ancient Copies Versions and Paraphrases especially the Septuagint and the Chaldee Paraphrast by observing the various readings and applications of places as we find them scatter'd in the writings of the Fathers and many other ways wherein you are better experienced then my self 2. To preserve the Faith it is necessary to distinguish in the Scripture points fundamentall from those which are not so This was proposed by the wise and learned King Iames as the best expedient for ending the Controversies of Christendom For as no book or doctrine so especially not the doctrine of the Scripture can be well understood much less maintain'd without an Analysis separation and digestion of the parts of it It being a Collection of the writings of so many Pen-men and those written upon severall occasions no one regularly delivering the whole Faith Now by Fundamentall points we do not mean necessary for all to know and believe to Salvation for to some more to some fewer are necessary according to their severall abilities and opportunities But we mean points principall and most essentiall in respect of the whole System of the doctrine of Salvation such as are necessary to make up the Unity of the Faith and so constitute a Church A perfect Catalogue of these we have in the Apostles Creed so called as the Fathers generally tell us because made by the Apostles before their dispersion to be a Rule in their preaching And therefore we need not go so far for a Rule of Faith or look upon it as so strange a thing and so difficult to find having it in our dayly prayers For this Creed is I conceive proposed in the Church of England to her Sons and Daughters as a Rule of Faith and was therefore in the beginning of the Reformation injoyned to be taught the People in English together with the Pater Noster and Ten Commandments the Breviats of our petenda and agenda respectively as that is of our Credenda And hath been therefore commanded ever since to be repeated twice a day that we might not if possible be to seek in so necessary a thing as the Rule of Faith This Creed the Ancients appeal to as to their Rule of Faith and thought their Faith sufficiently secured so long as this was stuck to Especially as it is opened in some parts by the Catholique Creeds of Nice Constantinople Ephesus Chalcedon and Athanasius This way they took to defend the Faith and with good reason for the defence of the Articles of our Creed involves the defence of all the Catholique Doctrine As in all sciences the principles Iustifie those Conclusions that are truly made from them 3. For the defence of the Faith it is necessary to study the old Ecclesiasticall Writers Fathers Councels Historians or whatsoever other they be For a great part of the points of our Faith being matters of fact such as our Saviours Birth Death Resurrection c. And our knowledge of the rest that are not matters of fact depending upon those that are they must in reason be best learned from the study of those books where they are best delivered historically whereof Scripture is the first and most Authentick record And next to it are the Christian writers of the eldest times For what is not recorded in Scripture cannot now be expected any where but in their writings Tradition whatever some men would make of it having so early and so grosly fail'd in the business of Easter admitting infants to the Eucharist and some other things Besides the many and great conflicts that they had with the Hereticks who oppugned the chief points of Faith give us a sight of all that can be objected against them and of enough though not all that is to be said in defence of them We do not say they are to be read with an implicite Faith as the Scripture is The infallible Inspiration of the Holy Ghost being withdrawn when the first Planters of the Gospel had finished their course and left the Word written Yet it seems the Holy Spirit did not take away all his extraordinary light at once having guided them to profess defend and deliver to us a more pure and unmingled Faith and this embraced with a more fervent and divine Love then the following ages could boast of How carefully the Church of England hath followed the ancient Fathers in this matter of Faith how much she relies on their Iudgement herein appears from the constant allegations of her ablest defenders since the Reformation and from her own act in Convocation 1571 where she forbids her publick Preachers to propose any thing to the People as matter of Faith but that which Catholici Patres veteres Episcopi ex S. Scripturae Doctrinâ collegerint which the Ancient Pastors and Catholick Doctors of the Church have drawn out of the Holy Scripture And it were no great boldness to challenge all her adversaries to show where she hath once swerved from this Rule or own'd any one point of Faith which she hath not proved after Scripture from a full consent of the Ancient Church To these must be added the study of the Schoolmen and of the chief writers of all Christian Churches that are or have been Since what is confess'd that there always hath been and now is one Catholick Church therefore one because professing this same Rule of Faith is to be demonstrated from the records of the severall Churches in the volumes of their Writers 4. The fourth means is the often teaching and explaining these chief articles and other approved and authorised forms of sound words to those that are most apt to learn and use best to remember what they learn And they are the younger sort to whom these points are made most intelligible by the familiar way of Catechising This is doubtless next to the inward operation of Gods grace the best and most effectual preaching and planting the Faith in any Soul To these it is commonly delivered in the most plain and free manner without any false glosses or sophistry which may hide or adulterate the light of it And in these tender and untainted minds it finds the least enmity and opposition obtains an easie quiet and secure possession and growing up with them becomes a rock and shelter against the winds of strange doctrines Whereas on the other hand even the reading of the written Word of God and much more the hearing of it paraphras'd upon in popular discourses and sermons is of far less use often of dangerous consequence to those that not onely want their first principles but it may be are leavened with false ones And therefore it is necessary that this be done as was said with approved and authorised forms of words For as the wisdom of the Church is best able to prescribe what is generally necessary for all her members to know and believe for their souls health So the interest that both Church and State have in the right principling of Youth
