them to do is to trust those Divines and to proceed accordingly to warn the Faithfull to beware of those Books in which they are inform'd there is such danger So that the motive those Governours proceed upon is their care of preserving the Faithfull untainted and the Judgment of Divines not Christian Tradition And what motive proceed those Divines upon in these Censures Upon their best skill as Divines that is their best skill in drawing Consequences in which neither themselves nor any else say they are Infallible Thus much for the Censurers Now come wee to the Person censur'd and his Books Of what nature are they Theologicall Discourses And what do such Discourses rely on formally On Tradition Nothing less On this hee rely'd as a Beleever or Christian not as a Divine but on his own humane skill in explicating Faith or it's Ground and his talent in deducing right Consequences in which also hee and every man Living is Fallible You see Sir by this time the ripe fruits of your performance in this point and that you have brought a worthy Instance of Difference amongst Reliers on Tradition in a passage wherein neither side rely on Tradition Oh but they contradict one another in the very point of Tradition 'T is your weak and unproud conjecture and besides you cannot I mean still will not distinguish between the Substance of Tradition that is the Infallibility of the Living Voice and Practice of the Church Essentiall in conveying down uninterruptedly Christ's Doctrine and the Explication of it show the Church of Rome condemns the former and you have my free Confession I am at a loss for my Faith But though you show shee condemns and censures all the later that is all the Explications whether made by that Authour my self or any other yet as long as she condemns not the former shee hath done nothing against Tradition and so your wise Instance is spoil'd as it was no other likely being the weakest you could have invented against Tradition and the least concerning it in regard there is not one learned Catholick in the Church that looks upon the Acts of the Roman Inquisition in Censuring Books as on Infallible Definitions of Faith 12. You 'l ask where lies the Fault in such cases I answer no where that I know not in the Head of the Church who acted the most prudently and carefully that could be in such an affair neither censuring any particular Proposition where there was no more Certainty to ground that Censure than the Judgment of some Divines and yet providing by the Caution his censure imported that the conceived harmfullness in those Books might work no ill Effects whence 't is but an invidious presumption of your own that perhaps the Pope is censur'd for it in England Nor were those Roman Divines Faulty in case they judg'd secundum ultimum potentiae but were bound in conscience to give in to the Court what they thought Again those Explications of Divinity-points looking new to them and it being the naturall Genius of the Followers of Tradition to bee jealous of any thing that is new and this not onely in Faith but also in Explications of Faith in regard these pretend a coherence and connexion with Faith it self it seems to mee to sound a laudable zeal both in them and others to bee suspicious of and less a Friend at First to what 's new 'till it bee farther lookt into and appear innocent Nor can I say 't is a Fault in the person censur'd in case hee sincerely ment to write what he judg'd was truth and so most advantageous to the Church and submits to the Orders of his Chief Eccesiasticall Superiour You see Sir the whole case in which I am larger because you are kinder here than ordinary and your Instance falling pittifully short you peece it out with Falshoods p. 22. that wee in England censure perhaps the Pope for this Action that the person censur'd disobeyes the Summons of his Chief Pastour that p. 24. the Governours of the Church do professedly cherish Ignorance in the Generality of the Papists for the increasing their devotion These are grear favours indeed you are too liberall Sir and will undo your self unless you restrain your hand from this profuseness of kindness Your 4th Section is all Reason like the foregoing one in which you laid your grounds and fell to build so strong and firm that it needs more than an ordinary blast to blow it down Therefore I conceive 't is best to stay a while and gain more breath which is something short with mee at present 13. But your fifth even kills me with Kindness and acquaints the Reader with a dangerous oversight of mine enough to overthrow my whole Book 'T is this that I make Traditions Certainty a First and self-evident Principle and yet go about to demonstrate it which you soberly admonish mee to take heed how I take it upon me that Aristotle never demonstrated First Principles because they could not bee demonstrated that most prudent men are of Opinion that a self-evident principle of all things in the world should not bee demonstrated because it needs not you ask to what end should a man write a Book to proove that which every man must assent to without proof so soon as 't is propounded to him c. Now Sr in my mind