it Chap. V. Of the proper Acts of God Creation and Preservation or Providence What is Creation That God created all things And how Of the Ministers of Gods Providence towards Inferiour Creatures the Angels of God Their nature and office towards man especially Chap. VI. Of the Works of God in this visible World Of the Six dayes work of God All things are good which were made by God Chap. VII Of the Creation of man in particular according to the Image of God Of the Constitution of him and of the Original of his Soul contrary to Philosophers and the Errors of Origen concerning it The Image wherein it consists principally Chap. VIII Of the Second General Act of God towards the Creature especially Man his Providence Aristotles Opinion and Epicurus his rejected What is Providence Three things propounded of Providence And first the Ground of it the knowledge of God How God knoweth all things future as present Of Necessity and Contingencies how they may consist with Gods Omniscience Chap. IX The method of enquiring into the Nature and Attributes of God Vorstius his grounds of distinguishing the Attributes of God from his Nature examined Of the Decrees of God depending on his Understanding and Will Of knowledge of Intelligence Vision and the supposed Middle knowledge The Impertinency of this middle knowledge invented in God How free Agents can be known by God in their uncertain choice Indifferent actions in respect of Man not so in respect of God All vision in God supposes certainty in the thing known Chap. X. Four Doubts cleared concerning the Knowledge and Decrees of God and free Agents and contingent Effects How man that infallibly acts is responsable for his Actions The frivolous Evasion of the said difficulties by them of Dort Chap. XI Of the Execution of Gods Providence in the Predestination and Reprobation of Man How the Decrees and Providence of God are distinguished The Reason and Method of Gods Decrees Righteousness is the effect and not cause of Predestination to Life Predestination diversly taken in Scripture as also Election and Vocation God predestinates no man simply to Death without consideration of Evil foregoing as Calvin and some others would have it Chap. XII Of Gods Providence in the Reprobation and Damnation of Man Preterition is without any cause personal but the corruption of the Mass of Humane Nature Damnation alwayes supposes sin Chap. XIII The occasion of treating of sin here What sin is What Evil Monstrousness in things natural and Evil in moral things illustrate each other Sin no positive or real thing God the direct cause of no evil St. Paul in his Epistle to the Romans makes nothing for the contra-Remonstrants literally and primarily taken Chap. XIV Of Sin more particularly And first of the fall of Adam Of Original Sin wherein it consisteth and how it is traduced from Father to Children The Proofs of it The nature and evils of it And that it is cured in Baptism That Natural Concupiscence hath not the nature of Sin after Baptism Chap. XV. Of the Restitution of Man after sin The Means and Motives thereunto In what manner Christs Mediation was necessary to the reconciling of Man to God Socinus his Opinion of Christs mediation refuted That Christ truely and properly satisfied by his Death and Passion for us Chap. XVI Of the Nature and Person of the Mediatour between God and Man In the beginning was the Word proved to be spoken of Christ and that he had a being before he was incarnate The Union of two Natures in Christ explained Christ a Mediatour by his Person and by his Office and this by his Sacrificing himself The Scriptures proving this Chap. XVII How Christ was Mediatour according to both Natures Calvins Opinion and others stated Of the effect of Christs Mediation and the extent thereof Of the Designation and Application of Christs death Of the sufficiencie and efficacie of Christs death How Christs death becomes effectual to all The necessity of Gods Grace to incline the will of man to embrace Christ Of the efficacie as well as sufficiencie of Gods Grace on the Will of Man Several Gradations observed in the Grace of God Chap. XVIII Of the effect and benefit of Christs Mediation in suffering and rising again seen in the Resurrection of Man The necessity of believing a Resurrection The Reasons and Scriptural Testimonies proving a Resurrection Objections against the same answered Chap. XIX Of the most perfect effect of Christs Mediation in the salvation of man Several senses of Salvation noted That Salvation is immediately after death to them that truly dye in Christ And that there is no grounds in Antiquity or Scripture for that middle State called Purgatory The Proofs answered Of the Consequent of Roman Purgatory Indulgences The novelty groundlesness and gross abuse of them The Conclusion of the first part of this Introduction The Contents of the Second Part c. Chap. I. OF the worship of God wherein the Second Part of Christian Religion consists Of the necessity of worshipping God It is natural to worship God Socinus holding the contrary confuted Of the name of Religion the Nature of Religious worship wherein it consisteth Chap. II. Of the two parts of Divine worship Inward and Outward The Proof of Outward worship as due to God and that it is both due and acceptable to God Several Reasons proving bodily worship of God agreeable to him Wherein this bodily worship chiefly consists Certain Directions for bodily worship Exceptions against it answered Chap. III. Of the second thing considerable in Divine worship viz. The state wherein we serve God What is a state The formal cause of a state Divine Vowes What is a Vow The proper matter of Vows Evangelical Councils That it is lawful and useful to make Vows under the Gospel contrary to Peter Martyr The nature of Vowes explained Chap. IV. Of the matter of Vows in particular And first of the Virginal state that it is both possible and landable And that it is lawful to vow Celibacie or Widowhood No Presidents in the Old Testament favouring Virginity The Virgin Mary vowed not Virginity no Votary before the Annunciation Chap. V. Of the second State of special serving God the Clerical State or Ministerial Of the necessity and liberty of singleness of Life in a Clergy-man The Opinion and custom of Antiquity concerning it That it is in the power of the Church at this day to restrain or permit the marriage of Priests The Conveniences and Inconveniences of wedded Life in Priests Chrysostom's Judgment of Marriage and Virginity recited Chap. VI. Of the third State of serving God a Life Monastical That it is not only lawful but may be profitable also The Exceptions of Mr. Perkins against it examined The abuses of Monastical Life touched That it is lawful to vow such a kind of Life duly regulated Chap. VII Of Religious worship the third thing considerable in it viz. The Exercise of it in the several kinds
a good event in general if not particular we are now to satisfie our selves What that we call Evil and Sin is And what relation God hath to it First then we are to note that Evil and Sin differ only as Genus and Species so that all Sin is Evil but all Evil is not Sin Evil is that which is contrary to nature or natural Good Sin is that which is contrary to grace and moral good And that which is contrary to the order rule and form of Nature is called Monstrous that which is contrary to the Rule of Justice and Holiness is called Sin And as monstrosity in nature is divided into defects and excesses So Sin in morality is divided into Omissions and Commissions And of neither of these can God be said to be the Authour or Nature under him For if Nature according to Philosophers which is but Gods Instrument doth not intend monstrous effects much less may God be said so to do whose acts are alwayes more constant and steady the higher they are and nearer to himself For to give an instance when we see a want of a limb in a monstrous birth it may so far be imputed to Divine Providence that it could not so happen without the knowledge and consent of the Supream Cause in whose power it was to have disposed outward and second causes to the effecting of a regular and perfect work yet directly and with a positive purpose to have assisted in the production of such a Monster we cannot safely nor wisely say seeing the denyal of that ordinary and more necessary concurrence to such an end is altogether sufficient to it and such defects arise not from Gods positive Will to have them so but from his not willing to have them otherwise There may seem somewhat more difficulty in Monsters in excess when any Creatures have more parts than are naturally proper to them as four hands or three leggs and the like But this proves not any direct intention to this but only an intention not to keep things in their proper limits and to their Rule A Master or Father when he holds not a severe hand over his child or servant cannot but by inference and consequence be said to be the cause of the exorbitant carriages of them because though he wills not to prevent such mischiefs he doth not will they should be God in like manner willeth redundance of matter as a thing real and positive but that it should meet together as to constitute such an unnatural effect is rather the suspence and with-holding his Providence then the exercising of the same This I premise as leading to the due apprehension of Moral Evil which to hold as such to have a positive Existence in the world is inevitably to become Manichean and to make God the Authour of sin as St. Austin in these words declareth Here we are to be careful that we fall not into the Herisee of the Manichees who said there was a certain Nature of Evil and a certain people of darkness with their Princes And afterward So they erre so they are blinded so they make themselves the people Gentem Tenebrarum of darkness by believing that which is false against him who created them for every Creature is good but it is corrupted by the depraved will of Man Thus he and were it so that Evil had a positive being from whom could it proceed but from God And it is repugnant to the Nature of the good God to be the Author of any thing simply Evil so far the Manicheans were in the right therefore they that hold this must with the Manichees invent and introduce another God I know the modern defenders of the positive nature of sin alledge several Schoolmen and some Fathers for the same but I know there are more express testimonies of the Ancient against it and the Modern of any account had either another sense than we now state the doubt in or must be rejected with their Relater It is not a place here to examine and encounter all nor to alledge the Reasons or Authorities to the contrary which might easily be done Only that Argument taken from the distinction of Sins of Omission and Commission deserves to be considered For say they if Sins of Omission consist only in defect of duty and are thereby distinguished from of Commission which are such as not only fall short of what is due but act the quite contrary as when a man instead of praying and praising God contumeliously abuses his Name and Worship this hath more in it than a meer negation or privation of good Thus indeed it seems but thus it is not For both these are evil upon the account of privation and the absence of good the difference only is in this that in sins of Omission the privativeness or negation is immediately seated in the Subject owing such an Act and in such a manner and here in no Action at all but the absence of it which renders a man and denominates him immediately evil or defective But in sins of Commission the case is far otherwise for here privation or defect relateth not immediately to the Subject as the Man himself but to the Action it self and by that is the Man made guilty and evil because though the act be in its nature positive yet is defective as to its circumstances according to which it ought to be performed For when God hath appointed and Justice and Reason directeth that a man should observe in his action such a time and season and such a place and have respect to such a person such a manner and measure and he neglecteth all or any of these doth he not plainly offend in the negative though the act it self be in nature positive But in the case we are about the Nature as we said of things is not to be valued but the Morality and the Morality may be evil when the Nature is good and the Morality may be privative when the Act is positive Hatred of God is an act of Man than which none can be instanced in to contain more evil or malice Therefore as this is an act Natural and Vital it is good and hath God for its direct and first cause but as this act is directed to God and so relates to a wrong object so it is evil and hath neither countenance nor concurrence from him For as is above-touched we are to distinguish Omne bonum viva substantia est vita est Vita autem Christus Omne autem malum sine substantia est nihil est tamen perdere protest Opus Imperf in Matth. Hom. 41. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrysost Homil 2. in Act. Apost Anselmus de Casu Diaboli Tom. 3. the Act of Sin from the Sin of the Act and that upon the received Maxime amongst the Philosophers That all Evil is in somewhat that is Good for having no subsistence of it self it must rest upon some other thing that hath a
wonderful dangerous abuse of the Old Testaments Autority not to be content to admit an invalidity of proofs drawn from thence to confirm Evangelical Duties but to make it no small presumption against the Evangelicalness of any duty that it is first found in the Old Testament which is a gross abuse of Scripture especially by them who would be held enemies to Antimonians They ought therefore first of all to show that such things are purely Legal that is as the Law it self is Mosaical and Typical and Ceremonial before they can damn them there for no better reason but there they find them Add to this when we challenge them to the most ancient and manifold Presedents of the Christian Church who constantly made Vows of various natures to God they presently betake themselves to their common subterfuge pretence of appeal to the Word of God as a Rule and that without any respect to any not truly divine Guides otherwise directing And this they do as confidently as if it had been concluded out of Scripture to the contrary For in such cases indeed their appeal would be most just and reasonable but until that little better then ridiculous especially Scripture being before advised about and appearing not definitive in the case Antiquity and Holy precedents consulted with the better to know the mind of Scripture For instance that text of St. Paul to Timothy saith of young Widows They have damnation in themselves because 1 Tim. 5. 12. they have cast off their first Faith Many of late dayes interpret the Apostle to mean only the Faith of Christ in general Others understand him to speak of a Faith particularly made to Christ by the Order of Widows vowing singleness of life and in all reason this seems to be most favoured by the context But besides this appeal is made by the one party to the judgment of the ancient and holy Christians interpreting this both by their writings and practise as relating specially to the dedication of Widowhood to God After this fair dealing for men to declare they will be tryed by none but that which they know is the main thing in question is very vain and somewhat more They having no special text so interdicting such Vows as this is to commend them But the worst of it is this that if there were any way more perfect then that they have pitched on they should be sufferers in the good opinion of the world but that must by no means be endured And this at the end of all is the great absurdity they bring us to but surely not so great but both the Cause and Defenders of it may well show their face after all this granted and owned The second thing now in the third place to be touched is concerning the Nature of a Vow in it self viz. That so it is no proper act nor any proper part of Gods Service but the manner of it For to vow to God is an indifferent thing to Good or Evil. A man may as well vow to Gods dishonour as his glory It is therefore good or evil in relation to the matter about which the Vow is made For to vow Sacrifices under the Law and to vow Alms under the Gospel or Virginity or such like is no farther part of the Service of God then the thing it self tends to the worship of God and its nature and office is to bind to the true and due performance of a thing but not absolutely a duty in its self The principle doubt on the contrary may be that which is taken from that which a man devotes to God as an ingredient to all vows For when a man vows he of a free man makes himself servile and limited to one of those things to which formerly he was free And this we have shewed is an argument of some against vowing because it takes away the liberty God had given On the other side the contrary party may in my judgment turn it against them and make it an argument of worth and excellencie because it gives to God that which is to us most precious For when St. Paul saith If you may be free use it rather and stand fast in the liberty where with Christ hath made you free he undoubtedly means only in reference to man and then only when we really have and not presume only that we have such a liberty and when this liberty is that which pertaineth to the substance of the Gospel as most of those places alledged to found a liberty do aim at But do they think as it should seem that either Natural Civil or Evangelical Liberty is such a thing and so given unto us of God that we may not render it to him nor part with it again to him Is it too good or sacred to give him it from whom we received it Nay the more dear and precious it is to us the more acceptable it should be to him When we deny our selves the liberty he hath given us the better to serve him surely it is no less pleasing to God than to part with meat drink money and the time which he hath given us dedicating the same to him It is strange therefore next to monstrous that Christians should stumble so at the Scriptures and they especially who will scarce allow any man to be cunning in the Scriptures besides themselves or to be governed by them as they pretend to be as to make such fond conclusions from them the contrary to which is much the truer To give away our liberty to God is an excellent Sacrifice to him and they would prove out of Scripture we ought not to give it him at all For if they prove not this they prove nothing when they say we ought not to make vows to him because it takes away our liberty And therefore to the argument viz. that by this it should follow that vowing is in it self an act or part of Gods worship I answer That if any thing here be an act of worshipping God it is the giving up it self of our liberty and not the vowing to give it up for this is but the means and manner so to serve and worship God and not the worship it self And thus much Perkins Perkins Cases of Conscience Chap. 14. Lib. 2. acknowledges in vows about bodily exercises such as Fasting Prayers and Alms but likes not it so to be in other matters Indeed as he confusedly and crudely touches the point passing from the nature of a Vow in it self which was his question unto the matter he might very well write against some vows and prove them unlawful when the thing it self is unlawful to be done whether with or without a vow such as are ceremonial acts of the Law of Moses and moral evils against truth justice or piety it self And thus much of the form of vowing the lawfulness and uses in general CHAP. IV. Of the Matter of Vows in particular And first of the Virginal state that it is
