because such Actions do tend to the general Happiness of his Creatures whom he loves § 16. and for the contrary Reason it will follow that he hates and abhors all Actions that are evil And this is what I mean when I say That God is most holy 19. All possible Excellency or Perfection that I can conceive is reducible unto these Five Heads viz. 1. Perfection of Being which consists in perpetual Duration without any Decay or Infirmity 2. Perfection of Understanding which consists in such Knowledg and Wisdom as is free all Mistake or Ignorance 3. Perfection of the Will which consists in a free Liberty to choose or refuse without any Constraint or fatal Necessity 4. Perfection of Power which consists in an Ability to do every thing And 5. Moral Perfection which consists in an inflexible Resolution always to do and encourage that which is morally good and to avoid and discourage whatsoever is morally evil Now since all these Perfections are in God in the most absolute manner as I think I have shewn in the foregoing Paragraphs from hence it will follow That God is most absolutely perfect 20. And since he who is absolutely perfect can stand in need of nothing it must also follow that God is most perfectly happy in Himself 21. As my Reason do's evidently demonstrate unto me the Being of a God so does it not in the least suggest to me any Argument to conclude that there is any more but One God And it is absurd and unreasonable to multiply Beings without any Ground or Reason for it 22. That there is a real and not only a nominal Distinction between the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost or Spirit that they are frequently spoken of in the Holy Scriptures in such Terms as we ordinarily use when we speak of Three Persons altho sometimes this Expression Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit may be put to signifie not so much the Person as the Power Effect or Energy of God's Spirit That altho the Son be often spoken of as really and truly a Man yet many things are said of him which cannot agree to a meer Man or to any created Being whatsoever and that there are such things also spoken of the Holy Ghost as cannot be accommodated unto a Creature Moreover that the Son derives his Being from and always depends upon the Father as the Holy Ghost does from and upon the Father and the Son All these things I say in my Opinion are not to be denyed by any one who will but interpret the Holy Scriptures according to the ordinary Sense and Signification of the Words thereof and not according to his own Prejudices or preconceived Opinions And altho the Socinians do clearly enough expound some of those Texts of Scripture which with more Zeal than Reason are sometimes urged against them yet as to the principal Passages which are alleged to prove what I have now asserted I think their Interpretation of them not only to be harsh and strained which in a manner is acknowledged even by their own acute and brief Historian in the last Paragraph of his second Letter but also many times to be utterly irreconcileable unto the Words and Context And now to explain those Conceptions which arise in my Mind upon the Consideration of the Texts here hinted at as well as in a Matter so abstruse and remote from my Senses I am able since I cannot find a more proper Term to express the Distinction of the Father Son and Holy Ghost by I call them Three Persons and not knowing what other Title to give a Divine Person who is no Creature I call each Person God But I give the Title of God in a more emphatical manner unto the Father than unto the Son or Holy Ghost because the Father depends on none but they do depend on him And since both my Reason and the Holy Scriptures do teach me to own no more than one God I am of necessity compelled to say that these Three are so united together tho in such a manner as is above my Understanding as to be but one God And altho it argues a great deal of Imperfection in Humane Speech that for want of other fit and proper Terms we are forced to give the same Appellation to each Person singly and to the Three conjointly yet this does not imply any manner of Contradiction as some do object because when we apply the Word God to one single Person it has not the same exact and adequate Signification as when we ascribe it unto the Three Persons conjointly for that would imply that each single Person were at the same time the Three Persons and so confound that Distinction which the Holy Scriptures do so often and apparently make between them And this analogical Difference in the Signification of the Word God will easily solve most of those Objections which the Socinians do bring against the Doctrin of the Trinity And because I know no better Word to express that Unity which I apprehend to be between the Three Persons I therefore say that they are One in Essence or Substance For Unity of Concord or Consent alone does not seem enough to me to denominate them to be One God And because I find that the Son is said to be begotten and the Holy Ghost to proceed or be sent or emitted I therefore make use of these Terms without pretending to assign the Difference between Generation and Procession And altho the Son and the Holy Ghost being each of them God are and must needs be of the same Nature and upon that account equal with the Father yet it is manifest that this Equality must be understood with an Allowance for the absolute Independence of the Father and the Dependence of the Son and Holy Ghost upon him 23. All the Objections that I can remember to be made against the Doctrin of the Trinity thus stated I think are easie enough to be solved by what I have now said excepting Two which must be particularly answered The first is taken from Joh. 10. 