you should onely have combated this and have given no other Answer to my whole Book but to this onely for nothing can bee so senceless nor so impertinent as to go about to proove that which that which can need no proof nor consequently less meriting an Answer I would then had I been in your case have thought it my best and most honourable play to omit all counterfeitings of my Adversaries defining all those multitudes of groundless Cavills voluntary mistaks Calumnies laughing at his First Principles Evidence demonstration c. together with all my wordish exceptions at his rumbling Rethorick perching upon the nature of things and other such expressions and have solely apply'd my self to this one Folly evacuating his whole Book and so excusing my Answer And this you might have done with far greater hopes of conquering than in any of the rest because that a First and self-evident Principle cannot bee evidenc't seems so clear that it even looks like a First Principle it self of which no other part of your confutation has the least Countenance or resemblance And be assur'd Sr since you would not use this advantage against mee as you might you shall never have mee upon the like lock again Caught in these streights by your entangling Logick I endeavour my escape on this manner Self-evidence is two-fold Speculative and Practicall Speculative self-evidence it that which cannot bee made Evident by any Speculation or Skill but is known meerly by the common light of understanding such is that which is found in those Principles I dicourst of before which were therefore Self-evident speculatively because their Subject and
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
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
manner is compounded of putting tricks upon your Adversaries that is putting their sayings upon such accounts they never intended then impugning your own fictions 'T is not on the impossibility of any going out of us nor meerly because whenany one is out of our Church hee is not in it wee ground the Necessity of our Churches Unity but in this that her nature and Constitution is so fram'd that shee can admit no division in her Bowells but keeps her self distinguisht from Aliens If any one recede from Faith it must bee by not hearing the present Churches living voice teaching him points which the Knowledge Practice and Expressions of the Teachers determins and make Evident what they are whence his disbeleef if exprest is an Evident matter of Fact which is most apt to make a plain distinction between the disbeleever and the Beleevers and an Evidence beyond Cavill for the Church Governours to proceed upon This done as likewise in the case of high disobedience against Church-Laws or Governours shee Excommunicates that is solemnly separates the Schismaticall Offender from the Obedient Faithfull Hence those Faithfull look upon him as a Rebell or Outlaw or as our Saviour expresses as a Heathen or Publican no Church-officer admits him to Sacraments but upon his pennance and Satisfaction nor any Son of the Church will communicate with him in Sacred duties Pray you Sir is this the Temper of your Church of England Your Rule is the Letter of Scripture as conceiv'd significative of Gods word and this to private understandings Again you say all necessary points of Faith are plain in it nay that nothing is fundamentally necessary but what is plain there Hence all that hold the Letter to bee plainly Expressive of Gods Sence and intend to hold to what they conceive plain there whether Socinians Anabaptists Independents or whatever other faction all hold to your Rule of Faith and so are all Protestants For if you would ty any of these to any determinable points you force them from the Rule of Faith Scripture as seeming plain to them and would instead thereof bring them to a reliance on your Judgement And if you would punish them for not doing it you cannot evidence their Fault by way of matter of Fact that so you may proceed upon it for as long as they profess their intention to hold to what seems plain to them in Scripture and that your Text seems less plain to them there than their own you ought not to proceed against them Ecclesiastically without disannulling your avowed Rule of Faith And your carriage executes accordingly neither using Church-discipline against them for Tenets nor yet for denying or disobeying your Goverment Episcopacy though held by you divinely instituted When did you put any distinction by any solemn Ecclesiastical declaration between an Anabaptist Presbyterian Socinian c. and your selves When did you excommunicate them warn the purer Protestants by any Publick Ecclesiasticall Act not to joyn with them in Sacred Offices but to look upon them as Aliens Might not any of them come to receive the Communion if hee would or has any discipline past upon him to debar him from being admitted None that wee see Your Party then in indeed no Ecclesiasticall body cohering by Unity of Tenets or Government but a Medly rather consisting of men of any tenet almost and so bears division disunion and Schism that is the Formal cause of non-Entity of a Church in it's very