in reason he ought to have done before he had forsaken us I shall declare it more particularly in these following Proposiâ—ions § 2. 1. That the Doctrine of Christian Religion was by Christ delivered to the Apostles and by them first preached to the World and afterwards by them committed to Writing which Writings or Books have been transmitted from one age to another down to us So far I take to be granted by our present Adversaries That the Christian Doctrine was by Christ delivered to the Apostles and by them publish'd to the World is part of their own Hypothesis That this Doctrine was afterwards by the Apostles committed to writing he also grants Corol. 29. 'T is certain the Apostles taught the same Doctrine they writ and if so it must be as certain that they writ the same Doctrine which they taught I know it is the general Tenet of the Papists that the Scriptures do not contain the entire body of Christian Doctrine but that besides the Doctrines contained in Scripture there are also others brought down to us by oral or unwritten Tradition But Mr. S. who supposeth the whole Doctrine of Christian Religion to be certainly conveyed down to us solely by oral Tradition doth not any where that I remember deny that all the same Doctrine is contained in the Scriptures only he denies the Scriptures to be a means sufficient to convey this Doctrine to us with certainty so that we can by them be infallibly assured what is Christ's Doctrine and what not Nay he seems in that passage I last cited to grant this in saying that the Apostles did both teach and write the same Doctrine I am sure Mr. White whom he follows very closely throughout his whole Book does not deny this in his Apology for Tradition where he saith that it is not the Catholick position that all its Doctrines are not contained in the Scriptures And that those Writings or Books which we call the Holy Scriptures have been transmitted down to us is unquestionable matter of fact and granted universally by the Papists as to all those Books which are owned by Protestants for Canonical § 3. Secondly That the way of Writing is a sufficient means to convey a Doctrine to the knowledg of those who live in times very remote from the age of its first delivery According to his Hypothesis there is no possible way of conveying a Doctrine with certainty and security besides that of oral Tradition the falshood of which will sufficiently appear when I shall have shewn that the true properties of a Rule of Faith do agree to the Scriptures and not to oral Tradition In the mean time I shall only offer this to his consideration that whatever can be orally delivered in plain and intelligible words may be written in the same words and that a Writing or Book which is publick and in every ones hand may be conveyed down with at least as much certainty and security and with as little danger of alteration as an oral Tradition And if so I understand not what can render it impossible for a Book to convey down a Doctrine to the knowledg of after-ages Besides if he had looked well about him he could not but have apprehended some little inconvenience in making that an essential part of his Hypothesis which is contradicted by plain and constant experience For that any kind of Doctrine may be sufficiently conveyed by Books to the knowledg of after-ages provided those Books be but written intelligibly and preserved from change and corruption in the conveyance both which I shall be so bold as to suppose possible is as little doubted by the generality of mankind as that there are Books And surely we Christians cannot think it impossible to convey a Doctrine to posterity by Books when we consider that God himself pitched upon this way for conveyance of the Doctrine of the Jewish Religion to after-ages because it is not likely that so wise an Agent should pitch upon a means whereby it was impossible he should attain his end § 4. Thirdly That the Books of Scripture are sufficiently plain as to all things necessary to be believed and practised He that denies this ought in reason to instance in some necessary point of Faith or matter of Practice which is not in some place of Scripture or other plainly delivered For it is not a sufficient objection to say that the greatest wits among the Protestants differ about the sense of those Texts wherein the generality of them suppose the Divinity of Christ to be plainly and clearly expressed Because if nothing were to be accounted sufficiently plain but what it is impossible a great wit should be able to wrest to any other sense not only the Scriptures but all other Books and which is worst of all to him that makes this objection all oral Tradition would fall into uncertainty Doth the Traditionary Church pretend that the Doctrine of Christ's Divinity is conveyed down to her by oral Tradition more plainly than it is expressed in Scripture I would fain know what plainer words she ever used to express this point of Faith by than what the Scripture useth which expresly calls him God the true God God over all blessed for evermore If it be said that those who deny the Divinity of Christ have been able to evade these and all other Texts of Scripture but they could never elude the definitions of the Church in that matter it is easily answered that the same Arts would equally have eluded both but there was no reason why they should trouble themselves so much about the latter for why should they be solicitous to wrest the definitions of Councils and conform them to their own opinion who had no regard to the Churches Authority If those great Wits as he calls them had believed the sayings of Scripture to be of no greater authority than the definitions of Councils they would have answered texts of Scripture as they have done the definitions of Councils not by endeavouring to interpret them to another sense but by downright denying their Authority So that it seems that oral Tradition is liable to the same inconvenience with the written as to this particular § 5. And of this I shall give him a plain instance in two great Wits of their Church the present Pope and Mr. White the one the Head of the Traditionary Church as Mr. S. calls it the other the great Master of the Traditionary Doctrine These two great Wits notwithstanding the plainness of oral Tradition and the impossibility of being ignorant of it or mistaking it have yet been so unhappy as to differ about several points of Faith insomuch that Mr. White is unkindly censured for it at Rome and perhaps here in England the Pope speeds no better however the difference continues still so wide that Mr. White hath thought fit to disobey the summons of his chief Pastor and like a prudent man rather to write against him here out
proof of this I appeal to that Decree of the Council of Trent in which they declare That because the Christian Faith and Discipline are contained in written Books and unwritten Traditions c. therefore they do receive and honour the Books of Scripture and also Traditions pari pietatis affectu ac reverentiâ with equal pious affection and reverence which I understand not how those do who set aside the Scripture and make Tradition the sole Rule of their Faith And consonantly to this Decree the general Doctrine of the Romish Church is that Scripture and Tradition make up the Rule of Faith So the Roman Catechism set forth by order of the Council of Trent says that the sum of the Doctrine delivered to the Faithful is contained in the Word of God which is distributed into Scripture and Tradition Bellarmine speaks to the same purpose That the Scripture is a Rule of Faith not an entire but partial one The entire Rule is the Word of God which is divided into two partial Rules Scripture and Tradition According to this the adequate Rule of Faith is the Word of God which is contained partly in Scripture and partly in the Tradition of the Church And that Scripture is look't upon by them as the principal Rule and primary foundation of their Faith and Tradition as only supplying the defects of Scripture as to some Doctrines and Rites not contained in Scripture must be evident to any one that hath been conversant in the chief of their controversial Divines Bellarmine where he gives the marks of a Divine Tradition speaks to this purpose That that which they call a Divine Tradition is such a Doctrine or Rite as is not found in Scripture but embraced by the whole Church and for that reason believed to have descended from the Apostles And he tells us further That the Apostles committed all to Writing which was commonly and publickly Preached and that all things are in Scripture which men are bound to know and believe explicitely But then he says that there were other things which the Apostles did not commonly and publickly teach and these they did not commit to Writing but delivered them only by word of mouth to the Prelates and Priests and perfect men of the Church And these are the Apostolical Traditions he speaks of Cardinal Perron says That the Scripture is the foundation of the Christian Doctrine either mediately or immediately And that the Authority of unwritten Tradition is founded in general on these sentences of the Apostle Hold the Traditions c. Again The things which thou hast heard of me among many Witnesses commit to faithful men c. And that the Authority of the Church to preserve and especially to declare these is founded in this Proposition viz. That the Church is the pillar and ground of Truth So that according to him the primary Rule of Faith is the Scripture in which the Authority of Tradition is founded Mr. Knott says expresly We acknowledg the H. Scripture to be a most perfect Rule for as much as a Writing can be a Rule we only deny that it excludes either Divine Tradition though it be unwritten or an external Judg to keep to propose to interpret it c. So that according to him Scripture is a perfect Rule only it does not exclude unwritten Tradition c. By which that he does not understand as Mr. S. does a concurrent Oral Tradition of all the same Doctrines which are contained in Scripture but other Doctrines not therein contained is plain from what he says elsewhere We do not distinguish Tradition from the written Word because Tradition is not written by any or in any Book or Writing but because it is not written in the Srripture or Bible Bellarmine also says the same And as for the interpreting of Scripture he tells us that this is not the office of a Rule but of a Judg. There is says he a great and plain distinction between a Judg and a Rule For as in a Kingdom the Judg hath his Rule to follow which are the received Laws and Customs which are not fit or able to declare and be Judges to themselves but that Office must belong to a living Judg So the Holy Scripture is and may be a Rule but cannot be a Judg. Here he makes the Scripture as much a Rule for matters of Faith as the Laws of the Land are for Civil matters And in his Reply to Mr. Chillingworth he hath a Chapter of above 150 Pages the Title whereof is Scripture is not the only Rule of Faith which had he with Mr. S. believed Oral Tradition to be the sole Rule of Faith had been as absurd as it would be to write a Book to prove that Turks are not the only Christians in the World Mr. Cressy likewise not very consistently to himself lays down this Conclusion The entire Rule of faith is contained not only in Scripture but likewise in unwritten Tradition § 2. Now all this is as contrary as can be to Mr. Rushworth's new Rule of Faith Therefore Mr. White says They speak ill who teach that some things are known in the Church from Scripture some by Tradition And Dr. Holden in opposition to those who make Scripture any part of the Rule of Faith advances one of the most wild and uncharitable Positions that ever I yet met withall viz. That if one should believe all the Articles of the Catholick Faith c. for this reason because he thought they were all expresly revealed in Scripture or implicitely contained so as they might be deduced from thence and would not have believed them had he not judged that they might be evinced from Scripture yet this man could be no true Catholick Because as he tells us afterwards we must receive the Christian Doctrine as coming to us by Tradition for only by this means excluding the Scriptures Christ hath appointed revealed Truths to be received and communicated In the mean time Cardinal Perron unless he altered his mind is in a sad case who believed the Authority of Tradition it self for this reason because it was founded in Scripture § 3. And this fundamental difference about the Rule of Faith between the generality of their Divines and Mr S's small party is fully acknowledged by the Traditionists themselves Dr. Holden says That their Divines who resolve Faith according to the common Opinion do inevitably fall into that shameful Circle of proving the Divine Authority of the Scripture by the Church and the Infallibility of the Church back again by the Scripture because they dare not build their Faith upon the natural evidence and certainty of Tradition So that Dr. Holden's way of resolving Faith is different from the common Opinion of their Divines which he says does not differ from the Opinion of those who resolve their Faith into the private Spirit and this according to Mr. White
Church and skipt into the Opinions of human Sects not of human Election as Mr. S. blindly following Mr. Wh. does most absurdly translate it but he that hath returned from his Errors and hearkned to the SCRIPTVRES and conformed his life to the Truth is as it were advanced from a Man to a God At the same rate he goes on for several Pages together taking the Scriptures for an indemonstrable Principle from which all Divine Doctrines are to be demonstrated and for the Criterion whereby they are to be tried and charges the Hereticks in such words as we cannot find fitter for our Adversaries As says he naughty Boys shut out their School-master so these drive the Prophecies out of the Church suspecting that they will chide and admonish them and they patch together abundance of falshoods and fictions that they may seem RATIONALLY not to admit the Scriptures Again speaking of these Hereticks affronting the Scriptures he tells us they oppose the Divine Tradition with human Doctrines by other Traditions delivered from hand to hand that they may establish a Sect or Heresie Again he says they adulterate the Truth and steal the Rule of Faith c. but for ORAL Frauds they shall have WRITTEN Punishments But enough of this whosoever desires to see more of it let him read on where these men to their shame have directed us and see whether any Protestant can speak more fully and plainly in this Controversy The whole trust of the Papists is upon the equivocal sense of the word Tradition Which word is commonly used by the Fathers to signify to us the Scriptures or Divine Tradition as Clement here calls it but the Papists understand it of their unwritten Tradition and to this they apply all those passages in the Fathers where Tradition is honourably mentioned So Mr. S. deals with us in the Testimonies I have already examined And there is nothing of argument in those few which remain but from the ambiguity of this Word which I need not shew of every one of them in particular for whosoever shall read them with this Key will find that they are of no force to conclude what he drives at § 5. As for his Citations out of the Council of Trent by which he would prove it to be the perswasion of their present Church that Tradition is the sole Rule of Faith I have already shewn that that Council hath declared otherwise and is otherwise understood by the chief of their own Writers And therefore he did prudently to conceal in an c. those choaking words in which the Council declares itself to receive and honour with equal pious affection and reverence the Books of Scripture and unwritten Traditions And after a great deal of shuffling what a pitiful Account is it that he at last gives of that Council's putting Scripture constantly before Tradition because Scripture being interpreted by Tradition is of the same Authority as if an Apostle or Evangelist were present and therefore no wonder they honour Scripture-Testimony so as to put it before Tradition which is to say that because Scripture is subordinate to Tradition and to be regulated by it therefore it deserves to be put before it Besides if Scripture and Tradition be but several wayes of conveying the Evangelical and Apostolical Doctrine why should he imagine an Evangelist or Apostle to be more present by the Scripture than by oral Tradition Especially if it be considered that he supposes Scripture to be an uncertain and Tradition an infallible way of conveying this Doctrine SECT II. § 1. ALL that now remains is to confirm the precedent Discourse by Testimonies of the most eminent Persons of the Church in several Ages in which I shall not need to be large being so happily prevented by that full Account which is given of the sense of the Ancients in this matter in the Answer to Labyrinthus Cantuariensis which Mr. S. may if he pleases consult for his further Conviction § 2 I begin with the Historical Account which Eusebius gives of committing the Gospel to writing which is to this purpose viz That the Romans were not content with the Doctrine Preached unless it were also committed to writing and therefore did earnestly beg of Mark Peter's Companion that he would leave them a Monument in writing of that Doctrine which had been deliver'd to them by word of mouth And this was the occasion of the writing of St. Mark 's Gospel And when Peter did understand that this Work was publish'd being suggested by the Divine Revelation of the Holy Spirit it is said he was very much pleased with the ready and earnest desire of those Persons and that by his Authority he confirmed this Writing to the end that it might be every where read in the Church As for St. Matthew and St. John he tells us That of all the Disciples they two only have left monuments in Writing of whom it is also reported that they betook themselves to write being drawn thereto by necessity Matthew after he had preached the Word of God to the Jews and was resolved to go to other Nations wrote his Gospel in the Language of his Countrey and thus by the diligence and pains of Writing did abundantly supply the the want of his presence to those whom he left And when Mark and Luke had published their Gospel it is reported that John who had always used to preach the Word without writing it being at length wrought upon by the same reason did betake himself to write From this account it is clear that the Apostles thought it necessary for the preservation and secure conveyance of the Christian Doctrine that it should be put into Writing and that they judged this a better way to supply the want of their presence than oral Tradition Therefore the same Author tells us That the Disciples who immediately succeeded the Apostles as they travelled to preach the Gospel to those who had not yet heard the Word of Faith did with great care also deliver to them the Writings of the Holy Evangelists Again That Ignatius as he travelled towards Rome where he was to suffer exhorted the Churches of every City to hold fast the Tradition of the Apostles which as also by Writing he testified for greater security he held necessary to be copied in Writing § 4. That the Hereticks of Old made the same pretence which the Papists make now of oral Tradition in opposition to Scripture the same Eusebius tells us and withal that Books are a sufficient confutation of this pretence Those says he who were of the Heresie of Artemon said that all their Fore-fathers and the Apostles themselves had received and taught the same things which they also did and had preserved the true Teaching unto the time of Victor Bishop of Rome whose Successor Zephyrinus corrupted it And this saith he would have great probability were it not first of all contradicted by the Scripture and next if there
did not remain the Writings of other Brethren much more ancient than Victor 's time c. in the Books of all whom Christs Divinity is acknowledged And afterwards he tells us that these Hereticks did change and corrupt the Scriptures to bring them to their Opinions so Mr. S. tells us that the outward Letter of Scripture ought to be corrected by Tradition and Sense written in mens hearts St. Hierom also tells us That the Hereticks were wont to say we are the Sons of the Wise who did from the beginning deliver down to us the Apostolical Doctrine but he adds that the true Sons of Judah adhere to the Scripture § 4. That Scripture is sufficiently plain in all things necessary St. Chrysostome All things in the Divine Scriptures are plain and straight Whatsoever things are necessary are manifest St. Austin having spoken of the profoundness of Scripture adds Not that those things which are necessary to Salvation are so hard to be come at But saith he when one hath there attained Faith without which there is no pious and right living there are besides many dark and mysterious things c. Again The manner of speech in Scripture how easie is it to all though few can penetrate to the bottom of it Those things which it plainly contains it speaks without disguise like a familiar Friend to the heart of the learned and unlearned How will Mr. S. reconcile this with his grand Exception against Scripture And what these things are which are plainly contained in Scripture the same Father tells us else-where in these words Among those things which are plainly set down in Scripture all those things are to be found which comprehend Faith and good Manners The same St. Austin as also Clement in the Book which Mr. White quoted for the understanding of obscure Texts of Scripture directs us not to Tradition but to the plain Texts without which he expresly says there would be no way to understand them § 5. That Scripture is so plain as to be fit to determine Controversies Justin sure thought so when disputing with Trypho concerning a point wherein the Jew had Tradition on his side he told him he would bring such proofs to the contrary as no man could gain-say Attend says he to what I shall recite out of the Holy Scriptures proofs which need not to be explained but only to be heard Mr. White might have found likewise much to this purpose in his Clement But not to tire my Reader in a Point which the Ancients abound with I shall only produce the judgment of Constantine in that solemn Oration of his to the Council of Nice wherein he bewails their mutual oppositions especially in Divine things concerning which they had the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit Recorded in Writing For says he the Books of the Evangelists and Apostles and the Oracles of the old Prophets do evidently teach us what we ought to think of the Divine Majesty Therefore laying aside all seditious contention let us determine the matters in question by Testimonies out of the Divine Writings Not a word of any other Tradition but Scripture which was held evident enough in those days though now Mr. S. tells us it is not sufficient to decide that Controversy about the Divinity of Christ. § 6. Lastly That Scripture is the Rule of Faith Irenaeus The method of our Salvation we have not known by any other but those men by whom the Gospel came to us which then they preached but afterwards by the Will of God delivered it to us in the Scriptures to be for the future the foundation and pillar of our Faith St. Cyprian the Church hath ever held a good Catholick yet Mr. S. takes notice that he erred in a Point of Faith and perhaps the rather because Mr. Rushworth had told him that he was not theirs in this Controversy For says he St. Cyprian seems to think that the Resolution of Faith was to be made into Scripture and not into Tradition But that we may not seem to accept of this of courtesie from him nor yet wholly to despise it I shall offer this one Testimony instead of many out of that Father who being opposed with an Argument from Tradition demands Whence have you that Tradition Comes it from the Authority of the Lord and of the Gospel or from the Epistles of the Apostles For God testifies that we are to do those things which are written c. If it be commanded in the Gospel or contained in the Epistles or Acts of the Apostles then let us observe it as a Divine and Holy Tradition Hilary commends Constantius the Emperor for regulating his Faith only according to those things which are written And to oblige him to deserve this commendation he adds He who refuses this is Antichrist and who dissembles in it is Anathema Optatus concerning the Controversy with the Donatists asks who shall be Judge and answers himself the Scriptures Which he illustrates by the similitude of a Father who delivered his Will orally to his children while he was living but when he was dying caused it to be written in lasting Tables to decide all Controversies that might happen among them after his death The passage is large and it is obvious to apply it Basil maintaining the Doxology as it was used in his days says Thus we received it from our Fathers but adds immediately This is not enough for us that it is the Tradition of the Fathers for they followed the Authority of the Scriptures making its Testimonies the Principles upon which they built He has indeed in the same Book a passage much insisted on by the Papists concerning unwritten Traditions but withal he says those Traditions were secretly conveyed which makes all the rest of no use to Mr. S. Chrysostom having mentioned several Heresies directs how they may be avoided viz. By attending to the Faith delivered and looking upon all that disagrees from that as adulterate For says he as those who give Rules do not put men upon a curious enquiry after many measures but bid them keep to the Rule given so is it in Opinions But no body will attend to the Scriptures if we did we should not only not fall into Errors our selves but also rescue those that are deceived Again If we would be throughly conversant in the Scriptures we should be instructed both in right Opinions and a good life Again among the many Sects of Christians it will be easie to judge of the right if we believe the Scriptures because these are plain and true If any one agree with these he is a Christian if he contradict them he is far from this Rule St. Austin calls the Scipture the Divine Balance for the weighing of Doctrine Again the Holy Scripture sayes he fixeth the Rule of our Doctrine And accordingly himself uses it both in his Dispute with Maximinus to whom he
