therefore that persons to bee converted may come to Faith without demonstration at all I may perhaps say that in an Assent thus grounded there is found at the bottom what is demonstrable by a learned man or apt to yeeld matter for a demonstration but that those who come to Faith must demonstrate or frame demonstrations which 't is manifest onely Schollers and good ones too can do is fa from my Tenet however 't is your Kindness to put it upon mee right or wrong You shall take your choice whether the Reader shall think you understand not the Tenet you are confuting or that understanding it you wilfully injure it You proceed p. 153. that according to Mr. S. Reason can never demonstrate that the one is a Certain and Infallible Rule the other not That never is a hard word and it will seem wonderfull to some Readers I should say Reason can never demonstrate this and yet in that very Book contend to demonstrate it by Reason my self nay make that the main scope of my Book But Sir those Readers know not yet the power of your wit and sincerity which can make mee say any thing nay say and unsay as it pleases Yet you quote my express words for it Sure-footing p. 53. where you say I tell you Tradition hath for it's basis Man's Nature not according to his Intellectualls because they do but darkly grope in the pursuit of Science c. I deny them Sir to bee my words or sence you have alter'd the whole face and frame of them by putting in the word Because which makes mee discourse as if man's Intellectualls could never arrive at Evidence nor consequently Certainty and you keep the Reader from knowing the true sence of my words by curtailing the sentence with an c. my words are not according to his Intellectualls darkly groping in the pursuit of Science by reflected thoughts or Speculations amidst the misty vapours exhal'd by his Passion predominant over his rationall will which discovers I speak of our Intellectualls plac't in such circumstances or employ'd about such a matter as our Passion or Affection is apt to blind and mislead us in it which wee experience too too often But do I therefore affirm our understanding can never arrive at Science at all or that our Passion exhales vapours to hinder us from seeing the Truth of the first Proposition in Euclid or was it ever heard that any man was transported so by his Passion as to deny there was a Henry the 8th Or can any one out of Passion bee ignorant of or forget what is inculcated into his Sences almost every day which naturall Knowledge I there make the Basis of Tradition Pray Sir reflect on my words once more and on the Tenour of my Discourse and you shall see it onely says that Tradition has for it's Basis man's Nature not according to his morall part which is of it self pervertible nor yet his Intellectualls as subject to his Moralls but on naturall Knowledges imprinted by direct Sensations not subject at all to his Will but necessary and inevitable and when you have done this you will easily see how you injure mee though I expect not from you any Acknowledgment of it You commit those Faults too often to concern your self in such a trifle as any handsome Satisfaction Your next Citation p. 153. layes on load 'T is taken out of my 2d Appendix p. 183. My whole Discourse there is to show how Reason behaves her self in finding out the Authority shee is to rely on that this is God's Sence or Faith and how in the points of Faith themselves Concerning the former I discourse there § 3. and have these Expressions that No Authority deserves assent farther than true Reason gives it to deserve that the Church's Authority is found by my Reason to bee Certain that 't is perfectly rationall to beleeve the Church assuring mee the Divine Authority is engag'd for such and such points that Gods and the Church's Authority as Objects imprinting a conceit of themselves in my mind as they are in themselves oblig'd my Reason to conclude and my Iudgment to hold them such as they were nor have I the least expression of diffidence of naturall Reason's certifying mee perfectly of the Ground of my Faith which can no wayes bee done by Acts of reflected Reason which I there speak of but by demonstrating it After this § 4. I come to discourse how differently Reason bears her self in order to the points of Faith or the mysteries themselves Hereupon I have these words p. 183. Reason acts now much differently than formerly Before I came at Faith shee acted about her own Objects Motives or Maxims by which shee scan'd the Autho rities wee spoke of but in Acts of Faith shee hath nothing to do with the Objects of those Acts or Points of Faith Then follow immediately the words you cite Shee is like a dim-sighted man who us'd his Reason to find a trusty Friend to lead him in the twy-light and then rely'd on his guidance rationally without using his own Reason at all about the Way it self Which most plainly signifies that as a dim-sighted man cannot use his Reason about the Way for that requir'd it should well affect his Senses and imprint it's right notion there which it did not but yet could use his Reason about chusing a trusty Friend to guide him for this depended not on his dim-sight but the converse and negotiation with his neighbours and relations which hee had been inur'd to and so was capable to wield and manage such a Discourse So our Reason dim-sighted in the Mysteries of Faith in which neither Senses nor Maxims of Human Science had given her light enough could not employ her talent of discoursing evidently and scientifically to conclude the Points of Faith themselves but yet was by Motives and Maxims within her own Sphere enabled to scan the nature of Authorities and find out on which as on a trusty Friend shee might safely rely This Sir is evidently my Discourse from whence you will needs force mee to say Reason is dim-sighted about the Authority wee come to Faith by or the Rule of Faith Now my whole Discourse in that very place aiming at the direct contrary and you leaving out the immediately foregoing words which clearly discover'd it I hope you will not take it ill Sir if I tell you I fear any sincere Examiner of it will judge that though you hold Plain-dealing a Jewell yet you would not bee willing to go to too much cost for it Especially when he reflects that you build better half your Confutation in your Book on such kind of willing mistakes and hope to blind it and make it take by Sophister-like quibbles flouts and jeers with which you use to sound your own triumph I expected sweet Sir some First Principles of your Discourse and I see now you intend those Artifices for such none else have I met with nor do you
