upon their own Authority to begin a new Church and to broach new Doctrines directly contrary to the judgement of the High Priest and Sanhedrin yea after they had pronounced Sentence against Jesus of Nazareth and condemned him to death and excommunicated his followers and punished as many as they could get into their power what could it in their opinion be but the Spirit of Faction and disobedience thus to oppose the Authority of their Church in believing contrary to its decrees and reforming without any power derived from it We see in our Saviours time how severely they checked any of the people who spake favourably of Christ and his Doctrine As though the poor ignorant people were fit to judge of these matters to understand Prophecies and to know the true Messias when he should appear And therefore when some of their Officers that had been sent to apprehend him came back with admiration of him and said Never man spake like this man they take them up short and tell them They must believe as the Church believes what they take upon them to judge of such matters No they must submit to their Governours Have any of the Rulers or Pharisees believed on him but this people which know not the Law are cursed i e. When they set up their own judgement in opposition to the Authority of the Church And after our Saviours death at a solemn Council at Hierusalem when Peter and John were summoned before them the first Question they asked was By what power or by what name have ye done this They never enquired whether the Miracle were wrought or no or whether their Doctrine were true all their Question was about their Mission whether it were ordinary or extraordinary or what authority they could pretend to that were not sent by themselves but let the things be never so true which they said if they could find any flaw in their Mission according to their own Rules and Laws this they thought sufficient ground to forbid them to preach any more and to charge them with Faction if they disobeyed 2. They charged the Christians with Faction in being so active and busie to promote Christianity to the great disturbance of the Jews in all parts This Tertullus accused St. Paul of that he was a mover of sedition among all the Jews throughout the world and accordingly the Jews at Thessalonica take the Christians by force and carry them to the Rulers of the City crying Those that have turned the world upside down are come hither also This they knew was the most effectual course to render them odious to all Governours who are apt to suspect all new things as dangerous and think no truth can compensate the hazard of alterations Thus it was especially among the Roman Governours who had learnt from the counsel given to Augustus to be particularly jealous of all innovations in Religion and had much rather the people should continue quiet under an old error than have the peace disturbed for the greatest Truth This was really the greatest difficulty in the way of Christianity it came no where but people were possessed before hand with quite other apprehensions of Religion than the Christians brought among them The Jewish and Pagan Religions were in possession in all places and the people were at ease in the practice of them What then must the Christians do Must they let them alone and not endeavour to convince them of the truth of their own Doctrine If so they are unfaithful to their trust betrayers of truth and false to the Souls of men if they go about to perswade men out of their Religion they know such is the fondness most men have for their own opinions especially in Religion that where they might hope to convince one they might be sure to enrage many especially of those whose interest lay in upholding the old Religion How little doth Reason signifie with most men where Interest is against it Truth and falshood are odd kind of Metaphysical things to them which they do not care to trouble their heads with but what makes for or against their Interest is thought easie and substantial All other matters are as Gallio said questions of names and words which they care not for but no men will sooner offer to demonstrate a thing to be false than they who know it to be against their interest to believe it to be true This was the case of these great men of the Jews that came down to accuse Paul they easily saw whither this new Religion tended and if it prevailed among their people farewell then to all the Pomp and Splendour of the High-Priesthood at Hierusalem farewell then to the Glory of the Temple and City whither all the Tribes came up to worship thrice a year farewell then to all the riches and ease and pleasure which they enjoyed And what was the greatest Truth and best Religion in the world to them in comparison with these These were sufficient reasons to them to accuse Truth it self of deceiving men and the most peaceable Doctrine of laying the Foundation of Faction and Sedition Thus we have considerd the false imputations which were cast upon Christianity at first implyed in these words After the way which is called heresie 2. I now come to the way taken by St. Paul to remove these false imputations which he doth 1. By an appeal to Scripture as the ground and rule of his faith Believing all things which are written in the Law and the Prophets 2. By an appeal to the best and purest Antiquity as to the object of Worship So worship I the God of my Fathers not bringing in any new Religion but restoring it to its primitive purity 1. By an appeal to Scripture as the ground and rule of his faith The Jews pleaded Possession Tradition Authority of the present Church against all these St. Paul fixes upon a certain and unmoveable Foundation the Law and the Prophets He doth not here insist upon any particular revelation made to himself but offers the whole matter in dispute to be tryed by a common Rule that was allowed on both sides And his meaning is if they could prove that he either asserted or did any thing contrary to the Law and the Prophets then they had some reason to accuse him of innovation or beginning of a new Sect but if the foundation of his doctrine and practice lay in what themselves acknowledged to be from God then they had no cause to charge him with introducing a new Sect among them But the great Question here is What ground St. Paul had to decline the Authority of the present Church Since God himself had appointed the Priests to be the interpreters of the Law and therefore in doubtful cases resort was to be made to them and not the judgement left to particular persons about the sense of Scripture and yet in this case it is apparent St. Paul declined all Authority of the present