33. c. But tho our Saviour did not here assert his Divinity when there seemed to be occasion for it yet it will not follow that therefore he is not God Especially if we consider that it was not always his Custom to give full and compleat Answers unto such captious Questions and Objections as were put to him But sometimes he contented himself only with shewing the Unreasonableness of those who proposed them of which we have one Instance Mat. 21. 23. c. and another Joh. 8. 3. c. and as some think another Mat. 22. 17. c. And we may as well conclude that he had no Authority for what he did because he did not declare it when the Chief Priests and Elders questioned it Mat. 21. 23. as deny his Divinity because he did not expresly maintain it when on that account he was charged with Blasphemy The other Objection is drawn from Mar. 13.
in Scripture as Joyned together in one Society or Body which is called the Church of which Christ Jesus is the chief or Head and under an obligation to live in communion and fellowship one with another under those Laws and Constitutions which Christ has given them but not that I can find in Scripture obliged to joyn with or submit to any one person as the Vicar of Christ and the visible Head of the Church upon Earth For if Christ had appointed any such person as his Deputy upon Earth he must either have declared a matter of such consequence with great plainness and evidence or else it would be very hard to find fault with any man for being mistaken in it Whereas the Arguments which those of the Church of Rome bring to prove either that such a Vicar there must be or that St. Peter the Apostle was the Man or that the Pope or Bishop of Rome and not the Bishop of Antioch is the Successour of St. Peter both in his Bishoprick and Authority are all so weak and precarious so forced and perplexed and so fully confuted by the Protestant Divines that nothing in my Opinion but Blindness of Understanding or worldly Interest can prevail with the Members of that Church still to insist upon them Now that Christ instituted but one Church in which all true Believers and good livers are for ever to be comprised is very plain And altho through the Mistakes and Perverseness of Man this Church is rent and divided into opposite and contending parts and parties yet this does not hinder but that according to its true and primitive Constitution it is or ought to be one as a Kingdom or Common-wealth by its Laws and Constitutions is but one Society altho there may arise Factions and different Interests in it nor shall any Man be esteemed as a Member of the Church before God who is not ready and willing according to the best of his power and knowledge to maintain the Unity of it and that upon those very Terms and none other which Christ has appointed as near as possibly he can find and apprehend them Moreover that all the Laws and Constitutions on which Christ has founded the Church and by which he would have it regulated are exactly agreeable unto the Rules of sound Morality and the Will of God cannot be so much as doubted and therefore it is truly said that the Church is Holy altho every particular Member thereof has both his frailties and his sins which yet he must repent of and so become holy as the Church is holy or else he violates one of the main and fundamental Laws and so becomes as it were an Out-law of the Church and forfeits his part in all the Privileges that belong unto that Society And whereas before the coming of Christ the People of Israel did enjoy more of the Favour of God and had greater privileges and advantages on the score of their being God's chosen and peculiar People than any or all other Nations of the World The Gospel of Christ on the contrary now looks upon all as equally entitled unto God's Favour and the advantages thereon depending who take care duly to qualifie themselves for it So that whereas formerly the Church that is the chosen People of God might have been said to be particular as being in a manner limited to one Nation or People now on the contrary it is Catholick that is to say universal as being no way confined to one place or Nation all People being equally chosen by God in Christ who will receive and love according to the Gospel 41. In those several Revelations which God was pleased to make of himself after the Fall of Man unto Adam to Abraham and to the People of Israel there was still a plain intimation given them that in the time to come there should an extraordinary Person arise in the World who should yet more clearly make known the Will of God to Mankind But when Christ who was That Person did accordingly come and send his Apostles to preach the Gospel over all the Earth he neither suggested to them nor they unto the World that any other Revelation was ever after to be expected But always