nature should still lament and tremble that the entrances to Heaven are so few and so difficult though they were yet far more and much easier than this opinion makes them There are enow obstructions from the frailty of our Flesh the subtilty of the Devil the tyranny of our Passions and the perverse crookedness of our corrupted Wilâ—s without the additions of any more from the imperfections of our intellect Sufficient is the danger we run in not performing those Duties which vve understand aright without making our mis-understandings damnable and condemning that as a Guilt which is to be pitied as a misfortune What then shall vve believe Turks Jews Heathens Atheists themselves if there be any such in an equal possibility of salvation with the unerring Christian Shall vve save all Beasts of what kind soever clean or unclean in that mystical Ark the Church of God Certainly in the two contrary excesses of belief in this matter that on the side of Mercy hath the appearance of greater safety and I had rather think with Origen That the Devils themselves by the excessive kindness of their Judge shall at last be exempted from damnation than that he himself shall be damn'd for that Opinion But as to this their Objection I believe first That Reason it self will declare to every Man in the World that he ought to adhere to the Christian rather than to any other Religion whatsoever if all things be propounded to him in a clear and impartial manner and this whosoever shall deny I dare confidently affirm it is impossible for him to be a Christian But because there are thousand accidents which hinder the greatest part of the world from the advantages of so fair a proposal hence it comes to pass that so small a part of Mankind hath submitted to the Obedience of the Christian Faith Now to condemn all those Millions of persons many millions for one that is to be saved is so wild an uncharitableness that few have been so barbarously severe as to be guilty of it and therefore those whose Ignorance in these matters hath been invincible they left to the hands of God without declaring a definitive opinion either of their safety or perdition Now if we consider rightly what Ignorance is to be accounted invincible we shall by this means restore the greatest part of Mankind into a hopeful and comfortable condition and none even amongst the worst Religions will be left to a certain ruine but such whose Consciences have been neglected or forced aside by those who ought to have been guided by them and such who can have no plea against the rigour of their sentence because they deserted themselves as well as God And the disobedience of Men to their own Conscience is not only in things of practice but also of belief and speculation though not in so evident and immediate a manner by suffering themselves to be deceived by the insensible operations of interest and prejudice Nor does it follow from hence that Christ is not the only source and cause of eternal felicity for I acknowledge there is no other Name under heaven by which men can hope for salvation But I may very well believe withal that there are secret and wonderful waies by which God may be pleased to apply his Merits to mankind besides those direct open and ordinary ones of Baptism and Confession which I have only advanc'd briefly in this place being a matter that will require a more ample and particular examination Now concerning the Salvation of all sorts of Christians except their lives disagree from their doctrines which is likewise a disobedience to their Reasons I know not why I should be terrifi'd out of my Charity by any Anathema whatsoever that shall proceed from the mouth of Man For I cannot see how any but God himself can certainly know that any man is an Heretick since it is only he who can discern by what close and unlawful means he corrupts his understanding and hardens his own will to the obstinate belief of any Errour for without that obstinacy there is no Heresie and without the perfect sight of the whole contexture of a mans Thoughts and Actions there is no knowledge of such an obstinacy and therefore when the Church declares any Opinion to be Heresie it is to be accepted as if the Law should say whosoever kills a man is a Murtherer which is a sentence not absolute but to be qualified with Circumstances even so the Church pronounces whosoever holds this Doctrine is an Heretick with an evident reservation of some Circumstances in the meaning thereof for no man can imagine that the sentence includes those who never shall hear of it nor no more say I those who though they hear of it yet cannot by any means bring their Conscience to the assent For to obey in matters of belief without being able to believe the thing commanded is no less and seems more a contradiction than simply to obey without knowledge of a Command Thus much briefly concerning Heresie which indeed is a Subject worthy a Treatise by it self But this will not suffice unless we can also clear our selves from the imputation of Schisme the ordinary railing word in all Controversies and a slander which is often fatal in making where it falsly accuses a separation of which they are truly guilty the word it self bearing witness against them who break the precious unity of the Christian Church but that is done not so much by them who differ in Opinions as by them who will not allow of such a difference Who knows whether that God who liked best that no mens Bodies should have the same complexion no mens Faces the same figures no Hands the same lines no Voices the same sounds nay not so much but their motions and gestures should be distinguishable has not likewise best pleased himself with no less variety in the parts of Men that are immaterial and even in the most immaterial Actions of those parts which is the worship and adoration of a Deity Does God gain any thing by our devotions does he receive hurt from one kind of worship and advantage by another is he pleased with any smell in the sacrifice besides that of Obedience and can a plain uniform unalterable obedience be expected without Commands of the same nature Without doubt he who gave Rules which might accept of so many several interpretations when he might have made them as plain to all in one sense as they seem now to every man in his own is likewise well contented that they shall be interpreted severally and as the Divines confess that the same words of Scripture admit of a Literal Typical Anagogical sense and that all those senses are both true and intended by the Holy Ghost that Spirit of unity that writ them so I say the Commands of God concerning Religion are equally obeyed and fulfilled by all the various kinds of Obedience which the Consciences of men conceive themselves bound