A LETTER OF THANKS From the AUTHOR OF SURE-FOOTING To his Answerer Mr. J. T. Quis autem magis de his novit hic ne seductus homo qui etiam nunc superest hucusque in hoc mundo versatur aut qui ante nos Testes fuerunt habentes ante nos Traditionem in Ecclesiâ quique etiam à Patribus suis Traditum acceperunt quemadmodum etiam hi à Patribus suis didicerunt qui ante ipsos fuerunt quomodo Ecclesia acceptam à Patribus suis veram fidem usque huc continet itemque Traditiones Epiphan contra Aerium haer 75. Paris 1666. SIR 1. YOur Friend Mr. Stillingfleet who I thank him professes a great deal of real kindness for mee tells your self in the beginning of his Appendix that your performances in your Book have been so clear and satisfactory that hee hopes Mr. S. in stead of another Letter of directions to his Answerer will write you one of Thanks for the Reason and Kindness you have shew'd him throughout your Book I hate to be ungratefull and have that reall kindness for him and your self too as not to suffer your hopes to be defeated My Obligations of Gratitude hee concieves to spring from a twofold Head the Reason and the Kindness you have shown mee The former of which is to be examin'd by reducing the respective parts of your Discourse to Grounds or Principles which I shall do when it shall please God to give me leasure and health to answer your Book and I promise you faithfully to own as much Reason in it as these will allow mee I fear you may dislike the verdict of Principles and think them discourteous because of their inflexible genius and self-confident too because they love naturally to express themselves with an Assuredness and are oft so bold as unconcern'd in the Sceptical humour of others to talk of those bug bears to Fancy Evidence and Demonstration But be assur'd Sir though they are not altogether so good-natur'd nor bashfull as your timorous quivering Probabilities which you phrase modest yet they are very just and honest and as they cannot flatter you so neither will they injure you in the least My other Obligation to Gratitude is the Kindness you have shew'd me and as Mr. Stillingfleet sayes very truly throughout your Book which it were a Sin to deny For I know no greater Kindness from one that opposes me than to write in such a manner as to put himself upon the greatest Disadvantages imaginable to give me so many Advantages against him and his Cause Nor am I to expect your Intention should go along with your Favours 't is abundant Kindness in an Adversary that by his means I enjoy the reality of the Benefit and this I have receiv'd from you never to bee forgotten but with Ingratitude As oft as you omit what 's important mistake either voluntarily or weakly triumph causlesly injure me undeservedly cavill groundlesly prevaricate from the business purposely revile bitterly jeer sillily or falsify and pervert my meaning or words palpably so many reall Kindnesses you conferr upon your poor Servant of which in this Letter of mine both to your self and the world I here make my hearty Profession and Acknowledgment 2. And first I am to give you very humble thanks for totally waving to take notice of my Letter to my Answerer The whole scope of it was to request you would hold to a Method which was evidently Conclusive that you would begin with some First Principles and vouch them to bee as First Principles should bee self-evident That as all Art and Common Sence gives it you would not produce any Thing against Tradition till you show it depends not on Tradition for its Certainty that you would either confess your Testimonies unapt to Certify or declare in what their virtue of Certifying consists which must needs either show them feeble if they be such or if otherwise enforce and strengthen them That you would uphold your Arguments satisfactory that is able to subdue the Understanding to Assent and show us how they come by that virtue with diverse other Requests not Prescriptions as you call them onely tending to make a short End of Controversy by bringing Truth quickly to a clearing by the way of Principles Now who sees not that I had oblig'd my self to the same severe Laws of Concluding by proposing them to you and so had you had any Principles worthy to be call'd such or the confidence in your Cause to venture upon any Conclusive method you had gain'd a notable advantage against me in laying hold of that method and obliging me to stand to it because I was the Proposer of it At least you might have pleas'd to have shown my Way Inconclusive and substituted and establish't a better in case you had thought any Evident or Conclusive method your Advantage But 't is a manifest signe you judg'd any rigorous way of Concluding unsutable to your Causes and your own Interest and that to continue still on Foot Inconclusive endlesly-talking wayes of Discourse as is yours which consists in being able to say a great many pretty plausible any-things to every thing was more proportion'd