vindicate themselves they must shew how it was possible for such corruptions to come in and no more notice be taken of them Such things could not be introduced without some notable alteration and in such a one the author the time the place the manner may be assigned We can tell say they all these circumstances in the Idolatries of Jeroboam Ahab and Manasseh if so great alterations have hapned in the state of our Church that there is a necessity of reforming it name us the persons the time the place the manner how all these corruptions came in When came men first to forsake the letter of the Scripture and adhere to Tradition Who first brought in the Pharisaical Superstitions What was his name where was his abode who first opposed and condemned him Were all men asleep then to suffer such alterations and to say nothing at all against them What could one Generation conspire to deceive the next and if not how could such changes happen in matters of Religion and no one take care to discover it and prevent the infecting of posterity by it Had no persons any regard to God and the purity of Religion then If they had would they suffer strange fire to come upon Gods Altar and take no notice at all of it Why did not Jesus of Nazareth when he so frequently and vehemently declaimed against the Pharisaical hypocrisie and superstitions and false Doctrines shew to the people when and where and how these things came into the Church of God He only condemns them and speaks sharply against them but he saith not one word to satisfie the Scientifical men among them how it was possible for corruptions to come in and prevail to such a degree and yet no circumstances of time or place be assignable of it Thus the Jews still believed themselves to be the only true antient visible Catholick and infallible Church of God and despised the poor Christians as a novel and upstart Sect of Nazarens which is the first imputation the Christians suffered under 2. They suffered under the imputation of Faction and Sedition which is the second thing implyed in the name of Sect or Heresie here mentioned and that they charged upon them two wayes 1. For not submitting to the Churches Authority 2. For disturbing the peace and quiet of the People 1. For not submitting to the Churches Authority not that the Disciples of our Lord did out of humour or fancy or only to make a party break with the Jews in matters meerly of order and indifferency no on the contrary we find them extreamly cautious of giving any offence in such matters which temper they learnt of their Lord and Master who complyed with many things that others might not take advantage by his omission of them to slight and contemn them thus when others were baptized of John he would be so too not that he had any need of washing away of sin but he would not make use of a particular priviledge to bring any discountenance upon a general duty Thus we see he went up at the solemn Feasts to Hierusalem as others did and not only was present in the Temple but vindicated by a Miracle the order and decency of it by driving out the buyers and sellers from the outward parts of it although they had a fair pretence of being ready at hand to serve the necessities of such as were to sacrifice to God in the Temple nay St. Mark tells us that he would not suffer any vessell to be carried through the Temple and this he did not upon any reason peculiar to the Levitical Law but because it was a House of Prayer And this example his Apostles followed who after they had the Holy Ghost poured upon them yet they attended the Temple at the hours of prayer But most remarkable to this purpose is the instance of St. Paul at that very time when he was seized upon and like to be destroyed by the fury of the Jews For understanding at Hierusalem from St. James that there were many thousands of believing Jews that were still zealous of the Law and were informed that St. Paul among the Gentiles slighted circumcision and the Levitical Customs he to give them all reasonable satisfaction that he intended to make no unnecessary breach among them about indifferent matters submits himself to a legal purification in the Temple for seven dayes together before the end of which the Jews made a tumult and seized upon him and so he was brought to answer the accusations against him in this Chapter Thus careful St. Paul was to give no ground for suspicion that he delighted in disorders and separations this example he did leave to all prudent Christians rather to submit to things which they have no great value for as no doubt at this time St. Paul had very little for the Levitical Customs than to hazard the breaking the peace of the Church for such matters But notwithstanding all this care of the first Christians they could not avoid the imputation of Faction because they would not entirely submit their judgements to the Authority of the Jewish Church For this was the great pretence they stood upon that they were the Governours of the Church by Gods own institution that they were to explain and interpret the Law and the Prophets and this was expressed in the beginning of their Law That in all cases of difficulty they were to go up to the place which the Lord their God should chuse and to go to the Priests and the Levites and to the Judge and they shall shew thee the sentence of judgement And thou shalt do according to the sentence which they of that place which the Lord shall chuse shall shew thee and thou shalt observe to do according to all that they inform thee and the man that will do presumptuously and will not bearken to the Priest that standeth to minister there before the Lord thy God or unto the Judge even that man shall dye and thou shalt put away the evil from Israel Upon this place they might certainly much better establish the infallibility of their own Church than others draw an argument for Infallibility in the Christian Church from it However absolute obedience would serve their turn to charge the Christians with Faction in not submitting to their Authority For was not this a matter of difficulty whether the Messias were to be a temporal Prince or not concerning what time and place and person the Prophecies were to be understood Who were the competent Judges in this case but those whom God had established by his Law If the Scribes and Pharisees were charged with false glosses and corrupting the Law by their Traditions the Christians were not to take upon themselves to judge of them but to appeal to the High Priest and the Sanhedrin who were the only lawful Judges in these matters Their duty was submission and patience but by no means ought they