is the Measure according to which we judg whether a thing be true or false and this is either general or more particular Common notions and the acknowledged Principles of Reason are that general Rule according to which we judg whether a thing be true or false The particular Principles of every Science are the more particular Rules according to which we judg whether things in that Science be true or false So that the general notion of a Rule is that it is a measure by the agreement or disagreement to which we judg of all things of that kind to which it belongs § 4. Faith though both among sacred and prophane Writers it be used many times more generally for a perswasion or assent of the mind to any thing wrought in us by any kind of argument yet as it is a Term of Art used by Divines it signifies that particular kind of assent which is wrought in us by Testimony or Authority So that Divine Faith which we are now speaking of is an assent to a thing upon the testimony or authority of God or which is all one an assent to a truth upon Divine revelation § 5. A Rule of Faith is the Measure according to which we judg what matters we are to assent to as revealed to us by God and what not And more particularly the Rule of Christian faith is the Measure according to which we are to judg what we ought to assent to as the Doctrine revealed by Christ to the world and what not § 6. So that this Question What is the Rule of Christian faith supposeth a Doctrine revealed by Christ to the world and that that Doctrine was intelligibly and entirely delivered by Christ to his Apostles and sufficient confirmation given to it that this Doctrine was in the same manner published to the world by the Apostles who likewise gave sufficient evidence of the truth of it All this is necessarily supposed in the Question For it would be in vain to enquire whether this or that be the Rule of Christian Faith if such a thing as the Christian Faith were not first supposed When therefore we enquire what is the Rule of Christian Faith the meaning of that enquiry is by what way and means the knowledg of Christ's Doctrine is conveyed certainly down to us who live at the distance of so many Ages from the time of it's first delivery For this being known we have the Rule of Faith that is a measure by which we may judg what we are to assent to as the Doctrine of Christ and what not So that when any Question ariseth about any particular Proposition whether this be part of Christ's Doctrine we may be able by this Rule to resolve it SECT II. § 1. THe next thing to be considered is his resolution of this Question by which we shall know what his opinion is concerning the Rule of Faith for that being known the Controversie between us will easily be stated His opinion in general is that oral or practical Tradition in opposition to writing or any other way that can be assigned is the Rule of Faith By oral or practical Tradition he means a delivery down from hand to hand by words and a constant course of frequent and visible actions conformable to those words of the sense and faith of Forefathers § 2. Now that I may bring the Controversie between us to a clear state I am first to take a more particular view of his Opinion concerning the Rule of Faith that so I may the better understand how much he attributes to Oral Tradition and what to the Scriptures or written Tradition And then I am to lay down the Protestant Rule of Faith that so it may appear how far we agree and how far we differ The sum of what he attributes to Oral Tradition so far as can be collected out of so obscure and confused a Discourse may be reduced to these five Heads § 3. First That the Doctrine of Christian Religion was delivered by Christ to the Apostles and by them published to the World and that the Age which first received it from the Apostles delivered it as they received it without any change or corruption to their Children and they to theirs and so it went on solely by this way of Oral Tradition This is the sum of his Explication of Tradition Disc. 5 th § 4. Secondly That this way alone is not only sufficient to convey this Doctrine down to all Ages certainly and without any alteration but it is the only possible way that can be imagined of conveying down a Doctrine securely from one Age to another And this is the natural result of his Discourse about the Properties of a Rule of Faith For if the true Properties of a Rule of Faith do belong to Oral Tradition then it is a sufficient means and if those Properties do solely and essentially appertain to it and are incompatible to any thing else as he endeavours to prove then it is impossible there should be any other way § 5. Thirdly That it is impossible this means should fail or miss of its end that is the Doctrine of Christ being once put into this way of conveyance it can neither cease to descend nor be at any time corrupted or changed in its descent This is that which his Demonstrations pretend to prove § 6. Fourthly That the infallibility of Oral Tradition or the impossibility of its failing is a first and self evident principle This he frequently asserts throughout his Book § 7. Fifthly That this way of Oral Tradition hath de facto in all Ages been acknowledged by Christians as the only way and means whereby the Doctrine of Christianity hath been conveyed down to them And this is that which he attempts to prove from the Consent of Authority § 8. As for the Scriptures he grants them indeed to have been written by men divinely inspired and to contain a Divine Doctrine even the same which is delivered by Oral Tradition so he tells us 'T is certain the Apostles taught the same Doctrine they writ But then he denies it to be of any use without Oral Tradition because neither the letter nor sense of it can without that be ascertain'd so he saith in his Letter to Dr. Casaubon As for the Scriptures ascertaining their letter and sense which is done by Tradition 't is clear they are of incomparable value not only for the Divine Doctrine contained in them but also for many particular passages whose source or first attestation not being universal nor their nature much practical might possibly have been lost in their conveyance down by Tradition Where though he give the Scriptures very good words it is to be understood provided they will be subordinate and acknowledg that they owe their sense and their being intelligible and useful to Oral Tradition For if any man shall presume to say That this Book hath any certain sense without Oral Tradition or that God
can write plainly and intelligibly and that this Book which he hath endited is so written and doth not depend upon Tradition for its sense and interpretation then the most scurrilous language is not bad enough for the Scriptures then what are those Sacred Writings but Ink variously figured in a Book unsensed Characters waxen natur'd words not yet sensed nor having any certain Interpreter but fit to be plaid upon diversly by quirks of wit that is apt to blunder and confound but to clear little or nothing These with many other disgraceful terms he very liberally bestows upon Divine Oracles the consideration whereof did it not minister too much horrour would afford some comfort for by this kind of rude usage so familiar with him towards his Adversaries one may reasonably conjecture that he doth not reckon the Scriptures among his Friends § 9. And whereas he saith That the Scriptures have preserv'd many particular passages which because their source or first attestation was not universal nor their nature much practical might possibly bave been lost in their conveyance down by Tradition this is impossible according to his Hypothesis For if neither the Scriptures letter nor the certain sense of it as to the main body of Christian Doctrine could have been secured without Oral Tradition that is if we could not have known that those passages which contain the main points of Christs Doctrine either had been written by men divinely inspired or what the sense of them was but from the consonancy and agreement of those passages with the Doctrine which was orally preached by the Apostles how can we be certain either of the letter or sense of other particular passages which must necessarily want this confirmation from Oral Tradition because their first attestation was not universal nor their nature much practical Nay his discourse plainly implies that we can have no security at all either of the letter or sense of any other parts of Scripture but only those which are coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine as is evident from these words Tradition established the Church is provided of a certain and infallible Rule to preserve a copy of the Scriptures Letter truly significative of Christs sense as far as it is coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine preached at first because sense writ in mens hearts by Tradition can easily guide them to correct the alteration of the outward letter This I perceive plainly is the thing they would be at they would correct the outward letter of Scripture by sense written in their hearts and then instead of leaving out the second Commandement they would change it into a precept of giving due worship to Images according to the Council of Trent and a thousand other alterations they must make in the Bible to make it truly significative of the sense of their Church But surely the outward letter of other passages of Scripture which were not intended to signifie points of Faith is equally liable to alterations and yet the Church is not by Tradition provided of any way to correct these alterations when they happen because Tradition doth as this Corollary implies only furnish the Church with a certain and infallible Rule of preserving a copy of the Scriptures letter so far as it is coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine § 10. Again he tells us Tradition established the Church is provided of a certain infallible Rule to interpret Scripture letter by so as to arrive certainly at Christs sense as far as the letter concerns the body of Christian Doctrine preached at first or points requisite to Salvation So that whatever he may attribute to Scripture for fashions sake and to avoid Calumny with the Vulgar as he says very ingenuously in his explication of the 15 th Corollary nevertheless 't is plain that according to his own Hypothesis he cannot but look upon it as perfectly useless and pernicious That 't is altogether useless according to his Hypothesis is plain for the main body of Christian Doctrine is securely conveyed to us without it and it can give no kind of confirmation to it because it receives all at its confirmation from it only the Church is ever and anon put to a great deal of trouble to correct the alteration of the outward letter by tradition and sense written in their hearts And as for all other parts of Scriptue which are not coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine we can have no certainty either that the outward Letter is true nor if we could can we possibly arrive at any certain sense of them And that it is intolerably pernicious according to his Hypothesis is plain because * every silly and upstart Heresie fathers it self upon it and when men leave Tradition as he supposeth all Hereticks do the Scripture is the most dangerous engine that could have been invented being to such Persons only * waxen natured words not sensed nor having any certain Interpreter but fit to be play'd upon diversly by quirks of wit that is apt to blunder and confound but to clear little or nothing And indeed if his Hypothesis were true the Scriptures might well deserve all the contemptuous language which he useth against them and Mr. White 's comparison of them with Lilly's Almanack would not only be pardonable but proper and unless he added it out of prudence and for the Peoples sake whom he may think too superstitiously conceited of those Books he might have spared that cold excuse which he makes for using this similitude that it was agreeable rather to the impertinency of the Objection than the dignity of the Subject Certain it is if these men are true to their own Principles that notwithstanding the high reverence and esteem pretended to be born by them and their Church to the Scriptures they must heartily despise them and wish them out of the way and even look upon it as a great oversight of the Divine Providence to trouble his Church with a Book which if their Discourse be of any consequence can stand Catholicks in no stead at all and is so dangerous and mischievous a weapon in the hands of Hereticks SECT III. § 1. HAving thus taken a view of his opinion and considered how much he attributes to Oral Tradition and how little to the Scriptures before I assail this Hypothesis I shall lay down the Protestant Rule of Faith not that so much is necessary for the answering of his Book but that he may have no colour of objection that I proceed altogether in the destructive way and overthrow his Principle as he calls it without substituting another in its room The opinion then of the Protestants concerning the Rule of faith is this in general That those Books which we call the Holy Scriptures are the means whereby the Christian Doctrine hath been brought down to us And that he may now clearly understand this together with the grounds of it which
with it and make them wiser in the mean time I shall inform him what I have found that the Fathers never except against that method but appeal frequently from the slanderous reports and misrepresentations which were made of their Doctrine to the Books of Scripture as the true standard of it § 8. Another evidence that Christians in all Ages since the Apostles times have owned the Scriptures for the Rule of their Faith is That the Fathers in their Homilies did use constantly to declare to the People what they were to believe and what they were to practise out of the Scriptures which had been most absurd and sensless had they believed not the Scriptures but something else to have been the Rule of Faith and Manners For what could tend more to the seducing of the People from Mr. S's supposed Rule of Faith Oral Tradition than to make a daily practise of declaring and confirming the Doctrins of the Christian Faith from the Scriptures Had the antient Fathers been right for Mr. S's way they would not have built their Doctrine upon Scripture perhaps not have mentioned it for fear of giving the people an occasion to grow familiar with so dangerous a Book but rather as their more prudent Posterity have done would have lock'd it up from the people in an unknown Tongue and have set open the stores of good wholsome Traditions and instead of telling them as they do most frequently thus saith the Scripture would only have told them this is the voice of the essential Church thus it hath been delivered down by hand to us from our Forefathers § 9. I might add for a Third evidence the great malice of the Enemies and Persecutors of Christianity against this Book and their cruel endeavours to extort it out of the hands of Christians and destroy it out of the World that by this means they might extirpate Christianity For it seems they thought that the abolishing of this Book would have been the ruine of that Religion But according to Mr. S's opinion their malice wanted wit for had all the Bibles in the World been burnt Christian Religion would nevertheless have been entirely preserv'd and safely transmitted down to us by sense written in mens hearts with the good help of of Mr. S's Demonstration Nay their Church would have been a great gainer by it For this Occasion and Parent of all Heresie the Scripture being once out of the way she might have had all in her own hands and by leading the people in the safe paths of Tradition and consequently of Science might have made them wise enough to obey Well but suppose the Persecutors of Christianity mistook themselves in their design how came the Christians in those days to be so tenacious of this Book that rather than deliver it they would yield up themselves to torments and death And why did they look upon those who out of fear delivered up their Books as Apostates and Renouncers of Christianity if they had not thought this Book to be the great Instrument of their Faith and Salvation and if it had really been of no greater consideration than Mr. Wh. and Mr. S. would make it Why should they be so loth to part with a few unsens'd Characters waxen natur'd words fit to be play'd upon diversly by quirks of wit that is apt to blunder and confound but to clear little or nothing Why should they value their lives at so cheap a rate as to throw them away for a few insignificant scrawls and to shed their blood for a little Ink variously figured in a Book Did they not know that the safety of Christianity did not depend upon this Book Did no Christian then understand that which according to Mr. S. no Christian can be ignorant of viz. that not the Scripture but unmistakeable indefectible Oral Tradition was the Rule of Faith Why did they not consider that though this Letter Rule of Hereticks had been consum'd to ashes yet their Faith would have lain safe and been preserved entire in its * Spiritual Causes Men's minds the noblest pieces in Nature Some of them indeed did deliver up their Books and were call'd Traditores and I have some ground to believe that these were the only Traditionary Christians of that time and that the rest were Confessors and Martyrs for the Letter Rule And if this be not evidence enough that the Scriptures have always been acknowledged by Christians for the Rule of Faith I shall when I come to examine his Testimonies for Tradition with the good leave of his distinction between Speculators and Testifiers prove by most express Testimony that it was the general opinion of the Fathers That the Scriptures are the Rule of Christian Faith and then if his demonstration of the infalliblity of Tradition will enforce that as Testifiers they must nesds have spoken otherwise who can help it SECT IV. § 1. HAving thus laid down the Protestant Rule of Faith with the grounds of it all that now remains for me to do towards the clear and full stating of the Controversie between us is to take notice briefly and with due limitations 1. How much the Protestants do allow to Oral Tradition Secondly What those things are which Mr. S thinks fit to attribute to his Rule of Faith which we see no cause to attribute to ours And when this is done any one may easily discern how far we differ § 2. 1. How much Protestants do allow to Oral Tradition First We grant that Oral Tradition in some circumstances may be a sufficient way of conveying a Doctrine but withall we deny that such circumstances are now in being In the first Ages of the World when the credenda or Articles of Religion and the agenda or Precepts of it were but few and such as had the evidence of Natural light When the World was contracted into a few Families in comparison and the age of man ordinarily extended to six or seven hundred years it is easie to imagine how such a doctrine in such circumstances might have been propagated by Oral Tradition without any great change or alterations Adam lived till Methuselah was above two hundred years old Methuselah lived till Sem was near an hundred and Sem out-liv'd Abraham So that this Tradition needed not pass through more than two hands betwixt Adam and Abraham But though this way was sufficient to have preserved Religion in the world if men had not been wanting themselves yet we find it did not prove effectual For through the corruption and negligence of men after the Flood if not before when the world began to multiply and the age of man was shortned the knowledg and worship of the one true God was generally lost in the world And so far as appears by Scripture-History the only Record we have of those times when God called out Abraham from Vr of the Chaldees the whole world was lapsed into Polytheisme and Idolatry Therefore for the greater security of Religion