gave them to understand that God had in the Gospel compleated and finished all that declaration which he intended to make of Himself or his Will unto Mankind until the general Judgment and Dissolution of the World If therefore the Holy Scripture had given me no manner of assurance of the perpetuity of the Church my own Reason would have been enough to make me conclude that God in his Providence will so order the matter as that the Christian Religion being the only known and ordinary means of eternal Salvation shall never be wholly extinguished while the World lasts so as to stand in need of any new Revelation to revive and restore it But that there shall always be a certain Company of Men evidently conspicuous to the World teaching and professing the true Christian Religion without any Errour or Corruption in Doctrine or Worship is what I can no where find promised or foretold either by Christ or any of his Apostles On the contrary there are several passages in the New Testament which do plainly seem to foretell that in process of time most pernicious Doctrines and practices should prevail and take place even amongst the generality of those who should profess themselves to be Disciples of Christ And whosoever shall but lightly compare the state of Christianity for several Centuries before the Reformation with that Draught of it which is left us by Christ and his Apostles in the Holy Scriptures must if he be impartial I think be fully convinced of the truth of those Predictions 42. Whether or no God has or does at any time communicate or bestow any extraordinary Grace or Assistance upon those who are no visible Members of the Church but altogether strangers unto that Revelation which he has made of himself is a question which the virtuous lives and heroick actions of some brave Heathens make it hard positively to determine in the negative But that he will give so much Grace and strength to every one who shall become a Member of Christ's Church as that thereby they may if the fault be not their own sufficiently qualifie themselves for eternal Happiness by the performance of those things which he requires on their part to be done is what I think no man can doubt of who does but in general consider the Mercy and Love which God designed even unto all men but more especially unto the Church in sending our Saviour Christ Jesus into the world altho there were not any particular Promises of this nature in the Gospel And that this Grace and ability to do good is in Scripture ascribed unto the Ministry and Influence of the Holy Ghost upon the hearts and minds of true Believers is plain and generally owned by all Christians But that this influence of God's Spirit does not work so uncontrollably but that it may be resisted and even wholly rejected and lost is I think sufficiently obvious as well from Reason and Experience as form those passages of the Holy Scripture wherein
least that what I have here done may move some more able and Judicious Person to take the Work in hand and supply those Defects of which I have been guilty THE CONTINUATION OF A Gentleman's Religion Being the Second PART 1. THE Holy Scriptures being the only authentick Record that I am able to find of the Christian Religion I take it for granted that they do express Divine Matters really and truly as the things are in themselves And therefore I cannot but believe that all the Doctrin therein delivered is most-certainly true altho many times I am not able to understand the Design and. Meaning of some Expressions and Passages which do occur therein I think it indeed to be very proper that Men of any reasonable Learning and Prudence should modestly offer their Thoughts to the World in order to the explaining of such Places of the Scriptures as appear to be abstruse and difficult But he who speaks his own Words and not those of Scripture can therein only offer his own Apprehensions to which no Man can be obliged to subscribe any farther than as he is in his own Reason convinced of the Truth of them and their Consonancy with the Scriptures 2. I do not apprehend that an implicit Faith is due to the Church of Rome which challenges it Part 1. § 21. much less sure to any other Church which does not require it When therefore any Church much more when any private Men do offer me any Doctrin of Religion in their own Words I think I ought to consider First Whether what they say is intelligible For tho we may be obliged to believe such things as are above our Understanding to comprehend Part 1. § 33. yet it is impossible for any Man to give an explicit Assent to any Form of Words if he does not Know the meaning of them Secondly Whether it is agreeable to the self-evident Principles of Reason for If I apprehend it to be otherwise it is impossible for me to believe it Part 1. § 33. Nor must any Text of Scripture be interpreted above the Level of plain and self-evident Reason whatever the literal Sense may seem to be And Thirdly whether the Truth of it can be proved by any solid Argument either from Reason or Scripture for tho a Doctrin be both intelligible and possible yet still it may be false and therefore is not to be believed except it can be proved These Rules I have endeavoured strictly to observe in the Trial of those Doctrins which I am now