be convicted of moral evil and so unconcernedly to omit the weightier matters of the Law as Judgment Mercy or Charity in Vnity and Faith what can Charity call this but meer Pharisaism and where must such Pharisaism end at length but in Sadducism even denying of the Blessings and Curses of a Future Life For as Drusius hath Si Patres nostri selvissent mâ—râ—â—â—s resurrecturâ— praemia manere â—ustos â—â—st hanc vitam nâ—n tantoperè râ—bellassent Drusius in Mat. c 3. v. 7. Item in c. 22 23. observed it was one Reason alledged by the Sadduces against the Resurrection If our Fathers had known the dead should rise again and rewards were prepared for the Righteous they would not have rebelled so often not conforming themselves to Gods Rule as is pretended by all but conforming the Rule of Sin and of Faith it self to the good Opinion they had of their own Persons and Actions which Pestilential Contagion now so Epidemical God of his great Mercy remove from us and cause health and soundness of Judgment Affection and Actions to return to us and continue with us to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. THE CONTENTS OF THE CHAPTERS Chap. I. OF the Nature and Grounds of Religion in General Which are not so much Power as the Goodness of God and Justice in the Creature And that Nature it self teaches to be Religious Chap. II. Of the constant and faithful assurance requisite to be had of a Deity The reasons of the necessity of a Divine Supream Power Socinus refuted holding the knowledge of a God not natural Chap. III. Of the Unity of the Divine Nature and the Infiniteness of God Chap. IV. Of the diversity of Religions in the World A brief censure of the Gentile and Mahumetan Religion Chap. V. Of the Jewish Religion The pretence of the Antiquity of it nulled The several erroneous grounds of the Jewish Religion discovered Chap. VI. The vanity of the Jewish Religion shewed from the proofs of the true Messias long since come which are many Chap. VII The Christian Religion described The general Ground thereof the revealed Will of God The necessity of Gods revealing himself Chap. VIII More special Proofs of the truth of Christian Religion and more particularly from the Scriptures being the Word of God which is proved by several reasons Chap. IX Of the several Senses and Meanings according to which the Scriptures may be understood Chap. X. Of the true Interpretation of Holy Scriptures The true meaning not the letter properly Scripture Of the difficulty of attaining the proper sense and the Reasons thereof Chap. XI Of the Means of interpreting the Scripture That they who understand Scripture are not for that authorized to interpret it decisively The Spirit not a proper Judge of the Scriptures sense Reason no Judge of Scripture There is no Infallible Judge of Scripture nor no necessity of it absolute The grounds of an Infallible Judge examined Chap. XII Of Tradition as a Means of understanding the Scriptures Of the certainty of unwritten Traditions that it is inferiour to Scripture or written Tradition No Tradition equal to Sense or Scripture in Evidence Of the proper use of Tradition Chap. XIII Of the nature of Faith What is Faith Of the two general grounds of Faith Faith divine in a twofold sense Revelation the formal reason of Faith Divine Of the several senses and acceptations of Faith That Historical Temporarie and Miraculous Faith are not in nature distinct from Divine and Justifying Faith Of Faith explicite and implicite Chap. XIV Of the effects of true Faith in General Good Works Good Works to be distinguish'd from Perfect Works Actions good four wayes Chap. XV. Of the effect of Good Works which is the effect of Faith How Works may be denominated Good How they dispose to Grace Of the Works of the Regenerate Of the proper conditions required to Good Works or Evangelical Chap. XVI Of Merit as an effect of Good Works The several acceptatations of the word Merit What is Merit properly In what sense Christians may be said to merit How far Good Works are efficacious unto the Reward promised by God Chap. XVII Of the two special effects of Faith and Good Works wrought in Faith Sanctification and Justification what they are Their agreements and differences In what manner Sanctification goes before Justification and how it follows Chap. XVIII Of Justification as an effect of Faith and Good Works Justification and Justice to be distinguished and how The several Causes of our Justification Being in Christ the principal cause What it is to be in Christ The means and manner of being in Christ Chap. XIX Of the efficient cause of Justification Chap. XX. Of the special Notion of Faith and the influence it hath on our Justification Of Faith solitary and only Of a particular and general Faith Particular Faith no more an Instrument of our justification by Christ than other co-ordinate Graces How some ancient Fathers affirm that Faith without Works justifie Chap. XXI A third effect of justifying Faith Assurance of our Salvation How far a man is bound to be sure of his Salvation and how far this assurance may be obtained The Reasons commonly drawn from Scripture proving the necessity of this assurance not sufficient c. Chap. XXII Of the contrary to true Faith Apostasie Heresie and Atheism Their Differences The difficulty of judging aright of Heresie Two things constituting Heresie the evil disposition of the mind and the falsness of the matter How far and when Heresie destroys Faith How far it destroys the Nature of a Church Chap. XXIII Of the proper subject of Faith the Church The distinction and description of the Church In what sense the Church is a Collection of Saints Communion visible as well as invisible necessary to the constituting a Church Chap. XXIV A preparation to the knowledge of Ecclesiastical Society or of the Church from the consideration of humane Societies What is Society What Order What Government Of the Original of Government Reasons against the peoples being the Original of Power and their Right to frame Governments Power not revocable by the people Chap. XXV Of the Form of Civil Government The several sorts of Government That Government in general is not so of Divine Right as that all Governments should be indifferently of Divine Institution but that One especially was instituted of God and that Monarchical The Reasons proving this Chap. XXVI Of the mutual Relations and Obligations of Soveraigns and Subjects No Right in Subjects to resist their Soveraigns tyrannizing over them What Tyranny is Of Tyrants with a Title and Tyrants without Title Of Magistrates Inferiour and Supream the vanity and mischief of that distinction The confusion of co-ordinate Governments in one State Possession or Invasion giveth no Right to Rulers The Reasons why Chap. XXVII An application of the former Discourse of Civil Government to Ecclesiastical How Christs Church is alwayes visible and how invisible Of the communion
traducing him with abusing the Sacred name of God privily born about him to that purpose The Heathens have compared to him Apollonius Tyanaeus and Jannes and Jambres withstanding Moses before Pharaoh being all notorious Magicians But these have received answer from most of Arnob. cont Gentes Aug. de Civit. Dei lib. 1. Euseb Demonst Evang. lib. 3. c. 3. 8. c. the ancient and Learned Fathers who have met with this Exception and to this purpose answered First that it is not true that they ever wrought such miracles as did Christ and his Servants Secondly the wonders they wrought were not done with such simplicity and perspicuity as the other were Christ and his Apostles only by the word of their mouths commanded the winds and seas and cured the sick opened the eyes of the blind gave straitness and strength to the Lame and Creepled whereas Magicians are constrained to use many horrible and ridiculous Rites to the inducing of Evil Spirits to act for them Thirdly The end of this doctrine and Miracles mutually justifie one another as to the divineness of them For most or all Magical wonders were wrought to ends agreeable to such Evil Spirits as set them on work viz. For Cousenage for Lust for wantonness for malice for revenge and such like unreasonable passions But the ends both of the Christian doctrine and Miracles were no other then Temperance Continence Patience Meekness Charity and the compleat exercise of all such Virtues as nature it self approved and magnified And declared openly to be done against vain-glory and Licentiousness and in opposition and confusion of such wicked Spirits as abused mankind generally before Christ's coming in the Flesh And as Christ argues strongly How can Satan cast out Satan How could he give Tertul. Apol. cap. 23. Lactan. 8. Institut cap. 27. Hieron ad Marcel ep 17. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Athan. de Incarnat Hotting Hist Orient lib. 2. any countenance or aid to them that ejected and dispossessed and confounded him yea made him pronounce his own unhappiness and inability to resist the Divine vertue in Christs servants by Exorcisms tormenting him as the ancient Fathers frequently assure us telling us how they openly challenged them to stand it out with them Now these things were effected by the Word of God Which insinuates A Third ground of the Divineness of the Scripture and Christianity also viz. The nature of the Doctrine whose simplicity Majesty Puritie Humility and Sublimity are such as will admit of no Competitors It is written of Mahomet indeed That having patched up his Alcoran he openly boasted and brag'd what he had done and challenged those pitiful ignorant and stupid people to shew any man that could compose such another piece But it is certain that himself was so altogether illiterate and ignorant and so continued that he could neither write nor read but caused it to be set together by better Wits but no better hearts then his And the very vain-glory discovered sufficiently the imposture But such was the doctrine of our Saviour and his Apostles that so far as any thing can prove it self from its native truth and Excellencie this did manifest it self to the world and captivated more with its plain dealing than ever any of the most profound Philosophers works or the Eloquence of humane Orators Which yet further appears from A Fourth head viz. The incapacity and infirmitie of the Chiefest Agents under God in inditing and framing the same which amazed the Elders of the Jews themselves hearing Peter and John deliver such wonderful doctrine Acts. 4. 13. accompanied with such marvellous works until they resolve themselves in the reason of it considering that they had been with Jesus who had taught and enabled them being but simple unlearned and ignorant men of themselves so to speak and act And the like may be said of the rest of the Apostles who likewise having been with Jesus and afterward more amply furnished with the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost spake the wonderful works of God to the Admiration of all their Auditors Which maketh St. Chrysostome in several places to triumph over all other Doctors in their behalf speaking to this purpose Where are now your Chrysostom Tom. 2. pag. 560. H. Tom. 4. pag. 611. grave and learned Philosophers with their affected habits their long beards their solemn gate Where are your Eloquent Orators A Poor Tent-maker as was Paul An ignorant Fisherman as was Peter and the rest of the simple Apostles have carried the world from them all have drawn all Nations after them Can this proceed from any but a Divine power And Fifthly could it be ascribed to any thing but a Divine power That so many wise so many learned so many noble so many rich so many young and old Virgins tender and delicate should so humbly and devoutly embrace so stoutly and hardily maintain with the loss of their lives and relations and fortunes such a doctrine as brought them no Credit no profit no pleasure but rigours and Severities and self denials but by Divine inspirations How many hath Mahomet's Religion won unto it for so many hundred years besides those who have either by early education suckt in those corrupt Principles or by Terrour and Power over them have been constrained to it or corrupted by the flatteries of Licentiousness and Pleasure countenanced by it Alass so few that they are not worth the reckoning up Sixthly The admirable harmony between these diverse Authors far distant in place at the time of their composing Holy writ with themselves and also with the Ancient Prophets before Christ insinuating the same things they at Christs coming explain'd and published is no small argument of Gods finger in the work Which are Tertullians two Tertul. Adver Marc. lib. 3. cap. 5. reasons given against Marcion who blasphemously affirmed One God to be the Author of the Old Testament and another of the New Seventhly consider we the manner of propagating this word of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A than de Incar nat and worship that as is already intimated was not only by weak and illiterate Instruments but altogether in a meek peaceable and gentle perswasive not coercive way by civil fore or violence but less towards such as once having freely given their names to God and were incorporated with them proved false and made defection from them Though it hath appeared that the vengeance of God hath wonderfully pursued the Persecutors of his faithful Servants Lastly aiming at brevity It is a notable argument of its Native Excellency and Perfection That all the greatest Wits of the world being bent against the Word of God and endeavouring to pick holes in it and convict it of errour have failed in such their attempts and have rather rendr'd it more undoubted and conspicuous Whereas no sooner are other Pretending writings brought to due light and examination but they are convicted of impostures CHAP. IX Of
In his state of innocencie and perfection or imperfection and blindness of mind God certainly knew that man was frail and apt to mistake when he delivered his Law How then is this an Apologie sufficient for him who gave such a Law as was disproportionable to his understanding at the time of giving it But then secondly considering that the understanding and the thing to be understood are Relatives and that it comes to the same end whether the Facultie be unapt to conceive or the Object unapt to be conceived such an excuse is to no purpose But yet withal wo must note that man is not to be excused from guilt in misunderstanding First be cause he willingly brought this defect upon himself by his Original â—â—lly and Falâ— of Secondly Because he through vile and vitious affections doth oftentimes contract a greater darkness and disorder than is natural to him even in this state of Original sin And God as all other Law-givers did not proportion the Law given according to the contingent dispositions of particular mens understanding but according to that common Scantling found generally in Man So that undoubtedly some men are the proper authors of their own ignorance in divine matters through their affected evil manners as the Scripture and the Fathers jointly shew A second General reason is from God 1. Calling man to the knowledge of himself and that by his word and never intending to alter the course of nature and general state of man in this life which was and is to be fallible Infallibilitie being the portion of the blessed in the life to come â—t were not impossible that God should either by so framing his word or so reframing man have secured him from erring about it but he hath not so done neither doth it appear how such Exemptions and priviledges could consist with his Providence more general For Secondly The Providence of God having determined to preserve humane and divine Societies as he had constituted this can hardly be understood to be more readily and safely effected than by mutual obligations and a necessity of mutual offices to be done one towards another And the first thing conducing hereunto is the Order of Governors and Governed of Masters and Scholars of such as teach and such as are taught in the Word But if every man were wise in the Laws of man had the power of the Sword justly given into his own hands or the power of the Word in his own breast then would there be no need at all of Rulers or teachers to teach or instruct or reprove and redress errours in manners because Every man is supposed to be an independent Prince and though he should offend against nature it self was not to be punished by one who had no autority over him Hence there fore it is that God most wisely hath suffered an inequalitie of Persons in all Ages all Faculties all Policies as well divine as humane that the more strickt the bond is the more intire the societie and unity might also be Thirdly As this discrimination secures the necessary relations between men within themselves so doth it the dependance between God and Man which must never be forgotten For as for the Father to deliver all the writings of his Estate to his son and to put him in present and full possession of all his wealth is the next way to tempt his son to forget and disrespect him and no more to acknowledg any duty to him in like manner were it so that God at once should have put man in ample and absolute knowledg of his holy writings and will without reserving to himself the farther manifestation of difficulter matters there would be no address to God no worship no seeking to him for satisfaction and information in the Care of his Soul One main end and office of prayer would be extinct So we read that God designing the Law to the Israelites provided aforehand That the ordinary Rulers should judg the people at all time but the hard causes they should bring to Moses and Moses himself cases too hard for him to God As in the Case of him that gathered sticks on the Sabbath day and of Zelophehads daughters Fourthly God suffers this to the end he might quicken and excite our Endeavours and industry in the search after his holy will so reveiled unto us For were it so that all things were presently and readily obvious unto us there would be wanting that excellent vertue of labour to which God hath ordained all men since the fall to perserve them from greater mischiefs incident to weak man And besides contempt and slighting are Besides those Texts of Scripture which by reason of wisdom and depth of sense and mystery laid up in them are not yet conceived there are in Scripture of things that are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seemingly confused 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 carrying semblance of Contrariety and Achronisms Metachronisms and the like which brings infinite obscurity to the text There are I say more of them in Scripture then in any writer that I know secular or divine Dr. Hales Serm. 1. p. 22. alwaies the consequent of what is plain and familiar to us And therefore that argument which some use to prove all things evident in Scripture and others contrariwise that all things are unquestionable in the Church so that according to the opinion of the one a man committing himself to the holy Scriptures and according to the other submitting himself to the Church in all things he may promise himself security rather than safety do make more against this It being more certainly the Will of God while we war in the Church militant we should never rest secure from due solicitudes and temptations but by often contentions with him to preserve our selves from falling from the true Faith or falling into a false Faith A third General reason of the obscurities in Scripture may be taken from the Scriptures themselves which not compared with the general ability of mans reason and understanding only but with other writings also are of difficult access and that will be thought no calumnie if it be considered First That the languages in which they were originally written are so far perished now adayes that they are familiar to no nation neither can the many Idioms and proprieties of the phrase be well understood by us Secondly The Histories thereof and the several customes rites Civil and Religious amongst the Heathens as well as Jews and Christians the habits gestures and acts very easily known and readily apprehended by such as lived in those dayes and places are now hardly to be understood Thirdly The difficulty of distinguishing between Canonical and Uncanonical Writings Fourthly The subtilty and artifices of Heretiques in their corrupting if not the Letter yet perverting the genuine sense Yea the very Orthodox Expositors are themselves so various and unconsenting in the true meaning that they much more distract and unsettle