afterwards when the posterity of Abraham was multiplied into a great Nation the wisdom of God did not think fit to entrust the Doctrine of Religion any longer to the fallible and uncertain way of Tradition but committed it to writing Now that God pitched upon this way after the world had sadly experienced the unsuccesfulness of the other seems to be a very good evidence that this was the better and more secure way it being the usual method of the Divine dispensations not to go backwards but to move towards perfection and to proceed from that which is less perfect to that which is more And the Apostles reasoning concerning the two Covenants is very applicable to these two methods of conveying the Doctrine of Religion if the first had been faultless then should no place have been sought for a second § 3. So likewise when Christ revealed his Doctrine to the world it was not in his life-time committed to writing because it was entertained but by a few who were his disciples and followers and who so long as he continued with them had a living Oracle to teach them After his death the Apostles who were to publish this Doctrine to the world were assisted by an infallible Spirit so as they were secured from error and mistake in the delivery of it But when this extraordinary assistance failed there was need of some other means to convey it to posterity that so it might be a fixt and standing Rule of Faith and Manners to the end of the world To this end the providence of God took care to have it committed to writing And that Mr. S may see this is not a conjecture of Protestants but the sense of former times I shall refer him to St. Chrysostom Homil. 1. in Matth. who tells us That Christ left nothing in writing to his Apostles but in stead thereof did promise to bestow upon them the grace of his holy Spirit saying John 14. He shall bring all things to your remembrance c. But because in progress of time there were many grievous miscarriages both in matter of Opinion and also of Life and Manners therefore it was requisite that the memory of this Doctrine should be preserved by writing So long then as the Apostles lived who were thus infallibly assisted the way of Oral Tradition was secure but no longer nor even then from the nature of the thing but from that extraordinary and supernatural assistance which accompanied the deliverers § 4. And therefore it is no good way of Argument against the way of Tradition by writing which he lays so much weight upon That the Apostles and their Successors went not with Books in their hands to preach and deliver Christ's Doctrine but words in their mouths and that primitive antiquity learned their faith by another method a long time before many of those Books were universally spread among the vulgar For what if there was no need of writing this Doctrine whilst those living Oracles the Apostles were present with the Church Doth it therefore follow that there was no need of it afterwards when the Apostles were dead and that extraordinary and supernatural assistance was ceased If the Preachers now adays could give us any such assurance and confirm all they preach by such frequent and publick and unquestionable miracles as the Apostles did then we need not examine the Doctrines they taught by any other Rule but ought to regulate our belief by what they delivered to us But seeing this is not the case that ought in all reason to be the Rule of our Faith which hath brought down to us the Doctrine of Christ with the greatest certainty And this I shall prove the Scriptures to have done § 5. So that in those circumstances I have mentioned We allow Oral Tradition to have been a sufficient way of conveying a Doctrine but now considering the great increase of mankind and the shortness of mans life in these latter ages of the world and the long tract of time from the Apostles age down to us and the innumerable accidents whereby in the space of 1500 years Oral Tradition might receive insensible alterations so as at last to become quite another thing from what it was at first by passing through many hands in which passage all the mistakes and corruptions which in the several Ages through which it was transmitted did happen either through Ignorance or Forgetfulness or out of interest and design are necessarily derived into the last So that the further it goes the more alteration it is liable to because as it passeth along more Errours and Corruptions are infused into it I say considering all this we deny that the Doctrine of Christian Religion could with any probable security and certainty have been conveyed down to us by the way of Oral Tradition And therefore do reasonably believe that God fore-seeing this did in his wisdom so order things that those persons who were assisted by an infallible spirit in the delivery of this Doctrine should before they left the world commit it to writing which was accordingly done And by this Instrument the Doctrine of Faith hath been conveyed down to us § 6. Secondly We allow that Oral Tradition is a considerable assurance to us that the Books of Scripture which we now have are the very Books which were written by the Apostles and Evangelists but withall we deny That Oral Tradition is therefore to be accounted the Rule of Faith The general Assurance that we have concerning Books written long ago that they are so ancient and were written by those whose names they bear is a constant and uncontroll'd Tradition of this transmitted from one Age to another partly Orally and partly by the Testimony of other Books Thus much is common to Scripture with other Books But then the Scriptures have this peculiar advantage above other Books that being of a greater and more universal concernment they have been more common and in every bodies hands more read and studied than any other Books in the World whatsoever and consequently they have a more universal and better grounded attestation Moreover they have not only been owned universally in all Ages by Christians except three or four Books of them which for some time were questioned by some Churches but have since been generally received but the greatest Enemies of our Religion the Jews and Heathens never questioned the Antiquity of them but have always taken it for granted that they were the very Books which the Apostles writ And this is as great an assurance as we can have concerning any ancient Book without a particular and immediate Revelation § 7. And this Concession doth not as M. S supposeth make Oral Tradition to be finally the Rule of Faith for the meaning of this question What is the Rule of Faith Is What is the next and immediate means whereby the knowledge of Christs Doctrine is conveyed to us So that although Oral Tradition be the means whereby we come to
know that these are the Books of Scripture yet these Books are the next and immediate means whereby we come to know what is Christs Doctrine and consequently what we are to believe § 8. Nor doth this Concession make Oral Tradition to be the Rule of Faith by a parity of Reason as if because we acknowledge that Oral Tradition can with sufficient certainty transmit a Book to After ages we must therefore grant that it can with as much certainty convey a doctrine consisting of several Articles of Faith nay very many as Mr. White acknowledges and many Laws and Precepts of Life So because Oral Tradition sufficiently assures us that this is Magna Charta and that the Statute-Book in which are contain'd those Laws which it concerns every man to be skilful in therefore by like parity of Reason it must follow that Tradition it self is better than a Book even the best way imaginable to convey down such Laws to us Mr. S. saith expresly it is but how truly I appeal to experience and the wisdom of our Law-givers who seem to think otherwise Tradition is already defin'd to us a delivery down from hand to hand of the sense and faith of Fore-fathers i. e. of the Gospel or message of Christ. Now suppose any Oral message consisting of an hundred particularities were to be delivered to an hundred several persons of different degrees of understanding and memory by them to be conveyed to an hundred more who were to convey it to others and so onwards to a hundred descents Is it probable this Message with all the particularities of it would be as truly conveyed through so many mouths as if it were written down in so many Letters concerning which every Bearer should need to say no more than this That it was delivered to him as a Letter written by him whose name was subscribed to it I think it not probable though the mens lives were concerned every one for the faithful delivery of his Errand or Letter For the Letter is a message which no man can mistake in unless he will but the Errand so difficult and perplexed with its multitude of particulars that it is an equal wager against every one of the Messengers that he either forgets or mistakes something in it it is ten thousand to one that the first Hundred do not all agree in it it is a Million to one that the next Succession do not all deliver it truly for if any one of the first Hundred mistook or forgot any thing it is then impossible that he that received it from him should deliver it right and so the farther it goes the greater change it is liable to Yet after all this I do not say but it may be demonstrated in Mr. S's way to have more of certainty in it than the Original Letter § 9. Thirdly We allow That the Doctrine of Christian Religion hath in all Ages been preached to the People by the Pastors of the Church and taught by Christian Parents to their Children but with great difference by some more plainly and truly and perfectly by others with less care and exactness according to the different degrees of ability and integrity in Pastors or Parents and likewise with very different success according to the different capacities and dispositions of the Learners We allow likewise That there hath been a constant course of visible actions conformable in some measure to the Principles of Christianity but then we say that those outward acts and circumstances of Religion may have undergone great variations and received great change by addition to them and defalcation from them in several Ages That this not only is possible but hath actually happened I shall shew when I come to answer his Demonstrations Now that several of the the main Doctrines of Faith contained in the Scriptute and actions therein commanded have been taught and practised by Christians in all Ages as the Articles summed up in the Apostles Creed the use of the two Sacraments is a good evidence so far that the Scriptures contain the Doctrine of Christian Religion But then if we consider how we come to know that such points of Faith have been taught and such external Actions practised in all Ages it is not enough to say there is a present multitude of Christians that profess to have received such Doctrines as ever believed and practised and from hence to infer that they were so the inconsequence of which Argument I shall have a better occasion to shew afterwards But he that will prove this to any mans satisfaction must make it evident from the best Monuments and Records of several Ages that is from the most Authentick Books of those times that such Doctrines have in all those Ages been constantly and universally taught and practised But then if from those Records of former times it appear that other Doctrines not contained in the Scriptures were not taught and practised universally in all Ages but have crept in by degrees some in one Age and some in another according as Ignorance and Superstition in the People Ambition and Interest in the chief Pastors of the Church have ministred occasion and opportunity and that the Innovators of these Doctrines and Practises have all along pretended to confirm them out of Scripture as the acknowledged Rule of Faith and have likewise acknowledged the Books of Scripture to have descended without any material corruption or alteration all which will sufficiently appear in the process of my Discourse then cannot the Oral and practical Tradition of the present Church concerning any Doctrine as ever believed and practised which hath no real foundation in Scripture be any argument against these Books as if they did not fully and clearly contain the Christian Doctrine And to say the Scripture is to be interpreted by Oral and Practical Tradition is no more reasonable than it would be to interpret the antient Books of the Law by the present practise of it which every one that compares things fairly together must acknowledg to be full of deviations from the antient Law SECT V. § 1. 2 dly HOw much more he attributes to his Rule of Faith than we think fit to attribute to ours 1. We do not say that it is impossible in the nature of the thing that this Rule should fail that is either that these Books should cease to descend or should be corrupted This we do not attribute to them because there is no need we should We believe the providence of God will take care of them and secure them from being either lost or materially corrupted yet we think it very possible that all the Books in the World may be burnt or otherwise destroyed All that we affirm concerning our Rule of Faith is that it is abundantly sufficient if men be not wanting to themselves to convey the Christian Doctrine to all successive Ages and we think him very unreasonable that expects that God should do more than what is abundantly
otherwise than by the usual and frequent success of it when it is applied Nor do I think that the Doctrine of the Gospel was ever intended for that purpose God hath provided no remedy for the wilful and perverse but he hath done that which is sufficient for the satisfying and winning over of those who are teachable and willing to learn And such a disposition supposeth a man to have laid aside both Scepticism and Obstinacy § 7. Sixthly That it be certain in it self Seventhly That it be absolutely ascertainable to us These two are comprehended in the second Property I laid down so that I have nothing to say against them but that the last looks very like a contradiction absolutely ascertainable to us which is to say with respect to us without respect to us for absolutely seems to exclude respect and to us implies it Having thus shewn that the seven Properties he mentions are either coincident with those two I have laid down or consequent upon them or absurd and impertinent it remains that the true Properties of a Rule of Faith are those two which I first named and no more SECT II. § 1. LEt us now see how he endeavors to shew that these Properties agree solely to Oral Tradition He tells us there are but two Pretenders to this Title of being the Rule of Faith Scripture and Oral Tradition these Properties do not belong to Scripture and they do to Oral Tradition therefore solely to it A very good Argument if he can prove these two things That these two Properties do not belong to Scripture and that they do to Oral Tradition § 2. In order to the proving of the First that these Properties do not belong to Scripture he premiseth this Note That we cannot by the Scriptures mean the sense of them but the Book that is such or such Characters not yet sensed or interpreted But why can we not by the Scriptures mean the sense of them He gives this clear and admirable reason because the sense of Scripture is the things to be known and these we confess are the very points of Faith of which the Rule of Faith is to ascertain us Which is just as if a man should reason thus Those who say the Statute-Book can convey to them the knowledg of the Statute-Law cannot by the Statute-Book mean the sense of it but the Book that is such or such Characters not yet sensed or interpreted Because the sense of the Statute-Book is the things to be known and these are the very Laws the knowledg whereof is to be conveyed to them by this Book which is to say that a Book cannot convey to a man the knowledg of any matter because if it did it would convey to him the thing to be known But that he may farther see what excellent reasoning this is I shall apply this Paragraph to Oral Tradition for the Argument holds every whit as well concerning that To speak to them in their own language who say that Oral Tradition is their Rule we must premise this Note that they cannot mean by Oral Tradition the sense of it that is the things to be known for those they confess are the very Points of Faith of which the Rule of Faith is to ascertain us when they say then that Oral Tradition is the Rule of Faith they can only mean by Oral Tradition the words wherein it is delivered not yet sensed or interpreted but as yet to be sensed that is such or such sounds with their aptness to signifie to them assuredly God's mind or ascertain them of their Faith for abstracting from the sense and actual signification of those words there is nothing imaginable left but those sounds with their aptness to signifie it When he hath answered this Argument he will have answered his own In the mean while this Discourse that he who holds the Scriptures to be the Rule of Faith must needs by the Scriptures mean a Book void of sense c. Because otherwise if by Scripture he should understand a Book that hath a certain sense in it that sense must be the Doctrine of Christ which is the very thing that this Book is to convey to us I say this Discourse tends only to prove it an absurd thing for any man that holds Scripture the means of conveying Christ's Doctrine to understand by the Scripture a Book that conveys Christ's Doctrine This being his own reason put into plain English I leave the Reader to judg whether it be not something short of perfect Science and Demonstration Nay if it were throughly examined I doubt whether it would not fall short of that low pitch of Science which he speaks of in his Preface where he tells us that the way of Science is to proceed from one piece of sense to another § 3. Having premised this that by the Scriptures we must mean only dead Characters that have no sense under them He proceeds to shew that these dead Characters have not the Properties of a Rule of Faith belonging to them Which although it be nothing to the purpose when he hath shewn it yet it is very pleasant to observe by what cross and untoward Arguments he goes about it Of which I will give the Reader a tast by one or two instances In the first place he shews that it cannot be evident to us that these Books were written by men divinely inspired because till the seeming contradictions in those Books are solved which to do is one of the most difficult tasks in the world they cannot be concluded to be of God's enditing Now how is this an Argument against those who by the Scriptures must mean unsensed letters and characters I had always thought contradictions had been in the sense of words not in the letters and characters but I perceive he hath a peculiar opinion that the four and twenty letters do contradict one another The other instance shall be in his last Argument which is this that the Scripture cannot be the Rule of Faith because those who are to be ruled and guided by the Scriptures letter to Faith cannot be certain of the true sense of it which is to say that unsensed letters and characters cannot be the Rule of Faith because the Rule of Faith must have a certain sense that is must not be unsensed letters and characters which in plain English amounts to thus much unsensed letters and characters cannot be the Rule of Faith that they cannot § 4. And thus I might trace him through all his Properties of the Rule of Faith and let the Reader see how incomparably he demonstrates the falshood of this Protestant Tenet as he calls it that a sensless Book may be a Rule of Faith But I am weary of pursuing him in these airy and phantastical combats and shall leave him to fight with his own fancies and batter down the Castles which himself hath built Only I think fit here to acquaint him once for
all with a great Secret of the Protestant Doctrine which it seems he hath hitherto been ignorant of for I am still more confirmed in my opinion that he forsook our Religion before he understood it that when they say the Scriptures are the Rule of Faith or the means whereby Christ's Doctrine is conveyed down to them they mean by the Scriptures Books written in such words as do sufficiently express the sense and meaning of Christ's Doctrine § 5. And to satisfy him that we are not absurd and unreasonable in supposing the Scriptures to be such a Book I would beg the favour of him to grant me these four things or shew reason to the contrary First That whatever can be spoken in plain and intelligible words and such as have a certain sense may be written in the same words Secondly That the same words are as intelligible when they are written as when they are spoken Thirdly That God if he please can endite a Book in as plain words as any of his creatures Fourthly That we have no reason to think that God affects obscurity and envies that men should understand him in those things which are necessary for them to know and which must have been written to no purpose if we cannot understand them St. Luke tells Theophilus that he wrote the History of Christ to him on purpose to give him a certain knowledg of those things which he writ But how a Book which hath no certain sense should give a man certain knowledg of things is beyond my capacity St. John saith that he purposely committed several of Christ's miracles to Writing that men might believe on Him But now had Mr. S. been at his elbow he would have advised him to spare his labour and would have given him this good reason for it because when he had written his Book no body would be able to find the certain sense of it without oral Tradition and that alone would securely and intelligibly convey both the Doctrine of Christ and the certain knowledg of those miracles which he wrought for the confirmation of it If these four things be but granted I see not why when we say that the Scriptures are the means of conveying to us Christ's Doctrine we may not be allow'd to understand by the Scriptures a Book which doth in plain and intelligible words express to us this Doctrine SECT III. 6 1. ANd now although this might have been a sufficient Answer to his Exceptions against the Scriptures as being incapable of the Properties of a Rule of Faith because all of them suppose that which is apparently false and absurd as granted by Protestants viz. That the Scriptures are only an heap of dead letters and insignificant characters without any sense under them and that oral Tradition is that only which gives them life and sense Yet because several of his Exceptions pretend to shew that the true Properties of a Rule of Faith do not at all appertain to the Scriptures therefore I shall give particular Answers to them and as I go along shew that Tradition is liable to all or most of those Exceptions and to far greater than those § 2. Whereas he says it cannot be evident to Protestants from their Principles that the Books of Scripture were originally written by men divinely inspired I will shew him that it may and then answer the reasons of this Exception It is evident from an universal constant and uncontrolled Tradition among Christians not only oral but written and from the acknowledgment of the greatest Adversaries of our Religion that these Books were originally written by the Apostles and Evangelists And this is not only a Protestant Principle but the Principle of all mankind That an undoubted Tradition is sufficient evidence of the Antiquity and Author of a Book and all the extrinsecal Argument that can ordinarily be had of a Book written long ago Next it is evident that the Apostles were men divinely inspired that is secured from error and mistake in the writing of this Doctrine from the miracles that were wrought for the confirmation of it Because it is unreasonable to imagine that the Divine power should immediately interpose for the confirmation of a Doctrine and give so eminent an attestation to the Apostles to convince the World that they were immediately appointed and commissioned by God and yet not secure them from error in the delivery of it And that such miracles were wrought is evident from as credible Histories as we have for any of those things which we do most firmly believe And this is better evidence that the Apostles were men divinely inspired than bare oral Tradition can furnish us withal For setting aside the authentick relation of these matters in Books it is most probable that oral Tradition of it self and without Books would scarce have preserved the memory of any of those particular miracles of our Saviour and his Apostles which are recorded in Scripture And for the probability of this I offer these two things to his consideration First No man can deny that memorable persons have lived and actions been done in the world innumerable whereof no History now extant makes any mention Secondly He himself will grant that our Saviour wrought innumerable more miracles than are recorded in Scripture And now I challenge him to shew the single vertue of oral Tradition by giving an account of any of those persons or their actions who lived 1500 or 2000 years ago besides those which are mentioned in Books or to give a catalogue but of ten of those innumerable miracles wrought by our Saviour which are nor recorded by the Evangelists with circumstances as punctual and particular as those are clothed withal If he can do this it will be a good evidence that oral Tradition singly and by it self can do something but if he cannot 't is as plain an evidence on the contrary that if those actions of former times and those miracles of our Saviour and his Apostles which are recorded in Books had never been written but entrusted solely to oral Tradition we should have heard as little of them at this day as we do of those that were not written § 3. Now to examine his Reasons for this Exception First He saith 't is most manifest that this cannot be made evident to the vulgar that Scripture was written by men divinely inspired This Reason is as easily answered by saying 't is most manifest that it can But besides saying so I have shewed how it may be made as evident to the vulgar as other things which they do most firmly and upon good grounds believe Even the rudest of the vulgar and those who cannot read do believe upon very good grounds that there was such a King as William the Conqueror and the miracles of Christ and his Apostles are capable of as good evidence as we have for this Secondly He says this cannot be evident to the curious and most speculative Searchers