and advantageous to your moderate modest courteous and probable Faith which is I dare say for it far from that Boldness and Self-confidence as to talk of Principles Evidence Demonstration or even Certainty unless minc't and allay'd with the Epithet Sufficient though you will never show us how acknowledg'd possibility to be otherwise can ever convince us sufficiently to Assent the thing is so or why a Capacity to bee false for any thing wee know is not the very notion of Incertainty and so most abusively pinn'd to the notion of Certainty Now that you should so perfectly wave speaking to that Letter it being particularly directed to your self whereas the Book you pretend to answer was not the end aym'd at in it being by all men's Confession very importantly good that is to shorten Controversies and bring our Disputes to a period also the method of Discoursing being as Logick tells us one of the praecognoscenda to the Discourse it self and so either Disputant has right to require it should be first treated of though I civilly requested it of you Lastly it being so indifferently fram'd to your or my interest or rather totally for his who had Truth or Grounds on his side that is for you were your cause so qualify'd and as such equally lik't by Judicious Protestants as well as Catholicks This being so that you should so totally sleight and disregard it in these circumstances is a clear argument you think it not safe to venture your cause and Credit upon Principles or any Evident or Conclusive method of discoursing and a plain Confession by way of Fact that all your discourse against my Book has neither Principles to subsist by nor Evidence to conclude by Which acknowledgment of yours though tacitly and modestly exprest for you are a
Tradition is the Rule of Faith is as much as to say Orall Tradition is the Rule of Faith the whole business had been concluded without any more ado and I think no body would have gone about to confute him What a terrible thing it is to deal with your great Wits Let 's see how a little honest plain Logick will dissipate this vapour To Conclude is to show evidently that two notions wee call the Subject and Predicate are identify'd or connected in that Proposition we call the Conclusion To do this wee find a Third notion call'd a medium or Argument to bee identify'd with those two whence wee infer them to be the same but how shall wee know that third notion to bee identify'd with those two others that is how shall wee know the major and minor propositions to bee true By finding another medium connected with them And how far must this go on Endlesly or no If endlesly since every following Connexion is prov'd by some foregoing ones in case wee cannot come to see some First Connexion or Principle wee could conclude or deduce nothing And how must we evidence the Connexion of the Terms or of the Subject and Predicate in these First Principles By another antecedent connexion of those Terms with a Third No for these are suppos'd the First Connexions Wherefore since they cannot be evidenc't by any thing out of themselves and yet must be Evident else nothing could bee evidenc't by them it follows they must bee Evident of themselves or self-Evident And in what consists this Self Evidence meerly in this that no medium middle Term or Argument can come between the notions of their Subject and Predicate which devolves finally into this that the Subject and Predicate are perfectly the same notion So that all Science about any thing is finally resolv'd into the nature or Essence of that thing that is into that things being what it is or which is all one it 's being the same with its self which your great Learning laughs at Hence what is is or Every thing is what it is as plain and course as it looks is the last resort of all Evidence in the world and in particular Sciences that the Subject of that Science is what it is as that man is a Man Quantity is Quantity and so a Rule is a Rule Faith is Faith must principle all that can bee solidly concluded either about Man Quantity Rule or Faith 6. Had you reflected on any maxims of Art and not stood pursuing your affected buffonerie when it became you to discourse like a solid Scholler you would have seen how little ground you had for your taunting non-sence To say that a Rule is a Rule is a First Principle had not been held a just occasion of giggling much less had you been so indiscreet as to parallell my Conclusion Orall Tradition is the Rule of Faith with my Principle A Rule is a Rule or to put it upon mee that because I make my Terms in my Principle self-evidently Identicall therefore I ought to do so in my Conclusion too whereas your Conscience tells you and my whole Book informs the Reader I go about at least to prove it in so rigorous a method that as you fear to admit and so wave speaking to my Letter so you and your fellow Probable-Christians judge it your best play to laugh at it And 't is a cheap way if you had a Fool to deal with who would let such weak evasions serve your turn But let mee summ up my obligations to you at present You have manifestly falsify'd my Intention pretending I mean't to define whenas I expresly disown'd it Sure Footing p. 4. You omit to answer whether those Propositions or Predications of mine bee true or false and if true whether my Consequences bee right or no which was all your task at present you lay the gull you have rais'd for your Ground and thereupon cavill and flout all the way without sense reason or the least occasion You laugh at the nature of First Principles bewraying either your Ignorance of those things on which all solid Discourse can onely bee built or your Necessity of scorning such unfriendly Discoverers of your weakness which is the worst of all you make this unsavoury kind of Talk the