so which can be the Ground of Absolute Certainty and justify that Assent and then that Assent is Infallible for a thing is Infallibly what it is He 'l say he took it to be so and that 's enough But to omit that his taking a thing to be so neither makes nor proves it to be so I press farther When he took it to be so Did he take it right or did he mistake it If he took it right then again his Knowledge and Certainty grounded on that Knowledge are both Infallible for his Knowledge when he took it right could not but be conformable to the Thing and the Thing is Infallibly as it is If he took it wrong or mistook it and yet be Absolutely Certain of it then again there may be Absolute Certainty of a Falshood or that a thing is so which is not so which is a rare kind of Certainty indeed especially for the Ground of his Faith and Posterity no doubt will owe much to his Memory for the Invention 'T is left then that he must say he did not know whether he took it right or wrong but apprehended he took it right In which case to omit that this apprehending or thinking the Evidence so strong as to determin assent is the Second kind of Certainty he assigns here before he comes to Absolute Certainty I ask how he can possibly think himself Certain a thing is such when he sees he does not know whether he be mistaken in it or no And how a Judgment that a thing absolutely is and a Judgment that it may not be for any thing he knows can be consistent together in an Intellectual Nature without destroying the First Principle of our Understanding viz. That 't is not Possible the same thing should at once be and not be 48. I have not done with this new invented Absolute Certainty of his It must spring he says from the Highest Evidence which in point of Reason the thing is capable of Where every expression is Indeterminate and Ambiguous Suppose as I urg'd lately the thing be not capable of any Clear Evidence as himself supposes there is not for such or such a Doctrin to have been taught by Christ why must he needs Assent at all Why does he not Suspend God has endow'd us with a Faculty of doing this as a bridle to keep us from Precipitation and to preserve us from running into Errour why should we not use it but expose our selves to run headlong into Mistakes both prejudiciall to our Nature whose Perfection is Truth and pernicious in its Consequences to the Conduct of our Lives Again Certainty taken from the Thing as he says this is signifies a Determination of the Mind by means of the Object and is the
and pursu'd with so many forcible Arguments that there can be no plainer Confession that his Cause is lost than not to attempt to answer them especially since the hinge of the whole Controversy depends upon it It was his Concern too to avow or disavow his dear Friend Dr. Burnet's Position making his Sober Enquirer judge of Councils but he would not be so candid Why declines he the giving us satisfaction that he does indeed hold the Testimony for Scripture Absolutely Certain by making out from the Nature of the Things why it must be so See Reader how it was there demanded of him and urg'd upon him to do himself and his Faith that Honour and Credit Yet he is perfectly deaf to all sollicitations of that kind And the Reason is because should should he do this as he ought to do he must necessarily make the Church Infallible and rely upon her Infallibility for the Certainty of Scriptures Letter and should it come to be prov'd that 't is easier to transmit down the same Doctrin than an Exact Copy this would oblige his Sober Enquirer to be led by her in matters of Faith. A condescendence not to be submitted to by his Fanatick Friends both because their First Principle is to think themselves wiser than the Church as also because to prove this would make the Knowledge of Christ's Doctrin too strong by Proofs and Outward Means which their Gifted and Inspir'd Genius impossible ever to be prov'd but by doing Miracles cannot away with To proceed Why clears he not himself from being oblig'd by his Principles to own a Brotherhood with all Hereticks who profess to follow Scripture as much as he does by shewing some Absolutely Certain Means to distinguish his Faith from theirs Did not the doing this mainly concern his Credit when it was severely objected and shewn that he had given just occasion for this Suspition of all comprehending Principles Why no Account given of the Absolute Certainty of Particular Texts and the most significant Words in each of them as well as of the Canon or Number of Books without which let the Canon be as Certain as it will 't is impossible for him to know assuredly whether what he holds be True Faith or Heresy Why no Answer to my Objection that to be the Word of God is not sufficient to make Scripture a Rule unless it has withall Perspicuity or Clearness to give those who read it and rely on it Absolute Certainty of its true Sense or Faith in those high Mysteries and Spiritual Points controverted between the Church and her Deserters Why no Reply to my Confutation of his smartest or rather Only Argument to prove Scripture a Rule given by me particularly to every Branch of it Is not a business of such high Consequence worth his Defence his whole Cause as far as 't is manag'd by him standing or falling by his maintaining or deserting that main Proof for it Why does he give us no Grounds that elevate Faith as it depends on the Rule ascertaining us it came from Christ above Opinion whenas it was charg'd upon him that he had no such Grounds and he was loudly call'd upon to produce them but to aggravate the fault to call here p. 41. all the Points of Christian Faith there spoken of Particular Opinions Why takes he no notice of the several Senses of the word Rule and in which of those Senses it is taken properly and why it must necessarily be taken in such a Sense in our Controversy but instead of doing this run on wilfully mistaking it still Why not a word in Confutation of an Infallible Iudge as that Point is stated by me Why did he not accept my Challenge that he could not shew me any one Solid Proof in his whole Treatise that he could maintain since the doing this had been a great Blurr to me and a high Credit to himself nay the very offering at it might have kept our Readers in some Suspence whether he were perfectly baffled or no whenas his total declining it is a plain Confession he does not think fit to stand to any one Proof he has produc't Why no Reply to my Discourse demonstrating that a Rule must be the Immediate Light to know the Thing in order to which 't is to regulate us and therefore that however he pretends to Scripture yet his own Interpretation or the Means he uses to Interpret it is unavoidably his Rule As also that the Testimony of all Christian Churches did not recommend to him such a Rule of Faith and that a Testimony for the Letter confess'd by himself to be Fallible stood in great need of his Logick to make what 's built on it to be Absolutely Certain Why not a word to the Testimony of that Antient and Holy Father and most Solid Controvertist St. Athanasius which quite overthrows the whole Scheme of his Doctrin and makes all his Sober Enquirers Unbelievers or Infidels And why no Excuse for his not putting amongst his Helps the Iudgment of the present Church at least of the Church of England this being both an easier Help than 't is to use his other painfull Methods to understand Scripture right more agreeable to the Order of the world especially since he stands impeacht of destroying Church-Government as to any thing belonging to Faith Why does not he shew us how Mr T. could be a Sober Enquirer whom he defends for so suddenly settling his Enquiry and Resolving tho' he did not use those Means which the Dr himself affirm'd his Sober Enquirers were bound to use especially since this carriage of the Dr's shews him very willing to contradict at pleasure even his own Principles and to dispense with those Obligations he himself had impos'd when it suits with his Interest Whence every considering man must necessarily conclude he holds not heartily and steadily to any Principle at all Why should not his Sober Enquirers trust the Church rather than themselves and why no Answer to the Reasons why they should Why does not he confute my Discourse proving that a Judge proceeding upon an Inerrable Rule is Infallible and that 't is no prejudice to the Church that those whom she has cast out or are her Enemies deny her to be such Why answers he not my Particular Reasons against his kind of Judgment of Discretion or the Reasons given for ours but makes impertinent Discourses of his own at random without regarding either our Objections or our Proofs nay when he had occasion without acknowledging their Distinction but most unconscionably pretending them to be the same whereas their Difference and perfect Opposition to one another is laid out there very largely and particularly And now Gentlemen I request even those who are the most Partial of his Friends to count over the Pages cited in the Margent and if you find by an exact Review that I have neither misreckon'd