should direct you to forsake your Christian-belief for which the Devil do's not want such pleasant colours and specious fallacies as may possibly deceive even a good understanding Before I answer this Objection I desire to know of him that makes it what it is for something it must be which he places in the same Ecclesiastical Superiority that I do reason The private Spirit what if that should perswade him to this Apostacy It cannot Not indeed if it be true but the same condition will make Reason as infallible as that and I may as well judg of the truth of the one as you of the other What is it then you will trust your Soul with in this important business Is it the Authority of Men These verily may lead you into error and it is not impossible into the greatest and worst of all which is the desertion of Christ himself not that this is likely to happen neither more probable is it that our Reason should so far misguide us But alas in this affair of so vast and so eternal consequence what security can we assume whilst there remains a possibility of miscarriage and this possibility is Evident For let us consider it in a Council which if there be any assurance in the number of men is that where most probably it may be found I will not here reckon up the many errors which great and famous Councils have fallen into themselves and labour'd to establish in others they are many and notorious But certainly if a Council could take away the satisfaction of Christs death and Divinity of his person as was done by that great one of the Arrians which condemned Athanasius not without the approbation of the Pope and the whole World besides a Council has already done that thing which you affirm impossible for it to do For they who believed Christ to come into the World as an example and pattern onely of Holiness are no more to be call'd Christians than Abrahamists or Davidists If you will here contend that even these men deserted not wholy Christianity as a man may do by the impulsion of his own private Reason yet certainly you will confess that they who fell so far into error might as well have sunk deeper and exalted some other Prophet above Christ as well as made Christ to be but a Prophet and this possibility of Errour even in so high a degree we shall find in the nature and very Elements of a Council for if any one Member of it may be a Heathen or Atheist in Opinion as the lives of many Popes and the speeches of some declare that they themselves have been why not two not three not more not the Major part that is the whole Council From the Sanctions of the 2 â— Nicene Council which establish'd the worship of Images how easie a step was there made for the next to the introduction of a full undisguis'd and Heathenish Idolatry which we must not say could not because by the mercy of God it did not happen And I verily believe if God had not stirr'd up some persons of excellent Abilities and worthy Spirits for such sure they were though not exempt from humane weaknesses to examine by the Rules of their own Reasons those follies and dangerous Errours in Religion which partly by the Interest partly by the Ignorance of Men and insensible advances of ill Custome were blindly embraced by the whole World if these Men I say had not discover'd the past Errours and by that means made their Adversaries more cautious not to fall into any new ones the world through the Adoration of Saints and Images and the boundless Increase of vain and Superstitious Ceremonies would have past before this time to its old and abominable worship of several Deities and to a Religion overwhelm'd if not with the same yet with as many and as vain Impieties It remains therefore that you put your Confidence rather in the Traditions of the former than the Commands of the present Church but what those were you must either trust some number of Men present which is not without the possibility of being misguided or your own search and diligence which is to fall into that Opinion which you condemn in me And truly they who build their Belief wholly upon the Authority of past or present Ages if they look upon all the Consequences of that Opinion are in much greater danger of being drawn from the Christian Faith than those who remit the judgment of these things to their own Reason For ever since the beginning of the Christian belief there has been the Authority of above an hundred to one against it and this Authority backt and strengthened with the universal agreement of more than three thousand years before it But on the contrary if we weigh impartially the Motives and Arguments which every Religion can produce in its own defence Reason it self will find more and much greater for the Christian than it can for any other Belief whatsoever And I am very confident that no man ever from a Christian became a Turk or a Jew because his Reason told him that was a better Religion but because either fear of punishment or hope of reward or some other sinister Cause perswaded his Reason that the worst Religion in it self would be the better to him upon those Conditions Now all those Arguments by which some men have laboured to prove that our Guide in spiritual matters ought to be Infallible will though they be granted for true as I believe in some sense they are will not at all dispossess Reason of this Authority which we have declared to be her due For the Infallibility of a Guide I conceive to be only this That it cannot fail to bring us to that end for which we chose to be guided by it and if to this end there happen to be a thousand several waies it is a Guide no less infallible as to the End if it lead us through a long an unpleasant and obscure Tract than if it conducted us by a short a delightful and an open road for not the goodness of the passage but certainty of not missing the End is that which constitutes this kind of Infallibility And truly every mans particular Reason if well followed for whatsoever Guide you pitch upon whether Scripture Spirit Church past or present or any thing else imaginable must have that condition annext or else it will become unprofitable will infallibly carry him at last though perhaps through many tedious and troublesome wandrings to his eternal happiness if it be followed for that condition cannot be repeated too often with constancy diligence and sobriety This Doctrine sets the great gate of Heaven so wide open that it will displease those men who with an envious kind of pride think it more honour to enter in with a few at a narrow wicket But I truly out of an humble consideration of my own weakness and the general imbecillity of humane