Passive preparedness we speak of doth not so much as either open the eye to discover the use or benefit of Grace nor in the least incline the Will to desire it Now because the holy Fathers and especially St. Augustine and moderner Divines do speak of the Works of the Unregenerate as not only insufficient and imperfect but sinful yea sin it is very requisite to take their true meaning which cannot possibly be as if they were simply evil for then were they simply to be forborn and omitted but Synecdochically they intend alwayes to intimate a sinfulness in defect of what was due to such Actions compared with the divine Rule Or they called them Sin not so much from the nature of the Actions themselves as the inseparable evil of Commission alwayes accompanying them as was Pride and presumption upon their such laudable works as sufficing of themselves without a Saviour or Sanctifier Extraordinarie which they were either wholly ignorant of or contemptuously rejected to intitle them to exact Philosâ—phers and observers of the law of Nature wheâ—ein the blessedness of a man in this life consisted according to them and afterward to open the door of a Paradise framed to themselves Of these Good works thus mischievously attended as constantly they were in Natural men truly might be said by St. Austine on the Psalms Good works without Faith do but help Aug. in Psal 31. men to go faster out of the way And by Chrysostom sometimes speaking more than enough of the use of works preparatory Nothing without Faith is Good and that I may use such a Similitude as this they seem to me who flourish with good works and are ignorant of Gods worship to be like the Reliques of dead persons finely adorned And the voice of Scripture is so clear that there is no need to alleadg the same against the inefficacie of the best natural Acts to spiritual ends and purposes The more principal and useful enquiry then is concerning the works of the Regenerate done upon the grounds by the vertue and to the proper ends of Faith what they may avail a true Believer For that they are beneficial and that most of all to the benefactor himself Man is in a manner consented to unanimously or if it be not we shall make no great scruple plainly and stoutly to affirm so much after the holy Scriptures have so clearly and positively delivered the same as amongst many in these places Finally brethren whatsoever things are true whatsoever things are honest Phil. 4. 8. whatsoever things are just whatsoever things are pure whatsoever things are lovely whatsoever things are of good report if there be any vertue if there be any praise think on these things Those things which ye have both received 9. and learned and heard and seen in me do and the God of peace shall be with you And Heb. 6. 8. For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh Heb. 6. 7. oft upon it and bringeth forth Herbs meet for them for whom it is dressed receiveth blessing from God But that which beareth Thorns and Briars is rejected 8. and is nigh unto cursing whose end is to be burned Who sees not here that a good Christian fruitful in good works is compared to good ground which is blessed of God and evil Christians barren and unfruitful compared to ill ground next to cursing And elsewhere This 2 Cor. 9. 6. I say he that soweth the seed of good works sparingly shall reap sparingly but he that soweth bountifully shall reap bountifully And the Psalmist Psalm 62. 12. agreeable hereunto saith Unto thee O Lord belongeth mercy for thou renderest to every man according to his works And Jeremie rendereth it as a Jerem. 32. 19. reason of Gods greatness which is an inseparable and essential attribute of God that he is so equal in this case saying Great in Counsel mighty in work For thine eyes are open upon all the wayes of the Sons of men to give every man according to his wayes and according to the fruit of his doings And yet more plainly St. Paul to the Romans speaking of God Who will Rom. 2. 6 7 8 9. render every man according to his deeds to them who by patient continuing in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality eternal life But unto them that are contentious and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness indignation and wrath tribulation and anguish to every soul of man that doth evil of the Jew first and also of the Gentile But glory honour and peace to every man that worketh good to the Jew first and also to the Gentile I shall add but one more Text and that found in the Epistle to Titus which not only in sense but almost in terms proves what I laid down concerning the beneficialness of good works This is a faithful saying and these things Tit. 3. 8. I will that thou affirm constantly That they which have believed in God might be careful to maintein good Works these things are good and profitable unto men And so far as we now urge good Works the answer is very sufficient to that place alledged against the Effect of good Works in general Luk. 17. 10. where our Saviour saith in St. Luke And when ye shall have done all things which are commanded you say We are unprofitable servants We have done that which was duty to do To this I say it is fully answered though more might be said We are unprofitable to God our Master who commanded us to work for so saith David likewise My Goodness extendeth Psal 16. 3. not to thee but it is not said We are unprofitable unto our selves or that no good accreweth unto our selves thereby And I would to God that though no good Christian can deny the usefulness of Good works in general that do not denie the Scriptures or common sense yet they would be more firmly setled in the belief hereof than too many are and suffer this Faith to have its proper influence upon their lives which might be safely admitted and that without any offense or prejudice to the freeness of Gods grace as will yet further appear For the Effect of Good works doth not only confine it self to certain temporal blessings of this world and outward prosperties which in truth was the proper portion and promise made by God to the Jew under the Old Law so far as it was Ritual and Mosaical upon their obedience but it extendeth it self plainly to the spiritual blessings upon earth and immortal in heaven as our blessed Lord expresly teaches us in his Sermon on the mount saying Not every one that saith unto me Lord Lord shall enter Mat. 7. 21. into the Kingdom of heaven but he doth the will of my Father which is in Heaven that he shall is to make no criminal addition to Scripture the sense being so plain And so St. Paul to Timothy teaches It is a
are intimated to us in these words of St. Paul which are vulgarly brought against us viz. Nevertheless the foundation of God 2 Tim. 2. 19. standeth sure having this seal The Lord knoweth who are his And let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity The first foundation of God is that which he hath layed in his assuring us that he will have a Church in despite of all Enemies and Persecuters which would destroy it The second is the seal to this Charter which relating to special persons is twofold The First That God knoweth who are his that is according to Scripture phrase owneth and asserteth the cause of those that are his and will never forsake them otherwise than he hath declared that is they not violating egregiously the Covenant on their parts The second is that which follows viz. Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity This is the seal set to the Covenant made by God which if not duly and proportionably to the favourableness of the Evangelical Covenant observed by man the seal of God avails but little to the benefit of a Christian A second conclusion may be That notwithstanding God hath no where enjoyned us under any forfeiture to obtain this assurance yet he requireth us to be alwayes so pressing and proficient in Faith and Holiness of Life that above his Capitulations or ordinary Promises made in his Word he may communicate his pleasure unto us and good-will concerning the particular salvation of us This hath been imparted unto divers and may again when it seems good to God But it is no Rule to us Thirdly A faithful Christian ought to endeavour the attaining to a strong and true degree of Hope by Gods grace and the working out of his Salvation with fear and trembling For St. John saith That a man may arrive to such a state of assurance as 't is called that considering and believing the undetermined mercy of God in the Gospel he may have confidence of Gods love towards him his own conscience not condemning him as St. John saith Beloved if our heart condemn us not then 1 John 3. 21. have we confidence towards God Lastly This sense serves much to the comfort and tranquility of the mind of scrupulous Christians more than the holding of a peremptory assurance of Salvation which they who require it cannot deny to be wanting to many faithful servants of God For when they consider that the want of this assurance is no indication or character of a Reprobate as some would make it and they must who bring it under precept and promise then are they heartened still to press towards holy and devout exercises believing that God not seeing nor judging as man judgeth nor as they of themselves but out of his incircumscribed mercie may accept them and have mercy on them And here properly doth that doctrine of Faith commended in the Articles of our Church as very comfortable take place viz. as that which when we have done all we must betake ourselves unto and which brings us neerest to God namely not that we believe we are justified for or because we believe we are freely but because Faith and trust in God as it is the first stone in our heavenly building so is it the crown and consummation of all when we disown and disavow all sufficiencie in ourselves or our most Christian Acts even Faith it self and trust in his mercy to be accepted under all our fears and reasonings to the contrary not manifestly violating the Covenant with God for which our own hearts and ordinary apprehensions may condemn us CHAP. XXII Of the Contrary to true Faith Apostasie Heresie and Atheism Their differences The Difficulty of judging aright of Heresie Two things constituting Heresie The Evil disposition of the mind and the falseness of the Matter How far and when Heresie destroyes Faith How far it destroyes the Nature of a Church THus having sufficiently treated of the most general and principal Effect of Faith before we leave this we are in reason to enquire into that which privatively relates to true Faith and that is Heresie What that is and wherein it consisteth For Heresie cannot properly be applyed to any but such who are of the Faith and in some degree belong to the Catholick Church wherein it is distinct from Atheism Apostasie and professed Infidelity For Infidelity though it carries with it in its name a sense which comprehends both Atheism and Apostasie yet use hath prevailed so far as to apply it only to such who do receive some Articles of the Christian Faith and them fundamental too though not as the Christians For Example Infidels may believe there is a God and that God but one and that there shall be a Resurrection of the Just and Unjust and Life everlasting either in misery or bliss yet being either wholly ignorant of or directly denying some fundamental Points of Faith as Christian they continue Infidels though not Atheists Neither can they be accounted Hereticks having never been of the Church nor initiated into or embraced the true Faith These are Negatively only related to the Church as Logicians say Dissimilary things relate one to another viz. A black thing to a white But Heresie is of a privative sense and an opposition to the true Catholick Faith with an Obligation not only taken from the matter of Faith it self to which all the world owe homage and obedience but from some extrinsecal formalities whereby some men more especially contract a relation to the Church of Christ And the first and most principal cause hereof is the solemn dedication which is made by ourselves or others we not oppugning it of us in the initiating Rite of Baptism wherein renunciation is openly made of all things persons and opinions contrary and inconsisting with that Doctrine we there submit unto and vow to observe This Dedication of us to Christ doth make and denominate us Christians and Catholicks according to the less ancient use of the word of which we shall hereafter speak Now according to the degree or manner of violating this most solemn and sacred Vow in Baptism are men said to be Apostates and Hereticks And an Apostates are Hereticks but not all Hereticks Apostates The principal difference consisteth in this 1. That the Apostate doth renounce even the first principles of Christian Faith as Christian And they are they which are expresly contained in the form of Baptism whereby he became a Christian 2. In a formal profession contrary to such Covenant made with God in Christ But Heresie doth not absolutely deny the Grounds of Christianity it self but whether by affected errour or invincible doth resolutely and firmly assert things contrary to true Doctrine But to give a precise definition of Heresie as St. Augustine of old so we find at this day very difficult and not to turn to the right hand or to the left not to make it too broad and wide
Tim. 2. 1 2. prayers and intercessions and giving thanks for all men For Kings and all that are in authority c. which hath been so understood by some as if he had intended here to distinguish and establish a co-ordination of Governours over the same people but there is no necessity at all of such a consequence and St. Peter expresly distinguisheth their relations 1 Pet. 2. 13 14. not to be co-ordinate but subordinate saying Submit your selves to every ordinance of man that is not as some weakly and presumptuously would interpret the Apostle as if Kings and Princes were mens creatures and by them constituted but humane Creature which is the word in the Original doth signifie such Persons as have authority over men as men and not as Christians such as were then Civil Governours amongst the Gentiles which the phrase of the Jews commonly called Creatures barely and Humane as having no such Divine Graces conferred on them as had the Jews for the Lords sake whether it be unto Kings as Supream or unto Governours as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evil doers and for the praise of them that do well Here Governours are said to be of two sorts not co-ordinate and subordinate but Supream and Subordinate such as have authority immediately and absolutely in themselves without dependence upon others and such as are of an Inferiour order and under the said Supream rule and execute Justice So that nothing can be more absurdly and sediciously taught than to make such as are constituted by another to have any authority at all over their Founder and Lord the author of their power I know infinite instances may be brought of Common-wealths which have admitted and been governed by such a Co-ordination or at least a power reserved in store in the hands of certain persons whose proper office and care it should be to regulate and reduce to a safe mean the extreams which single and absolute Monarchs may easily fall into But all these varying so exceedingly from the natural form of Government sway not much with me For that which is natural and of Divine Ordinance and Institution cannot possibly be uncertain and mutable so that no man shall be able to know where to place his duty of Obedience which God requires to be paid to such as are in Authority And obedience being due only to the Supream himself immediately or to those that derive authority from him how is it possible to understand but by the sad effects of power pressing and afflicting a man where he is to yield his obedience Therefore surely God can have no hand in such modellings of States which shall perplex a man in rendring his subjection For it is not a great empty and ridiculous Title which maketh a Supream but entire power and absolute freedom at least from subjection to others especially of his own Dominion All Titles without this are honourable Mockeries but the real Supremacy is actual I say not how justly or injuriously in those Tutours of Princes and Keepers of the Liberties of the people as is commonly given out and in this case supposing that Right and Power are not separated not these Proveditors or Senatours who thus chastise Princes are rebellious but they who bearing the name of Kings and Princes being in truth but meer subjects refuse to submit to the decrees of their Superiours But if possession giveth not Right which is the most Christian as well as rational opinion it may be doubted how a just title can be acquired by any Persons in co-ordination to the Supream power when as we have shown the People never had any such themselves and therefore can transferr none nor such select persons had any of themselves who assume this nor is it to be conceived how any natural Right should descend upon many persons as the Paternal power doth upon one from whence Monarchical Power and Right may flow And If Senatours as they call them or suck like States-men cannot regularly found their title in nature or Divine Writ or revelation It was no act of Rebellion that greatest act of Hostility in Julius Caesar to reduce the Roman Common-wealth to Monarchy For there are two things to be considered in Civil Authority The Government it self in its form and kind and the Governour invested with this The Person Governing may doubtless offend notoriously though I dare not say forfeit to any other his Authority but the Government it self being abused cannot be in fault or for any miscarriages of the Person lapse to other The Government is religiously to be observed and secured from adulterations and corruptions even when the Monarch is irreligiously discarded and dethroned So that the Tyranny of a single person invading the Government administred by States and arrogating the Supremacy to himself alone must needs be less criminal than for many conspiring into a Common-wealth to change both Person and Government from the Natural to the Artificial and meerly of Humane invention and pleasure Now that Possession doth not alwayes include a Title nor Might Right in Civil Affairs is both most reasonable and Christian to believe Reasonable from several heads First from the notoriousness of the mischiefs which croud in upon all Societies of Men where this Tenet is received For what a powerful motive will it be to all discontented persons to invade others and dispossess them when there lies no other difficulty before them but the means to attach successfully whom they intend to destroy but having overcome that by whatever villanies they shall be reputed as legal owners of what they are become Masters as the most innocent and just person of all But can ever any peace or security be expected by that Society wherein it shall be lawful for any man to intrude himself into Power No say some Power acquired and possessed doth give Right to hold but not justifie the Act of inordinate acquiring the same But if it be true in Logick That the Conclusion doth alwayes partake of the weakness of the Premisses and in Nature That an evil cause be it but of the nature of a Circumstance corrupteth the whole effect is it not altogether as rational that such an hainous act in the acquiring such Power here should quite marr the effect Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean not one saith holy Job 14. 4. Recte factum est ut id quod male caeptum est Autoritate publica destrucretur Damasus Epist Acholio Eurydico c. apud Holstennii Collectionem pa. 40. Part. 1. Job So not one can by an unrighteous Act produce a righteous effect Neither can the inveterateness of an Evil any wayes mitigate the same nor tract of time wipe away that Guilt which was at first acquired For prescription in such cases never gives just Title but where other Titles are extinguished which is by accident Then indeed Possession it self giveth not a good Title but hath less evil and inconvenience
A thing may be said in its self efficacious though it doth not attain the proper end of its working it misses of its effect because the conditions required are not kept For fire it self as active and operative an Element as it is doth not work effectually upon any thing but its proper matter nor upon that at too great a distance So may it be with the Sacraments which though indeed they are the power of God and not of nature unto salvation yet through some defect in the object or indisposition may fail of their proper and wonted Effect but not from any insufficiency in themselves or indignity of the Minister of them For if in this sense that old barbarous Rule be taken viz. That Sacraments have their virtue Ex Opere Operato viz. From the work done i. e. that they are Efficacious means of Grace in themselves and their vertue doth not depend upon the Ministers unworthines or worthiness provided he doth work according to Christs institution and intention it is true For what St. Paul speaks of the Ministers of the Gospel is true of the Ministers of the Sacraments Not that we are sufficient of our selves to think 2 Cor. 3. 5. any thing as of our selves but our sufficiency is of God The Officers of God in the delivering of these means of salvation not swerving from the Rule and Prescription given by God these Instruments themselves have their due and proper effect As when a King of his Free Grace sendeth by a leud and vain fellow a Grant of some great Favour to any of his subjects whom he pleaseth to raise out of a poor and base estate to riches and honour 't is not the unworthiness or wickedness of the bearer so long as he is true in his Office that can void the Grant so neither can the evil manners of the Ministers of the word and Sacraments null the power and promises of God made in them But though evil manners and vitiousness of the person do not corrupt or destroy the nature and end of the Sacrament yet it is believed that the actual aversation of the mind of him who consecrates and administers not only not intending actually to Consecrate but actually intending not to consecrate may evacuate the whole Action But this is shown by the former example to be very false because still God hath inserted his will and annexed his promises to the thing it self and not to the Persons disposition or indisposition either of understanding or manners It is true some of the Antients have said that Intention is necessary to a Sacrament and this hath given occasion to that gross Error in the Church of Rome which hath mistaken the intention of such Fathers as have spoken of Intention For Intention is twofold The Intention of Christ or God and the Intention of Man or the Minister They may say that Intention is necessary to a Sacrament taking their Intention for the will and mind of God which if it be not observed in all necessary thing at least the Sacrament is not perfect or valid but if it be whatever mans intention be it hinders not the Sacrament is the same And whereas they would sosâ—en this harsh and moderate this erroneous doctrine by distinguishing of Intention in the Priest into Actual Habitual and Vertual First we may well except against this distinction it self because they are forced in the explication of it to make Habitual and Vertual Intention the same in all material things only they cause them to differ in that Habitual is only a general intention without any actual consideration at the time of Consecration of what they are about Vertual that there is at the entrance upon that Action an actual purpose to do what Christ and the Church intended should be done at that time but this passeth a way suddenly and all the remaining Action is performed by vertue of that first good thought But this cannot serve the turn For the form of the Sacrament consisting chiefly in the words of Consecration according to their own doctrine if such an Intention be wanting at that time there can be no consecration and if no consecration no Sacrament So that there are two notorious inconveniences following upon this Error the one that the most sacred and Comfortable Instruments of Gods Grace and our Salvation are left to the lusts of malitious and vain man to be bafled at his pleasure and the Communicant defeated of the blessings God hath consigned to him thereby Another that upon supposition that the Sacraments were duly administred and so by consequence effectual to their proper ends yet this being not certainly known to the Partaker thereof his mind must be in perpetual disturbance and conflict fearing that the Priest had an inward intention contrary to the outward appearance But they say there is at least a Moral certainty And what is a Moral certainty Can they tell They have not yet And all I suppose they can say is no more then to make it a good degree of Probability which will not serve this Case But in truth many Cases fall out so that there is that they call a Moral Certainty on the contrary when spite and malice boll high in the breasts of men and their happiness consists in doing all the mischief they can to them they malign which we know by several Instances is not seldom found in those Countryes where this doctrine flourishes most And to what they are wont here chiefly to oppose That there can be no probability of an effect where the cause is not real but jocular ludicrous and Histrionical as it must be where there is no intention but only a fiction of doing a thing as if one in mockery upon the Stage should baptize one in derision of the Faith and Church of Christ We answer That if this Ludicrous Action be so fictitious and false that the thing only seems to be done but is not done and one seems to be baptized but is not It matters not what his intention may be For we now suppose the thing to be done as Christ and the Church intends For if this be wanting surely nothing is really performed But the question is whether when the thing is really done saving the due intention this defect voids all the rest For let an Officer of a King mock what he pleases and act what he pleases in scorn and derision of the thing he hath in Charge to deliver and declare it is contrary to his resolution to deliver it yet if he really doth deliver it his contrary purposes and actions cannot hinder the effect nor the benefit accruing from thence For as St. Paul saith Neither he that 1 Cor. 3. 7. planteth is any thing nor he that watereth is any thing but God who giveth the encrease We see this in marriage more apparently than in other Sacraments if we may call this a sacrament of which by and by that let the Minister intend what he pleases