a guide appointed for any Christian which neither Christ nor his Apostles nor any of their Followers ever mentioned yea which formally destroys one of our twelve Articles of the Apostles Creed viz. I believe the Holy Catholick Church Thus he does by Reason clearly and infallibly evince that Reason cannot be otherwise than a most blind and fallible guide This it is to talk of things when a man looks only upon one side of them as if because Reason has a blind side and is uncertain in some things therefore we ought to conclude her universally blind and uncertain in every thing and as if because all men cannot think all things reasonable which any one man thinks to be so therefore it is to be doubted whether those common Principles of Reason be true which Mankind are generally agreed in And that Mr. Cressy speaks here of the use of our private Reason in the finding out of our Rule is clear from what he says in the next Section viz. That this hood-wink't guide enquiring into Scripture and searching after Tradition may possibly stumble upon the way to Vnity and Truth that is the true Catholick Church If this be true why does Mr. S. pretend that he can by Reason demonstrate the Infallibility of Tradition and by this hood-wink't guide lead men to the true Rule of Faith And what a pitiful encouragement would this be to an inquisitive Philosopher who knowing no other guide but his Reason whereby to find out whether Scripture or Tradition be the true Rule to tell him that by the help of this hood-wink't guide he might possibly stumble upon the right A man may justly stand amazed at the inconsistency of these mens Discourses and Principles In one mood they are all for Demonstration and for convincing men in the way of perfect Science which is the true Rule of Faith But then again when another fit takes them there 's no such thing as Science humane Reason grows all on the sudden dim-sighted and at the next word is struck stark blind and then the very utmost that it can do towards the bringing of an unprejudiced and inquisitive person to the true Rule of Faith is to leave him in a possibility of stumbling upon it but if he be a Heretick that makes use of private Reason for his guide then it is impossible but that he with his blind guide should fall into the Pit I cannot for my part imagine how they can reconcile the blindness of humane Reason with all that noise which they make about Science and Demonstration but this I must confess that these kind of Discourses which I meet with in Mr. S. and Mr. Cressy are very proper Arguments to perswade a man of the blindness of humane Reason And indeed there is one passage in Mr. Cressy which gives me very great satisfaction concerning these matters where he tells us That the Wit and Judgment of Catholicks is to renounce their own Judgment and depose their own Wit Now he that professes to have done this may write Contradictions and no body ought to challenge him for it However it is a very ingenuous acknowledgment that when he forsook our Church and turned Papist he laid aside his Judgment and Wit which is just such an heroick act of Judgment as if a man in a bravery to shew his liberty should sell himself for a slave I am glad to understand from an experienced Person what charges a man must be at when he turns Roman-Catholique namely that whoever will embrace that Religion must forfeit his Reason § 3. Secondly The way of Demonstration is according to Mr. S. no certain way to find out the Rule of Faith In his 4th Appendix against my Lord of Down one of the Eight Mines as he calls them which he lays to blow up my Lords Dissuasive against Popery is this That the method he takes in dissuading cannot be held in reason to have power to dissuade unless it be proper to that effect that is not common to that effect and a contrary one Now that being most evidently no method or way to such an effect which many follow and take yet arrive not at that effect 't is plain to common sense that my Lord of Down miscalls his Book A Dissuasive and that it can have in it no power of moving the understanding one way or other unless he can first vouch some particularity in the method he takes above what 's in others in which we experience miscarriage c. If this be true then his method of Demonstration is no way to make men certain of what he pretends to demonstrate because that is most evidently no way to an effect which many follow and take yet arrive not at that effect so that 't is plain to common sense that Mr. S's Demonstrations can have in them no power of moving the understanding one way or other unless he can vouch some particularity in the Demonstrations he pretends to bring above what is in other pretended Demonstrations in which we experience miscarriage Do not Thomas and Scotus as Mr. White tells us all along pretend to demonstrate and yet it is generally believed that at least where they contradict one another one of them failed in his Demonstrations Did not Mr. Charles Thynne pretend to have demonstrated that a man at one jump might leap from London to Rome and yet I do not think any one was ever satisfy'd with his Demonstration And Mr. S. knows one in the World whom I will not name because he hath since ingenuously acknowledged his Errour who thought he had demonstrated the Quadrature of the Circle and was so confident of it as to venture the reputation of his Demonstrations in Divinity upon it and some of those Divinity Demonstrations were the very same with Mr. S's Since therefore the World hath experienced so much miscarriage in the way of Demonstration before Mr. S's Demonstrations can be allowed to signifie any thing he must according to his own Law vouch some particularity in his way and method of Demonstration above what is in other mens He hath not any where that I remember told us what that particularity is wherein his way of Demonstration is above other mens Nor can I upon the most diligent search find any peculiar advantage that his Way has more than theirs above mentioned unless this be one that he pretends to demonstrate a self-evident Principle and herein I think he hath plainly the advantage of Mr. Charles Thynne and unless this may be counted another advantage that he has so extraordinary a confidence and conceit of his own Demonstrations and in this particular I must acknowledge that he clearly excels all that have gone before him In all other things his way of Demonstration is but like his neighbours SECT II. § 1. I Come now to examine his Demonstrations of this Self-evident Principle as he often calls it that Oral Tradition is a certain and infallible way of
sense and explication thereof to have descended to them by Oral Tradition For just as the Traditionary Christians do now so Josephus tells us the Traditionary Jews of old the Pharisees did pretend by their Oral Tradition to interpret the Law more accurately and exactly than any other Sect. In like manner he tells us That all things that belonged to Prayer and Divine Worship were regulated and administred according to their interpretations of the Law And they both agree in this to make void the Word of God by their Tradition which the Pharisees did no otherwise than Mr. S. does by equalling Oral Tradition to Scripture nay preferring it above Scripture in making it the sole Rule of Faith and interpreting the Scripture according to it Hence are those common sayings in the Talmud and other Jewish Books Do not think that the written Law is the foundation but that the Law Orally delivered is the right foundation which is to say with Mr. S. that not the Scripture but Oral Tradition is the true Rule of Faith Again There is more in the words of the Scribes viz. the Testifiers of Tradition than in the words of the written Law Again The Oral Law excells the Written as much as the Soul doth the Body which accords very well with what Mr. S. frequently tells us That the Scripture without Tradition is but a dead Letter destitute of life and sense Hence also it is that they required the People as the Traditionary Church does now to yield up themselves to the dictates of Tradition even in the most absurd things as appears by that common saying among them If the Scribes say that the right hand is the left and the left the right that Bread is Flesh and Wine is Blood hearken to them that is make no scruple of whatsoever they deliver as Tradition though never so contrary to Reason or Sense And lastly The Doctrines of the Pharisees were many of them practical such were all those which concerned external rites and observances as washing of hands and cups c. So that these Pharisaical Traditions had also that unspeakable advantage which Mr. S. says renders their Traditions unmistakeable That they were daily practised and came down clad in such plain matters of Fact that the most stupid man living could not possibly be ignorant of them Therefore according to Mr. S's Principles it was impossible that any Age of the Jews should be perswaded that these things were commanded by Moses and ever since observed if they had not been so And yet our Saviour denies these Customs to have been of any such Authority as they pretended § 2. But I needed not to have taken all this pains to shew the agreement which is between the Traditionary Jews and Papists their own Writers so liberally acknowledging it Mr. White indeed says That the Faith of the Jews was not delivered to them Orally but by Writing than which nothing can be more inconsistent with his Hypothesis For if the Jewish Faith was conveyed to them not Orally but by Writing then either the Jewish Church had no sufficient Rule of Faith or else a Writing may be such a Rule But other of their Champions make great use of the Parallel between the Traditionary Jews and the Romish Church to confirm from thence their own Traditionary Doctrines Cardinal Perron hath a full passage to this purpose As this says he is to preserve a sound and entire respect to the Majesty of the ancient Mosaick Scripture to believe and observe not only all the things which are therein actually contained but also those things which are therein contained mediately and relatively as the Doctrines of Paradise c. which were not contained therein but mediately and by the authority which it gave to the deposition of the Patriarchal and Mosaick Tradition preserved by heart and in the Oral Doctrine of the Synagogue So this is to preserve a sound and entire respect to the Majesty of the Apostolical Scripture to believe and observe all the things which it contains not only immediately and by it self but mediately and by reference to the Apostolical Traditions to which in gross and generally it gives the Authority of Apostolical Doctrines and to the Church the Authority of Guardian and Depositary to preserve and attest them Voysin in his Observations upon Raymundus Martyn tells us That as in the Old Law the great Consistory at Jerusalem was the foundation of the true Tradition so says he the See of Rome is the foundation of our Traditions And as the continual succession of the High Priests and Fathers among the Jews was the great confirmation of the Truth of their Traditions so says he with us the Truth of our Catholick Doctrine is confirmed by a continual succession of Popes § 3. From all this it appears that the Pharisees among the Jews made the same pretence to Oral Tradition which the Papists do at this day according to Mr. S. And if so then Mr. S's Demonstration a Posteriori is every whit as strong for the Jews against our Saviour as it is for the Papists against the Protestants For we find that in our Saviour's time it was then the present perswasion of the Traditionary Jews that their Faith and their Rites and the true sense and interpretation of their written Law was descended from Moses and the Prophets to them uninterruptedly which we find was most firmly rooted in their hearts But the Jews had a constant Tradition among them that the Messiah was to be a great temporal Prince And though the Letters of the Prophesies concerning him might well enough have been accommodated to the low and suffering condition of our Saviour yet they did infallibly know that their Messiah was to be another kind of person from sense written in their hearts from the interpretation of those Prophesies Orally brought down to them from the Patriarchal and Mosaick Tradition preserved by heart and in the Oral Doctrine of the Synagogue and from the living voyce of their Church essential that is the universal consent of the then Traditionary Jews If it be said That the Jewish Tradition did indeed bring down several Doctrines not contained in Scripture of Paradise of Hell of the last Judgment of the Resurrection c. as Cardinal Perron affirms but it did not bring down this Point of the Messiah's being a Temporal Prince Then as Mr. S. asks us so the Jew does him By what vertue Tradition brought down those other Points and whether the same vertue were not powerful to bring down this as well as those Then he will ask him farther Is there not a necessary connexion and relation between a constant Cause and its formal Effect So that if its formal Effect be Points received as delivered ever the proper Cause must be an ever-delivery whence he will argue from such an Effect to its Cause for any particular Point and consequently for this Point that is in Controversie between Jews
is the very way of the Calvinists and of the absurdest Sects Nay Mr. White says farther That he will be content to suffer all the punishment that is due to Calumniators if the Roman Divines he there speaks of do not hold the same Rule of Faith with the Calvinists and all the absurdest Sects So that it seems that the Calvinists c. do not in their Rule of Faith differ from the Papists but only from Mr. White Mr. S. c. Now the Divines he there speaks of are the Censors of Doctrines at Rome according to whose advice his infallible Holiness and the Cardinals of the Inquisition do usuall proceed in censuring of Doctrines Concerning these Divines he goes on to expostulate in this manner Shall we endure these men to sit as Censors and Judges of Faith who agree with Hereticks in the very first Principle which distinguishes Catholicks from Hereticks Again These are thy gods O Rome upon these thou dependest whil'st prating Ignorance triumphs in the Roman Colledg And he says the same likewise of the generality of their School-Divines whom he calls Scepticks because they do not own his Demonstrative way Insomuch that he tells us That few sound parts are left uninfected with this Plague of Scepticism that this is an universal Gangrene that there are but few that go the way of Demonstration and these are either wearied out or else live retiredly or despair of any remedy of these things And indeed all along that Book he bemoans himself and his Traditionary Brethren as a desolate and forlorn Party who have Truth on their side but want company and encouragement So he tells us That the true scientifical Divines dare not profess their knowledg lest they should be exposed by the Sophisters of their Church to the derision and scorn either of their Judges or of the People § 4. So that upon examination of the whole matter it appears that Mr. S's Demonstration proceeds upon a false Supposition That it is the perswasion of their present Church that Tradition is the sole Rule of Faith For there is no such matter unless Mr. S. mean by their Church a few private persons who are look'd upon by those who have the chief power in their Church as Heretical as we may reasonably conjecture by the proceedings at Rome against Mr. White many of whose Books are there condemned as containing things manifestly Heretical erroneous in the Faith rash scandalous seditious and false respectively c. And all this done notwithstanding that the chief subject of those Books is the explication and defence of this most Catholick Principle That Oral Tradition is the only Rule of Faith To sum up then the whole business If nothing be to be owned for Christian Doctrine as the Traditionists say but what is the general perswasion of those who are acknowledged to be in the communion of the Roman Catholick Church then much less can this Principle That Oral Tradition is the sole Rule of Faith which is pretended to be the foundation of the whole Christian Doctrine be received as descended from Christ and his Apostles since it is so far from being the general perswasion of that Church at the present that it has been and still is generally disowned But Mr. White has a salvo for this For although he grant That very many of their School-men maintain that Tradition is necessary only for some Points not clearly expressed in Scripture whence he says it seems to follow that they build not the whole Body of their Faith upon Tradition yet he tells us there is a vast difference betwixt relying on Tradition and saying or thinking we d◠so Suppose there be yet I hope that mens saying that they do not rely on Tradition as their only Rule is a better evidence that they do not than any mans surmise to the contrary is that they do though they think and say they do not which is in effect to say that they do though we have as much assurance as we can have that they do not Besides how is this Rule self-evident to all even to the rude Vulgar as to its ruling power as Mr. S. affirms it is when the greatest part even of the Learned among them think and say that it is not the only Rule But Mr. White endeavours to illustrate this dark point by a similitude which is to this sense As the Scepticks who deny this Principle That Contradictions cannot be true at once yet in their lives and civil actions proceed as if they owned it So the Schoolmen though they deny Tradition to be the only Rule of their Faith yet by resolving their Faith into the Church which owns this Principle they do also in practice own it though they say they do not So that the generality of learned Papists are just such Catholicks as the Scepticks are Dogmatists that is a company of absurd people that confute their Principles by their practice According to this reasoning I perceive the Protestants will prove as good Catholicks as any for they do only think and say that Tradition is not the Rule of Faith but that they practically rely upon it Mr. S. hath past his word for them For he assures us and we may rely upon a man that writes nothing but Demonstration that if we look narrowly into the bottom of our hearts we shall discover the natural method of Tradition to have unawares setled our Judgments concerning Faith however when our other Concerns awake design in us we protest against it and seem perhaps to our unreflecting selves to embrace and hold to the meer guidance of the Letter of Scripture So that in reality we are as good Catholicks and as true holders to Tradition as any Papist of them all at the bottom of our thoughts and in our setled judgments however we have taken up an humour to protest against it and may seem perhaps to our unreflecting selves to be Protestants § 5. Thus much may suffice to have spoken to his two great Arguments or as he good man unfortunately calls them Demonstrations which yet to say truth are not properly his but the Authors of Rushworth's Dialogues the main foundation of which Book is the substance of these Demonstrations Only before I take leave of them I cannot but reflect upon a passage of Mr. S s wherein he tells his Readers that they are not obliged to bend their brains to study his Book with that severity as they would do an Euclid meaning perhaps one of Mr. White 's Euclids for it does not appear by his way of Demonstration that ever he dealt with any other As for the true Euclid I suppose any one that hath tasted his Writings will at the reading of Mr. S's unbend his brains without bidding and smile to see himself so demurely discharged from a study so absurd and ridiculous SECT XI § 1. I Should now take into consideration his Ninth