first part of your Onset and the first tast you give your Reader of your Sincerity and depth of Reasoning And now Sir bee Judge your self whether the confessing your self thus amply to bee a disingenuous and weak Caviller bee not strangely obliging to your thankfull Servant Really Sir unless you will bee so good as to take the telling you candidly of your Faults to bee sufficient Payment I am exceedingly afraid I shall live and dy in your debt I could make good sport with the word measure in your definition for you will define to excell mee though none requires it of you but I dare not imitate you nor pretend to so great a degree of witty and pleasant Eloquence Onely I will beg leave to transcribe your words which introduce your definitions p. 4. Rejecting then his way of definition as inept and frivolous and no wayes tending to give a clearer notion of things I shall endeavour to explain a little better if I can the meaning of these Terms And certainly Sir a man may with a little Astrology prognosticate your victory for you combat nothing but a Chimera your own brain had coin'd In the mean time 't is another small Kindness to show your self so vain as to build your own triumphs on a voluntary misprision But right or wrong you are resolv'd to conquer and I must have patience 7. I hop't when I came to your second Section your Reason which as your Friend Mr. Stillingfleet who hummes your Book as loud as you can do his for your heart tells us runs throughout your Book would have given some respite to your Kindnesses and my Thanks for them but I discern in this and your following Section that your very Reason it self is compounded of Kindness and that your soberest impugnation of my discourse is made up of Groundless Cavills and which I am loath to say voluntary mistakes I am sorry to see it because I intended to throw aside the rubbish of your Book in this Letter that in my Answer I might better lay open the admirable Fabrick of your Discourse and have nothing there to do but to speak to solid points But in this disappointment I must behave my self as well as I can and your Goodness must help mee out by pardoning me if I omit to thank you for innumerable Kindnesses which are involv'd in your Rational performances till God gives me health and leasure 8. You are pleas'd to honour me with a very loud and heavy Calumny all over your Book as reviling Scripture vilifying disgracing it and what not Now Sr I use still to distinguish in Scripture the Sence of it from the Outward Letter which distinction if you
never are more powerfull than when you use your wit to make Authours fall out with one another and unnaturall mee with my self But to the point In the first Citation I say That the common course of humane Conversation makes it a madness not to beleeve great multitudes of Knowers c. But I add Sure-footing p. 49. what you omit that in the way of Tradition all Deliverers or immediate Forefathers are Knowers all the Knowledge requisit being of what they were taught and practic 't accordingly all their lives I beseech you Sir are those great multitudes of immediate Forefathers Knowers when they deliver down a Book for a right one that is do they all know the Translation is right made the Copy right printed or written and all the Perquisits which are needfull that they may bee truly said to know this Book is rightly qualify'd You see then how far I am from contradicting my self unless you show that I hold all Recommenders or Accepters of a Book to bee Knowers as they are of the practicall Doctrine they were bred and brought up to which I neither do nor can with any Sence profess The Reader also will see that the stratagem by virtue of which you made mee contradict my self was your omitting those words of mine which made the contrary clear The next place you cite p. 104. from mee to the same purpose is this that none but madmen can suspect deceit where such multitudes agree unanimously in a matter of Fact Now the words such multitudes mean all their immediate Fore-fathers qualifi'd as Knowers as I exprest myself a little before which will veryill sute your purpose in regard the matters of Fact employ'd about the delivering a right Book as in translating transcribing pointing right c. of which their Sences onely can make them Knowers are so inumerable and minute yet such that very great miscarriages may ensue upon a very little over-sight that to think all Forefathers can know no Fault in any of these interven'd is such an extravagant conceit that onely a most obstinate passion could make a rationall soul entertain it The point is at present that you affect to represent mee to the half part and by that art you take mee up perpetually before I bee down For it is not an agreement in any matter of Fact but in such a one as may bee known by all in which I place the force of being able to oblige others to assent to their proposalls You treat mee far worse p. 105. making mee say that the Providence of God is no security against those Contingencies the Scripture is liable to because wee cannot bee certain of the divine Providence or Assistance to his Church but by the Letter of Scripture which is to put upon mee a ridiculous Argument making mee infer there is no such Assistance from this that wee cannot bee Certain of it but such a way Whereas Common sence tells every one that our Certainty being an Effect of the Thing 's Existence must depend indeed on their Existence in regard we cannot bee Certain of what is not But the things can exist whether wee bee Certain of them or no I affirm then and charge upon you that I have no where either such words or sence in my whole book as you with a strange precipitancy to say no worse affirm p. 104. that I tell you Sure-footing p. 18. where my discourse onely pretends to show