Moral and Natural only but Spiritual also ought to have a spiritual or heavenly end And as the reward upon Obedience doth exceed that of the Law so the severity upon disobedience contrary to the too common Errour that the Gospel is more favourable unto sinners than was the Law For though indeed the same trivial neglects or commissions as against Vide Chrys Tom. 6. Serm. 94. initio the Old Law are not now punished in a bodily sensible manner as were they yet the punishments generally of the offences against the New Covenant were greater as St. Paul expresly witnesseth to the Hebrews Hebr. 2. 2 3. He that despised Moses's Law dyed without mercy under two or Hebr. 10 28. 29. three witnesses Of how much sorer punishment suppose ye shall be thought worthy who hath troden under foot the Son of God and accounted the blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing and hath done despite unto the Spirit of Grace c. For we know c. Fifthly the Administration 30 31. of the New Covenant differed from that of the Old and that 1. In the Extent comprehending all Nations without distinction Jer. 31. 34. whereas that of Moses was restrained to Abrahams Seed and that by Isaac and that Seed again of Isaac by Jacob. And secondly it extends not only to all Persons according to the promise made to Abraham that in his Gen. 22. 18. Seed all the Nations of the earth should be blessed and only his own Seed blessed but to all capacities of man his spiritual as well as carnal which the Law of Moses did not as the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews Hebr. 9. 9. doth witness where he tells us how those Legal Rites could not make him that did the service perfect as pertaining to the conscience And again It is not possible that the blood of Bulls and Goats should take away sins Hebr. 10. 4. But the Soul and Conscience are both purged by the Sacrifice of the New Testament once offered for all which was the Body of Christ Thirdly v. 10. It extends to a greater degree of Liberty from the outward servile part of Gods worship and either directs us only to the more inward and spiritual service or gives Liberty greater to the Church than anciently was allowed to accommodate it self to times and place and persons in the worship of God which Liberty was not so far granted under the Old Testament Sixthly The Law and Covenant made by Moses were according to the Letter but Christs according to the Spirit That was exacted upon outward terrours propounded or Mercies This was transacted by an inward principle of Ingenuity and Grace given of God as St. Paul is to be Rom. 6. 14. understood where he saith For sin shall not have dominion over you For ye are not under the Law but under Grace meaning That now least of all we should let sin rule over us being not under the Law that is exempted from the penalties and terrours outward which seemed to constrain obedience or whose disobedience was remitted upon certain outward Rites which have no effect upon them who are under the Law of Grace But the Grace of God so revealed outwardly and so assisting and inclining inwardly doth require more ingenuous obedience than formerly as in the next Chapter it is said But now we are delivered from the Law that being Rom. 7. 6. dead wherein we were held that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the Letter Now from this adjustment of the Law of Moses and of Christ it is evident in what sense St. Paul so oft calls one the Law of Works and the other the Law of Grace For he there takes not Law so generally as some would understand him for all Rule and Doctrine of Holy Life whereby they comprehend as well Evangelical as Natural and Mosaical but in contradistinction to the Law of the Gospel published by Christ viz. the Law as it was Mosaical according to which it could justifie no man it being it self to be done away in Christ For as the Scripture hath it if perfection were by the Levitical Priesthood for under it the People received Hebr. 7. 11. the Law what farther need that another Priest should arise after the order of Melchisedec and not be called after the order of Aaron Secondly Answer from hence may be made to the difficulty How far the Law of Moses or the Old Law binds under the Gospel For having shewed that the Gospel in substance being ancienter than the Law of Moses as well because of the moral duties common to all mankind as the Promises of the Messias contained in it whatever we sind in Moses or the Prophets or the Sacred Historians against any injustice vice or irreligion is not to be imputed so much to the Law as Mosaical but as Evangelical And therefore whatever was Levitical or Mosaical in that Law given to the Seed of Abraham as such ceased and had its full completion in Christ And though many things there found were alwayes and still are of excellent use to all men both morally and judicially taken so that they cannot be said to have no force upon us Yet their obliging power as delivered by Moses and not partaking of the nature of the Gospel ceases and is extinct but lives and is hinding as the same belonged anciently to Christs Law and by it is renewed and confirmed Thirdly The obscurity at least if not errour of those Notes of distinction found in many learned mens writings from hence is discerned such as are these First That the Law propoundeth wrath without Mercy but the Gospel Mercy and Justice For that the Law thus properly and precisely taken as distinct in matter as well as form from the Gospel propounded Mercies as well as Judgments is most apparent from the eighteenth Chapter of Deuteronomy though as we have shewed neither the Mercy not the Judgments were of the same nature as they propounded by the Gospel but chiefly temporal For whether the breach of any of Moses his Laws as such made men obnoxious to Hell and not only to bodily and temporal punishments I much question unless we consider the disobedience formal and doing presumptuously which may attend that evil act Secondly They say the Law Perkins required internal and perfect Righteousness the Gospel imputed But this is very dangerous Doctrine For first it doth not appear that the Law as such and not partaking of the nature of the Gospel doth require such internal and perfect Righteousness it being satisfied with the outwardness and formality of the Letter Secondly It must not be granted that Christs Law doth not much more require internal and perfect Righteousness than the Law and that to our Justification For it is one thing to require a thing absolutely and another necessarily and indispensibly to such an end The Gospel doth
necessary to Salvation are as clear as those under the Old But this is not so clear as Circumcision To which we answer That this is as true taking in the whole manifestation of Gods will For the clearness of the Sacraments enjoyned in the Old Testament do conduce to the clearness of them signified by them And there needs nothing more be said for the clearing of the necessity of these than to admit them to have succeeded those two in the Old Testament And we find not such necessity particularly imposed upon us of receiving the Eucharist as was upon the Israelites of receiving the Paschal Lamb but general necessity without determination of time or place the Gospel expresseth unto us upon the hope of salvation which is sufficient The vertue and Efficacie of this Sacrament above-touched proves this farther but it needs it self be proved according to those extravagant opinions brought by Modern Divines into the Church that it is only a seal of our Faith and eternal Favour of God in Predestinating us to Glory As if First all according to their judgements that were baptized were ordained to Glory and this were assured them by that Seal Or Secondly that God had Predestinated any to Life without the necessary means to it Or that remission of sins Actual and the expiation of Original were not necessary to the entring into Life or that God had so simply and absolutely ordained us to heaven that he had not ordained these two as Means to obtain Perkins on Gal. 2. v. 15. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theod Haret Fabul 5. c. 2. this For what can be a more horrible prophanation of this Sacrament then to say with one upon the Galatians We are born Christians if our Parents believe and not made so in Baptism Which is contrary to the Doctrine of our Catechism and the whole stream of Primitive Doctors of the Church from whom we may Gather this threefold Effect of Baptism First it is not only a sign as the same Persons say of our Covenant but it is the Covenant it self made between God and Man For God indeed doth make a Promise but he maketh no Covenant otherwise than by Baptism God made a Promise to Abraham that his seed should be blessed before Circumcision but he made no Covenant with him but by Circumcision nor is any actually in the Covenant of Faith but by being baptized Doth not the Scripture expresly say that God gave Abraham the Covenant of Act. 7. 8. Circumcision Circumcision then was not only a Sign of that Covenant though that it were but an Essential part of it Circumcision therefore was a sign in a twofold sense First in respect of the Covenant under the Law as words whereof the Covenant consists are signs of the Will of the Covenanters to the ear and works outward are in like manner signs of the same to the Eye which sort of signs are not distinct from the thing it signifies For God Covenanted with Abraham that he should use those Ceremonies Now this outward visible Covenant was a sign of an inward and invisible relating to the righteousness of Faith as St. Paul saith of Abraham And he received the Sign of Circumcision a Seal of the Righteousness Rom 4. 11. of Faith So that is the Second way in which Circumcision may be said to be a sign viz. As the whole Sacramental Covenant of which it was a part signified the Covenant of Faith into which we are entred by Baptism as the Jews into the other by Circumcision A Second effect of Baptism is to wash away all sins as well Original as Actual of which that Prophesie of Zacharie is generally understood In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David and Zechar. 13. 1. to the inhabitants of Jerusalem For sin and for uncleanness To which St. Paul agrees in his Epistle to the Ephesians speaking of the Church That Eph. 5. 26. he might sanctifie it and cleanse it by the washing of water by the word Where the Word sanctifieth the Water and the water sanctifieth the Person which it can no otherwise do then by washing off the sins of the Soul As St. Peter hath it Not the putting away of the filth of the flesh but the answer 1 Pet. 3. 21. of a good Conscience towards God That is at the time of baptism whereby the filth of the Spirit necessarily implied to make up the correspondence is put away And St. Paul telleth the Corinthians They were washed 1 Cor. 6. they were Sanctified viz. By Baptism But whether Original sin be so far extinguished in the baptized as no more remains should be found is much doubted to which we briefly and clearly answer from the distinction of Sins For sometimes the Cause of sin is termed sin Sometime the Effect of Sin is called Sin whereas Sin is properly the Evil Act it self or the omission of an act due from us Original Sin in us is not so properly called Sin as it was in Adam who actually sinned and that with a consent of his own will But it is rather the Effect of his Actual transgression which doth originally adhere to us and is called sin upon this threefold account First because it is the necessary effect or consequence of Adams Sin as we find Moses to speak in Deuteronomy And I took your sin the Calfe which ye made The Calfe was the fruit of their Sin and Deut. 9. 21. not their sin it self So is that evil Effect the Sin Original because it is the evil consequence of it Secondly It is Sin because it doth partake of the nature of sin in one of the principal parts making up sin They are two The Obliquity of the Act or Deformity and disagreement to the accurate Law of God and the disobedience of the will and pravity thereof This latter original sin as it was actual in Adam had as well as the former but so is it not with us There can be no such disobedience in the Will where there is no Will. There is no will in Infants besides the remote faculty it self and therefore all sin yea all humane acts requiring consent of the Will original sin cannot be sin in this sense But taking sin for a dissonancy from 1 Joh. 3. 4. the Law and Rule as St. John doth and that conformity as is justly required by the Law certainly that Original depravation and corruption found generally in our natures at our first entrance into the World may truly be called sin because it makes us to differ so much from that God made us and intended us to be Thirdly Original sin hath this likewise denominating it sin that it is the cause of sin that original inclination to sin being that which moves us all unto the actual commission of sin which St. Paul surely aimeth at where he saith Now then it is no more I that do Rom. 7. 17. it but sin that dwelleth in
freely to conclude with them But until this be better evinced what make they with so many zealous professions of their believing of Christ or protestations against others that herein they believe not Christ It becomes then the principal doubt of all not what were Christs words but what was the drift and purpose of them And surely they must needs grant this to be worthily doubted of when they consider how sundry of their eminent Doctors do yield such an Indifferency in the words as that they are capable of both senses as might easily be made apparent But saying that We ought to take the Scriptures always literally where it will consist with the analogy of Faith they say no more than we But if it happens as here it doth that our Analogy of Faith differs from theirs what are we the neerer For our Faith tells us Christs words were spiritual as well here as in St. John where he expresly testifies so much saying Joh. 6. 63. The words that I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life that is spiritually and not properly to be understood And Literal sense we understand two ways First as being the same as the prime signification of the words according to common use And this Literal sense we deny of these words But affirm them literally to be taken taking Literal for that which by the same words was immediately and primarily intended by the speaker in which way all Metaphorical speeches are Literally to be taken For he that says of a vicious man He is a Beast doth literally mean that he is of beastly qualities and not the very nature of a Beast So that Metaphorical and Literal are not opposite but Metaphorical and Natural and Natural and Spiritual We say then That this Proposition as in the Eucharist is Metaphorical and yet Literal But it is a weak and spiteful slander to say That because we say this therefore we hold that Christs Body is only Metaphorically and Figuratively in the Eucharist For we profess it to be really and properly and really and properly received in the Sacrament and not as they would fain perswade the World of us imaginarily only But the figurativeness is not so much in the Presence of Christ as the Predication of Christ of the visible Elements We say plainly the Elements are Christ only Figuratively and improperly and as St. Ambrose hath Ambros de Sacrament Lib. 4. C. 4. it or rather had it before a false Cause here as elswhere constrained men to foul practises After Consecration that which was remains and yet is changed into another It retains its nature it is changed to its name to its use and ends and effects and these are sufficient The Fathers who are alledged to prove Christ spake here properly do speak of many changes made in the Elements but then they do as often deny the substance to be changed sometimes they say The Nature is changed but we know Nature is somtimes used more largely than to imply the very Being and Essence it self We say commonly Such a man is quite of another nature from what he was We do not mean his very Essence or Being is changed but his condition It is said in the first Book of Samuel 1 Sam. 10. v. 9. that after his anointing to the Kingdom God gave Saul another heart I hope not in substance but in disposition But it is neerer to our Case what St. Paul saith of Christ and us in his Epistle to the Ephesians We Eph. 5. 30. are members of his body of his flesh and of his bones Can any thing be more expresly affirmed than this to signifie a corporeal unity and identity with Christ if the Verb Copulative Are must here be taken Substantively as they say Is must in these words This Is my Body As they profess with much ardour and zeal they will believe Christ say he what he please and be the thing never so contrary to our common sense and reason so do we And no less do we believe St. Paul speaking by the same spirit This he hath said and therefore we must not dispute but believe He hath said as plainly as words can make it that we are the very flesh of Christ and the bones of Christ and that he cannot be understood of the same in Kind but number is manifest from his argument when he saith No man ever hated his own flesh but as his flesh is anothers in nature we know there is nothing more common Now the like if not same interpretation will satisfy the Scripture in one place and other And not only so but the Fathers who are urged for the literal signification of the words rather than Literal sense of the Author of them speak diverse times of a Real change of the foresaid Elements but saying the same in other cases as in the holy Chrysm after Benediction and specially the water of Baptism we would have one give meaning to the other And the Modern Greeks who are arrived at higher expressions and sense than their forefathers yet when occasion serves can affirm the substance of Bread and wine to remain and would never fully receive the term 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Transubstantiation as the Latins do which declare how much they suspect an Evil sense in the Roman Church Again as they are defective in their characterizing this change to that degree so are they excessive according to the Latins opinions in ascribing too great a change upon Consecration For they make no such distinction as the other between Nature or substance and the Accidents And they deny as much there remains any Accidents as any substance of Bread wherein they seem to take Christ more Literally than the Papists For if as they give out we must take Christ at his word and hold him hard to the Letter we must and ought to do it no less in reference to the Accidents than the Substance For Christ made no distinction and then why should we By vertue therefore of his words the Accidents must be changed as well as the Substance And so in truth we believe and to make our meaning clear will allow no effect of Christs words upon the one which we will not upon the other And if they oppose sense to discriminate the Cases saying that we see and feel that the Specieses and Accidents are the same We must tell them in their own words and that without fraud or dissimulation that we believe Christ rather than our own senses And were it not so yet we cannot teil that they are the same individual Accidents which were before consecration though like them and appearing so to be And I could never as yet meet their reason worth the noting 〈◊〉 remembring which should move them to be lead by their senses to interpret Christs words when he saith Positively and with the same Verb Suâ—â—â—an â—â—ve This Cup IS the New Testament in my blood and commands them to drink the Cup