them with so much as a videtur quod non But it may be he means no more by this Corollary than what he said in the 18 th viz. That no solid Argument from Reason can be brought against Tradition If so then the sense of his 23 d Corollary must be this That there is no possibility of arguing at all against Tradition with any solid shew or substantial shadow of Reason which would be a little inconvenient I will instance but in one more his 40 th which is this The knowledg of Traditions Certainty is the first knowledg or Principle in Controversial Divinity i. e. without which nothing is known or knowable in that Science Which is to infer that because he hath with much pains proved the certainty of Tradition therefore it is self evident i. e. needed no proof Nay it is to conclude the present matter in Controversie and that which is the main debate of his Book to be the first Principle in Controversial Divinity i. e. such a Proposition as every one ought to grant before he can have any right to dispute about it This is a very prudent course to make begging the question the first Principle in Controversie which would it but be granted I am very much of his mind that the method he takes would be the best way to make Controversie a Science because he that should have the luck or boldness to beg first would have it in his power to make what he pleased certain § 2. Were it worth while I might further pursue the Absurdities of his Corollaries For they are not so terrible as he makes shew of by his telling Dr. Casaubon That Sure-footing and its Corollaries may put him out of his Wits Which though intended for an Affront to the Doctor yet it may be mollified with a good interpretation for if the reading of wild and phantastical stuff be apt to disorder a very learned head then so far Mr. S's saying may have truth in it It remains only that I requite his 41 Corol. not with an equal number but with two or three natural Consectaries from the Doctrine of his Book First No man can certainly understand the meaning of any Book whatsoever any farther than the Contents of it are made known to us by a concurrent Oral Tradition For the Arguments whereby he and Mr. Rushworth endeavour to prove it impossible without Tradition to attain to the certain sense of Scripture do equally extend to all other Books Secondly The memory of matters of Fact done long ago may be better preserved by general Rumor than by publick Records For this is the plain English of that Assertion That Oral Tradition is a better and more secure way of Conveyance than Writing Thirdly That the Generality of Papists are no Christians For if as he affirms Tradition be the sole Rule of Faith and those who disown this Rule be * ipso facto cut off from the Root of Faith i. e. unchristian'd And if as I have shewn the Generality of Papists do disown this Rule Then it is plain that they are no Christians THE RULE of FAITH PART IV. Testimonies concerning the Rule of Faith SECT I. § 1. THus far in the way of Reason and Principles The rest is Note-book Learning which he tells us he is not much a Friend to and there is no kindness lost for it is as little a Friend to him and his Cause as he can be to it I shall first examine the Authorities he brings for Tradition and then produce express Testimonies in behalf of Scripture In both which I shall be very brief in the one because his Testimonies require no long Answer in the other because it would be to little purpose to trouble Mr. S. with many Fathers who for ought appears by his Book is acquainted with none but Father White as I shall shew hereafter By the way I cannot much blame him for the course he uses to take with other mens Testimonies because it is the only way that a man in his circumstances can take otherwise nothing can be in it self more unreasonable than to pretend to answer Testimonies by ranking them under so many faulty Heads and having so done magisterially to require his Adversary to vindicate them by shewing that they do not fall under some of those Heads though he have not said one word against any of them particularly nay though he have not so much as recited any one of them for then the Trick would be spoiled and his Catholick Reader who perhaps may believe him in the general might see Reason not to do so if he should descend to particulars which as he well observes would make his Discourse to look with a contingent Face § 2. I begin with his three Authorities from Scripture which when I consider I see no reason why he of all men should find fault with my Lord Bishop of Down's Dissuasive for being so thin and sleight in Scripture-Citations Nor do I see how he will answer it to Mr. Rushworth for transgressing that prudent Rule of his viz. That the Catholick should never undertake to convince his Adversary out of Scripture c. For which he gives this substantial Reason because this were to strengthen his Opponent in his own Ground and Principle viz. That all is to be proved out of Scripture which he tells us presently after is no more fit to convince than a Beetle is to cut withall meaning it perhaps of Texts so applied as these are which follow This shall be to you a direct way so that Fools cannot err in it This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord my Spirit which is in thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart from thy mouth and from the mouth of thy Seed and from the mouth of thy Seeds seed from henceforth for ever I will give my Law in their bowels and in their hearts will I write it From which Texts if Mr. S. can prove Tradition to be the only Rule of Faith any better than the Philosophers Stone or the Longitude may be proved from the 1 Cap. of Genesis I am content they should pass for valid Testimonies Though I might require of him by his own Law before these Texts can signifie any thing to his purpose to demonstrate that this is the Traditionary sense of these Texts and that it hath been universally in all Ages received by the Church under that Notion and then to shew how it comes to pass that so many of the Fathers and of their own Commentators have interpreted them to another sense And lastly to shew how Scripture which has no certain sense but from Tradition and of the sense whereof Tradition cannot assure us unless it be the Rule of Faith I say how Scripture can prove Tradition to be the Rule of Faith which can prove nothing at all unless Tradition be first proved to be the Rule of Faith This
but this if a Pope and Council should define a new thing and declare they ground themselves on new lights as did their first reformers in England but I shall find he saith no such fopperies in faith-definitions made by the Catholick Church Is this the man who made choice of reason for his weapon could there be a greater calumny cast on our Church than to say her reformers grounded themselves on new lights when our great charge against the Church of Rome is for introducing Novelties and receding from pure and primitive antiquity Whether the charge be true or no yet sure it follows they did not declare they ground themselves on new lights but expresly the contrary Well but Pope and Councils neither define new things nor ground themselves on them but what means the man of reason that they make no new definitions surely not for then what did they meet for and what mean their decrees but he intends that they deliver no new doctrine but how must that be tried or hath Mr. S. gained the opinion of infallibility both from Pope and Councils that we must believe his bare word but we not only say but prove that even their last Council hath defined many things which never were delivered by Christ or his Apostles And it is to no purpose whether they say they ground themselves on new lights or pretend to an infallible assistance for it comes all to the same at last For if the assistance be infallible what matter is it whether the doctrine hath been revealed or no for on this supposition it is impossible that Pope and Council should miscarry Therefore if any Church be guilty of fopperies in faith-definitions it must be that which you miscall the Catholick but is more truly known by the name of the Roman Church There is yet one piece of Mr. S's sagacity to be taken notice of as to this particular which is that I am at an end of my argument because I say the opinion of the Pope and Councils infallibility is the common doctrin maintained in which I confound the Church with the schools or some private opinaters and then carp at those mens tenets And this is the force of all that Paragraph He tells me I want not wit to know that no sober Catholick holds humane deductions the rule of their faith schoolmen definers of it nor the schools the Tribunal whence to propose it authoritatively and obligingly to the generality of the faithful Neither doth Mr. S. want the wit to know that our present enquiry is concerning the sense of their present Church about the rule of faith Since then Mr. S. must confess it necessary to faith to know what the certain rule of it is let me enquire further whether any particular person can know certainly what it is unless he knows what the Church owns for her rule of faith and whether that may be owned as the Churches judgement which is stifly opposed by the most interessed persons in the Roman Church and the most zealous contenders for it Especially when the Pope who is said to be Head of the Church condemns the doctrine asserted and that only by a small number of such who are as much opposed by themselves as by any of us Is it then possible to know the Churches judgement or not if not 't is to no purpose to search for a rule of faith if it be which way can we come to know it either by most voices or the sense of the Governours of the Church either of the ways I dare put it to a fair tryal whether oral tradition or the infallibility of Pope and Councils be the Doctrine most owned in the Church of Rome But Mr. S. still tells us these are only private opinators and schoolmen who assert the contrary doctrine to his But wiill not they much more say on the other side that this way of oral trodition is a novel fancy of some few half-Catholicks in England and tends to subvert the Roman Church But is the present Pope with Mr. S. a private opinator or was the last a meer schoolman I am sure what ever Mr. S. thinks of him he thought not so of himself when he said he was no Divine in the controversie of Jansenius Doth the Court of Rome signifie no more with Mr. S. than a company of scholastick Pedants that know not what the sense of the Church is concerning the rule of faith I meddle not with the Schools but with the authority of the present Church and him whom Mr. S. owns for the head of it and is it consistent with his headship to condemn that doctrine which contains in it the only certain rule of faith Mr. S. may then see they were no such impertinent Topicks which I insisted on and as stout as Mr. S. seems to be I an apt to believe he would not look on the censure of the Inquisition as an impertinent Topick But at last Mr. S. offers at something whereby he would satisfie me of the sense of the Church as to this particular and therefore asks whether I never heard of such a thing as the Council of Trent I must ingenuously confess I have and seen more a great deal of it than I am satisfied with But what of that there he tells me I may find a clear solution of my doubt by the constant procedure of that most grave Synod in its definitions That is I hope to find that oral tradition was acknowledged there as the only self-evident rule of faith If I do this I confess my self satisfied in this enquiry But how much to the contrary is there very obvious in the proceedings of it For in the 4 th Session the Decree is That Scripture and tradition should be embraced with equal piety and reverence and the reason is because the doctrine of faith is contain'd partly in Scripture partly in tradition but what arts must Mr. S. use to infer from hence that oral tradition in contradistinction to Scripture was looked on as the only rule of faith I cannot but say that the ruling men of that Council were men wise enough in their generation and they were too wise wholly to exclude Scripture but because they knew that of it self could not serve their purposes they therefore help it out with tradition and make both together the compleat rule of faith Where I pray in all the proceedings of that Council doth Mr. S. find them define any thing on the account of oral tradition instead of which we find continual bandyings about the sense of Scripture and Fathers which might have been all spared if they had been so wise as to consider they could not but know the sense of the present Church nor that of the precedent and so up to the time of Christ. But they were either so ignorant as not to light on this happy invention or so wise and knowing as to despise it It is true they would not have their doctrines looked
of harms-way than to venture the infallibility of plain oral Tradition for the Doctrines he maintains against a practical Tradition which they have at Rome of killing Hereticks Methinks Mr. S. might have spared his brags that he hath evinced from clear reason that it is far more impossible to make a man not to be than not to know what is rivetted into his soul by so oft repeated sensations as the Christian Faith is by Oral and Practical Tradition and that it exceeds all the power of Nature abstracting from the cases of madness and violent disease to blot knowledg thus fixt out of the soul of one single Believer insomuch that sooner may all mankind perish than the regulative vertue of Tradition miscarry nay sooner may the sinews of entire nature by overstraining crack and she lose all her activity and motion that is her self than one single part of that innumerable multitude which integrate the vast testification which we call Tradition can possibly be violated when after he hath told us that the City of Rome was blest with more vigorous causes to imprint Christ's Doctrine at first and recommend it to the next Age than were found any where else and consequently that the stream of Tradition in its source and first putting into motion was more particularly vigorous there than in any other See and that the chief Pastor of that See hath a particular Title to Infallibility built upon Tradition above any other Pastor whatsoever not to dilate on the particular assistances to that Bishop springing out of his divinely constituted Office when I say after all this quaint Reason and rumbling Rhetorick about the infallibility of Oral Tradition and the particular infallibility of the Bishop of Rome built on Tradition we cannot but remember that this great Oracle of Oral Tradition the Pope and this great Master of it Mr. White who is so peculiarly skill'd in the Rule of Faith have so manifestly declar'd themselves to differ in points of Faith For that the Pope and his Congregation general at Rome have condemn'd all his Books for this reason because they contain several Propositions manifestly heretical is a sign that these two great Wits do not very well hit it in matters of Faith and either that they do not both agree in the same Rule of Faith or that one of them does not rightly understand it or not follow it And now why may not that which Mr. S. unjustly says concerning the use of Scripture be upon this account justly apply'd to the business of Oral Tradition If we see two such eminent Wits among the Papists the Pope and Mr. White making use of the self-same and as they conceive the best advantages their Rule of Faith gives them and availing themselves the best they can by acquired skills yet differ about matters of Faith what certainty can we undertakingly promise to weaker heads that is to the generality of the Papists in whom the Governors of the Church do professedly cherish ignorance for the increasing of their devotion § 6. Fourthly We have sufficient assurance that the Books of Scripture are conveyed down to us without any material corruption or alteration And he that denies this must either reject the authority of all Books because we cannot be certain whether they be the same now that they were at first or else give some probable reason why these should be more liable to corruption than others But any man that considers things will easily find that it is much more improbable that these Books should have been either wilfully or involuntarily corrupted in any thing material to Faith or a good Life than any other Books in the World whether we consider the peculiar Providence of God engaged for the preservation of them or the peculiar circumstances of these Books If they were wrirten by men divinely inspired and are of use to Christians as is acknowledged at least in words on all hands nothing is more credible than that the same Divine Providence which took care for the publishing of them would likewise be concerned to preserve them entire And if we consider the peculiar circumstances of these Books we shall find it morally impossible that they should have been materially corrupted because being of universal and mighty concernment and at first diffused into many hands and soon after translated into most Languages and most passages in them cited in Books now extant and all these now agreeing in all matters of importance we have as great assurance as can be had concerning any thing of this nature that they have not suffered any material alteration and far greater than any man can have concerning the incorruption of their oral Tradition as I shall shew when I come to answer the thing which he calls Demonstration § 7. Fifthly That de facto the Scripture hath been acknowledged by all Christians in former Ages to be the means whereby the doctrine of Christ hath with greatest certainty been conveyed to them One good evidence of this is That the Primitive Adversaries of Christian Religion did always look upon the Scripture as the standard and measure of the Christian Doctrine and in all their writing against Christianity took that for granted to be the Christian Faith which was contained in those Books there having not as yet any Philosopher risen up who had demonstrated to the World that a Doctrine could not with sufficient certainty and clearness be conveyed by writing from one Age to another But how absurd had this method of confuting Christian Religion been if it had been then the publick profession of Christians that the Scriptures were not the Rule of their Faith How easie had it been for the Fathers who apologized for and defended Christian Religion to have told them they took a wrong measure of their Doctrine for it was not the principle of Christians that their Faith was conveyed to them by the Scriptures and therefore it was a fond undertaking to attaque their Religion that way but if they would effectually argue against it they ought to enquire what that Doctrine was which was orally delivered from father to son without which the Scriptures could signifie no more to them than an unknown Cipher without a Key being of themselves without the light of Oral Tradition only an heap of unintelligible words unsensed Cha racters and Ink variously figured in a Book and therefore it was a gross mistake in them to think they could understand the Christian Religion like their own Philosophy by reading of those Books or confute it by confuting them Thus the Fathers might have defended their Religion nay they ought in all reason to have taken this course and to have appealed from those dead senseless Books to the true Rule of Faith the living voice of the Church Essential But doth Mr. S. find any thing to this purpose in the Apologies of the Fathers If he hath discover'd any such matter he might do well to acquaint the World
but by so deep an inspection into the sense of Scripture as shall discover such secrets that Philosophy and human Industry could never have arrived to As if we could not be assured that any thing were written by men divinely inspired unless it were above the reach of human understanding and as if no man could know that this was our Saviours Doctrine Whatever ye would that men should do unto you that do ye likewise unto them because every one can understand it But if there were more mysteries in the Scriptures than there are I hope a man might be satisfied that they were written by men divinely inspired without a clear comprehension of all those mysteries The evidence of the inspiration of any person doth not depend upon the plaineness or sublimity of the things revealed to him but upon the goodness of the arguments which tend to perswade us that the person is so inspired And the Argument that is most fit to satisfy us of that is if he work miracles Now I would gladly know why a learned man cannot be assured of a miracle that is a plain sensible matter of Fact done long ago but by so deep an inspection into the sense of Scripture as shall discover such secrets that Philosophy and human Industry could never have arrived to § 4. Thirdly Because all the seeming contradictions of Scripture must be solved before we can out of the bare letter conclude the Scripture to be of God's enditing to solve which literally plainly and satisfactorily he tells us the memory of so many particulars which made them clearer to those of the Age in which they were written and the matter known must needs be so worn out by tract of time that it is one of the most difficult tasks in the World As if we could not believe a Book to be of God's enditing because there seem now to be some contradictions in it which we have reason to believe could easily have been solved by those who lived in the Age in which it was written Or as if oral Tradition could help a man to solve these contradictions when the memory of particulars necessary for the clear solution of them is as himself confesses worn out by tract of time If Mr. S. can in order to the solution of the seeming contradictions of Scripture demonstrate that oral Tradition hath to this day preserv'd the memory of those particulars necessary for that purpose the memory of which must needs be long since worn out by tract of time then I will readily yield that his Rule of Faith hath in this particular the advantage of ours But if he cannot do this why does he make that an Argument against our Rule which is as strong against his own This is just like Capt. Everard's Friend's way of arguing against the Protestants That they cannot rely upon Scripture because it is full of plain contradictions impossible to be reconciled and therefore they ought in all reason to submit to the infallibility of the Church And for an instance of such a contradiction he pitched upon the three fourteen Generations mentioned in the first of St. Matthew because the third Series of Generations if they be counted will be found to be but thirteen Not to mention now how this difficulty hath been sufficiently satisfied both by Protestant and Popish Commentators without any recourse to oral Tradition that which I take notice of is the unreasonableness of making this an Exception against the Protestants when it comes with every whit as much force upon themselves Suppose this Contradiction not capable of any solution by Protestants as he affirms and I should submit to the infallibility of the Church can he assure me that infallibility can make thirteen fourteen If it cannot how am I nearer satisfaction in this point by acknowledging the infallibility of the Church The case is the very same as to Mr S's Exception if I owned oral Tradition I should be never the nearer solving the seeming contradictions of Scripture and consequently I could not in Reason conclude it to be of God's enditing So that in truth these Exceptions if they were true would not strike at Protestancy but at Christian Religion which is the general unhappiness of most of the Popish Arguments than which there is no greater evidence that the Church of Rome is not the true Mother because she had rather Christianity should be destroyed than it should appear that any other Church hath a claim to it It was a work very proper for the Heretick Marcion to assault Religion this way who as Tertullian tells us writ a whole Book which he call'd Antitheses wherein he reckoned up all the Contradictions as he thought between the Old and New Testament But methinks it is very improper for the Papists who pretend to be the only true Christians in the World to strain their wits to discover as many contradictions as they can in the Scripture and to prove that there is no way of reconciling them The natural consequence of which is the exposing of this sacred Instrument of our Religion and even Christianity it self to the scorn of Atheists Therefore to be very plain with Mr. S. and Captain Everard I am heartily sorry to see that one of the chief fruits of their Conversion is to abuse the Bible § 5. Secondly He says that Protestants cannot know how many the Books of Scripture ought to be and which of the many controverted ones may be securely put in that Catalogue which not This he proves by saying 't is most palpable that few or at least the rude vulgar can never be assured of it And if this be a good Argument this again is a good Answer to say it is not most palpable But I shall deal more liberally and tell him that we know that just so many ought to be received as uncontroverted Books concerning which it cannot be shewn there was ever any Controversy and so many as controverted concerning which it appears that Question hath been made And if those which have been controverted have been since received by those Churches which once doubted of them there is now no further doubt concerning them because the Controversy about them is at an end And now I would fain know what greater certainty oral Tradition can give us of the true Catalogue of the Books of Scripture For it must either acknowledg some Books have been controverted or not if not why doth he make a supposition of controverted Books If oral Tradition acknowledg some to have been controverted then it cannot assure us that they have not been controverted nor consequently that they ought to be received as never having been controverted but only as such concerning which those Churches who did once raise a Controversy about them have been since satisfied that they are Canonical The Traditionary Church now receives the Epistle to the Hebrews as Canonical I ask Do they receive it as ever delivered for such That they must