that who will argue orderly must first bee Certain of that on which hee builds his Conclusion ere hee asserts the Conclusion it self This was the tenour of my discourse there which I conceive to bee evident beyond Cavill If I err'd any where 't was in supposing you onely took from Scripture that God assisted his Church in preserving a right Copy of Scripture and therefore argu'd preposterously if you inferr'd God has a Providence over his Church in preserving right Scripture therefore 't is preserv'd right But this I spoke onely with an If and besides had good grounds for it For I conceiv'd there being but two wayes to know this by Revelation which you profess to have onely by way of Scripture and by naturall Reason whence you could not have it For however meer nature might teach it's exact Followers there was a God and that hee had Providence over his Creatures as it taught Socrates Seneca and such like yet I remember not that wee have any Ground to say meer nature inform'd any God had a Church much less that there was no way to Provide for her continuance in Faith or deriving his Doctrine down in her but by way of Books Hence I concluded and conclude still it must bee either by Scripture or no way you can know God has such a kind of Providence over his Church You are pleased to tell your Reader p. 119. that this Principle That in matters of Religion a man cannot bee reasonably satisfy'd with any thing less than that Infallible Assurance which is wrought by Demonstration is the main Pillar of Mr. S' s. Book whereas I assure you Sir the last part of the kind slur you put upon mee which is wrought by Demonstration was never either my words nor sence neither Pillar nor the least part of Sure-footing wherefore as you put those words in a different Letter for mine so you had done well to have put down the place too where those words were found which you wisely omitted If I had affirm'd that that Assurance which grounds Faith must bee wrought by Demonstration how should I pretend the Vulgar can bee sav'd who are manifestly incapable of Demonstration as I also frequently acknowledge Understand then my Tenet at length which you ought to have done e're you begun to write against it but that to use your own words you thought it an absurd and ridiculous study to bend your brains to read my Book as you would do Euclid p. 292. which yet is no more but to consider attentively my Principles and my Consequences My Tenet is that all the Faithfull have and those who seek after Faith may have and those who seek after Faith may have Assurance of their Faith wrought in them by Practicall Self-evidence in the same naturall manner but with far better Reason than they beleeve there was a Henry the 8th and that 't is onely Schollars that go about to Demonstrate what the Faithfull know but for want of Study or Reflexion on their own thoughts and on the Causes and Manners with which they were so assur'd are ignorant how to make it out I beseech you Sir repress this overflowing of Kindness in giving mee so many Advantages against you and take a little pains to understand what I say nor to borrow your elegant expression p. 292. suffer your self to bee so demurely discharged of a Study so necessary and so honorable I had affirm'd in my Letter to my Answerer p. 5th that it was a civill piece of Atheistry to say Faith is possible
build on any thing so much as these but one of these laid for a Ground you run on with such a Carreer as if you would overthrow all the Sence and Reason that ever comes in your way You tell mee p. 158. by a parallell Discourse to mine against my Lord of Downs that my demonstrations are none unless I vouch some particularity in my Method above what 's in others which p. 160. you say you remember not I have done any where It seems you read my Transition not with any sober intent to understand it and speak solidly to it but onely to carp at it and break jests upon it Have you so soon forgot the pleasant mood it put you into p. 3 and 4. I contest then that the Method I there declare my self to pursue is particular above what I ever observ'd in any of your Controvertists not that they want better Parts to lay it but because they want a good Cause to bear it and give them leave to follow it I declare also that I hold that Method sufficient to demonstrate by though I pretend it not the exactest than can bee made As for those great men whom you alledge to differ in demonstrations Charles Thynn I leave to bear you company you are both such merry Blades I doubt not but were the business well examin'd their differences spring from not attending heedfully to the Method of concluding and that no miscarriage could ensue in any Discourse were the way of Discoursing perfectly laid agreed to and exactly follow'd nay that those few Differences amongst Geometricians arise from the same defect as were it seasonable I could show particularly with the help of a Friend you must think in that famous one about angulus contingentiae But to our present purpose meethinks Sir you may remember a thing call'd a Letter to my Answerer where I endeavour'd at least at some means to settle some particularity in our Method above what has been practic 't in other Controversies formerly begging you would agree to it that so wee might both follow it but you would have none you thank't mee Since then you would not accept it when offer'd you should not ask for it again when your Book is writ and the Circumstances of using it past But perhaps there lies the policy of it You end with a Glance or two at my Self-confidence But are you Propheticall in this too Sir that 't is some proud and vain humour in mee and not rather my Assuredness of the Truth of my Cause and of the Conclusiveness of my Method which makes mee deliver my self undauntedly See