Bowells These two flams of yours are Sir the Favours you have done my Friends and I can onely tell you in a country complement I thank you as much for them as if you had done them to my self Seeing your Reason begin to play it's part bravely in the following part of your Book I thought I had done my duty of Thanking but I percieve one main Engin your Reason made use of was to make mee perpetually contradict my self And this you perform'd by singling a few words out of my Book from their fellows introducing them in other circumstances and so almost in every Citation falsifying my Intentions and this purposely as will bee seen by this that you practis'd designe and Artifice in bringing it about This obliges mee in stead of making an End to return back and to show how sincerly you have us'd mee in almost all your Citations I omit your false pretence that I mean't to define contrary to my express words You tell your Reader p. 11. That if any presume to say this Book Scripture depends not on Tradition for it's Sence then the most scurrilous language is not bad enough then are those Sacred writings but Ink variously figur'd in a Book quoting for those words App. 4th p. 319. But if wee look there not a word is there found of it's depending or not depending on Tradition for it's Sence nor of making that the Cause why I us'd those words you object cite for it but onely that whereas my Lord of Downs sayes his Faith has for its object the Scriptures I tell him that since he means not by the word Scripture any determinate Sence which is the formall parts of words hee must mean the Characters or Ink thus figur'd in a Book as is evident there being nothing imaginable in them besides the matter and the form which every Schollar knows compound the thing This being then the plain tenour of my discourse there and not the least word of Tradition sencing Scripture Whatever the Truth of the Thing is 't is evident you have abus'd my words as found in the place you cite My Citation p. 12. which abstracts from what security wee can have of those parts of Scripture which concern not Faith you will needs restrain to signifie no security at all either of Letter or Sence which is neither found in my words nor meaning How you have abus'd my words to avoid Calumny with the Vulgar cited by you p. 13. as also the former of those cited p. 14. I have already shown § 9 and 10. P. 17. You quote my words 'T is certain the Apostles taught the same Doctrine they writ whence you infer they writ the same Doctrine they taught Which your introducing Discourse would make to signifie an Equality of Extent in Writing and Tradition by saying I grant this Doctrine which signifies there the First deliver'd Doctrine was afterwards by the Apostles committed to writing Whereas whoever reads my 29th Cor. will see I can onely mean by the word same Doctrine a not-different Doctrine Whatever the truth of the point is this shows you have an habituall imperfection not to let the words you cite signifie as the Authour evidently meant them but you must bee scruing them to serve your own turn You quote mee p. 36. to say that Primitive Antiquity learn'd their Faith by another method a long time before many of those Books were universally spread amongst the Vulgar The summe of your Answer is that when the Apostles who did miracles
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
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
of such things consists in a kind of Undulation So that now Corrupt Nature when shee finds her self a little more free follows her own tendency or propension and bears downwards and now again Supernatural and Gracious Assistances with which the Wisdome of the Eternal Father had furnish't his Church superabundantly being shock't and excited even by this contrary motion of Nature begin to put themselves forwards into an opposit motion and strive more vigorously to raise themselves upwards For example Disciplin which is to apply Christian motives by tract of time grows remiss in the Church hence decay of virtue dissoluteness of life addiction to material goods and consequently Ignorance creep in by insensible degrees into diverse parts so that it happens there are multitudes of corrupt Members in the Church and regardless of any duty who therefore want nothing but a fair occasion and one to lead them to break all ties of Virtue and Obedience and run into the utmost Extravagancies Nor can wee think but in the course of such a vast variety as is found in a World now and then there will bee found amongst those wicked men some notable fellow of a subtle wit a bold spirit and a plausible tongue so circumstanc't that hee can hope for Impunity by the friendship of some great person and so dares give way to his proud desire of having followers or his private spleen to renounce the Church's Faith and shake of the yoak of her disciplin Hereupon the rampires of Government and disciplin being forc't and violently broken down presently like a Torrent or Inundation all those whose hearts were corrupted with spiritual pride or other vices like brute beasts leap after one another out of the Fold of the Church