as the capacity he is in will permit him to have And as Mr. White says well Satisfaction is to be given to every one according to his capacity it is sufficient for a Child to believe his Parents for a Clown to believe his Preacher And this is universally true in all cases where we have not better or equal evidence to the contrary But such is the unhappiness of the Popish Doctrines that if people were permitted the free use of the Scripture they would easily discern them to have no probable foundation in it and some of them to be plainly contrary to it so that it cannot be safe for their Preachers to tell the people that the Scripture is the only Rule of Faith lest they should find cause not to believe them when they teach Doctrines so plainly contrary to that Rule § 8. Lastly He says the Protestants cannot be certain of the true sense of Scripture Does he mean of plain Texts or obscure ones Of the true sense of plain Texts I hope every one may be certain and for obscure ones it is not necessary every one should But it may be there are no plain Texts in the Scriptures then the reason of it must be till Mr. S. can shew a better either because it is impossible for any one to write plainly or because God cannot write so plainly as men or because we have good reason to think that he would not write things necessary for every one to believe so as men might clearly understand him But he tells us The numerous Comments upon Scripture are an evidence that no man can be certain of the true sense of it I hope not for if those numerous Commentators do generally agree in the sense of plain Texts as 't is certain they do then this Argument signifies nothing as to such Texts And as for those which are obscure let Commentators differ about them as much as they please so long as all necessary Points of Faith and matters of Practice are delivered in plain Texts He adds There are infinite disputes about the sense of Scripture even in most concerning Points as in that of Christ's Divinity But are not Commentators both Protestant and Popish generally agreed about the sense of Scripture in that Point And what if some out of prejudice do mistake or out of perverseness do wrest the plainest Texts of Scripture for the Divinity of Christ to another sense Is this any argument that those Texts are not sufficiently plain Can any thing be spoken or written in words so clear from ambiguity which a perverse or prejudiced mind shall not be able to vex and force to another meaning God did not write the Scriptures for the froward and the captious but for those who will read them with a free and unprejudiced mind and are willing to come to the knowledg of the Truth If Mr. S. had been conversant in the writings of the Fathers he could not but have taken notice with what confidence they attempt to prove the Divinity of Christ out of Scripture as if that did afford convincing arguments for this purpose St. Chrysostom professes to demonstrate out of Scripture That the Son is of the same substance with the Father and relies upon Scripture alone for this without mentioning any other kind of Argument So that it seems St. Chrysostom was not acquainted with the insufficiency of Scripture for the conviction of Hereticks in this Point and that he was either ignorant of the infallible way of Demonstrating this point from Oral Tradition or had no great opinion of it The same Father elsewhere arguing against Hereticks about the Divinity of Christ says That they pervert the Scriptures to strengthen their Heresie from thence But then he does not with Mr. S. blame the Scripture and say that this Doctrine is not there deliver'd with sufficient clearness but contrarywise he says That the Scripture is clear enough but the corrupt minds of Hereticks will not see what is there contain'd Had St. Chrysostom been a true Son of the Traditionary Church he would have lain hold of this occasion to vilifie the Scriptures and to shew the necessity of regulating our faith not by such uncertain Records but by the infallible Reports of Oral Tradition § 9. But because Mr. S. lays great weight in several parts of his Book upon this Exception against Scripture viz. That Protestants cannot be certain of the true sense of it Therefore I shall not content my self only to have shewn that we may be sufficiently certain of the sense of Scripture so far as to understand all necessary matters of Faith and Practice and that more than this is not necessary but shall likewise return this Exception upon him by enquiring into these two things 1. How the Traditionary Church can be more certain of the true sense of Scripture than the Protestants 2. How they can be more certain of the true sense of Tradition than Protestants of the true sense of Scripture 1. How the Traditionary Church can be more certain of the true sense of Scripture than Protestants They pretend to have an Oral Tradition of the true sense of it delivered down from Father to Son But this only reacheth to those Texts which are coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine as for all other parts of Scripture they are as useless to Papists as they suppose they are to us because wanting the help of Oral Tradition they cannot be certain of one tittle of them And as for those Texts the sense whereof is conveyed down by Oral Tradition this sense is I hope delivered in some words or other And have all Preachers and Fathers and Mothers and Nurses the faculty of delivering this sense in words so plain as cannot possibly be mistaken or wrested to another sense I am sorry that when every one hath this faculty of speaking their thoughts plainly the Holy Ghost should be represented as not able to convey his mind to men in intelligible words And does not his own Objection rebound upon himself If the Church have a certain sense of Scripture orally delivered whence are the numerous Comments of the Fathers upon it and of later Writers in their Church and the infinite Disputes about the sense of it in the most concerning Points viz. The efficacy of Gods grace the Supremacy of St. Peter the infallibility of a Pope and Council by immediate assistance of the Holy Ghost What a stir is made about the sense of Dabo tibi Claves Tu es Petrus super hanc Petram c. Pasce oves Do not they differ about the meaning of these Texts among themselves as much as they do from the Fathers and from the Protestants Some understanding them of St Peters Supremacy only others of his infallibility others of his infallibility only in and with a general Council which yet others do not allow to Pope or Council from any immediate assistance but only from the
rational force of Tradition supposing that the Pope and Council hold to it If oral Tradition have brought down a certain sense of these Texts why do they not produce it and agree in it If it have not to use a hot phrase of his own 't is perfect phrenzy to say they can be certain of the true sense of Scripture If he say they are by Tradition made certain of the true sense of Scripture so far as it concerns the main body of Christian Doctrine and do all agree in it and that is suffcient then I ask him What are those points of Faith which make up the body of Christian Doctrine He will tell me they are those which all Catholicks agree to have descended to them from the Apostles by a constant and uninterrupted Tradition I enquire farther how I shall know what is the certain sense of Scripture so far as it concerns these points He must answer as before that that is the true sense which all Catholicks agree to have descended to them by Tradition Which amounts to this that all Catholicks do agree in the sense of Scripture so far as they do all agree in it It is to be hoped that the Protestants how much soever at present they differ about the sense of Scripture may in time come to as good an agreement as this This brings to my remembrance a passage or two of Mr. Cressy the one in his Appendix where he tells us That as it is impossible that Hereticks should agree any other way than in Faction so it is impossible that Catholicks should differ in points of Faith Why so Were not those Catholicks first who afterwards became Hereticks and when they became so did they not differ in points of Belief Yes but here lies the conceit when they began to differ then they ceas'd to be Catholicks therefore Catholicks can never differ in points of Faith The other passage is where he says That he hath forsaken a Church where Vnity was impossible c. and betaken himself to a Church where Schism is impossible This last Clause That Schism is impossible in their Church cannot possibly be true but in the same absurd and ludicrous sense in which it is impossible for Catholicks to differ in points of Belief For he cannot deny but that it is possible for men to break off from the Communion of their Church which in his sense is Schism but here is the subtilty of it No Schismatick is of their Church because so soon as he is a Schismatick he is out of it therefore Schism is impossible in their Church And is it not as impossible in the Church of England Where Mr. Cr. might have done well to have continued till he could have given a better reason of forsaking Her § 10. But to return to our purpose Mr. Rushworth acknowledgeth that the Scripture is of it self sufficiently plain as to matters of practice for he asks Who is so blind as not to see that these things are to be found in Scripture by a sensible common and discreet reading of it though perhaps by a rigorous and exact balancing of every particular word and syllable any of these things would vanish away we know not how So that for the direction of our lives and actions he confesseth the Scripture to be sufficiently plain if men will but read it sensibly and discreetly and he sayes that he is blind that does not see this But who so blind as he that will not see that the sense of Scripture is as plain in all necessary points of Faith I am sure St. Austin makes no difference when he tells us That in those things which are plainly set down in Scripture we may find all those things in which Faith and Manners of life are comprehended And why cannot men in reference to matters of Faith as well as of Practice read the Scriptures sensibly and discreetly without such a rigorous balancing of every word and syllable as will make the sense vanish away we know not how If the Scripture be but sufficiently plain to such as will use it sensibly and discreetly I do not understand what greater plainness can be desir'd in a Rule Nor can I imagine what kind of Rule it must be that can be unexceptionably plain to captious Cavillers and such as are bent to play the fool with it Well suppose the Scripture be not sufficiently clear as to matters of Faith and hereupon I have recourse to the Church for the true sense of Scripture Must I believe the Churches sense to be the true sense of such a Text though I see it to be plainly contrary to the genuine sense of the words yes that I must or else I make my self and not the Church judg of the sense of Scripture which is the grand Heresie of the Protestants But then I must not suppose much less belive that the Churches sense of such a Text is contrary to the genuine meaning of it no although I plainly see it to be so This is hard again on the other hand especially if that be true which is acknowledged both by Dr. Holden and Mr. Cressy viz. That though general Councils cannot mistake in the Points of Faith which they decree yet they may mistake in the confirmation of them from Texts of Scripture that is they may be mistaken about the sense of those Texts And if Mr. S. think his Brethren have granted too much he may see this exemplified in the second Council of Nice to mention no other which to establish their Doctrine of Image-worship does so palpably abuse and wrest Texts of Scripture that I can hardly believe that any Papist in the World hath the forehead to own that for the true sense of those Texts which is there given by those Fathers § 11. Secondly How the Traditionary Church can be more certain of the true sense of their Traditional Doctrines than the Protestants can be of the true sense of Scripture And this is worthy our enquiry because if the business be search'd to the bottom it will appear besides all other inconveniences which oral Tradition is much more liable to than Scripture that the certain sense and meaning of Traditional Doctrine is as hard to come at as the sense of Scripture And this I will make appear by necessary consequence from their own Concessions Mr. White and Mr. S. say that the great security of Tradition is this that it is not tied to certain phrases and set-forms of expression but the same sense is conveyed and setled in mens hearts by various expressions But according to Mr. Rushworth this renders Tradition's sense uncertain for he says 'T is impossible to put fully and beyond all quarrel the same sense in divers words So that if men do not receive Tradition in a sensible common discreet way as Mr. Rushw. speaks concerning reading the Scriptures but will come to a rigorous and exact balancing of every particular phrase word and
as it is a conclusion it can only beget a probable assent which is to say that considered barely as a conclusion and so far as in reason it can deserve assent it is only probable but considered as it serves an Hypothesis and is convenient to be believed with reason or without so it is infallible But to carry the supposition further put the case that the whole present Age assembled in a general Council should declare that such a Point was delivered to them yet according to Mr. S. we cannot safely rely upon this unless we knew certainly that those whom they relied on had secure grounds and not bare hear-say for what they delivered and that they were not contradicted within the space of 1500 years by any of those that are dead which it is impossible for any one now to know But to shew how inconsistent he is with himself in these matters I will present the Reader with a passage or two in another part of his Book where he endeavors to prove that men may safely rely on a general and uncontrolled Tradition He tells us That the common course of human Conversation makes it a madness not to believe great multitudes of knowers if no possible considerations can awaken in our reason a doubt that they conspire to deceive us And a little after Nor can any unless their brains rove wildly or be unsetled even to the degree of madness suspect deceit where such multitudes agree unanimously in a matter of Fact Now if men be but supposed to write as well as to speak what they know and to agree in their Writings about matter of Fact then it will be the same madness not to believe multitudes of Historians where no possible consideration can awaken in our reason a doubt that they have conspired to deceive us and mens brains must rove wildly and be unsetled even to the degree of phrenzy who suspect deceit where such multitudes unanimously agree in a matter of Fact And this seems to me to be the great unhappiness of Mr. S's Demonstrations that they proceed upon conrtadictory Principles so that in order to the demonstrating of thc uncertainty of Books and Writings he must supopse all those Principles to be uncertain which he takes to be self-evident and unquestionable when he is to demonstrate thc Infallibility of Oral Tradition § 13. Secondly He tells us the Providence of God is no security against those contingencies the Scriptures are subject to because we cannot be certain of the Divine Providence or assistance to his Church but by the Letter of Scripture therefore that must first be proved certain before we mention the Church or Gods assistance to her As if we pretended there were any promise in Scripture that God would preserve the Letter of it entire and uncorrupted or as if we could not otherwise be assured of it as if the light of natural Reason could not assure us of Gods Providence in general and of his more especial care of those things which are of greatest concernment to us such as this is That a Book containing the method and the terms of Salvation should be preserved from any material corruption He might as well have said That without the Letter of Scripture we cannot know that there is a God § 14 Thirdly Nor says he can Testimonies of Councils and Fathers be sufficient Interpreters of Scripture We do not say they are Our Principle is That the Scripture doth sufficiently interpret it self that is is plain to all capacities in things necessary to be believed and practised And the general consent of Fathers in this doctrine of the sufficient plainness of Scripture which I shall afterwards shew is a good evidence against them As for obscure and more doubtful Texts we acknowledge the Comments of the Fathers to be a good help but no certain Rule of interpretation And that the Papists think so as well as we is plain inasmuch as they acknowledge the Fathers to differ among themselves in the interpretation of several Texts And nothing is more familiar in all Popish Commentators than to differ from the ancient Fathers about the sense of Scripture And as for Councils Dr. Holden and Mr. Cressy as I said before do not think it necessary to believe that alwayes to be the true sense of Texts which Councils give of them when they bring them to confirm Points of Faith Nay if any Controversie arise about the sense of any Text of Scripture it is impossible according to Mr. Rushworth's Principles for a Council to decide either that or any other Controversie for he makes it his business to prove That Controversies cannot be decided by words and if this be so then they cannot be decided at all unless he can prove that they may be decided without words and consequently that Councils may do their work best in the Quakers way by silent Meetings § 15. Fourthly Nor can says he the clearness of Scripture as to Fundamentals be any help against these defects Why not First Because a certain Catalogue of Fundamentals was never given and agreed to by sufficient Authority and yet without this all goes to wrack I hope not so long as we are sure that God would make nothing necessary to be believed but what he hath made plain and so long as men do believe all things that are plainly revealed which is every ones fault if he do not men may do well enough without a precise Catalogue But suppose we say That the Articles of the Apostles Creed contain all necessary matters of simple belief what hath Mr. S. to say against this I am sure the Roman Catechism set forth by the Decree of the Council of Trent says as much as this comes to viz. That the Apostles having received a command to preach the Gospel to every creature thought fit to compose a form of Christian Faith namely to this end that they might all think and speak the same things and that there might be no Schisms among those whom they had called to the unity of Faith but that they might all be perfect in the same sense and the same opinion And this Profession of the Christian Faith and Hope so fram'd by them the Apostles called the Symbole or Creed Now how this end of bringing men to unity of Faith and making them perfectly of the same sense and opinion could probably be attained by means of the Creed if it did not contain all necessary Points of simple belief I can by no means understand Besides a certain catalogue of Fundamentals is as necessary for them as for us and when Mr. S gives in his ours is ready Mr. Chillingworth had a great desire to have seen Mr. Knott's catalogue of Fundamentals and challenged him to produce it and offered him very fairly that when ever he might with one hand receive his he would with the other deliver his own But Mr. Knott though he still persisted in the same demand
could never be prevailed with to bring forth his own but kept it for a secret to his dying day But to put a final stop to this Canting demand of a Catalogue of Fundamentals which yet I perceive I shall never be able to do because it is one of those expletive Topicks which Popish Writers especialy those of the lowest Form do generally make use of to help out a Book however to do what I can towards the stopping of it I desire Mr. S. to answer the reasons whereby his Friend Dr. Holden shews the unreasonableness of this demand and likewise endeavours to prove that such a Catalogue would not only be useless and pernicious if it could be given but that it is manifestly impossible to give such a precise Catalogue Secondly He asks Is it a Fundamental that Christ is God If so Whether this be clearer in Scripture than that Gad hath hands feet c To which I answer by another question Is it clear that there are Figures in Scripture and that many things are spoken after the manner of men and by way of condescension and accomodation to our capacities and that custom and common sense teacheth men to distinguish between things figuratively and properly spoken If so why cannot every one easily understand that when the Scripture saith God hath hands and feet and that Christ is the Vine and the Door these are not to be taken properly as we take this Proposition that Christ is God in which no man hath any reason to suspect a Figure When Mr. S. tells us That he percheth upon the specifical nature of things would it not offend him if any one should be so silly as to conclude from hence that Mr. S. believed himself to be a Bird and nature a Perch And yet not only the Sciptures but all sober Writers are free from such forc't and phantastical Metaphors I remember that Origen taxeth Celsus his wilful Ignorance in finding fault with the Scriptures for attributing to God humane affections as anger c. and tells him that any one who had a mind to understand the Scriptures might easily see that such expressions were accomodated to us and accordingly to be understood and that no man that will but compare these expressions with other passages of Scripture need to fail of the true sense of them But according to Mr. S. Origen was to blame to find fault with Celsus for thinking that the Scripture did really attribute humane affections to God for how could he think otherwise when the most fundamental Point is not clearer in Scripture than that God hath hands feet c How could Origen in reason expect from Celsus though never so great a Philosopher that he should be able without the help of Oral Tradition to distinguish between what is spoken literally and what by a certain Scheme of speech Theodoret tells us of one Audaeus who held that God had a humane shape and bodily members but he does not say that the reason of this Error was because he made Scripture the Rule of his Faith but expresly because he was a fool and did foolishly understand those things which the Divine Scriptures speak by way of Condescension So that although Mr. S. is pleas'd to make this wise Objection yet it seems according to Theodoret that men do not mistake such Texts either for want of oral Tradition or of sufficient clearness in the Scriptures but for want of common reason and sense And if Mr. S. know of any Rule of Faith that is secure from all possibility of being mistaken by foolish and perverse men I would be glad to be acquainted with it SECT IV. § 1. IN his next Discourse he endeavours to shew that unlearned Persons cannot be justified as acting rationally in receiving the Scripture for the Word of God and relying upon it as a certain Rule because they are not capable of satisfaction concerning these matters But I have already shewn that they are and shall not repeat the same over again And whereas he says That several Professions all pretend to Scripture and yet differ and damn and persecute one another about these differences the answer is easie That they all pretend to Scripture is an argument that they all acknowledg it to be the Word of God and the Rule of Faith and that they are generally agreed about the sense of those plain Texts which contain the fundamental Points of Faith is evident in that those several Professions acknowledg the Articles contained in the Apostles Creed to be sufficiently delivered in Scripture And if any Professions differ about the meaning of plain Texts that is not an argument that plain Texts are obsure but that some men are perverse And if those Professions damn and persecute one another about the meaning of obscure Texts the Scripture is not in fault but those that do so § 2. And whereas he pretends That the Scripture is not able to satisfie Sceptical dissenters and Rational doubters because nothing under a demonstration can satisfie such persons so well concerning the incorruptedness of Originals the faithfulness of Translations c. but that searching and sincere Wits may still maintain their ground of suspence with A Might it not be otherwise This hath been answered already partly by shewing that the Scripture was not intended to satisfie Scepticks and that a Demonstration is not sufficient to give satisfaction to them and partly by shewing that Rational doubters may have as much satisfaction concerning those matters as the nature of the things will bear and he is not a Rational doubter that desires more But that he may see the unreasonableness of this Discourse I shall briefly shew him That all Mankind do in matters of this nature accept of such evidence as falls short of Demonstration and that his great Friends and Masters from whom he hath taken the main grounds of his Book though he manageth them to less advantage do frequently acknowledg that it is reasonable for men to acquiesce in such assurance as falls short of Infallibility and such evidence as is less than Demonstration Do not mankind think themselves sufficiently assured of the Antiquity and Authors of several Books for which they have not Demonstrative evidence Doth not Aristotle say that things of a moral and civil nature and matters of Fact done long ago are incapable of Demonstration and that it is madness to expect it for things of this Nature Are there no passages in Books so plain that a man may be sufficiently satisfied that this and no other is the certain sense of them If there be none can any thing be spoken in plainer words than it may be written If it cannot how can we be satisfied of the certain sense of any Doctrine Orally delivered And if we cannot be so satisfi'd where 's the certainty of Oral Tradition But if Books may be written so plainly as that we may be abundantly satisfied that this is the certain