my Letter to my Answerer where I have these words p. 18. By this means it will bee quickly discover'd whether or no you have overthrown my Discourse by showing it ill-coherent and how far 't is faulty that if I cannot clear it to bee connected I may confess my fault and endeavour to amend it For however I see my Grounds evident yet I am far from judging my self Infallible in drawing my Consequences though I see withall the Method I take will not let me err much or if I do my Errour will bee easily discoverable because I go not about to cloud my self in Words but to speak out as plain as I can from the nature of the Thing Had you a desire to practice the due candour towards mee I should have done to you you would not have sought occasions to put in upon a personall priding my self in my performances which I so frequently disown and place all my advantage in my Cause and my Method But you are angry I deliver my self so boldly in what I take to bee Truth I beseech you Sir is it not naturall for any one who judges hee speaks what 's Evident to express himself fear lesly when hee disputes against an Adversary of the Truth whose Cause hee has espoused as 't is on the contrary for one who judges hee has onely Probability for what hee sayes to speak dis-confidently and condescendingly and when hee indeed sneaks not daring to speak out then to praise himself and his party for modest and moderate men You know by experience Sir ' t is Has there in our late age come out a Book more brisk than this of yours not in asserting but in scorn and proud petulancy and which is to bee pittied proud of an aiery jest or some gay conceit Shall I bee bold to tell you Sir what is Self confidence To undertake to write a Discourse about the Ground of Faith without so much as one Principle that deserves to bee call'd such to bless himself with to lay for Grounds all along Falsifications of his Adversaries meaning and words and then quibbling taunting and vapouring as if all the world were his own Lastly to tell his Auditours soberly and sadly out the Pulpit all is God's Word hee preaches and press they should beleeve him and yet when hee writes against us confess all hee preaches concerning Salvation and the Way to it may possibly bee false that is for any thing hee absolutely knows hee has not told them one true word all the while This Sir I must needs confess is such a Heroick strain of self-confidence that however it bee familiar and naturall to others yet I dispair for my part ever to attain it To bear ones self as holding a thing a demonstration which he judges hee has Evidence that 't is such is a puling and trifling kind of self-conceit but to carry it out with the greatest Formality in the world as if it were most Certain and yet hold at the same time and profess 't is possible to bee false that is may for any thing any man knows bee shown false to morrow is a noble and gallant Self confidence and such a one as fears not the face of any man living P. 161. You come to examin my demonstrations à priori and in order to it my four Grounds which you affirm you will set down in my own words Which intimates you did not do so formerly though it bee your duty to do it alwayes However 't is a Kindness which I am bound to thank you for and as far as I discern you have not faltred in it of which I here make my hearty Acknowledgment But Sir may I not fear this particular Resolution of yours here to bee Sincere springs hence because in this Sect. 2. where you put down my words you do not yet go about to apply them to your Discourse and attempt to confute which in your next Section p. 163. you endeavour I foresee you will bee shrew'dly tempted there for want of other Answer to break your resolution till wee come there then I leave you with my hearty wishes of strength constancy against that habituall Infirmity which so often overcoms all your resolutions of that nature And wee are now come to your third Sect p. 163. the place of the triall of your perseverance where you begin your confute and
where speaking of the Application of the Cause to the Patient p. 63. 64. 65. I end thus In a word Christianity urg'd to execution gives its followers a new Life and a new Nature than which a neerer Application cannot bee imagin'd So that you see I make account it's Application depends upon it's being urg'd to Execution and what is it that urges things to Execution but Government and Disciplin I wish Sir when you are to confute a rational Discourse you would not stand running after Butter-flies and catching by the way childishly at this little word and the other little word to play upon them jestingly but have patience to read it thorough and take the whole substance of it into your head and so endeavour to speak to it solidly This is the way to benefit your Readers to whom you owe this duty nay a far better to credit your self with understanding men than all those petty tricks of impertinent Wit and ironical Expressions which you so passionately dote upon I am heartily weary of so illiberal a task as to spend ink and paper much less time in discovering mens defects and I assure you Sir I am very sorry your carriage made it necessary whereupon though I see much rubbish of this nature behind and have overslipt too very much yet I should have ended did not I find my self highly concern'd to defend one Assertion of mine than which you who use no hot phrases but are all Civility and Sweetness say p. 173. nothing can be more impudent I humbly thank you Sir This most impudent position is this that Sure-footing p. 65. being to meet with the Objection that there have been many Hereticks or deserters of Tradition I say If wee look into Histories for experience of what has past in the world since the first Planting of Christianity wee shall find far