Print in the frequent Meetings of Dissenters and other ways Opinions so repugnant to the Christian Faith and destructive of true Piety will now have the same malignant influence and effect upon both which heretofore they used to have And will diffuse a venom too strong for any help but that Power which planted the Faith in its first Purity And withall it is to be feared that the great dishonour done to the Majesty of God the injuries done to our meek and most blessed Saviour and to the most holy and sanctifying Spirit by these blasphemous opinions and by that wanton liberty they have of walking abroad with Publick connivence will bring upon us a guilt and wrath from God not to be expiated by another twenty Years suffering VI. The sixth means to defend the Faith is by a dayly and constant confession of it in all times and trials even of death and Martyrdom We are taught to profess our Rule of Faith twice a day in our publick prayers And upon good reason For as all truth desires nothing more then that beauty that is native to it to commend it to our belief and best defends it self against all contradiction when it appears most naked So certainly truths of so illustrious a magnitude as the Articles of our Creed cannot be better preached and maintained then by an open hearty and constant profession of them The most difficult service which they require of us in the greatest opposition is then but to own them with which alone we gain an absolute Conquest over all the World 1 Iohn 5. 4 5. This is the victory that overcometh the world even our Faith Who is he that overcometh the world But he that believeth that Iesus is the Son of God Our Faith is the purchase of His exinanition and therefore the Cross the inseparable badge of it not to be laid aside when God puts it upon us without certain loss of those Heavenly Ioys that attend patient suffering for the truth and Martyrdom which as it is of peculiar benefit to those that faithfully wade through it sanctifying that death which we owe to Nature for sin and raising it as a gift of Faith and Patience offered up acceptably to God So it did of Old and always will give the greatest renown to the Christian Faith and Name being next the Miracles wrought by God himself the most pregnant and visible testimony of the Power of the Holy Ghost going along with the Faith And of this the first ages of the Church are a sufficient proof These are some of the proper and direct ways of contending for the Faith There are others that come in as Auxiliaries and serve onely by consequence The chief of which are these two 1. Holyness of life Purity of mind and conscience This is the proper vehicle of true Faith 1 Tim. 3. 9. Holding the mystery of the Faith in a pure Conscience Cap. 1. 19. Which some having cast away concerning Faith have made shipwrack Long gathered habits of vertue or vice insensibly cast the Soul into a setled state of good or evil respectively In which case from the dictate of self-preservation as all things else it naturally seeks and adheres to such principles as will make good and maintain the condition it is possest of If the condition be good it appeals to Faith as the author and refuge of it in the strength whereof it stands and in the encrease of it doth triumph and glory If the condition be evil then Faith appears as a witness against us and a tormentor and the Soul cannot contemplate it without horror but must turn aside and betake it self to the refuge of lies some doctrines however false yet plausible that may help it at present to silence the fear of a Iudgement to come Which Article and severall others as remission of sins the resurrection and eternall life are absolutely inconsistent with a continuation and security in evil courses It is true Faith is supernaturall Grace infused into our Souls by God himself from above Yet it is liable to be disturbed yea and ejected too by the strength of our own corruptions and the powers of darkness raigning in us These stifle and extinguish those motions and illuminations whereby the holy Spirit doth usually work Faith in us Who though he delight to dwell in Tabernacles of Clay in the hearts of the Sons of Men yet abhorrs and flyes from the tents of the wicked especially the proud and the sensuall And it is notorious in the history of the Church that the great Heresies that troubled it of old had their birth from one of these either the Ambition or Debauchery of their first Broachers 2. The next means Is to preserve the dignity of the Ministers of the Gospel who are the Dispensers of this Faith Did Christians generally found their belief and practice upon those rules and principles by which they are to be measured there would be the less need of this But it is obvious to be observed that men commonly begin with the esteem of a Person or Party and then raise their Faith according to the dictate of that Person or Party This the Hereticks of all ages have seen and therefore made it their