a Hundred years to a Hundred but from Month to Month and even less If this be all that Tradition doth this is nothing but what is done among Protestants and that with greater advantage because we always teach Children to say their Prayers in a known Tongue so as they may understand them And we also teach them the Creed and Ten Commandments and the Sacraments so many as Christ hath instituted and no more So that if this be so infallible a way of conveying the Doctrine of Christianity we have it among us And we do over and besides instruct them in the Scriptures which are the authentick Instrument whereby Christ's Doctrine is conveyed to us But then we do not suppose as his Hypothesis necessarily enforceth him to do that the Christian Doctrine is equally taught and learned by all but by some more by others less perfectly according to the different abilities and diligence of Parents and Teachers and the various capacities and dispositions of Children whereas his Hypothesis falls if all or at least the generality of Parents do not instruct their Children with the like exactness and if the generality of Children do not receive this Doctrine in the same perfection that it is delivered For if it be taught or received with any variation it must necessarily be so conveyed and these variations will grow daily I had thought he would have told us how all Parents do teach their Children the whole Body of Christ's Doctrine and explain to them every part of it in a Hundred or a Thousand several expressions signifying the same sense and not have instanced in two Set-forms such as the Creed and Ten Commandments for according to Mr. White That cannot be a Tradition which is delivered in set-words § 2. Having thus explained Oral Tradition he comes to shew that the Properties of a Rule of Faith agree to it I have already shewed that the true Properties of a Rule of Faith are but two viz. That it be plain and intelligible and that it be sufficiently certain The first of these that Oral Tradition may deliver a Doctrine plainly and intelligibly I grant him All the difficulty is about the second Property whether we have sufficient assurance that the Doctrine delivered down by Oral Tradition hath received no coruption or change in its conveyance And all that he pretends to prove in this Discourse is That if this Rule hath been followed and kept to all along the Christian Doctrine neither hath nor can have received any change that is if the next Age after the Apostles did truly and without any alteration deliver the Christian Doctrine to their immediate Successors and they to theirs and so on then upon this supposition the Doctrine of the present Traditionary Church must be the very same with that which was delivered to the Apostles All this is readily granted to him But that this Rule hath always been followed nay that it is impossible there should have been any deviation from it as he pretends this we deny not only as untrue but as one of the most absurd Propositions that ever yet pretended to demonstrative evidence THE RULE of FAITH PART III. In which Mr. S's Demonstrations and Corollaries are examined SECT I. § 1. BEfore I come to speak particularly to his Demonstrations I shall premise these two Considerations First That according to the Principles of the Patrons of Tradition no man can by his private Reason certainly find out the true Rule of Faith Secondly That according to Mr. S. the way of Demonstration is no certain way to find out the Rule of Faith If either of these be made out his Demonstrations lose all their force If the first be made good then he cannot demonstrate the Infallibility of Tradition nor consequently that that is the Rule of Faith If the second then the way of Demonstration which he pretends to take signifies nothing § 2. First No man can according to the principles of the Patrons of Tradition by his private Reason certainly find out what is the Rule of Faith Suppose a Heathen to be desirous to inform himself of the Christian Faith in order to which he is inquisitive after some Rule by which he may take a measure of it and come certainly to know what it is He enquires of Christians what their Rule is and finds them divided about it some saying that the Scriptures others that Oral Tradition is the Rule In this case it is not possible without a Revelation for this man to find out the Rule of Faith but by his own private Reason examining and weighing the arguments and pretences of both sides And when he hath done this unless he can by his Reason demonstrate that the one is a certain and infallible Rule and the other not so he hath not according to Mr. S. found out the Rule of Faith But Reason can never do this according to Mr. S. For speaking of demonstrating the certainty of Tradition he tells us That Tradition hath for its Basis mans nature not according to his Intellectuals which do but darkly grope in the pursuit of Science c. And again speaking how Reason brings men to the Rule of Faith he uses this comparison She is like a dim-sighted man who used his Reason to find a trusty Friend to lead him in the twilight and then relied on his guidance rationally without using his own Reason at all about the Way it self So that according to him the certainty of Tradition cannot be founded on Demonstration because it is not founded in the intellectual part of man which only can demonstrate Besides if it were founded in the intellectual part yet that can never be able to demonstrate the certainty of Tradition because that faculty which is dim-sighted and does but grope darkly in the pursuit of Science is uncapable of framing Demonstrations Nor can any man understand how dim-sighted reason should see clearly to choose its guide any more than its way especially if it be considered what a pretty Contradiction it is to say that Reason as it is dim-sighted can see clearly But Mr. Cressy is not contented to call every mans Reason dim-sighted he ventures a step further and calls it hood-winkt and blind For he tells us That private Reason is apparently a most fallible guide and he pities my Lord Falkland's case because in the search of the true Religion he did betake himself to the casual conduct of blind humane natural Reason which afterwards he calls a guide that two persons cannot possibly follow together because no two persons that ever followed any other guide beside Authority did or could think all things to be reasonable that all others thought so and by consequence such a guide that as long as he continues in that office there cannot possibly be any Church any where which says he is an infallible eviction that this is an imaginary seducing guide since it is impossible that that should be
the Faith by Scripture This says he is a great Triumph of our Faith to demonstrate our Opinions so strongly and to overthrow the contrary by Testimonies from Scripture And neither in this Epistle nor the other does he make any mention of Oral Tradition Next he cites that known place in Irenaeus But what if the Apostles had not left us the Scriptures ought we not to follow the Order of Tradition c. This makes clearly against him for it implies that now the Apostles have left us the Scriptures we ought to follow them The other passage he cites out of Irenaeus Lib. 1. c. 3. is a clear eviction that he did not consult the Book For he puts two sayings together which he had met with in Mr. White immediately one after the other and because Mr. White had cited Lib. 1. c. 3. for the first saying and brought in the other immediately upon it with an Et rursus Again c. Therefore Mr. S. who is of a right Traditionary temper which is to take things easily upon trust himself and require Demonstration from others concluded that these sayings were in the same place though in truth they are in several Books As for the Testimony it self there is nothing in it to Mr. S's purpose besides the word Tradition which Irenaeus does often apply to Scripture as well as Oral Tradition and there is nothing in this place to determine it to Oral Tradition His Testimonies out of Origen will do him less stead For every one that hath been conversant in the Writings of that Father knows what he means by the Churches Tradition preserved by order of Succession viz. The mystical Interpretations of Scripture which he says were delivered by the Apostles to the Governors of the Church and by them down from hand to hand If this be the Tradition Mr. S. contends for Origen is at his service if it be not I assure him he is not for his turn Next comes Tertullian concerning whom as also Origen the Papist upon occasion thinks it enough to reply in St. Hierom's words As for Tertullian I have nothing to say of him but that he is not a man of the Church Whatever he was these are his words If thou beest but a Christian believe what is traditum deliver'd And here 's nothing again but the word deliver'd which as I have said is indifferent to Written or Oral Tradition if the Circumstances do not determine it to one as here they do very unluckily for Mr. S. to the Scripture For he disputes here against Marcion who denied the Flesh of Christ and who to maintain that denied his Nativity and expunged the whole History of it out of the Gospel But saith Tertullian by what authority dost thou do this If thou be a Prophet foretell something If an Apostle preach publickly If Apostolical be of the Apostle's mind If no more but a Christian believe what is delivered And where delivered But in those Instruments or Books of the Gospel out of which as Tertullian immediately before tells us Marcion had made bold to expunge this Story As for his Testimonies out of Athanasius the two first of them prove nothing but that Faith comes down from our Ancestors or was by them delivered to us which no body denies Nor is there a word in either of them concerning oral in opposition to written Tradition The third Testimony is out of an Epistle to Epictetus to whom Athanasius writing concerning those who held Christ's Body to be Consubstantial with his Divinity tells him this was so gross a conceit that it needed no sollicitous confutation but that it would be a sufficient answer to say in general the Orthodox Church was not of that mind our Fathers did not think so From whence Mr. S. infers that Tradition is held by him a sole sufficient Rule of Faith and the only Answer to be given why we reject Points from Faith c. But if he had consulted the Book he would not have inferred that this was the only Answer to be given c. For it immediately follows But lest from our being wholly silent these Inventers of evil things should take occasion to be more impudent it will be good to recite a few passages out of Scripture c. And from thence he confutes them at large It was so gross an Error that he thought it might be sufficient without bringing particular arguments out of Scripture against it to say that it was contrary to the ancient Faith but yet lest they should if he had said no more have taken boldness from thence and thought that nothing more could be said against it therefore he confutes it from particular Texts of Scripture And what in his opinion was the sufficient Rule of Faith Mr. S. might have seen at the beginning of this Epistle from these words That Faith which was professed by the Fathers in that Council viz. the Nicene according to the Scriptures is to me sufficient c. It seems that Scripture was to him the Rule and Standard whereby to judg even the Creeds of General Councils Mr. S. says he will be shorter in the rest and so will I. For what is to be said to Testimonies brought at a venture when he that brings them had he read the Books themselves could not have had the face to have brought them Such is this out of Clem. Alezand As if one of a Man becomes a Beast like those infected with Circes poyson so he hath forfeited his being a Man of God and faithful to our Lord who spurns against Ecclesiastical Tradition and leaps into Opinions of human Election Mr. S. knows whose way of quoting this is to pick a bit out of the midst of a Text that sounds something towards his purpose and leave out the rest which would make it evident to be meant just contrary Yet I cannot charge this wholly upon Mr. S. whose implicit Faith were it not for his culpable Ignorance might excuse him But for his Seducer Mr. White how he can acquit himself of so foul an Imputation I leave it to any ingenuous Papist to judg when I have nakedly set the whole passage before him Clemens speaking of Hereticks who relinquish the Scripture or abuse it by wresting it to their lusts says Men who deal in matters of highest importance must needs commit great Errors if they do not take and hold the RVLE OF TRVTH from Truth it self For such men having once deviated from the right way do likewise err in most particulars probably because they have not the Faculty of distinguishing Truths and Falshoods perfectly exercised to choose what ought to be chosen For if they had this they would be ruled by the Divine SCRIPTVRES Therefore as if any of Mankind should become a Beast in such sort as those who were bewitched by Circe even so he hath lost his being a Man of God and abiding faithful to the Lord who hath spurned against the Tradition of the
sayes Neither ought I now to alledg the Nicene Council nor thou that of Arminium for neither am I bound to the Authority of the one nor thou of the other Let us both contest with the Authorities of Scripture which are Wtinesses common to us both And also against the Donatists in these words Let them if they can demonstrate their Church not by the Talk and Rumors or oral Tradition of the Africans not by the Councils of their own Bishops not by the Books of their Disputers not by deceitful Miracles c but by the prescript of the Law Prophets c. i. e. by all the Canonical Authorities of the Holy Books Hierom saith Of those things which without the Authorities and Testimonies of the Scripture men invent of their own heads as from Apostolical Tradition they are smitten with the Sword of God Theophilus Alexandr whom Hierom hath Translated calls Scripture more than once the Rule and the Testimonies of it the firm foundations of Doctrine And again saith It comes from a Demonical spirit that men follow the Sophisms of humane minds and think any thing Divine that wants the Authority of Scripture Theodoret charges all Heresies upon the not following of Scripture which he calls the inflexible Rule of Truth Again We have have learned the Rule of Opinions from the Divine Scripture After the Fathers I shall produce the Testimonies of two Eminent Persons of latter Times Gerson and Lyra. Gerson in his Book of the Tryal of Doctrines hath this remarkable passage In the Tryal of Doctrines that which is first and principally to be considered is Whether a Doctrine be conformable to the H. Scripture c. The reason of this is because the Scripture is deliver'd to us as a SVFFICIENT and INFALLIBLE RVLE for the Goverment of the whole Ecclesiastical Body and its Members to the end of the world So that it is such an Art such a Rule or Exemplar that any other Doctrine which is not conformable to it is to be renounc'd as Heretical or to be accounted suspicious or not at all appertaining to Religion Again It is evident how pernicious the rejection of the H. Scripture is and how certain a preparatory for the reception of Antichrist Once more What mischief what danger what confusion hath happen'd thorough contempt of the H. Scripture which sure is sufficient for the Government of the Church else Christ must have been an imperfect Law-giver let us ask Experience c. Lyra also writes thus As in Philosophy truth is discovered by reducing things to their first and self-evident Principles so in the Writings deliver'd by the H. Doctors Truth is discover'd as to matters of Faith by reducing them to the Canonical Scriptures Sir You know how easy it were to swell up a large Volume with Testimonies to this purpose especially if I should take the course that Mr. Wh. does to hale in quotations though never so impertinent or use the wretched importunity which Mr. S. does to perswade them to be pertinent But these Testimonies which I have nakedly set down leaving them to speak for themselves are enough to satisfie an unpassionate Reader such an one as dares trust himself with the use of his own eyes and reason As for that sort of men which chuses to follow noise rather than light we must be content to leave them to the blind conduct of those Guides who having no better means to keep their Followers to them go halloing in the dark and fill their ears with the insignificant sounds of Infallibility Indefectibility Self-evidence and Demonstration Concerning the Appendix wherein you are particularly challeng'd I hope for an Account very shortly and so take leave SIR Your Affectionate Friend JOHN TILLOTSON Lincolns-Inn Febr. 20. 1665. FINIS A REPLY TO M r. J. S. his 3 d APPENDIX Containing some Animadversions ON THE BOOK ENTITULED A RATIONAL ACCOUNT of the Grounds of Protestant Religion By Ed. Stillingfleet B. D. London Printed by H.C. for Henry Mortlock at the Sign of the Phoenix in St. Paul's Church-yard near the little North-door 1675. An Appendix to the Rule of Faith To his honoured Friend Mr. John Tillotson SIR AS soon as I understood your intentions to answer Mr. Serjeant I could not but rejoice on his behalf as well as on the truths and your own For I have that real kindness for him that I heartily wish him that reason and science he pretends to which I could not but despair of his attaining unless he were undeceived in that monstrous opinion he hath of himself and his undertakings And I knew no person more fit than you to let him understand the truth and himself together In which your performances have been so clear and satisfactory that I hope Mr. Sergeant in stead of another Letter of directions to his Answerer will write you one of thanks for the reason and kindness you have shewed him throughout your Book Unless it fares with you as it hath done with some other Adversaries of theirs that their civility hath been interpreted as an argument of their uncertainty and their own confidence cried up for a demonstration In which sense only I shall grant our Protestant Writers to build on uncertainties and Mr. White and Mr. Serjeant to be the great Demonstrators of this age If their own reason had been as severe as the censures at Rome against them they had saved us the labour of any answer and would have found out their own sophistry without a confutation But the least thing we can imagine by their excessive confidence is that they are deceived themselves and therefore it is a part of charity to them as well as justice to the truth to let the world see that big words are quite another thing from science and a strong presumption from a regular demonstration As to which no more need to have been said than what you have already done if Mr. Serjeant had not thought it an accession to the glory of his atchievements to lead two Pages of my Book in triumph after him I confess I was somewhat surprized to see a person who would be noted for his valour in assaulting Protestant Writers steal so behind the main bulk and design of my Book and when he had gotten two single Pages by themselves fall upon them with as much pomp and ostentation as if he had attack'd the whole And this must be noised abroad as an Answer to me by the same figure that his arguments are called demonstrations which is by an hyperbole unfit for any but such who never flag below the sphere of Science in their own judgments though they seem not to come near it in others Yet since Mr. Serjeant is not only pleased to concern himself so far as to answer that part of my Book relating to oral tradition but in most express terms to challenge me to reply to him he may now see assoon as I could get any