more particulars fail in propagating their kind than their faith Now Sir if this bee prov'd not at all impudent which you judge most impudent I hope the rest which you judge less impudent may easily pass for blameless Let 's to work then and because 't is your business as well as mine I beseech you lend mee your thoughts to go along with mine from one end of the 7th discourse in Sure-footing to the other Company may do much in making them attentive otherwise I see plainly they will stand loitering and gazing by the way at this odd word or the inelegancy of that phrase or noting some passages that may bee prettily mistaken and make excellent good sport by which means You who as you say p. 292. are apt to unbend your brains without bidding will hardly ever bee drawn to go forwards with a deliberate pace half the way In the said discourse then p. 65. you see I design to clear an objection of my own which I conceiv'd obvious namely that there have been actually many Hereticks or deserters of Tradition I make my way to it p. 66. by asserting that the way of Tradition is as efficaciously establisht in the very grain of mans nature as what seems most naturall the propagation of their kind Hence I come at last to that most impudent assertion that more have faild in propagating their kind than their Faith Proceeding to proove it I show p. 66. how Heresy or a failing to propagate Faith happens and I allow p. 68. that it must bee perform'd by deserting Tradition and chusing at least for a show another Rule that so they may have occasion to break from the former Church But I affirm withall p. 65. § 3. that assoon as the breach is sufficienly made and the novellists begin to bee shap't into a body whatever for a show they still would seem to keep to yet that they presently desert the new Rule they had taken up and the naturall way of Tradition again recovers it self that the Reformers themselves make use of it to keep their company together that Children are taught they are to beleeve their Pastors and Fathers even in interpreting Scripture that the first Reformers punish them if they break from their body and hold not to the Sence of Scripture they give them And hence I conclude p. 74. that the number of the Actuall deserters of the naturall way of Tradition have been but few to wit the First Revolters that the descendents of these Revolters follow'd the way of Tradition however misplac't then I added some considerations for Grounds to ballance the number of Failers in propagation with the number of those who faild in Tradition and as reasons why I concluded this number less but you never use to speak to my reasons onely you mistake my discourse and my conclusion to mean not onely the First breakers but their descendents too which I make account return naturally to the Traditionary way then you denie and impugn like a learned logician the Conclusion it self amplify strangely upon your own mistake of it instancing in all the Countries almost East West North and South triumph mightily and would have mee show you a whole nation that refus'd to marry As if my Conclusion could not bee true unless such a rare sight were show'd you all at a clap E're I come closer to the proof of my Assertion I foresee I am to make good first that even the deserters of Tradition when they think themselves sufficiently enfranchiz'd from the disciplin of the former Church and that their followers settle into a kind of Body under them bring in again the way of Tradition or rather indeed permit nature to work both in the new brood that grow up under those Fathers who had lately deserted Tradition and in those deserters themselves nothing being more naturall than both for the Fathers Elders or Governours to desire and even expect the children Posterity and Subjects should follow their judgments and not to make themselves wiser than their betters nor for the descendents and young ones credulously to beleeve those whom they look't upon ever with an awe and respect and to permit their lives to bee fram'd by their conduct I affirm then that even in all those Sects that have faln from the Catholick Church whether Protestants Lutherans Presbyterians or whatever else they bee that pretend to hold to Scripture the Generality if not all are continu'd to the former body or immediately foregoing Generation by Tradition and not by virtue of Scripture Evidence uniting their understandings For what a wild conceit it is to imagin that the Children throughout a whole Kingdom of Lutherans for example should still light to interpret Scripture just as did their Forefather Lutherans and thence unanimously hold to the Lutheran Profession And the same in Protestants Presbyterians Arians Pelagians And the like may bee said in some sort even of Turks and Heathens that 't is not the virtue of any motive that they go upon which keeps up a Succession of men of the same Tenet but the naturall force of Education at first and Custome