and threaten to trample down all that 's Sacred Reviling the Church and laying to her charge all the faults found in particular persons as if they were Effects of her Doctrin though their own knowledge tells them otherwise and make use of failings in particular Governours to renounce and extirpate the Government it self On the contrary those good Catholikes who by this Trial are made manifest stir up their zeal both in behalf of their Faith and their Governours instituted by Christ and detest the vicious Lives and Pride of those Rebels the Parents of such a horrid Revolt The Governours alarm'd begin to look into the Cause of this distraction and to provide wholesome Remedies They call Councils Generall ones if need bee to straiten afresh Ecclesiasticall Disciplin enjoyning the Officers of the Church to stand every one to his Charge They take order to promote worthy Officers and to advance Ecclesiastical Learning they recommend afresh by their grave Authority the points of Faith to the Ecclesia Credens as the depositum preserv'd uninterruptedly in the Church from Christ and his Apostles and establish them in a particular beleef of them nay make these more intelligible and rational by Explicating them more at large or if the Heretical party involve and confound them in ambiguous words they define and declare them in language most properly suting to the sence writ in the hearts of the Faithfull and lastly anathematize the Revolters if they prudently judge their contumacy irreducible that so the remaining Body may concieve a just horror and aversion against that Rebellious party and bee preserv'd uninfected with their contagious Communion All which Advantages and much more are visibly found in the Change made in the Church by that neverenough-renowned Synod the Council of Trent occasion'd by Luthers fall Nor is this all for the Faithfull not onely grow more virtuous by the reformation of Church-disciplin but even by the Calumnies of their Adversaries Again the learned party in the Church are excited to far greater industry and consequently Knowledge by the insulting opposition of the Churches enemies whose disgracing points of Faith for absurd and contradictions stir up divines to show their conformity with acknowledg'd naturall Truths as does their calling into question the Ground and Certainty of Faith open the understandings of those who defend it to look into the Causes on which Gods sweet and strong Providence has founded it's infallible Perpetuity and so demonstrate it A task no Heretick durst ever attempt finding Principles failing him to begin with that is Causes laid by Gods Providence to build his Congregation on whence all they can do is to talk gaily and plausibly about the Conclusions themselves and laugh at Principles From which discourse is Evident that by occasion of a Heresy which purifies the Church of all her ill humors and rectifies and makes sound what remains Tradition renews as it were it's Youth and recovers it's vigor whence also it must needs Propagate and extend it self still unto more and more Subjects as is also daily Experienc't 'T is seen also that the abundance of corrupt Humors begets Heresy at First for multitudes fall away then wheras afterwards scarce two or three in any Age desert the Catholick Banner It appears also that Secular interest or desire of Liberty and Spirituall Pride not zeal of Truth begun and continu'd the breach I mean in the Leaders for afterwads they are content to remain where they are without troubling themselves to propagate the Truth to other Nations nay they have let the large region of Nubia run to wrack for as Mr. T. to make us smile tells us p. 174. Alvarez sayes it was for want of Ministers and never sent so much as one single Protestant Parson to assist them It shows also how unconcern'd the Catholik Churches Stability is in all the Heresies that have or shall fall since they onely tend to confirm and radicate more deeply in the hearts of the Faithfull the Points of Faith they renounc't to occasion reformation of disciplin and so to purify their virtue Lastly it shows how Tradition or the Delivery of Faith by the Living Voice and Practice of the Catholik Church is so immovably planted by the hand of the Almighty that it loses nothing by all the Actuall Deserters of it that ever have been but is by that means onely prun'd of it's saples branches to shoot out in due season livelier and farther But to return my Friend I hope Sir you will pardon mee if I have rather taken pains to open your understanding a little in acquainting it more fully with that part of my doctrin is totally mistook than to proceed with your Faults in lieu of which I here pardon you all the Injuries you have done my meaning or words in neer the other half your book that is from p. 176. to p. 300. though I see them many and some of them very gross ones The Testimony part I would not here neglect because as you shall see shortly they concern not my book as any proofs of the point and so are improper to bee allow'd room in my future Answer which designes nothing but against your reasons You are resolv'd to bee brief in them and I hope