it implies as much as to say Give us but our demands and then we will be quiet by which Rule no man should defend his own right in lesser matters which to part with perhaps would not utterly undo him but he must be lookt on as accessary to and guilty of his own destruction if the Invader shall have power enough to bring it upon him because he will not peaceably satisfie his unjust desires A man may be and our Saviour in the Gospel saith expresly Luk. 16. 10. is unjust in the least as well as in much And so undoubtedly are they who having no Autority but what they frame to themselves shall by violence and aggressions attempt to extort the least thing belonging of right to another though haply better spar'd than kept For it is a Case of Justice rather than Christianity In justice and common equity the inferiour members of a Church and state owe obedience to their Superiours in all things not contrary to the Law of God the Church or the Nation but at most they can claim such things that are as they say indifferent to be granted them out of Courtesie or Charity only And whoever was so wilfully stupid as not to perceive that Injustice is much more a sin than Uncharitableness and so whatever mischief or guilt shall fall out in such contentions must necessarily light upon the heads of the unjust Aggressour and not indiscreet Resister were it indiscretion to withstand to deny such bold and insolent demanders or uncharitableness both which are denied in the present Case For there can be nothing more unjust on the one side and unwise on the other than so rudely and unrighteously to require of another all that may be granted or to grant all such things as are so demanded And if they urge still The peace of the Church to require such concessions I shall answer Let them first as all good Christians ought to do observe the Peace of Nature and the Peace of Nations which is not to offer violence nor to be unjust nor to go out of their Rank and Order but with good Autority and then take care for the Peace of the Church But what can be more absurd than that men should break the Peace of Nations and Nature it self yea the Law of God and Scriptures which require to obey all that are in autority over us as well Ecclesiastically as Civilly and then so much as to mention the Peace of the Church especially calling that only the Peace of the Church which puts them into quiet possession of their desires But to this we add that it is also very false which is here supposed to be true For there is nothing more manifest than that with diverse things of indifferent nature they mix many things of indispensable use to a Church and such is that so much reproached and derided Hierarchie which all the earth sees they have made it their business to Destroy utterly And when we plainly see as we do that those things in nature indifferent are demanded chiefly as an introduction to a farther abolition of things we hold necessary we hold them no longer indifferent nor can we in common prudence or Christianity part with them to such person any more than we can in a neighbourly manner lend away an Ax or Hammer when we are assured they will be made use of to break open our houses and spoil us though we know they may possibly be made use of to other purposes The Second Obstacle rather than Objection cast in our way is the parity of their Case with the Church of England with that of the Church of England with the Roman wherein whether they show more Spite or Policy may be a question Their Policy imitates them who finding the war to lie heavy upon them at their own doors contrive by all means possible to translate it into another Country as was particularly seen in Hindersons Letter to his late Sacred Majesty who finding the ability of his pen and weight of his discourses advised him rather to turn himself against the common enemy the Papist And thus these men would needs oblige us to make our quarrel good against the Romanists that they may be the les molested in the pursuance of their most Schismatical designs against the Church in which they were educated And this being discovered we might well excuse ourselves from such a task as they would set us But this we have before resolved in good part and had we not might and shall in a very few words dispatch as somewhat out of its proper place We grant then there is a Schism between us and the Romanists And we grant that there can be no cause to be Schismaticks though for a Separation there may and that they are truly Schismaticks who have ministred just Cause of Separation Some we know out of an ancient Father have urged against us That there can be no cause to divide the Church which is true in two senses only First when that Church is not before really divided from other Churches of unquestion'd integrity Realy I say by deserting some considerable point of Faith or introducing some unchristian manner of worship though not Openly and Formally as hath been said Again it is true only in such junctures as the Father spake those words in which was an apt and orthodox agreement within itself both in Faith and manners in such Cases there can be no cause to divide the Church as did the Novatians and Donatists But it was never his purpose to say that no case could happen in which it was not lawful for one Church to leave the Communion of another when it was so often done So still the point is wholly whether cause was given or not and not whether such outward and wilful Separation was made For undoubtedly however some would mince the matter Separate we did and that wilfully from the Church of Rome and chose rather than were forced to go out And upon those very grounds we still stand out and refuse to return The gross corruptions there maintained and not lurking and the fear of the loss of our souls in there continuing and much more thither returning What those are hath been even now touched and we here add that notwithstanding 't is confessed such senses are found of their doctrine and superstitious worship in some private authors amongst them which they offer at first to them they would seduce which may put persons into a possibility of their continuing without incurring damnation yet the Publick autority of that Church which I suppose they will call their Church having evermore of late years censur'd purged and expunged such more tollerable constructions and appeared for the most harsh and uncatholick there can be no great regard had to the fairer opinions Again it is not sufficient that a Church hath a true sense of Christian Faith if it alloweth and commendeth a false and a wicked sense 'T is little to the
good argument against the opinion that holds the Soâ—l of man to be educated out of the matter of the Body as are Brutes Souls But that is not here nor there because certain it is that the way of producing the Soul at first differ'd much from what it doth in the course of Natural generation For then were there no natural Causes concurring with God in the production of the Soul but now there are God now not so absolutely creating humane souls but that there should be some pre-disposing and preparatory acts on mans part conducing thereunto For it seemeth not to be inconsistent with proper Creation that such Acts are required thereunto so that the Soul of man is never now created but by them preceding according to the order of Nature though not of time because in so concurring the Natural Agent doth not concurr with God in the very act of Creating but to the occasion rather which God hath by a Law made freely to himself decreed to work by in this matter But at the first of all God purely made the occasion it self and simply and solely acted of himself There are therefore these three errours to be avoided in the doctrine of the Soul The first is that of Epicures and Infidels that the Soul of man was no otherwise produced than the souls of Brutes but that they are in Substance the same with brutes differing only from them in the finer temperament of the body and the nobler aspect which it informeth But this cannot stand good because though we grant that the evil disposition of the humors of the Body and incommodious frame of the Parts thereof may impede the due exercise of such Acts which are proper to that Kind yet such perfection cannot at all give ability to act so and therefore another Principle must be found out whose nature it is so to act and to which such things are only Organical and subservient For it being acknowledged that the Soul is of an Active and more noble nature than the Body as Spirit is than flesh it cannot be imagined that the Soul should follow the fashion or nature of the Body but that the matter or the Body should be accommodated and suited to the nature of the soul as no man can say that the hand should be fitted to the Instrument by which it works but the Instrument to the Hand And no man can with reason affirm that an house being to be built the Inhabitant or owner is to be brought to that but that surely is to be modelled and framed according to the mind and Ranck of the Owner So no reason is there to suppose the body should give Law to the soul in the nature I mean of it and its actions though it may have some force upon the manner of its actions As the Hand makes the Pen to write and not the Pen the hand absolutely but a good and well-made Pen may be an occasion to the Hand to write well or ill And therefore it is not the body of Brutes which makes the Soul brutish nor the Body of man which makes the Soul humane but on the contrary so that as their natures are different should their original likewise differ And this difference cannot be taken from the matter because the diversity of the matrer ariseth from the Form And besides the Scripture telling us that God breathed into man the breath of Life declareth withal that the Soul of man as the Philosopher himself speaks came from without doors and not from within But this is said of no other Creature A Second mortal Errour is that imputed to Origen viz. That Human souls were created but not singly and separately according to the conception of particular persons but all at once and that together with the Angels That the Angels as all other things God excepted were created is to be received as an Article of Faith but there is neither any thing revealed unto us by the Scripture or discovered by reason when they were so created How then can any man positively say that the souls of men were then created this being then a groundless supposition light and vain must needs be the inference from thence Nay not only is the Scripture silent in that Case but expresses on the contrary the time when the Soul of man was made and that it was at his first Constitution according to the order of the Historie which first describes the manner how Man was made and then adds how God not put the soul into it which he had before made but breathed into it the breath of Life So that as the breath is not at all until it be actually breathed no more was the Soul before it was thus infused by way of breathing Again the absolute ignorance of the Soul of any such pre-existence which it is not possible if we may suppose it in one or two that all Souls shouls be subject to And I call this ignorance and stupidity rather than oblivion as some Philosophers the Authors of this opinion would have it For though a man may forget what he did at such a time and that once he was in such a place and such and such things befel him yet who did ever forget that he had a Being A man may through the strong invasion of some sickness or distemper cease to understand any thing as also in a profound sleep yet he is not properly said to forget these Some have forgot their own names but never any that they were simply And therefore some ancient defenders of this opinion seeing the incredibleness of this Forgetfulness have with infinite impudence introduced persons professing they remembred what they were and did some hundreds of years before they were in those bodies they spake of these things in Lastly How is it credible that that soul which is the fountain of Life Sense and Knowledg to the person where it is should so inform a thing distinct from it self and yet be ignorant of it self Surely it must be because there was nothing to be known of it before it inhabited the Body A Third Errour depending upon this last is that of Origen likewise who affirmed that Souls being Spirits before they were committed to the body were put into them as to so many prisons for their former disobedience and wickedness for their punishment But against this amongst other reasons Isidore of Pelusium argueth well thus How vain and absurd Isidor Pelusior Ep. â— 4. Ep. 163. would it be to suppose Providence to Chastise any sinful person or Spirit by offering greater and more occasions of Sinning than before Prisons are made chiefly for restraint but the body of man rather disposeth the soul to sin and ministreth many more occasions and temptations than it could have before to dishonour God and break his Laws Again as Parisiensis hath it That cannot be said to be a punishment to man of which he is no wayes sensible Guli l. â—eris 〈◊〉 Vniverso
How can any man be said to be afflicted for his loss of a great empire or riches unless he knew that he once was possessed of them or they were at least his by Right How can any pain trouble a man which he feels not And if he feels it not how can it be a punishment to him And to this I add the Scripture saying God made man according to his own Image in Genesis Gen. 1. 26. Jam. 3. 9. and in St. James's Epistle After the similitude of God How is it less than blasphemous that a sinful guilty creature such as man must needs be having a wicked Spirit put into him should be said to be according to Gods Image or likeness And how can it consist with the Scripture elsewhere saying God made man upright but they have found out many inventions Eccles 7. 29. For though the Evil Spirit supposed to be put into man were the Author of its own wickedness yet when once that was so wicked for to put it into man is to make man wicked Now this Image of God so much spoken of in Scripture and treated of by Divines to the great honour of Man we may understand to consist in these five things Principally 1. Wisdom and Knowledg 2. Liberty of Will 3. Justice and Holiness 4. Immortality 5. Dominion For when we speak of the Image of God in Man we must be sure not to confound it with that proper to Christ the Image of God For first that of man was made as we have heard that of God Christ was neither made nor created but begotten and that not by way of Carnal Generation but purely divine and Spiritual Secondly That was as well Eternal in respect of what is past as what was to come But the Image of God in Man only everlasting as to the future time Thirdly That of Christ was immediate but that of Man mediate So that he is not the Image of God but as he is the Image of his more express and Natural Image Christ and that first as is said in Wisdom Christ being primarily called the Wisdom of his Father and deriving of the same to us For as St. John saith Of John 1. 16 his fulness have all received and Grace for Grace And God creating all things through his Natural Word his Son signified by that Metaphorical word expressed in the Book of Genesis did in particular through him communicate that Wisdom unto Adam which he excelled in at his first Institution whereby it was natural to him to understand the natures of all Creatures Earthly as well from their Causes from whence they proceeded as from their effects proceeding from them which latter is the principal means of attaining that remainder and as it were ruins of a more perfect Body of knowledg in Adam which we are capable of in the state we now are And not only Natural things but Supernatural also as God and the Holy Spirits were much more perfectly known to him than to us So that the knowledg of the First man exceeded all after him Christ the Second Adam only excepted in these three things First in the manner of enjoying that knowledg which he had it being not acquired by tedious and experimental discursiveness observations or reasoning within himself but by a divine illumination which was not given him after the manner of Revelations given by God to some of his eminent Servants transiently not to continue or to descend to others but it was by way of a connatural habit which should have passed to his posterity Secondly the object of this knowledg or extent of it transcended that of Man now adayes stretching it self to heavenly as well as Earthly things and the minuter things lying hid from us Thirdly It differed in the manner and perfection as being more accurate and less Fallible than ours The Second thing shining eminently in Adam was Liberty of will whereby he resembled his Creatour who is the only absolute and Free Agent For there was no natural inclination nor temptation in him to err or offend in choosing the Evil and refusing Good according to that of Syracides God himself made man from the beginning and left him in the hand of his Councel c. Leaving it equally in his power and choice to turn to the Eccles 15. 14. Right hand or to the Left to stand or fall And not only freely to do what he did though propelled thereunto but freely to Act or not to act which is the perfectest and most proper freedom of all From this twofold perfection of the Understanding and Will arose a Third which was perfect Innocency and Holiness which by some is called Original Justice and by others Original Grace both ayming at the same thing For Original Justice or Righteousness it may be called because it was not acquired but connatural and simultaneous to the Being of Man Again It was Grace because though it pleased God to create man with it yet he might also have created him without it and it was separable from him and so not intrinsick to his very nature Which is yet thus further to be understood that it were most absurd and blasphemous to believe that God could make a man a sinner without any precedent or concurrent act of his own will or without this original innocency and Justice for as nothing but God can proceed immediately and directly from Gods hand so neither could man as he was the effect of God be any otherwise than Good This then may be called his natural and Original Justice and Goodness and Original Grace also in some sense because though all the works of God must needs be good as his yet man for example might not have been so perfect either in his understanding and will and yet have retained innocency And this was the Grace of God Besides which may probably be asserted another Grace which to the bare stock of Nature thus put together by God superadded a more special and Free Grace called though not very properly the Grace of Sanctification not as it is in us purifying and restoring us in some competent manner to what hath been decayed or depraved by the fraud and power of the Devil in us or our own vile hearts and affections but by way of Preservation preventing the evils and dangers unto which we were subject Now this as it is called Grace because it was not necessarily due to nature So was it called Natural or Original because God conserred the same at our first being and would so have continued it had we not abused and forfeited the same And from hence sprang a Fourth beam of the bright Image of God in man viz. Immortality as an appendage to the said Natural Justice and a reward of the perseverence in it For God saying In the day thou eatest Gen. 2. 17. thereof the tree of the knowledg of Good and Evil Thou shalt surely die did imply that so long as he persevered in due