Church for at that very time the High-Priests and Elders came down to accuse him and he takes not the least notice of their judgement in this matter I shall therefore now shew that St. Paul had very great reason so to do and to appeal only to Scripture 1. Because the Authority of the present Church was more lyable to error and mistake than the Rule of Scripture was 2. Because it was lyable to more partiality than that was 1. Because it was more lyable to error and mistake than the Rule of Scripture was It was agreed on both sides that the Law was from God and that the Prophets spake by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost all that was now left was only to find out the true meaning of them and to compare Prophecies with events As in the case of the Messias if the circumstances foretold by the Prophets had their exact accomplishment in Christ as might appear to those who carefully compared them If he were born at Bethlehem of the Tribe of Judah when the Scepter was departed from it and during the second Temple and all other circumstances agreeing then though the ordinary judgement concerning true Prophets belonged to the Sanhedrin yet it was far more reasonable to believe that they were mistaken than that all the Prophecies should be accomplished in a person that was not the true Messias For those Prophecies were not intended only for the Priests and Rulers but for directions to the People that they might be able to judge of the accomplishment of them otherwise when the Authority of the Jewish Church condemned our Saviour the People could have no reason to believe him to be the Messias if they were bound in the sense of Scripture to submit their judgement wholly to the Churches Authority It is plain then that the sense of Scripture may be so evident to private capacities that they are not to submit in it to the present Authority of a Church For notwithstanding all the promises made to the Jewish Church and the command of submitting to the sentence of their Priests and Rulers in a matter of the highest concernment viz. concerning the true Messias men were bound to believe directly contrary to the present Authority in the Church For the people were bound to believe Christ to be the true Messias although the High Priest and Elders had condemned him for a deceiver and malefactor But besides this particular case there may be several others wherein men may lawfully reject the Authority of the present Church and those are when that Authority shall go about to overthrow those things which must be supposed antecedent to the belief of any such Authority as 1. The common sense of mankind 2. The force of a divine Law 3. The liberty of judgement concerning truth and falshood All these must necessarily be supposed before any Authority of a Church but if any Church goes about to overthrow these it thereby forfeits its own Authority over men 1. If it requires things contrary to common sense as in that instance wherein some of the Jewish Rabbies required submission to their Authority viz. in believing the right hand to be the left or the left to be the right if they determined so or supposing the Jews to have required the people to deny that they ever saw any Miracle wrought by Christ or in the Miracle of the Loaves that what they saw and handled and tasted to be bread was true bread or to say that the same individual body might be in a thousand places at once or that things whose nature it is to be in another can subsist without their proper subject what Church soever requires such things as these from its members to be believed gives them just reason to reject its Authority 2. If it requires things contrary to the force and reason of a divine Law as the Jews themselves would have acknowledged if any Authority among them had gone about either to have left out the second Commandment or made it lawful to give Religious worship to Images under any distinctions whatsoever or if the Priests had taken away from the people their share in the sacrifices under pretence of the unsanctified teeth or the long beards of the Laity which were not fit to touch what had been offered in sacrifice to God But we need not put cases among them for our Saviour therefore bids men have a care of the leaven of the Scribes and Pharisees because by their traditions they made the Commandment of God of none effect as in their Corban if they made a vow to God they thought themselves excused from relieving their Parents and in this way our Saviour generally deals with them shewing that though they pretended to keep the letter of the Law yet by their corrupt additions and false glosses they overthrew the scope and design of it which he thought sufficient reason to reject their Authority and therefore when he bids his Disciples observe and do what soever the Scribes and Pharisees bid them it must be supposed to be only while they keep to the letter and reason of the Law for if he had intended an absolute obedience he would never elsewhere bid his Disciples beware of their Doctrine 3. If it takes away all liberty of judgement concerning truth and falshood in Religion For this is a natural right which every man hath to judge for himself and they that take this away may as well command all men to put out their eyes that they may better follow their Guides But the other is so much worse because it is an assault upon our understandings it is a robbing us of the greatest talent God hath committed to our management it is a rape upon our best faculties and prostituting them to the lusts of Spiritual Tyrants it is not captivating our understandings to the obedience of faith but enslaving them to the proud and domineering usurpations of men wherein they would do by us as the Philistins did by Sampson they would put out our eyes that we might grind in their prison and make them sport I would not be mistaken it is the liberty of judgement I plead for and not of practice that may be justly restrained by the Laws of the Church where the other is allowed because the obligations to peace and unity are different from those to faith and inward assent And that no absolute submission of judgement could be required by the Law of Moses notwithstanding the command of outward obedience in the cases mention'd Deut. 17. 8 9 c. is most evident from hence because that Law makes provision for a sin-offering in case the whole Congregation of Israel sin through ignorance and the thing be hid from the eyes of the Assembly or Supream Council and they have done something against the commandment of the Lord which had been a Law made to no purpose if it had been impossible for their chief Authority to have erred or been mistaken