about to propose and I desire my Reader carefully to make use of the same in the Examination of all that I shall offer unto him But here I must desire him to take notice that I do fuppose him to be well acquainted with the Holy Scriptures and also with the common Arguments upon which the several Parties of Christians do ground and maintain their Opinions And therefore for his Ease as well as my own I shall save my self the Labour of mentioning such Arguments and Places of Scripture as are usually brought to prove those Points which are generally acknowledged by all Christians and even in those Points which are controverted between different Parties I shall ordinarily think it enough to hint at some of those Texts and Arguments which are used on either side of which I can scarce suppose any Man to be ignorant that is but moderately acquainted with the Principles of Christianity and the several Parties that profess it 3. To believe what God makes known and to do what he commands is what all Men call Religion But things that are impossible 't is certain that God requires from no Man Part 1. § 14. When therefore Damnation is denounced in Scripture against those who receive not the Gospel it must needs be understood only of them in whose Power it was to have received it and not of such who are invincibly ignorant either for want of Capacity John 9. 41. or of the means of Knowledge Joh. 15. 22. But for a Man who has both the Capacity and Means of Knowledge through Negligence to continue in Ignorance of God's Will my Reason tells me is a very great Sin besides all those Places of Scripture which do require us diligently to seek after Knowledge 4. That there is a God is sufficiently to be proved from our own Reason and Observation But fully to comprehend his Nature or declare in all Points what he is is by all allowed to be impossible to us 5. That God never had a Beginning I think I have sufficiently concluded Part 1. § 6. And if the holy Scripture had not told me that he is from Everlasting to Everlasting yet my own Reason would have inferred that he is subject to no Decay nor ever shall have an Ending 6. The Nature of every Material Being seems necessarily to imply a Possibility of having its Parts disjoyned and separated one from another and consequently of being dissolved and destroyed And theresore I conclude that the eternal God does not consist of Matter and that Being which is intelligent and does not consist of any material Parts I call a Spirit And this is what I mean when I say that God is a Spirit As for those Expressions the Eyes of the Lord the Arm of the Lord and such like which do occur sometimes in Scripture and seem to imply Bodily Parts it is manifestly obvious that they must be purely metaphorical 7. Our Experience does sufficiently testifie that whatsoever is visible to us is ever material Since therefore God does not consist of Matter I conclude that he is invisible to Mortal Eyes as the Scripture positively declares him to be And all those Texts which seem to say that he has been seen by Man I think must of necessity be interpreted some other way viz. either 1. Of an Angel appearing in a glorious and majestatick manner Or 2. Of the eternal Son of God assuming a Bodily Appearance as after he took our Nature upon him Or 3. Of some visible and extraordinary Signs and Tokens that the invisible God was there present in an extraordinary Manner Or 4. Of those mystical and Hieroglyphical Representations which God has sometimes been pleased to make of himself not to the Senses but to the Imagination and Understanding of his Prophets in their extatick Dreams and Visions 8. Amongst all those things which I can conceive possible to be done i. e. to imply no Contradiction I can find nothing which to me appears more difficult than what God has already done in the Structure of the Universe And therefore I conclude that God can do whatsoever in its self is possible to be done which is what I mean when I say that he is Almighty Nor is there any one sure who will venture to say that God can do such things as imply a Contradiction either in themselves or to his own Nature and Attributes 9. That God who made all things should be ignorant of any thing appears to
we are exhorted not to quench the Spirit but to walk in and be led by the Spirit and the like which were apparently needless and to no purpose if the operations of the Holy Spirit upon our Hearts were so strong as that we could not chuse but comply with them Now the things which God requires to be performed on our part in order to life everlasting are apparent and can be no more but to believe those Truths which he has made known which is called Faith and to observe those Precepts which he has commanded which is called Obedience And as I have already shewn that these things are required from no man beyond the measures of possibility Part 1. § 14. So does the Scripture most fully assure us that God will in them make a very sufficient allowance for the ignorance and frailty and even for the perversness of our Nature and will not only be merciful unto our Weaknesses and ordinary Failings but will pardon and forgive even our greatest and most wilful Sins upon our true and hearty Repentance which is a part of our Obedience And as for the sin