effect such things as in their general nature they had no tendencie unto The distinction common amongst Philosophers of Fortuna and Casus i. e. Fortune and Casualty and calling that Fortune which contingently falls out to free Intelligent Agents acting and that Casualty which besides natural intention happens to fall out may seem to clear this For if we should affirm that in natural things there were no such indifferencie really but all things were precisely and particularly determined by God in his private counsel however a wide latitude seemeth to us to be left them to move and act or not to act or to move and act thus or not thus but contrariwise no great absurdity or inconvenience would follow For what absurdity could be inferred if a man should say That the Eagle letting fall a Tortoise upon the bald head of the Philosopher of Syracuse walking in the field and so beating out his brains was determined necessarily so to do of God or that the tree that fell down in a wind and killed him that walked out to preserve himself from the fall of his house which he feared was inevitably appointed so to do These effects did not proceed from the nature of these causes themselves but a Superiour hand and yet might be no less necessary than such effects of which the common reason of man can give an ordinary and easie account And if this be granted in some things it doth lye upon them who deny it in all to render a reason of the difference and not on them who affirm a paritie by infinite instances to prove it being sufficient to say There can nothing be shown to the contrary But in things rational and endowed with a power of Election and Rejection it must be confessed that the difficulty is much greater because there seems to be a repugnancie to free will in such tacit necessity and God should seem to take away with one hand what he had given with the other And therefore of this in a more convenient place after we have spoken somewhat preparatory thereunto concerning the Decrees of God which are internal acts of the Providence of God CHAP. IX The method of enquiring into the Nature and Attributes of God Vorstius his grounds of distinguishing the Attributes of God from his Nature examined Of the Decrees of God depending on his Vnderstanding and Will Of knowledge of Intelligence Vision and the supposed Middle knowledge The Impertinencie of this Middle knowledge invented in God How Free Agents can be known by God in their uncertain choice Indifferent Actions in respect of Man not so in respect of God All Vision in God supposes certainly in the thing known IF the Holy Scriptures leaving us many precedents have thereby warranted or at least permitted us to speak of God after the manner of Mans body ascribing unto him head eyes mouth hands and feet and the better to perceive the things of God much more may we be allowed if at all to search into Gods nature to regulate our enquiry of God from the nature of mans mind and the more supream acts of his soul The first Act of which is his apprehension and knowledge with judgment following thereupon The next in order is the Act of his will and this Order we may best follow in the enquiry into Gods Providence which is constituted according as we can judge of knowledge and will whose proper act it is to decree And here first It is requisite that we take notice of the folly and gross impiety of Vorstius a late Pragmatick in Divine Mysteries who would needs distinguish God from himself and taking him at his word wherein speaking after the manner of men such diversity is mentioned concludes that God and his Attributes are really distinct in nature one from another And why did he not by the same rule conclude that Gods very Being his Essence was distinct really from it self as well as from the supposed Accidents he Epicurean-like feigns to God For God is no less affirmed to have heart hands and feet than to have Understanding and Will And if it be granted there is a figurative and no proper sense in the one case why may it not be in the other And that God is all these things Eminently but not after the formality of mankind The matter will be cleared better by examining his prime arguments taken from the Decrees of God our present subject First sayes he The decrees of God are various and many but the Essence of God is but one therefore they must be really distinct To which the answer is as obvious as the argument presumptuous That if the Decrees were really many they must of necessity be really distinct as well from themselves as God But their plurality is rather Relative than Absolute All the Acts of God being but one pure simple Act as in him but denominated divers from the event or relation they bear to the Creature This is one of the first principles in his Christian Catechise and why did he pretending to reason leap over this and not first disprove it and then proceed to his arguments It was a great piece of folly therefore in him to prove a real distinction of Gods Attributes before he had proved that the Nature of God was compounded or would admit of any such opposition For they who deny this will certainly deny that Another of his reasons is The decrees of God are free because they might have not been as well as have been But Gods nature is not so Answ There is a twofold freedom in the Decrees of God The one in respect of the Nature of God as God is precisely considered which abstracting from all Acts was indifferent to others as well as those Decrees made And the other in respect of the Creature or object which was capable of other Decrees and therefore were Gods Decrees said to be free but we all know that distinction of Instants in Order and Nature do not infer a necessary distinction in duration but that both Nature and Decrees might be coequal in eternity Now all things that are eternal are in some case necessary And the Schools have such a distinction of Decrees as they have of nature viz. Decretum Decretans and Decretum Decretatum meaning that the Decrees of God are sometimes used for the Act of God decreeing and sometimes for the thing decreed And of this latter it may be said That the Decree of God is produced and made which is a third special argument of Vorstius but of the other it cannot so be affirmed but it may flow from him by an eternal Law or Volition within himself and not at all occasioned by the Creature And it is therefore said to be free because it was not imposed upon him and therefore necessary because not accessary to him or contingent but proceeding from him as a natural and necessary yet voluntary Agent For we must not look upon God as subject to the condition of the
real being as a ruinous and crased house resteth upon a sound foundation And it is distinguished from it as the matter from the form for though evil hath no such proper matter as other real Beings have for if it had it should it self also be real in nature and of it self yet hath it somewhat proportionable and answerable thereunto in that it affecteth such a Person immediately as sins of omission or such an act as proceedeth from him whereupon Aristotle saith well in a certain place Privation is a certain habit though taken properly nothing is more contrary to habit than Privation whose nature it is to be the absence and want of Habit and nothing by that Philosopher opposed more to habit than Privation I might here set down the opinions and testimonies of diverse Philosophers and Fathers expresly declaring against the positive nature of sin but I shall rather compose the disputation by giving Anselmes judgment of the case than whom none have disputed the matter more acutely of his Age. In his eleventh Chapter of his Dialogue concerning the fall of the Devil he asks How Nothing and Evil should signifie any thing whereas Evil is altogether Privative and there he answers Although Evil and Nihil signifieth something yet that which is signified is not Evil or Nothing but some other manner whereby they signifie something And that which is signified is somewhat but yet not really somewhat but as it were somewhat Many things are spoken after a certain form which are not in very deed And to fear according to the form of the word doth signifie somewhat Active when as it is Passive according to the thing it self And so Blindness c. And afterward in the 26th Chapter of that Treatise he speaketh thus Evil which is called unrighteousness is alwayes Nothing But Evil which is Incommodiousness sometimes without doubt is Nothing as Blindness Aliquando est aliquid Sometimes is something as Sadness and Pain And Chapter the 27th He gives the general reason why Evil cannot be Any thing viz. Because if it were any thing it must be of God Thus he who we see distinguisheth Evil first into that of sin and that of punishment or Incommoditas as he calls it And that of punishment he again distinguishes into meerly Privative as blindness and Positive which is in suffering Pâ—â—na Damni and paena Sensus pains which is the same with the common distinction of Punishment of dammage or loss and punishment of sense so well known in the Schools And we may easily yield that all Evil of Punishment is positive though it be not and yet retain our opinion which runs only upon the Evil of Sin I know Augustine than whom it is well known no man speaks more expresly for the privative nature of all Sin and Thomas and Cajetane and others are alledged to have asserted a real Being of Concupiscence in man which undoubtedly is Sin But they may be interpreted according to our former ground where we allowed all sins to have a subject in which they are and when this subject is somewhat active and positive as such acts of Original Concupiscence are and of our other Passions and Affections then is the Evil of them taking its denominations from its matter to which it relates said to be positive for distinction sake from those sins we call Sins of Omission From these grounds laid we may now adventure farther into the causality God may be said to have in reference to the Evil of Sin for as to that of Punishment the difficulty is not great There are two Parties in the Roman Church which go contrary wayes making two several Propositions which joyned together do make God directly the Authour of Sin So that a man may with better Reason make it a reason against communion with the Roman Church than Companion against the Reformed one of whose ten Reasons against the Reformed that they made God the Authour of sin For this by the confession of some of the Romanists must follow For the Dominicans do directly profess That God doth concurr to the act of Evil and with the Will not only determined by it self but determining it self to an evil On the contrary The Jesuits affirm that God awaiting and expecting the inclination and self-determination of the will doth not concurr to the very act of sin but follows that motion which is evil adding and professing as in particular doth Suarez That if God should first according Suarez in Thom. 22dâ—â— Disputat 6. Tract 4. to nature move and apply the will to an act which is sin before it had determined it self He should then in very deed be the Authour of sin This we make the major Proposition The Assumption is made by the Dominicans who constantly affirm That God doth concurr to a sinful act as doth Medina Medina in Thom. Quaest 79. Art 2. Therefore by these two joyned together God should be the Author of Sin Nay Medina goes farther and of himself will do the work before he is aware He denies I grant that God is the Authour of Sin and so will Calvine and Beza and Zuinglius and such others who are so warmly charged by their Enemies with that pernicious Errour But he by consequence and they do no more doth thus plainly inferr so much in the place cited saying When God is the cause of any act he is also the Cause of the Privation which naturally follows upon that Act. But yet saith he concurreth not to the deformity of sin Here is a mystery if any man could find it out The deformity of Sin consisteth only in the privation of the act or which is the very same want of conformity to the Rule of Actions and the will of God And yet it is here said That God may be the Author of the Act and the Author of the Privation that is found in that act which Privation is nothing else but a want of due conformity and yet not the Author of the deformity of that Act. This is a contradiction The true and simple account then of this matter may be this That God is never any direct cause of Privations or Deformity of any Act though he be the true Cause of the Act it self And his not willing to prevent by his effectual concurse such an Evil in the Act is all can be imputed unto him and that is far from being the Cause of sin unless it could be proved that there lay an obligation any time upon God as many times there does upon man That he should exert his Divine power to the utmost for the preventing all the mischiefs he can and hindring sin And here if querulous man as 't is often seen doth repiningly reply upon God for hard dealing towards him in that he punishes him for that sin which he foresees cannot be avoided by him Gods grace withdrawing it self from him St. Paul commands him silence whether he understands the reason Rom. 9. 20 21.
or equity of it or not saying Nay but O man What art thou that replyest against God Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it Why hast thou made me thus Hath not the Potter power over the clay of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour and another unto dishonour No man that acknowledges and every Christian must acknowledge the like and greater power and prerogative in God over Man than the Potter hath of his clay can deny that God may order the work of his hands as he pleases neither can he deny but the drift of the Apostle in this comparison was to show the absolute power and dominion of God over all Creatures and therefore let them see how they aggravate matters of this nature and multiply fond ratiocinations which they cannot but know agree not with St. Pauls stating and decision of this Question I do freely grant the adverse Party that St. Paul doth not at all concern himself with that kind of Predestination Election or Vocation as very many confidently presume he doth in his Eighth and Ninth Chapters to the Romans I mean not particular or personal Prae-determination and the like the whole letter and the occasion of his discourse there being concerning the Election of the Gentile Church and the uncessant protection thereof against all threatnings and Oppositions and disputing the equity of Gods deserting the Jewish Church yet thus far his argument being general holds good in particular persons that if it be free to God without any just exceptions to choose and leave a Church or Nation at his pleasure and according to the counsel of his own will it is also reasonable and just for him to favour or show disfavour to any single person in like acts of his Providence without being called in question for what he doth or not doth CHAP. XIV Of Sin more particularly And first of the Fall of Adam Of Original sin wherein it consisteth and how it is traduced from Father to children The Proofs of it The Nature and Evils of it And that it is cured in baptism That Natural Concupiscence hath not the Nature of Sin after baptism BY what is said competent satisfaction may be had in that mystery of Gods Providence in the fall and sin of the first Man created as we have shewed in such perfection of natural Faculties and divine Grace the reason absolute and demonstrative whereof cannot be rendred by the witâ— of Man viz. Why God should make such a fine and exquisite piece and deliver it over presently to ruin and loss It may suffice that God was not the direct cause of such his Fall by impelling him though his Free-will embracing the Temptation he was privy to his errour As it was in that memorable case of the death of Benhadad King of Syria in the second of the Kings when Hazael was sent to enquire Whether he should recover 2 Kings 8. 10. of that Sickness The Prophet Elisha answered Go say unto him thou mayest certainly recover how be it the Lord hath shewed me that he shall surely dye And this was the true case of Adam whom God knew to have full power certainly to stand and yet he knew he would surely fall As therefore God in that case spake after the method and manner of mans apprehension so he here acted In that he first said the King might surely recover and this was according to the common order of natural Causes which then were upon him in his sickness which were such as were easily resisted and like to have no such effect But then God withal beholding that which was not seen of man perhaps not thought on by the Actour himself at that time he saw withal a necessary dependencie and connexion between another cause and that effect which followed and so declared surely the contrary to the other In like manner God beholding Adam in that integrity and vigour of gifts and Graces with which he had furnished him saw him in a certain condition to persevere in that state but seeing withal the future outward cause of Temptation he might well see the effect what it would be infallibly So that when we say a thing is contingent we cannot say so in respect of all causes but in respect of some special cause to which in our opinion and observation such an effect may seem properly to belong For it is a true Axiome amongst Logicians All causes accidental are reducible to proper and direct causes So that there was no necessity by Gods appointment of Adams Fall as he was framed of God but somewhat might occurr outwardly which by Gods permission might have as certain effect upon the will of Man though Free of it self and indifferent as had the wet cloath laid by Hazael 2 Kings 8. 15. upon the face of Benhadad this only excepted That what natures simple Act did in this the will of man combining freely against himself with those outward causes suffered in that The thing therefore principally to be here enquired after is rather about the Nature of this Sin in Adam and the Effects thereof And as to the former it is to be observed That what was in him an Actual sin became in us an Original and what was free to him to be subject to it or void of it becomes necessary to us and inevitable It might be called in some sense an Original sin in him as it was the first in nature and time he stood guilty of but not as if his Nature was from the beginning so corrupt as to dispose him unto it Again in him it was of it self purely sinful and a transgression of Gods Law upon which followed evil effects but in us it seems to partake originally of both sin and punishment but chiefly of this latter For though they speak truly in the larger sense who make three things proper and inseparable from Sin Guilt Stain and Punishment yet restraining our selves to the true Nation of it there are these two things only essential to it The matter it self which is the evil act committed against the Law of God or which commeth to the same omitted contrary to the same And the manner or formality of it which consisteth in the perversness and pravity of the will which is so essential to it that it both distinguishes the errours of rational men from them of beasts and mad-men and them of the same Man from one another so that what was done voluntarily and freely differs wholly from that done with incogitancie so not affected for then the will concurs with it and infects it and without any intention so to do as to point of moral Goodness or Evil. And according to the bent or averseness of the will to evil commonly are estimated the degrees of evil But though in Adam all these things concurred to the heightening of his Actual sin yet in those that inherit that evil from him the sin must needs be much less in Nature and lighter because