and all the Papists of forreign Countreys do as faithful agree with Mr. White in this It seems not so by the proceedings in the Court of Rome against him in which as appears by the censure of the Inquisition against him dated 17. November 1661. his doctrine is condemned not only as false seditious and scandalous but as heretical and erroneous in faith And if it were not for this very doctrine he was there censured why doth Mr. White set himself purposely to defend it in his Tabulae suffragiales If these then do agree as faithful who cannot but envy the excellent harmony of the Roman Church in which men condemn each other for hereticks and yet all believe the same things still Well Sir I am in hopes upon the same grounds Mr. S. will yield us the same charity too and tell us that we agree with him as faithful only we differ a little from him as discoursers for I assure you there is as great reason the only difference is we give them not such ill words as they do each other For let Mr. S. shew us wherein we differ more from him about the Rule of Faith than they do among themselves For Mr. White when he hath said that all kind of heresie doth arise from hence that men make the holy Scripture or a private spirit the rule of faith he presently adds it is all one if one make Councils or Pope any other way than as witnesses to be the authors of faith For saith he this is to subject the whole Church to that slavery to receive any errour for an article of faith which they shall define or propose modo illegitimo i. e. any other way then as witnesses of tradition Either then we differ from Mr. S. only as discoursers or he and his Brethren differ from each other more then as such And so any one would think who reads the oppositions and arguments against each other on this subject particularly Mr. Whites Tabulae suffragiales But let Mr. White say what he will Mr. S. tells me I am not aware how little they differ even as Divines The more shame for them to have such furious heats and oppositions where there is so little difference But as little as they differ Mr. White thinks it safer to talk of their unity in England than to try whether they be of his mind at Rome by going thither to clear himself for he justly fears he should find them differ from him some other way than as bare discoursers Yet let us hear Mr. S's reason for saith he though some speculators attribute to the Church a power of defining things not held before yet few will say she hath new revelations or new articles of faith But we know the temper of these men better than to rely on what they barely say For they say what they think is most for their purpose and one of Mr. White 's adversaries if himself may be credited plainly told him if the doctrine of the Popes infallibility were not true yet it ought to be defended because it was for the interest of the Church of Rome for which he is sufficiently rebuked by him It is one thing then what they say and another what necessarily follows from the Doctrine which they assert But for plain dealing commend me to the Canonists who say expresly the Church by which they mean the Pope may make new articles of faith and this is the sense of the rest though they are loth to speak out Else Mr. White was much too blame in spending so much time in proving the contrary But what man of common sense can imagine that these men can mean otherwise who assert such an infallibility in Pope and Councils as to oblige men under pain of eternal damnation to believe those things which they were not obliged to before such a definition And what can this be else but to make new articles of faith For an article of faith supposes a necessary obligation to believe it now if some doctrine may become thus obligatory by virtue of the Churches definition which was not so before that becomes thereby an article of faith which it was not before But these subtil men have not yet learnt to distinguish a new doctrine from a new article of faith they do not indeed pretend that their doctrine is new because they deny any such thing as new revelation in the Church but yet they must needs say if they understand themselves that old implicit doctrines may become new articles of faith by vertue of the Churches definition So little are they relieved by that silly distinction of explicit and implicit delivery of them which Mr. S. for a great novelty accquaints us with For what is only implicitly delivered is no article of faith at all for that can be no article of faith which men are not bound to believe now there are none will say that men are bound to believe under pain of damnation if they do not the things which are only implicitly delivered but this they say with great confidence of all things defined by the Church And let now any intelligent person judg whether those who assert such things do not differ wide enough from those who resolve all into oral tradition and make the obligation to faith wholly dependent upon the constant tradition of any doctrine from age to age ever since the Apostles times But Mr. S. is yet further displeased with me for saying that Pope and Councils challenge a power to make things de fide in one age which were not in another For 1. he sayes I speak it in common and prove it not 2. He adds That take them right this is both perfectly innocent and unavoidably necessary to a Church And is it not strange he should expect any particular proofs of so innocent and necessary a thing to the being of a Church But he will tell me it is in his own sense of de fide which I have already shewn to signifie nothing to his purpose Let him therefore speak out whether he doth believe any such thing as inherent infallibility in the definitions of Pope and Councils if not I am sure at Rome they will never believe that Mr. S. agrees with them as faithful if he doth whether doth not such an infallible definition bind men by vertue of it to the belief of what is then defined if it doth then things may become as much de fide by it as if they were delivered dy Christ or his Apostles For thereby is supposed an equal obligation to faith because there is a proposition equally infallible But will he say the Pope doth not challenge this Why then is the contrary doctrine censured and condemned at Rome Why is the other so eagerly contended for by the most zealous sons of that Church and that not as a school-opinion but as the only certain foundation of faith Mr. S. is yet pleased to inform me further that nothing will avail me
on as novelties therefore they speak much of tradition and the ancient faith but that was not by what their Parents taught them but what the Fathers of the Church delivered in their writings for by these they judged of traditions and not the oral way And therefore I see little reason to believe that this was either the sense of the Council of Trent or is the sense of any number of Roman Catholicks much less of the whole Church none excepted as Mr. S. in his confident way expresses it And if he will as he saith disavow the maintaining any point or affecting any way which is not assented to by all I hope to see Mr. S. retract this opinion and either fall in with the Court of Rome or return as reason leads him into the bosom of the Church of England But there seems to be somewhat more in what follows viz. that though schoolmen question the personal infallibility of the Pope or of the Roman Clergy nay of a General Council yet all affirm the infallibility of tradition or the living voice of the Church essential and this he saith is held by all held firmly and that it is absolutely infallible To this therefore I answer either Mr. S. means that none do affirm that the universal tradition of the Church essential can err or that the Church of Rome being the Church essential cannot err in her tradition But which way soever he takes it I shall easily shew how far it is from proving that he designs it for For if he take it in the first sense viz. that all the faithful in all ages could not concur in an error then he may as well prove Protestants of his mind as Papists for this is the foundation on which we believe the particular Books of Scripture If this therefore proves any thing it proves more then he intends viz. that while we thus oppose each other we do perfectly agree together and truly so we do as much as they do among themselves But if Mr. S's meaning be that all of their Religion own the Roman Church to be the Church essential and on that account that it cannot err setting aside the absurdity of the opinion it self I say from hence it doth not follow that they make oral tradition the rule of faith because it is most evident that the ground why they say their Church cannot err is not on Mr. S's principles but on the supposition of an infallible assistance which preserves that Church from error So that this falls far short of proving that they are all agreed in this rule of faith which is a thing so far from probability that he might by the same argument prove that Scripture is owned by them all to be the rule of faith For I hope it is held by all and held firmly that the living voice of God in Scripture as delivered to us is infallible and if so then there is as much ground for this as the other But if we enquire what it is men make a rule of faith we must know not only that they believe tradition infallible but on what account they do so For if tradition be believed infallible barely on the account of a promise of infallibility to the present Church then the resolution of faith is not into the tradition but into that infallible assistance and consequently the rule of faith is not what bare tradition delivers but what that Church which cannot err in judging tradition doth propose to us It is not therefore their being agreed in general that tradition is infallible doth make thâ—m agree in the same rule of faith but they must agree in the ground of that infallibility viz. that it depends on this that no age could conspire to deceive the next But all persons who understand any thing of the Roman Church know very well that the general reason why tradition is believed infallible is because they first believe the Church to be infallible whereas Mr. S. goes the contrary way and makes the infallibility of the the Church to depend on the infallibility of tradition And therefore for all that I can see we must still oppose private Opinators in this controversie the Church of Rome not having declared her self at all on Mr. S's behalf but the contrary and the generality believing on the account of the present Churches infallibility And it is strange Mr. S. should find no difference between mens resolving faith into common sense and into the immediate assistance of the Holy Ghost If this then be the first principle of controversie as Mr. S. pretends we see how unlikely they are to agree about other matters who are so much divided about the principle of resolving them And if this be the ground of faith then most Romanists build on a wrong Foundation But if the infallibility of oral tradition be the foundation on which that formidable structure is erecting which he speaks of wo then to the Court of Rome for that is known to build on quite a different foundation And if this as he saith rises apace and has advanced many stories in a small time it only lets us know how fast their divisions grow and that they are building so fast one against another that their Church will not stand between them By this discourse Mr. S. pretends to answer all those If 's which follow which are these In case the Church may determine things de fide which were not before whether the present Church doth then believe as the precedent did or no if it did how comes any thing to be de fide which was not before if it did not what assurance can I have that every age of the Church believes just as the precedent did and no otherwise when I see they profess the contrary And if a thing may be de fide in one age which was not in a foregoing then a Church may deliver that as a matter of faith at one time which was never accounted so before by which means the present Church may oblige me to believe that as a matter of faith which never was so in Christs or the Apostles times and so the infallibility on the account of tradition is destroyed To all which Mr. S. gives a very easie answer viz. that they do not hold any disparate or unimplied points of faith but such as are involved and implied in the main point This is no more easily said then understood for if these be implied in the former how can there come a new obligation to believe them For to take his own instance will any man in his senses say that he that believes homo est animal rationale doth not believe homo est animal and this he makes choice of as an example how one point of faith may be involved in another so as to receive a distinct obligation to believe it I grant that homo est animal is involved in the other but he that shall say that after he hath assented
the Church of Rome and the hazard of Salvation in the communion of it the first Part octavo A second Discourse in vindication of the Protestant grounds of Faith against the pretence of Infallibility in the Roman Church in Answer to the Guide in Controversie by R. H. Protestancy without Principles and Reason and Religion or the certain Rule of Faith by E. W. with a particular enquiry into the Miracles of the Roman Church octavo An Answer to Mr. Cresey's Epistle Apologetical to a person of Honour touching his Vindication of Dr. Stillingfleet octavo All written by Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. Chaplain in Ordinary to his Majesty Knowledg and Practice or a plain Discourse of the chief things necessary to be known believed and practiced in order to Salvation by S. Cradock quarto A Book very useful for Families The Remains of Sir Walter Rawleigh in twelves A Discourse of War and Peace by Sir Robert Cotton in octavo The Moral Philosophy of the Stoicks in octavo Hodders Arithmetick twelves The Triumphs of Rome over despised Protestancy octavo The Original of Romances octavo The Advice of Charles the Fifth Emperor of Germany and King of Spain to his Son Philip the Second upon resignation of his Crown to his said Son twelves Observations upon Military and Political affairs by the Right Honourable George Duke of Albemarle folio published by Authority A Fathers Testament by Phineahs Fletcher in octavo The Explication of the Terms of the Question P. 180. * P. 4. * P. 159◠Mr. S's Rule of Faith * p. 41. * P. 117. * P. 337. * Append. 4th p. 319. * P. 68. * p. 116. * p. 117. * Apology for tradition p. 165. The Protestant Doctrine concerning the Rule of Faith * P. 117. * P. 171. P. 38 39. * P. 54. * P. 116. * Mr. Wh. Exetasis P. 9. * P. 39. How much Protestants allow to Oral Tradition * Hebr. 8.7 * P. 40. * Rushw. Dial. 4. Sect. 9. * p. 93. How much Mr. S. attributes to his Rule of Faith more than Protestants to theirs * P. 11. * P. 11. * P 3. P. 12. * P. 12. * P. 11 12. * Analys Fid. L. 1. c. 3. * P. 12. * P 12. That the Properties of a Rule of Faith belong to Scriptute * P. 13. * P. 14. * P. 17. * Luke 1.3 4. * John 20.31 Mr. S's Exceptions against Scripture examined * P. 13. * P. 13. * P. 13 14. * P. 14. * L. 1. contr Marcion * P. 14. * Com. in Esai c. 6 c. 8. * P. 15. * Ep. 48. * P. 15. * P. 16 17. * P. 16. * P. 16. * P. 16. Preface * Answ. to the Lord Falkland P. 33. * P. 17. * P. 17. * P. 17. * Hom. 32 de Consubstant * Hom. 7 de Sanctc Phoca * P. 17. * Exomolog 2 d. Edit p. 554. * Exomolog c. 53. Sect. 2. * Dial. 2. Sect. 12. * De Doctr. Christ. L. 2. * Dial. 2. Sect. 6. * Analys Fidei L. 1. c. 9. * Append. c. 6. * Answ. to Chilling c 2. Sect. 6. * P. 17 18. * Answ. to Chilling c. 1. Sect. 33. * P. 49. * Ibid. * P. 18. * P 18 19. * Dial. 2. Sect. 8. * P. 20 21. * Praefat. * Analys Fid. L. 1. c. 4. * P. 21. * L. 4. * Haeret. Fabul l. 4. That Scripture is a sufficient Rule to the Unlearned and to the most Rational doubters * P. 24. * P. 25.26 27. * Dial. 2. Sect. 7. * De bonis malis Libris * P. 27. Sect. 3. 4. * Ibid. Sect. 6. * L. 1. c. 1. * C. 19. Sect. 5. * C. 32. Sect. 4. * Append. c. 5. * C 40. Sect. 3 c. * Append. Sect. 2. 3. * C. 5. Sect. 6. * P. 14 15. * P. 30. * P. 46. * Letter to his Answerer p. 5. That Scripture is sufficient to convince the most acute Adversaries and that it is sufficiently certain * P. 28. * P. 31. * P. 31. * P. 116. * P. 32. * P. 33. * P. 34. * P. 34. * P. 34. * P. 35. * P. 36. * Dial. 2. Sect. 7. * P. 38. * P. 38. * P. 38. * P. 38. * Dial. 2. Sect. 14. * P. 41. That the Properties of a Rule of Faith do not belong to Oral Tradition * Apolog. P. 81. Considerations touching his Demonstrations in general * P. 53. * Append 2 d. P. 183. * Append. c. 6. Sect. 8. * Ibid. Sect. 9. * Ibid. Sect. 11. * Append. c. 7. Sect. 8. * Ibid. * P. 253. 254. * Extasis P. 24. Mr. S's demonstration à priori * P. 59 60. The First answer to this Demonstration * P. 60. * P. 75. * P. 54. * P. 78. * P. 89. * P. 54. * Chron. ad Annum Christ. 352. * Ad An. 363. * Ad An. 364. * Advers Lucifer * Ibid. * Ibid. * In Epist. ad Galat. l. 3. * Orat. 20. 21. * Orat. 25. * Chron. ad Annum octavum Maurit * Caus. Dei * P. 65. * Hist. Aethiop * P. 67. * P. 62. * P. 6◠The second Answer to his Demonstration * P. 53. * Heb. 5.11 12. * Advers Luciferian * P. 75. * P. 60. * P. 53. * P. 53. * Apology for Tradition p. 51. * Phoc. Ep. 7. * De Fid. Theol. Tract 1. Sect. 4. * Ibid. Sect. 5. * P. 53. 54. * Ibid. * P. 78. * P. 86. * P. 89. * P. 90 91. * P. 93. Mr. S's Demonstration à posteriori * P. 76. * P. 77 78. The First Answer to his second Demonstration * Dial. 1. Sect. 4. * Dial. 3. Sect. 7. * Dial. 1. Sect. 4. * In Vit. Romani Papae 117. A. C. 900. * In Platin. * Anno 506. * Anno 9.8 * Ennead 9. L. 1. Anno. 900. * De Regn. Ital. L. 6. * Chron. L. 4. * Fascic Tempor * Epist. 40. * Bell. Sacr. L. 1. c. 8. * Elfric Serm. ad Sacerdot * C. 2. 3. * De Rom. Pontif. L. 4. c. 12. * Annal. Tom. 10. Anno 900. * In Convers. Sancti Pauli Serm. 1. * C. 3. * C. 5. * C. 6. * C. 9. * C. 11. * C. 13 * C. 14 * C. 16. * C. 20 21 23. * C. 25. * C. 27. * Exomolog C. 68. * Ibid. * Dial. 3. Sect. 3. * Dial. 3. Sect. 7. * Reply to K. James L. 4. C. 6. * Apology for Tradition p. 49. The second Answer to his second Demonstration The third Answer to Mr. S's second Demonstration * Antiq. Jud. l. 13. c. 18. * Ibid. l. 17. c. 3. de Bell. Jud. l. 1. c. 4. l. 2. c. 12. * Antiq. l. 18. c. 2. * De Fid. Theol. Tract 1. Sect. 6. * Rep. to K. James observ 3. c. 4. * Pugio Fid. p. 145. * P. 76. * Apol. 123 c. *
adds that the whole Body is under every little part in its full proportions for he says expresly That the Head and Foot of the Body of Christ are as far distant from one another in the sacrament as they are in Heaven as if one should say that a Body all whose parts lye within the compass of a small pins-head may yet within that little compass have parts two yards distant from one another And lastly how the sensible species of Bread e. g. quantity whiteness softness c. can exist without any subject to affirm the possibility of which as generally they do is to say that there may be quantities of white and soft nothings For this is the plain English of that assertion that sensible species may exist without a subject which being strip't of those terms of Art species and subject that do a little disguise it it appears to be plain Non-sense Now the proper and necessary consequence of this Doctrine is to take away all certainty and especially the certainty of sense For if that which my sight and taste and touch do all assure me to be a little piece of Wafer may notwithstanding this be Flesh and Blood even the whole Body of a man then notwithstanding the greatest assurance that Sense can give me that any thing is this or that it may be quite another thing from what Sense reported it to be If so then farewel the Infallibility of Tradition which depends upon the certainty of Sense And which is a worse consequence if this Doctrine be admitted we can have no sufficient assurance that the Christian Doctrine is a Divine Revelation For the assurance of that depending upon the assurance we have of the Miracles said to be wrought for the confirmation of it and all the assurance we can have of a Miracle depending upon the certainty of our senses it is very plain that that Doctrine which takes away the certainty of Sense does in so doing overthrow the certainty of Christian Religion And what can be more vain than to pretend that a man may be assured that such a Doctrine is revealed by God and consequently true which if it be true a man can have no assurance at all of any Divine Revelation Surely nothing is to be admitted by us as certain which being admitted we can be certain of nothing It is a wonder that any man who considers the natural consequences of this Doctrine can be a Papist unless he have attained to Mr. Cressy's pitch of Learning who speaking of the difficult Arguments wherewith this Doctrine was pressed says plainly I must answer freely and ingenuously that I have not learned to answer such Arguments but to despise them And if this be a good way when ever we have a mind to believe any thing to scorn those Objections against it which we cannot solve then Christian Religion hath no advantage above the vilest Enthusiasms and a Turk may maintain Mahomet and his Alcoran in opposition to Christ and his Doctrine against all that Grotius or any other hath said if he can but keep his countenance and gravely say I have not learned to answer such Arguments but to despise them § 10. I will add one Instance more in another kind to shew the uncertainty of Oral and Practical Traditions and that shall be the Tradition concerning Pope Jone than which scarce any was ever more generally received in the Historical kind Many and great Authors affirm it as Testifiers of the general Fame None ever denied it till the Reformers had made use of it to the disadvantage of Popery Since that time not only Papists deny it but several of our own Writers cease to believe it Phil. Bergomensis tells the story thus Anno 858. John the 7 th Pope c. The Tradition is that this person was a Woman c. Here 's an Oral Tradition He concludes thus In detestation of whose filthiness and to perpetuate the memory of her Name the Popes even to this day going on Procession with the People and the Clergy when they come to the place of her Travel c. in token of abomination they turn from it and go a by-way and being past that detestable place they return into the way and finish their Procession Here is one Practical Tradition And for avoiding of the like miscarriages it was decreed that no one should thereafter be admitted into St. Peter 's Chair priusquam per foratam sedem futuri Pontificis genitalia ab ultimo Dyacone Cardinale attractarentur Here is another with a Witness Sabellicus relates the same and moreover says that this Porphyry Chair was in his time to be seen in the Popes Palace He adds indeed that Platina thinks that this Tradition of Pope Jone was not faithfully delivered to Posterity But however says he such a Tradition there is Concerning the first Practical Tradition Platina says that he may not deny it For the second he thinks the Chair rather design'd for a Stool for another use c. He concludes These things which I have related are commonly reported yet from uncertain and obscure Authors Therefore I resolved says he briefly and nakedly to set them down lest I should seem too obstinately and pertinaciously to have omitted that which almost all affirm It is no wonder that he says the Authors of this Report were uncertain and obscure since so very few writ any thing in that Age. But suppose none had writ of it so long as he acknowledges it to have been a general Oral Tradition attested by a solemn and constant Practice it has according to Mr. S's Principles greater certainty than if it had been brought down to us by a hundred Books written in that very Age. So that here 's an Oral and Practical Tradition continued we are sure for some hundreds of years preserved and propagated by a solemn practice of the Popes Clergy and People of Rome in their Processions and by a notorious Custom at the Election of every Pope and in a matter of so great importance to their Religion the honour of the See of Rome and the uninterrupted Succession from St. Peter being so nearly concerned in it that had it been false they had been obliged under pain of Damnation not only not to have promoted it but to have used all means to have discovered the falsity of it Therefore Mr. S. is bound by his own Principles either to allow it for a Truth or else to give an account when and how it begun which may possibly be made out by We Metaphysitians as he styles himself and his Scientifical Brethren but I assure him it is past the skill of Note-book Learning SECT X. § 1. IT is not the present perswasion of the Church of Rome nor ever was that their Faith hath descended to them by Oral Tradition as the sole Rule of it And this being proved the Supposition upon which his Demonstration is built falls to the ground And for the