against the Holy Ghost which is said to be absolutely unpardonable I do not think it needful to enquire here into the Nature and Consequence of it but shall refer my Reader to that excellent Sermon of Dr. Tillotson the late Arch-Bishop of Canterbury upon that subject But here it is highly necessary that we should all take that Caution which both Reason and the Holy Scripures do give us viz. That we should not presume so much upon God's Mercy and Lenity as from hence to take occasion of going on in our Wickedness For Kindness thus abused will certainly turn into the highest Wrath and much increase the Damnation of a Sinner 43. I am inclined to think that those Arguments which are drawn from the nature of the Humane Soul it self are not by themselves sufficient to prove that it is immortal but on the contrary that the eternal duration of any created Being depends not so much upon its own Nature as upon the Will of God who created it But as Reason alone suggests unto us that there is a Life to come after this Part 1. § 13. And that Man was at first designed by God unto life eternal Part 2. § 29. so does the Holy Scripture most clearly assure us that they who perform what God requires shall be happy to all Eternity and they who do not so shall be miserable without end The reconcilableness of which with God's Justice and Mercy I have accounted for § 17. But wherein this Happiness of the righteous shall consist we can but very imperfectly tell and whether the Punishment of the wicked shall literally be in everlasting Fire or whether that expression be only made use of Metaphorically to signifie the greatness of the Torment I think it not necessary to determine But both my own Reason and some places of Scripture do seem strongly to suggest that neither the Reward of good men nor the Punishment of the evil shall be equal unto all but greater or less according as they have exceeded one another in the Holiness or Wickedness of their Lives 44. That all Men are mortal is sufficiently testified by out daily Experience But that the Souls of Men immediately upon their separation from their Bodies are not in a state of Insensibility but are straitway conveyed into a state either of Joy or Misery seems very apparent to me from St. Paul's desire to be dissolved that he might be with Christ from our Saviours Promise unto the Thief upon the Cross and from the Story or Parable of the Rich man and Lazarus as also from some other intimations which the Holy Scripture gives us But since there is one day to be a general Judgment of all mankind before the Tribunal of Christ where every man must receive his Sentence for eternal either Happiness or Misery as the Holy Scripture does assure us It seems not irrational to judge that neither the righteous nor the wicked do receive their full and final portion until that Judgment be passed upon them I know not therefore how to condemn those who anciently took up the Custom of praying for their deceased Friends who had lived holily and died piously that they might find favour and acceptance at the general Judgment and have their portion of Glory augmented But I can by no means approve of those who upon such pitiful suggestions have presumed to determine that there is such a place as Purgatory where the Souls of men are to be purged and suffer a temporary Punishment before their admission into Heaven And altho I look upon their praying for the dead to be a mistake rather than a sin yet their taking of Mony for so doing and raising such a Revenue upon that Fund I look upon to be a most ungodly Cheat and Imposition upon the People 45. Altho I do not apprehend that there is any natural decay in the general frame and structure of this World yet it is certain that by the Power of God who made it it may whenever he pleases be destroyed and dissolved and the Scripture assures us that it shall be so at the time of the general Judgment at which time also there shall be an universal Resurrection of the Bodies of all those who have died and a change of those who shall be then alive But whether all the same individual Particles of each mans Body which have been laid down in the earth shall be raised and reunited again to their Souls I look upon to be a needless Enquiry What St. Paul says upon this Argument 1 Cor. 15. 35. does abundantly satisfie me the purport of whose words I take to be this viz. That God who being the Author of Nature has given such a vegetative power to a Grain of Corn that when it is thrown into the Ground and there macerated and dissolved it springs up again and brings forth a Body suitable and proper to its self that that same God I say both can and will at the last day from the dead and dissolved Bodies of Men raise up such Bodies as shall please himself And as there is a continual and great change of Particles in the Humane Body between the Birth and the Grave so I see not what Absurdity would follow if we should allow also that there is a like change between the Grave and the Resurrection 46. And thus I have endeavoured to give a brief and plain account of that part of Christianity which is purely or chiefly doctrinal which upon the most strict search that I have been able to make I think is exactly agreeable to the tenour and main design of the Holy Scriptures