of no personal concurrence to such deformity Yet not so neither but that it justly is denominated Sin from the very nature and effects of it For seeing whatever is in the Will must be good or evil and if the Will be found crooked perverse or averse to that it ought to incline to this is contrary to Gods institution and Law and whence ever this proceeds from an immediate act of our own or by traduction from others seeing it is found in the Will it must needs be contrary and consequently odious to God and in conclusion sinful Again as the fountain poisons and corrupts all streams flowing from thence so the Will being thus corrupt and naturally thus ill inclined all the other defects even in his body as well as soul contracted by this fall are as so many deformities in man which render him deservedly hated of God seeing such disparity and unlikeness to the worse to that which he first fram'd Thirdly Original sin in Man hath this more of disorder in it that it not only is a corruption of the will and thereby a deformity and vitiosity in the inferiour parts and faculties but it is of ill consequence For if this depravation went no farther than that evil born with us if it stand there and wrought no more evil the nature of it had been less sinful and more tolerable but being of an active nature and having taken up the chiefest room in the soul of Man it disposeth and impelleth to more mischief in actual transgressions As a Garrison held by a Rebel doth not only offend Sacred Majesty by standing out against him it self but when it finds it self strong enough and hath opportunity sallies out and makes invasion upon its proper Soveraign and offers actual and active violence against him So by this Original Evil first possessing the Soul doth Concupiscence stir and act by outward practises contrary to the Law and Will of God And therefore when St. Austin saith alledged by the corrupters of this Doctrine of Original Corruption They are born not properly but originally evil he no wayes contradicts his own Doctrine whereby he most of all farther explained and maintained this Original sin being the first that gave the name Original to that Pravity in man For true it is that that only is called properly Original Sin which Adam and Eve in person committed and were not subject to by nature as their Posterity are because it was the first in respect of mankind as well in order of time as nature and causality Again though this be traduced unto us his Off-spring and be the cause and fountain of all other sins actually committed afterward and for the same causes may rightly be called Original yet considering that this Evil thus vitiating our nature had no consent of our personal will we neither understood it nor any wayes affected it it cannot be so properly called sin as others which we act knowingly and willingly our selves For nothing is in strict way a sin which we do not consent unto in some manner either immediately or in its remoter causes And this doth yet farther appear because no man is bound to repent properly of Original sin Proper Repentance being an Act contrarying and reversing so far as in us lyes some evil by us done and not suffered involuntarily But Original sin is rather suffered than acted by the children of Adam Yet though in the severst sense we cannot be said to repent of Original sin we are bound to exercise some Act of Repentance for the same As grief and sorrow of mind and heart for the evil we lye under Confession and Recognition of our sad state before God Imploration of his mercie and favour to remove the same from us and restore us to our pristine innocencie and integrity For this those many places of Scripture describing this Evil do seem to require at our hand And no where doth the Scripture more fully declare this unto us than in the Fifth Chapter of the Epistle to the Romans which because Socinus and such as plough with his Heifer and are tickled with his pretty phansies in eluding the Apostles meaning and the constant interpretation of the most Ancient and Modern Expositours we shall more particularly consider It is undeniable that St. Paul Rom. 5. amplifying the grace of God and benefits unto mankind even the Gentiles by Christ Jesus doth there make a comparision from the Twelfth verse to the end of the Chapter of the first and second Adam and of the Evil we sustained by the first Man Adam and the benefits we receive by the second Man Christ To this he supposes the ground of his Comparison which is this that By one v. 12. man Sin entred into the world and death by Sin and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned This is made no more of than that Adam being the first Man in the world and sinning Sin must needs enter first into the world by him if he sinned first and that death followed upon that sin of Adam But if this be all how come the effects to exceed the cause and death to extend farther than sin For it is not only said that death entred into the world in seizing upon that single Malefactour Adam but So death passed upon all men for that all have sinned where two things are to be noted First the note of dependance and consequence So. For if St. Paul had meant that Adam by himself and only for himself introduced death wherefore serves the tearm So which is a certain indication of the manner how death came into the world upon all persons and as much as if it had been said Adam first sinning and bringing death into the world so it was that this death fell upon all men for that all have sinned Now it is certain that all that dye have not sinned personally and therefore Secondly the Note So must also ralate to the Cause of that death which was sin and is as much as Adam sinning his Posterity also sinned and became obnoxious to death For to say as some eminently learned and useful otherwise in their Doctrine of Repentance Death passed upon all i. e. say they Upon all the whole world who were drowned in the floud of Divine vengeance and who did sin after the similitude of Adam is as much as if another Scholiaâ—t like him had said That is upon all Senacheribs Armies before Jerusalem in the dayes of Hezekiah or Upon all the Romans in the battle of Canna with Hannibal For it is certain that all men dye and it is no less certain that all men without exception died not in the floud And therefore what is added upon these words In as much as all have sinned that by them is meant All have sinned upon their own account we have already shown that it is not absolutely true and therefore cannot be St. Pauls meaning For all that dye have not as did Adam or following Adams
as of the only begotten of the Father And when St. Paul saith that God sent Rom. 8. 3. his Son in the likeness of sinful Flesh and for sin condemned sin in the Flesh he implyeth that there were two tearms considered in Christ as in all other things sent First there is the Person by whom or from whom the Party is sent and that here was God Secondly there was the Party or tearm to whom and that was either to the World in general or to that individual substance of Flesh so assumed by him and which is here intended Now it cannot be that the Act of sending should be the same with making but first a Thing is before it is sent and the rearm to which must be distinct from that which is sent Therefore Christ according to the Phrase of holy Scriptures being sent to take Flesh must have of necessity a subsistence before which subsistence must be of a Divine Nature as is also witnessed in the Epistle to the Hebrews For as much then as children Hebr. 2. 14. are partakers of flesh and bloud he also himself took part of the same That is the person of Christ took part of the mass of humane Flesh and Nature when he was formed of the substance of his Mother in her womb And in that it follows Verily he took not on him the nature of Angels but the seed of Abraham v. 16. What can be more necessarily implyed than a Person prae-existing to whom according to the nature of the thing it was indifferent to have taken the nature of Angels or the Flesh of man and that it pleased God to send his Son to man and it also pleased his Son to elect humane nature to dwell in so that the manner of Christ thus consisting of two Natures is matter of difficulty rather than the thing it self i. e. how two Natures can be and how they were and are actually united in Christ Suidas observes ten sorts of unions to be found in the World of which Suidas in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. Qu. 2. 1. we cannot stay here to speak Thomas reduces all unto three One union is of things that are absolute and perfect in themselves as many stones make one heap Another is when things in nature perfect are so united that they cease thereby to be perfect of themselves as when the Elements concurr to make one perfect mixt body Thirdly when diverse things being in nature imperfect not absolutely but in that they are naturally capable of greater perfection and tend thereunto as the soul and body and the several members of the body constitute one man But after none of these exactly can Christ be said to consist of two natures united Not the first way because such things are rather relatively and denominatively one than really Not the second because it were to suppose that the Divine Nature could be alterable and mutable and because if such a composition were made both the Divine and Humane nature must loose their natural being and kind and so neither of both remain but a third thing Not the last because both Divine and humane nature are perfect of themselves in their kind So that in truth speaking strictly no precedent in Nature can be found answering this Union called Hypostatical or Persâ—nal because it is the union of two intire Natures into one Person and that the Second person of the Trinity God blessed for evermore But of the former the last representeth this Mystery most clearly and is often used by the ancient Fathers to express the same and especially by Athanasius in his Creed who thus declareth this mistery sufficiently to the sober and modest and not curious mind Christ is God of the substance of the Father begotten before the worlds and man of the substance of his mother born in the world Perfect God and perfect man of a reasonable soul and humane flesh subsisting Equal to God as touching his God-head and inferior to his Father as touching his Manhood Who although he be God and man yet he is not two but one Christ One not by conversion of the Godhead into Flesh but by taking of the manhood into God One altogether not by confusion of substance but by unity of person For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man so God and Man is one Christ Now the ground of this great mistery is taken partly from the testimonies and descriptions of Christ the Mediator made in the Scripture where besides those already given diverse proper to God are ascribed to him and many which are proper to humane nature are attributed to him and because there can be nothing more absurd in nature or Christian Religion than to imagine that Christ is more than one Person one Son one Mediator therefore it follows necessarily that this one Person must consist of more than one nature and partly because the end of Christ being Incarnate seemed to require this most necessarily As First there was all reason that the nature which sinned and offended should suffer and satisfie but none but humane nature had so sinned Secondly that he should be a Prophet to instruct and teach his Church Thirdly that he should be a King to rule and direct his Church according to the Prophesies of old concerning him For Moses truly said unto the Fathers a Prophet shall Acts 3. 22. the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren like unto me which must be of humane condition Now according to this union of the Divine and Humane nature in one Person may Christ in some sense be said to be a Mediator Essential being a Mean Person not simply God nor simply Man but this is not the proper Mediation of Christ between God and Man but this rather consisteth in Acts performed and Offices of Christ And these acts of Christ may be distinguished into two sorts Preparatory and Consummatory The former I call preparatory because they were ordained as useful expediencies not as essential to Reconciliation between the parties at distance And the first act of this nature was after the manner of Civil Arbitrements to take the Case into serious consideration and to deliberate with himself about the most proper means of attaining an amicable composure of differences on foot And as the Scripture Heb. 2. 14. saith forasmuch then as the children of God to be redeemed are partakers of flesh and blood he also himself likewise took part of the same that through death he might destroy him who had the power of death that is the Devil It appearing unto him that there was no such proper or convenient means to Arbitrate between God and Man as the taking upon him humane nature For by this means as Moses is said to be the Intercessour medius et sequester between God and the People of Israel and therefore the Law is said to have been given in the hand of a Mediatour Deut. 5. 5. Gal. 3. Hebr. 9. 15.
disputation of St. Chrysostome thus rendred Thou thy self saith the Heretick against whom he had before argued forbiddest marriage By no means Far be it I should be as mad as you How then dost thou exhort me to marry Because I am perswaded that Virginity is much Chrysost â—â—â— supra better than marriage I do not therefore place marriage amongst evil things but I commend it highly For it is the haven of Continence to such as will use it aright not permitting nature to be outragious For prefixing as bounds lawful mixture and hereby receiving the waves of Lust it secures and preserves us in great calmness But some there are who not wanting this safeguard instead of this do tame the madness of Nature by fastings and watchings lodging on the ground and such like hard usage These I exhort not to marry not forbidding them to marry But there is a vast distance between these two even as great as there is between necessity and choice For he that advises suffers his hearer to be master of the choice of his own matters concerning which he gives counsel but he that forbiddeth taketh away from him this power Moreover I do not in exhorting do wrong to the other thing nor do I condemn him that is not perswaded by me But you speaking evil and calling it wicked and taking upon you the person of a Law-giver and not of a Counseller in all likelyhood do hate those that will not be perswaded by you But I nothing so but admire such as list themselves for this combate but I accuse not them who continue out of this conflict For then only doth accusation take place when a man tends to that which is naught But he that attains to the less good not arriving at the greater deprives himself of the praise and admiration which the other hath but deserves not to be blamed How then do I forbid marriage not blaming them that marry I forbid fornication I forbid Adultery but not at all marriage These indeed that practise such things I punish and drive them from the Body of the Church But those that do this if they contain commending I advance For thus two benefits arise One that Gods Institution is not slandered Another that the dignity of Virginity is not taken away but rather appears much more honorable Thus far he and much more in the following discourse against both the condemners of Marriage and contemners of Virginity CHAP. VI. Of the third state of serving God a Life Monastical That it is not only lawful but may be profitable also The Exceptions of Mr. Perkins against it examined The Abuses of Monastical Life touched That it is lawful to Vow such a kind of Life duly regulated THE last state of worshipping God which we mentioned is that of Separation from the world and devoting a mans self more entirely to the fulfilling the high ends of Christian Religion under the wise sober and strict Discipline drawn out of the Word of God and compleated from the wise and holy Rules and Observations of Gods most faithful holy and renowned Servants This state of life is by a current Antinomasie signally and peculiarly called Religion which name may seem to imply much of Arrogance and Pride if it be so given to that State as to undervalue the secular state of serving God as not worthy the name of Religion compared with that commonly called Regular But if no more be thereby intended than a certain degree of living holily to God and his service that presumption may be passed over For according to its first Institution and Intention no question can fairly and reasonably be made of the excellent use and ends thereof it being no other than Thomas describes it to be viz. Status Thomas 22. Qu. 187. 6. co Poenitentiae contemptus mundi A state of repenting and contempt of the world And as we may so speak that though men of one profession may sometimes do the work as well and sometimes better of another trade than he whose proper calling it is yet this is no rule to deny it needful to be bound to such a Trade so in Religion no doubt is to be made but many living in the world as they speak may exceed in holiness and devotion diverse who live secluded as to outward profession from the world yet this is no good argument to conclude therefore such a life is vain and needless much less that it is superstitious and worse then I will say after some light heads and loose tongues For in truth it is the trade to which Monastical persons are bound all their lives the more constant and spiritual service of God And if they do not profit more therein then other persons conversing in the world more busily they are worthily to be condemn'd as well by Man as God But as before against the Clergy against vowed Celebacie so here against Monastick life for men to rake in the Canals for durt and filth taken from single persons to cast in the face of the Orders themselves and to cry not only them down but all the most eminent servants of Christ from the most primitive Ages and downwards for many Ages who have either been so Ascetical themselves or unanimously approved and magnified the same is extream folly and insolence as St. Augustine in like case calls it Many things objected against this state are in common with Vows and Virginity of which we have spoken and therefore now pass over And do moreover grant such to have been the corruptions and abuses of that Deus merit ò contemptun effadit in Monachos propter vitiâ— Vide Schasnaburgenside Rebus German Ann. 1071. Ambros 10. Epist 82. Quid enim aliud fuere Monasteria quam efficinae virtutum Et August Epist 137. Simpliciter eutem faâ—â—r charitati vesâ—â—ae â—â—am Dâ—mino Dec c. Aug. Ep. 16. holy state of late years yea for some Generations past that the hand of God was justly against them but not so the hand of Man And were it so that the like depravations of the ends were inseparable from them the Church might be as holy without them But God forbid any man should think men may not live at least as civilly and soberly in Monasteries as in private Families or Kings Courts which I hope ought not to be ruined and destroyed for abuses their reigning St. Ambrose in an Epistle calls Monasteries The shops of Vertue Abstinence Fasting Patience and Labours c. Yet St. Austin speaketh thus clearly and ingenuously of them in an Epistle likewise I speak unfeignedly to your Goodness before our Lord God whom I call to record upon my soul since the time I began to serve God that as I could scarce find any better than such as have profited in Monasteries so have I no where found any worse than they who in Monasteries have fallen Yet though this were granted they never took up an opinion against Monastick life absolutely A few
contrary A Third abuse noted by Mr. Perkins is That a man may say the Canonical hours of one day for another which may be an abuse or no abuse as the matter is ordered To neglect wilfully ones usual prayers is certainly ill but having so done to double his prayers the next day is no such error as may be supposed Much besides this may be said out of the Authority of the Church and more out of Scripture than may be found for some things by Puritans religiously observed Much likewise is here wont to be said about the Hours themselves the reason and number of them but I cut off all them at present and resolve all into the general reasonableness and piety of such a practice and the manifold benefit which may accrue unto the serious and devout user of them though he ties not himself to any one form strictly and so shall rest till I can hear what can be objected worthy of a Christian against them more than I have found already which may be as well objected against Morning and Evening prayer as them CHAP. XIV The Third thing to be considered in the Worship of God viz. The true Object which is God only That it is Idolatry to misapply this Divine Worship What is Divine Worship properly called Of the multitude and mischiefs of New distinctions of Worship Dulia and Latria though distinct of no use in this Controversie What is an Idol Origen's criticisme of an Idol vainly rested on What an Image What Idolatry The distinction of Formal and Material Idolatry upon divers reasons rejected The Papists really Idolatrous notwithstanding their good Intentions pretended Intention and Resolution to worship the true God excuse not from Idolatry Spalato Forbes and others excusing the Romanists from thence disproved That Idolatry is not always joyned with Polytheism or worshipping more Gods than one How the Roman Church may be a true Church and yet Idolatrous FRom the nature kinds acts circumstances of Place and Times of Prayer we pass to the object of this worship of Invocation and Adoration which is the most important of all and which as duly observed is the end complement and perfection of all Religion so mistaken is the foulest of all errors and the highest of all provocations and affronts of almighty God who Isa 42. 8. protesteth by his Prophet upon this occasion I am the Lord that is my name and my glory will I not give unto another neither my praise unto graven Images This therefore it were superfluous to prove which all Christians yea almost all the world as well Unchristian as Christian doth readily and unanimously assent to That God only is the proper object of Divine or Religious worship And they that glory that they stick firmly to this what do they more than do Infidels and Heathens who all hold that God is to be worshipped with supreamest worship and that Idolatry is a notorious errour and offence against him This I say all rational men assent to in the notion that the worship of the true God or which seems to be the very same the true worship of God is to be given only to God and yet fall flat into the Practice of that great sin For though Idolatry be so odious in its name yet in its nature it is very pleasing and ravishing of our senses and hath of late days been so fairly and neatly trimmed up by the fine wits and curious hands of men and they especially Christians and they more especially Catholiques God bless us that now there is either no such thing to be found in the world or that the least sin one of them in the world And this is brought about by the ministry and help of innumerable distinctions which I think may be reduced to these two heads viz. to those concerning the Act of worshipping and those concerning the Object of worship Concerning the Act we find such as these very common and current first Natural and Civil and Divine and Religious And these again Properly Divine or Improperly supream and Inferior Direct and Indirect Absolute and Relative Ultimate and subalternate or subordinate Mediate and Immediate For it s own sake or for anothers sake Again for its own sake which we worship as a thing in it self or as a Representation of another All these but these are not all to be found in Learned Authors books to rectifie the worlds errours in its Religion And besides these more may be found concerning the Object but this one shall I only name which is their strongest Hold and Refuge That to secure them from all assauls of Adversaries this to receive them when they shall by strong hand at any time be beaten out of their fastnesses And that is that modern but very famous distinction of Material and Formal So that some of no mean knowledge have thus defended themselves What if for instance in the Mass we should by errour worship that as God which is not God yet this would be but Material Idolatry at the most and not Formal seeing we believe that to be very God which we so adore and Material Idolatry with such circumstances we must suppose is one of the least sins that we can be subject to Thus have some discoursed to me though 't is well known some others of them as Costerus do acknowledge that if Costerus Enchirid Catholicks miss their mark and that be not really God which they with divine worship adore in the Sacrament they are gross Idolaters Of this we shall speak more by and by Now are we to consider first of the first sort of distinctions to pass over all which by a particular examination would be too tedious a task for my self and Reader too I shall therefore only examine the most reasonable and comprehensive of them and them I take to be that of Worship Civil and Divine and of Absolute and Relative not omitting altogether others And to understand clearly what is meant by Divine Worship we are to enquire whether the Act makes the Worship or the Object For all worship as other Acts moral takes it specification from the Object as Philosophers say then unless the Object be Divine or God himself cannot the Worship be Divine and so by consequence a man cannot give Divine Worship though he would never so fain unto an object not Divine and so cannot though he would commit Idolatry because the worship it self is not Divine but much inferior because the object is such which constitutes not Divine Worship being some Creature But if the Act in its own nature be intrinsecally Divine it would be known what is that which makes it so For they say all acts external are equivocal and dubious in themselves and indifferent to Civil Religious Inseriour or Supream worship and that nothing can be concluded from thence Idolatrous For we bow the head we bend the knee we fall down at the feet of men many times whom we give no Idolatrous worship unto