first business to worm themselves into vogue and credit being sure they must needs be Masters of their Faith whose understandings their reputation had first blinded And indeed we cannot reasonably expect that our Doctrine should gain much upon the minds of those that despise our Persons or Callings which God be thanked at present is not nor lightly can be done by any but such in whom Atheism or Fanaticism hath smothered if not destroyed the power of Religion All Nations not wholly barbarous have lookt upon it as both the security of their Religion and Glory of their Countrey to have the estate of their Priesthood maintained in honour and plenty And it were much to be wished that the Reformed Churches of Christendom had not been in this point more sordid and sacrilegious then all other Christians not to say Nations in the World We have seen verified in England what was upon this miscarriage in the Reformation foretold by the most learned and Iudicious Writer of his rank among the Protestants That the time of Religion and the Service of God would likely fall as the age of Man within seventy or eighty years and what followed would be small Ioy to them that beheld it And we are yet to pray and hope that the little that remains may escape if possible all fears and Iealousies from the luxury and profaness of the Age The naturall issue of which vices in conjunction is the devouring of holy things and then an open Apostafie from the Faith Unless Gods mercy make them childless as unlawfull embraces often prove I have now sufficiently tired you with a lame account of some things in the right management whereof the continuance of our Faith is greatly concern'd And had we hearts to make use
of them with that Zeal and constancy which the greatness of the Cause it self and our unchangeable concernment in it require and was the second part of our earnest Contention proposed they would not fail through Gods blessing who never deserts the Cause of Faith to make our Church and People happy But they have generally had that bad fortune that other good things have to be better known and valued from the want then from the enjoyment and benefit of them A miscarriage which surely we have since his Majesties most happy Restauration been guilty of A miscarriage that must from the notion and nature of it make Mankind miserable all happiness consisting in the right apprehension and enjoyment of the good we are possest of And the more extreamly miserable the greater Importance and Necessity the things themselves are of which was the Third member of the Text and hath two parts First the importance of our carnest contending for our Rule of Faith It is the securing of the foundation and the very Being of the Church and the Pillars of our future Happiness and undoubtedly of the greatest consequence Secondly the necessity of it now the Greater because of the restless importunity and unrestrained licenciousness of our Adversaries which is so visible and causes so much complaint already that I shall not spend time in speaking of it nor I hope need to caution you to defend yourselves against it Yet must not forget to put you in the right way to do it and that is by laying at home in your own Souls a good foundation of this Ancient and Holy Faith by a diligent learning of and resolute adhering to these Articles to this Rule of Faith as it is literally delivered in the plainest places of Holy Scripture and comprised and explained in the three Creeds and the Church Catechism If we forsake these holds there is nothing in the Christian World can secure our Faith These we are therefore constantly to teach our Flocks and they diligently to learn and to consider that exhortation of the Apostle Hebr. 13. 7 8 9. Remember them which have the rule over you who have spoken unto you the Word of God whose Faith follow considering the end of their conversation Iesus Christ the same yesterday and to day and for ever And be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines FINIS a Sure Foot Disc. 1. Para. â—7 b Lib. 1. capp 2 3. c De Praescript Regula est autem fidei ut jam hinc quid credamus defendamus illa scilicet quâ creditur unum ominino deum esse Haec regula à Christo Instituta nullas habet apud nos quaestiones nisi quas Haereses inferunt quae Haereticos faciunt Ceterùm manente forma ejus in suo ordine quantum libet quaeras tractes Fides in regulâ posita est Cedet Curiositas Fidei Certè aut non strepant aut quiescant adversus Regulam Idem de Veland Virg. Regula quidem fidei una omnino est soimmobilis irreformalis credendi scilicet in unicum Deum omnipotentem mundi Conditorem d Serm. de temp 119. Symbolum est breviter complexa Regula fidei Idem de fide symbolo Idem de Genesi ad literam Catholica fides Est haec Deum Patrem omnipotentem universam creaturam fecisse Idem similiter pluries alibi e Adversus Valentin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Contra Marcosios versus finem In Ancoratu versus finem In compendiariâ verâ doctrinâ De fide Catholicae Apostolicae Ecclesiae In Marcelli fide conscriptâ f Ad Cledonium adversus Apollinarium Orat. 52. Fidem Nicaenam vocat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vide sequentia ibid. Idem Contra Iulian. Orat. 3. g Epist. ad Pulcheriam August Siquidem ipsa Catholici Symboli brevis perfecta confessio Tam instructa sit munitione coelesti ut omnes Haereticorum opiniones solo ipsius gladio possunt detruncari Hujus symboli plenitudincm si Eutiches Sure foot Disc. 4. Par. 5. Lib. 3. Cap. 4. Verbo Dei â— 1. cap 2. Concil Triden Sess. 4. Ibid. 1 Cor. 4. 13. S. Mar. 13. 10. Sure foot Disc. 2. para 2. Ibid. Edw. Injunct 5. Q. Eliz. Injunct 5. Rubr. before the Apostles Creed Canon de Concionator pag. 19 True relation of the Form and Government of the Kirk of Scotland 1640. Primo Eliz. cap. 1. Hooker Eccles Pol. l. 5. par 79.