to strike at the root of this Argument it is false that the worship or honour of God consists in the opinion of others if it did Idolatry for four thousand years had been the best nay the only Religion and if I were now in the South Continent where I suppose I should be the only Christian I ought not to abstain from the Christian worship of God no nor to hide or disgâ—â—…ise it for fear least the wonder contempt and mockery of Infidels should on a sudden I know not how convert it into sin and blasphemy True it is that in honour paid from Men to Men custome consent and acknowledgment makes up the business and an honour contrary to the use of the place is counted an affront as to put off the Hat would be in the East and in the West to keep it on before Princes But the reason of this is because men who are not able to search into the hearts must be govern'd in their judgment of them by the exteriour actions and the measure or standard of those is Custome but with God it is quite otherwise He beholds and judges the very thoughts of man which are the fountains of his actions so much more fully and plainly than we do the actions themselves that he needs not make a second a mediate a syllogistical judgment of the reality of mens worship from the external circumstantial and onely probable testimonies of their outward behaviours And truly if we put the case amongst Men methinks a great Roman Emperour that calls himself Master of the world should delight to prove himself to be so from the variety of homages tribute and worship which he receives from several Nations and no more refuse to be honour'd in several fashions than he would to be prais'd in several Languages He would be glad perhaps to establish the Latine Tongue and make that the Speech of all Countries but finding that design to be impossible would at least pardon that diversity which agrees and consents in his own glory Truly if men could cast away so much passion as to make but true Comparisons they would find no more hurt from the use of different Ceremonies then of different Tongues in the same City and we might be as well allowed to serve God after the English manner as to speak English in the Spanish Dominions As words are the images of our thoughts so our thoughts are of the things themselves and as well may differing thoughts truly represent the worship of one God and of his Son Christ Jesus as differing words can represent the same thought And this the Roman Church seems to acknowledge which does not think sufficient Unity in Gods Service to be retain'd with the allowance of more than of one Language and for preservation of Fantastical Identity teaches her Sons first to think and afterwards to speak they know not what They say first Our errour is the same with that of the Greeks which is taxed by Saint Paul to the Corinthians That they sought after wisdom but that the world by wisdom knew not God that the wisdom of the wise was destroyed and the understanding of the prudent brought to nothing that it was made foolishness nay it was confounded by the foolish things of the world And against this wisdom many excellent things are spoken in the beginning of that Epistle and it is strucken down as Saint Paul was himself by a greater light of Divine truth which came from God for that very purpose to amaze and confound it first and then to convert it But if we mark it well we shall observe that under this name of Wisdom which is arraigned condemned nay and executed here for it is brought to nothing is not signified Humane Reason but that which among the Greeks at that time was falsly and blindly esteemed to be so As in the Laws against Magick not that which is truly but that which is falsly called so is only condemned And therefore Saint Paul names it the wisdom of words the enticing words of mans wisdom and the wisdom after the flesh and the wisdom of the Princes of the world By which three names are plainly methinks described the three great suborners and corrupters of Humane Reason and not at all it self the desire of Reputation of Pleasure and Profit By the first we forsake the Truth to make demonstrations of our wit and eloquence By the second to compass those carnal and worldly pleasures which our own true Reason does not allow of and therefore we will not allow of it as Henry the Eight seems to have left the Pope because he refused to dispence with his lusts and to call that Matrimony which was indeed Adultery And by the third to comply with the interest of States and Princes and either willingly deceiving our selves with the errours of our Governours or deceiving others with a desire to Govern them And these three at least the two latter causes of errour in the understanding may be the Reason contained with truth in the parable concerning which is strongest That that which falsly seemed to be Humane Reason and not that which truly is so is accused by Saint Paul appears yet more plainly where he says that God hath chosen the things which are not to confound the things which are where the things which are not can signifie nothing else but the things which are esteemed as nothing that is neither of value in themselves nor of power to produce any effects True it is that the best and truest Humane Reason could not have found out of it self that wisdom of God in a mystery even that hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world which is the mystery of Christ Jesus but it was necessary it should first be revealed by that Spirit which can only search and discover the deep things of God But as soon as the Spirit had reveal'd it which it did by Miracles by fulfilling of Prophecies and many other means of power and demonstration even Humane Reason was able to behold and to confess it not that Grace had alter'd the Eye-sight of Humane Reason but that it had drawn the object nearer to it And till the object was brought so nigh the wisdom of man did as safely not discern it as it does not now the new state of things which shall be revealed at the Second coming And whereas they oppose against this the saying of the Apostle that the Natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him neither can he know them because they are spiritually discern'd The word Natural I take to be a very ill translation and conceive it ought to be rendred the sensual man for such 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek and Animalis in the Latine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 many times signifying the lower and sensitive part of the Soul in distinction to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the upper or rational as anima is