undoubted Right of lawful Governours under God to propound and impose Laws serviceable to the common ends of such a Society as thereby is disposed and regulated And there are three things principally requisite to make a Law obligatory upon men The first is taken from the Person Giving or propounding this Law and that is Authority without which the best Laws that can be invented are directly tyrannical and unjust as well in respect of the Person whose Right is thereby invaded and usurped so that Conscience is so far from being obliged by it that rather it is bound to oppose and resist such Laws though in themselves very profitable and reasonable because they imply a wrong to another to whom only pertaineth the Legislative Power as of the persons to whom such goodly Laws are given because thereby is an unjust service and bondage brought upon them But no man can be bound to this double injury though peradventure such a Case may be put in which to decline a greater evil and mischief a man may be patient and passive under such usurpers A second thing is taken from the matter and nature of the Law it self which if it be not just and reasonable bindeth not the Conscience though enacted by Authority altogether lawful and unquestionable The reason whereof is that so often abused place of holy Writ which adviseth to obey God rather then men Gods eternal and indispensable Law Acts 5. 29. exacteth of man due observation and that chiefly upon account of his absolute Soveraignty and Dominion which no inferiour Power ought to controul or can make void But should any mortal man command contrary of God it could signifie nothing more then the folly of his own heart and the distemper of his mind and a foul revolt and defection in him that should suffer himself to be so abused But is there no difference think we between the Powers on earth acting quite contrary to God and such as only want special warrant for what they sometimes expect from their Subjects The ignorance or wilful negligence of this distinction or notion is it which hath hurried men into so many unchristian acts and made such havock especially in Religion A third principal ingredient into a Law is that taken from the Persons to whom it is made not that they must owe obedience unto the Lawgiver thought that be true for this is the very same with the first For wherever there is the first part of the Relation there must also of necessity be the second and so wherever there is Power and just Authority to command and rule there must necessarily be a duty of obedience in others but knowledge and manifestation of a Law before touched is absolutely requisite to bind people to the observation of it And yet I mean not actual and inevitable knowledge but possible and ordinarily attainable it being most certain that the same persons who stand generally obliged to observe a Law made and propounded are likewise bound to take notice of its promulgation and this neglecting subject themselves to the like penalties as the wilful Violators of it There may well be added unto these three a Fourth Condition to the validity of a Law and that is Power How Power and Authority differ is not unknown viz. that the first consists in sufficient strength and force to constrain obedience or inflict the punishment denounced against disobedience not necessarily inferring Right so to do And this is not intrinsecal to a Law because it is only to be exercised as a necessary instrument subservient to the ends of Right and Justice preceeding which is Authority properly so called which duly exercised doth oblige without force to submission and that out of Duty and Conscience as appeareth from what we have said already in the First Book of the First Part of this Treatise Now though this Power be not intrinsecal to the Obligation of a Law as some unnatural Philosophers have of late days imagined and boldly and basely endeavoured to maintain yet may it be essential to the Execution of the same Men being generally so unreasonable and averse to Order and Government and the publick Good when no special and immediate advantage accrues to their particular person that without the iron rod to constrain the Majesty of the Scepter will not sway them And but that I have found such prodigious tenets in the writings of late Politicians denying all Justice and Conscience and destroying them as far as their blind and pestilent wits will enable them which certainly they never shall any more than to destroy God himself and extinguish the notion of a Deity out of the minds of men I should have thought that for want of such a distinction between the Obligation and Execution of a Law they fell into such flat and portentous errours For what doth argue greater stupidity than to conclude there is no necessity of violence this should be done therefore it ought not to be done Or because that man is impious who because he is strong enough to be successful scruples not at all to invade and prey on another and he may become ridiculous that commandeth without any ability or probability of effecting what he requireth therefore no obligation lyes on the persons to whom he directs himself to obey Aristotle indeed Arist Politic. l. 3. c. 4. §. 78. tells us of a Law that the Hares should make in their solemn Assemblies that all beasts should share alike in the earth but at this said Antisthenes the Lyons laughed and well they might when such Laws proceeded from them who had neither Right to make nor Power to enforce them but where there is Right without Might the matter is more to be abhorred on the one side than decided on the other True it is that Marsilius Patavinus does make Coaction an ingredient into Lex propriè sumpta Praeceptum coactivum est de fiendis aut omittendis humanis actibus sub poena transgressoribus infligenda Marsilius Patavinus de Jurisdictione Matrimoniali the definition of a Law and that not amiss if we consider that definitions of things are to be made according to the Habitude of things rather than Actualness and so this his definition is very good A Law properly taken is a Coactive Precept of doing or omitting humane acts under punishment to be inflicted on transgressours For though a Prince deprived of Power makes Laws which he is not able to enforce or the Church yet while indelible Right to Power resides with him as an Habitude the Law is of force and is of a Coactive nature though not actuated And this being not unduly as we hope premised we now proceed to the explication of that particular Law of God called the Decalogue which though it branches it self into ten parts yet according to the Jews not amiss conceiving is but One Law as proceeding from one Fountain pronounced in one breath say they engraven or written as one Line or Word on
there was no intention to divide that Period into two Precepts For then in all probability the Persons should have been ranked by themselves and the Goods by themselves so to distinguish them but no heed being given to this no intention seems to be for that To this they answer most colourably That in Deuteronomy the order is otherwise Coveting ones Neighbours wife being first prohibited and Deut. 5. 21. that the Law as there repeated and revised is to be a President to us But first the contrary to this is most true That the Law was more exactly delivered in Exodus than in Deuteronomie in all those points which are in common to them as hath been shewed out of Grotius For Deuteronomy according to its Name being indeed a Repetition in a compendious manner of what was more expresly and at large handled in the four first Books of Moses it cannot be supposed but many if not all things should be in them more plainly and accurately treated of than in this For as St. Augustine Evangelista autem Lucas in oratione Dominicà Petitiones non septem sed quinque complexus est c. Aug. Enchirid ad Laurent cap. 115. hath observed of the diverse manner of reciting the Lords Prayer in Saint Matthews Gospel and St. Lukes St. Matthew setting down seven Petitions and St. Luke but five and thereupon directs us to make St. Matthews words the Rule of understanding St. Lukes So questionless where a thing in the Pentateuch is more distinctly and fully expressed there ought we to take our measures for the interpretation of what is more confusedly or breifly rehearsed elsewhere and by consequence the Law in Deuteronomy is to be regulated by that of Exodus But farther The order of persons or things is not in Deuteronomie observed For first it is said Thou shalt not desire thy Neighbours Wife then Neither shalt thou covet thy Neighbours House and then follows his Servants and then again his Goods which shew that God would not have us too rigorously to seek for methods in his word but matter Therefore the sum of all is this That God knowing how imperfect mans understanding was in the matter wherein his senses were concerned and how willing he was to be deceived and ignorant of his duty and lastly how prone a man is to proceed from evil thoughts to evil deeds he doth here inform his people in an higher point of Sobriety and Justice than Gentile Philosophers or common light of Nature could direct men For Saint Paul saith he had not known lust to be a sin except the Law had said Thou Rom. 7. 7. Matth. 5. 28. shalt not covet And our Saviour in the Gospel interdicteth all vain and lascivious looks whereby Lust may be conceived The reason of all which is this because as the Scripture often intimates unto us God accepteth the heart for the act and the will for the deed where there is a defect of power to bring things to perfection which are righteous and holy so doth God judge that Evil to be done against him which is so conceived and resolved upon in the mind as to want nothing but ability and opportunity to put in execution For as an holy Father saith No man is righteous who cannot do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Basil Mag. Per hoc etiamsi minora mala faciant quia minus possunt non minus tamen mali sunt quia nollent minus esse si pâ—ssent amiss And as another speaks of wicked mens inclinations By this though peradventure they commit less evil they are no less evil because they would not be less wicked if they could tell how to shift it Thus Salvian And necessary was this Commandment not only for the reasons now given but also for the general pronity of all men to fall into this sin All men naturally having this unnatural called sometimes for the commonness Natural Concupiscence in them inclining and urging them to evil none but Christ himself not the Virgin Mary being exempted from it in the root and first seed called Original sin But Original sin is not here forbidden as that which surprises a man inevitably and cannot possibly be prevented but the actuating or drawing that evil principle which lurks in our nature forth Neque enim ea dimitti nobis volumus quae dimissa non dubitamus in baptismo sed illa c. Aug. Epist 108 to particular evil motions of the will For as St. Austine hath observed We do not pray God to forgive us those sins which we doubt not but are forgiven in baptism but those which through human frailty creep upon us unawares which though small are frequent So are we not here advised to pray against or resist Original sin which is irresistible but the vermine of evil thoughts which are apt to breed in the remains of natural Concupiscence as Snakes in a dunghil which coming to get strength creep out in evil outward acts to the endangering of the soul Hence it is that the Scriptures exhort us to avoid the occasions and resist the Devil at first and by Faith to quench these fiery darts of the Devil that shall be shot into our souls with some of which proper and useful means so to do I shall conclude this Chapter First the outward occasions of wicked thoughts are carefully and resolutely to be avoided such as are Idleness evil Objects evil Authours and evil Company Secondly Not to give way to the least friendly entertainment to the first motions or injections of the Tempter but crush the Cockatrice egg and quench the spark and growing flame at the very first For as when an enemy without throws in a Granado into a Fort to ruin it if they within take it up presently and throw it back again before it breaks it confounds the Enemy rather then them in the Fort so do evil thoughts cast into the Soul by the Devil rather torment him than hurt the Soul when they are rejected suddainly and cast out Thirdly By being instant and fervent Wisd 8. 21. Matth. 17. 21. in prayer whereby God is called to the assistance of the labouring Soul as some good hand by crying out is ready to pull out one sinking in waters Fourthly Imploying a mans self constantly and carefully in some laudable and profitable actions much secures him from the vain illusions of the mind from whence do spring that Lust of the Flesh Lust of the Eyes and Pride of Life against which St. John warns us and all which with their particular branches are forbidden by this last Commandment CHAP. XXI Of Superstition contrary to the true Worship of God and Christian Obedience AS Heresie is a corruption of the Faith or Doctrine of the Church and Schism of its Unity and Christian Communion so necessary to its well being so is Superstition a degeneration and corruption of the true worship of God now last spoken of And therefore as to the more compleat
subjection and obedience to his will he should not dye So that Adam was not simply and in his own nature immortal as were Angels and immaterial Spirits but by this Supernatural Priviledg and Grace of Justice given of God whereby he was well able to persevere in that state of Holiness and secure himself from falling into sin And a sufficient argument of the former is that Man before his fall did or was to eat and drink as appeareth from the indulgence of God to him saying Of every tree of the Garden Gen. 2. 16. thou mayst eat Now eating and drinking do necessarily of themselves inferr such an alteration both in the body eating and eaten as tendeth to corruption and therefore a more immediate hand and power of God was required to obviate that propensity And the manner of propagation being contrary to the imagination of some of the Ancients by that natural way that now it is though much purer prove the same inclination to dissolution and the necessity of a Divine Grace to secure man from Corruption And thirdly it is proved from the manner of the Fall which spoiled us not of any thing natural in a proper sense to us but lost to us the Supernatural Aids which otherwise should never have forsaken us Lastly a Fifth Beam of the Image of God in man was and is the Dominion he hath over the inferiour Creatures and the subserviency of them to him For this an express Charter is given to him as Gods Vicegerent on Earth in Genesis in this manner And God blessed them and God said unto Gen. 1. 28 them Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the Earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the Sea and over the foul of the air and over every living thing that moveth upon the Earth Which Right of Rule was not altogether extinguished after the Fall but as experience sheweth that man partly by strength and partly by wit and understanding bringeth all things under him so the Scripture affiâ—meth Every Jam. 3. 7. kind of Beasts and of Birds and things in the sea is tamed and hath been tamed of Mankind And after the Flood God in especial manner re-enstated man in his right of dominion saying The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every Beast of the Earth and upon every Foul Gen. 3. 2. of the Air upon all that moveth upon the Earth and upon all the Fishes of the Sea into your hand are they delivered CHAP. VIII Of the Second General act of God towards the Creature especially Man his Providence Aristotles opinion and Epicurus's rejected What is Providence Three things propounded of Providence And First the Ground of it the Knowledge of God How God knoweth all things future as present Of Necessity and Contingencies how they may consist with Gods Omniscience THUS far of the Power of God exemplified chiefly in man It follows now that we speak of the Second General Act of God towards the Creature and specially Man known to be his Providence The Providence of God is one of those things Clem. Alex. Strom. 5. pag. 547. Vid Theodor. Haereticar Fabul L. 5. C. 10. saith Clemens Alexandrinus of which to desire a demonstration or proof is most absurd it so manifestly displaying itself over the whole Universe And therefore next to that opinion of Epicurus denying God to take any Care of things in the world lest it should trouble him too much is that of Aristotle in absurdity and impiety that his Care and providence extended no farther than the Heavens committing as it were the management of this inferiour world to inferiour Officers both so unworthy of wise men to affirm that we shall bestow no other confutation of them than what obliquely may be inferred from the positive assertion of this divine Attribute of God For God being in Being and Power infinite and as the Apostle saith upholding all things by the word of his Power that is meer will Heb. 4. 3. and pleasure declared it were ridiculous to conceive any toil or labour in Gods conservation and administration of all the things in the world As it were most absurd to say that the glorious body of the Sun and the influences thereof should be be disparaged in giving vertue unto Gnats and Nits and pittiful weeds growing out of the earth and not confining it self to more high and excellent Offices But Providence is as Boetius defines it that Boetius de Consolat Lib. 4. Pros 6. Highest Reason residing in that Supream Prince of all things which disposes all things And surely if God did not foul his fingers or degrade himself in making man as well as Angels and Beasts as well as Man and Earth and Water and Air as well as Beasts and that to us there may be such things which we call clean and unclean but to God there is no such distinctions in the natures of things then truly could it be no blemish to him to regard them being made And if to make them was no labour properly so called though it is so termed by the Scripture for our instruction to preserve them can be nothing of molestation to God My Father worketh Joh. 5. 17 hitherto and I work saith Christ of God and himself in St. John meaning nothing more than a continued Creation as Conservation is well called by Philosophers or an Act of Providence proportionable to the Act of Creation infinitely â—asie to God as well as Effectual towards the Creature The thing then being thus declared and supposed we shall consider it in this threefold manner First in the foundation and Ground or Prepararation of his Divine Providence Secondly in the Execution of it Thirdly in the Object of it And concerning the First Providence being an Act of infinite Supream wisdom as Boetius saith doth suppose knowledg in God And the exercise or Execution hereof implies a Will in God so inclined And the Object the Effect of both For as the Apostle saith Who hath resisted his will Rom. 9. 19. And as to the Knowledg of God it hath been before shewed how it must be commensurate unto God himself and that is Infinite He must be and is Omniscient And therefore well hath Lactantius said If there be Lactan. de Iâ—a Cap. 9. a God certainly he is Providential as God neither can Deity be otherwise ascribed to him but as he retaineth things past knows things present and foresees things future or to come And truly I cannot but here insert besides my General purpose the most excellent saying of the Heathen Salust It Salust ad Câ—sar de Repub. Ordinan appears to one as a certain truth that the Divine Nature inspects the life of all Mortals and that neither the Good nor Evil Acts of men go for nothing but naturally there follows different rewards for Good and Evil men This Reward is that outward ground inferring Providence but the Inward taken from