words Authority of the Catholick Church mean the Book of Scriptures Or can I desire more then this Father offers mee in express terms or a greater Testimony that you are to seek for an Answer to it then the strange Evasion you substitute instead of a reply Especially if wee take the Testimony immediatly following which from the best establisht Seats of the Apostles even to this very day is strengthen'd by the Series of Bishops succeeding them and by the Assertion of so many nations Is here the word Tradition pretended Indifferent and apt to bee taken ambiguously and not rather Assertions of so many nations or Consent of nations and Authority of the Catholik Church of force to cause Faith and Assu rance which to demonstrate is the whole Endeavour of Sure-fooring The 5th is the same Fathers cited p. 137. The Faithfull do possess perseveringly a Rule of Faith common to little and great in the Church Is the word Church the same with the word Tradition or in danger of being ambiguous or as you say of the word Tradition p. 318. commonly us'd by the Fathers to signify to us the Scriptures The 6th is of St. Irenaeus All those who will hear Truth may at present perfectly discern in the Church the Tradition of the Apostles manifest in the whole world What means the world at present but that the Tradition of the Apostles is yet vigorous and fresh in the Church which remark had very unfitly suted with Scriptures The 7th and 8th are Tertullians Both say the same Sence that what is establisht as Sacred or profest at this present day in the Churches of the Apostles is manifestly deliver'd by the Apostles or a Tradition of the Apostles which is incompetent to Scripture it not being a Tradition or point delivered but the Delivery The last is of Chrysologus which has indeed the word Tradition but by the additionall words of the Fathers not left ambiguous but determin'd to unwritten Tradition For the Fathers according to you are not to give or diliver down the Sence of Scriptures it being plain of it self This Sir is the upshot of your skill in Notebook-learning the three first Testimonies from Scripture you answerd not mistaking quite what they were brought for the 4th you omitted You have given pittiful answers to eight from the Fathers and shufled off nine more without answer pleading you had given us a Key to open them which was never made for those locks By which I see you reserve your greatest Kindnesses like a right friendly man till the last You will not have the Councill of Trent make Tradition the onely Rule of Faith you had oblig'd mee had you answer'd my reason for it in my 4th note p. 145. 146. But this is not your way you still slip over my reasons all along as if none had been brought and then say some sleight thing or other to the Conclusion as if it had never been inferrd by mee but meerly gratis and rawly affirm'd I have explicated our Divines that seem to differ from mee herein Sure footing p. 187. 188. and the Council it self takes my part in it by defining and practising the taking the Sence of Scripture from that quod tenuit tenet Sanct a Mater Ecclesia which in this antecedency to Scriptures Sence can no where bee had but from Tradition You cavill at mee for not putting down the words in which that Councill declares it self to honour the Holy Scripture and Tradition with equall pious affection and reverence Why should I you see I was very short in all my allegations thence and rather touch't at them for Catholicks to read them more at large than transcrib'd them fully But how groundless your Cavill is may bee understood hence that I took notice of a far more dangerous point to wit it's putting the Holy Scriptures constantly before Tradition and show'd good reason why But you approve not even of any honour done to the Scriptures upon those Terms and your interest makes you wish that rather it's Letter and Sence both should remain uncertain than it should owe any thing to the Catholick Church You ask how an Apostle and Evangelist should bee more present by the Scripture ascertain'd as to words and Sence then by or all Tradition I answer because that Book is in that case Evident to bee peculiarly and adequately his whereas Orall Tradition was common to all and 't is doubtable what hand some of those Apostles or Evangelists might have had in the source of that which was lineally deriv'd to us Sir I wonder how you hit so right once as not to answer likewise the Testimony I brought p. 152. of the Catholick Clergy's adhering to Tradition in the â—ick of the breach you might as well have spoke to that as to the Council of Trent divers others But I perceive it had some peculiar difficulty as had divers of the neglected nine else your Genius leads you naturally to flie at any thing that has but the semblance or even name of a Testimony whereas unactive I stoop at no such game till I see certainly 't is worth my pains and I fear yours will scarce prove so THey come in play p. 320. And because they are huddled together here something confusedly it were not amiss to sort them under Dr. Pierce's Heads found Sure-footing p. 170. To the first Head which comprises those which are onely brought to vapour with belongs that of St. Hierom. p. 323. To the second Head which consists of those which are raw unapply'd and onely say something in common which never comes home to the point belong all those of Eusebius That of St. Chrysostome and St. Austin's p. 324. of Iustin and Theodoret p. 325. That of Hilary p. 327. of St. Basil. p. 328. of Chrysostom p. 328. and 329. and those of St. Austin in the same place Of Theoph. Alexandr p. 330. Theodoret p. 330. 331. The 2d and 3d. from Gerson p. 331. To the 4th that of St. Austin p. 325. To the 7th Head which comprises those which are false and signifie not the thing they are quoted for appertain that of Ireneus p. 326. of St. Austin St. Hierome and the 2d of Theoph. Alexandrinus p. 330. To the 8th consisting of those which labour of obscurity by an evidently ambiguous word that of Optatus p. 327. The first from Gerson p. 331. and that from Lyra p. 332. St. Cyprian's Testimony was writ by him to defend an Errour which both wee and the Protestants hold for such and therefore no wonder if as Bellarmin sayes more errantium ratiocinaretur hee discoursed after the rate of those that err that is assumes false Grounds to build his errour on Whence the inferring an acknowledg'd false Conclusion from it is an argument rather his Principle was not sound I know Sir you will fume at this usage of your Testimonies but with what reason For first you putting them down rawly without particularizing their force or import