I took him to be How can I charge such a man for not doing his duty How can I convince his Conscience that it was his own fault and negligence that he did not that which he ought and might have done Is there no man then to be found that could possibly have done no more good than actually he has done Does every man improve that Talent of Grace which God has given him to the uttermost of his power and skill Or will any of you when you confess your sins unto Almighty God tell him to this purpose Lord I confess I do daily fall into many and grievous sins But since they are gone and past I perceive there was no remedy for it it could not be avoided those sins must needs have been practis'd by me I did whatsoever I was enabled to do If I had had more strength I had done better when thou bestowest on me more Talents of Grace I shall be a more profitable servant and yield thee a greater interest and advantage by them If any of you entertain such conceits as these I confess you are a great deal more righteous than I thought you had been 13. For mine own part I confess with grief and shame and self-condemnation that I have offended Almighty God in many respects when I might have done otherwise I have not only hid my Talent in a Napkin I have not only not improv'd that stock of grace which God gave me but on the contrary notwithstanding that I have been very laborious and abounding in the unfruitful works of darkness I have wilfully grieved the Holy Spirit of God and many times quenched his good motions in me Yea so voluntarily and resolvedly have I done all these sins that I am perswaded I could easily have chosen whether I would have committed them or no no necessity at all lay upon me to compel me thereunto God was faithful and righteous in his promises and dealings with me and my own wicked heart deceiv'd me And I think all of you have been guilty in some measure of betraying and surrendring the abilities which God has bestowed on you though I dare not charge you so deeply as my self 14. Now that we have heard who may be said to be able to resist a Temptation or not For my more distinct proceeding in the confirmation of St. Paul's Proposition in my Text I will take our Saviour's counsel I will sit down and examin whether he that hath but ten thousand be able to meet with him which cometh against him with twenty thousand Here are two Enemies Camps and no doubt great Forces on both sides But without question disproportionable It concerns me therefore now by taking a survey and muster of each to demonstrate that in all respects the advantage lies on our side I mentioned before briefly that we had three especial Enemies to deal with the Devil the World and the Flesh We will proceed in this order against them in the first place examining the Devil's power and the forces we have to oppose against him 15. There are many terrible names I confess by which the Devil is described in Holy Writ He is called Abaddon and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Destroyer as one whose imployment it were to counter-work against God who calls himself the Saviour and preserver of all men He is call'd a ramping and a roaring Lyon that runs about seeking whom he may devour He is call'd the great Dragon the old Serpent the Devil and Sathan Apocal. 12.9 which deceiveth the whole world All this in one verse He is call'd the Red fiery Dragon There are extant a great many more hideous pictures of him in Gods Word But these will serve our turn sufficiently to shew how dangerous an Enemy we have and therefore how great ought to be our resolution and wisdom in encountring with him And lest we should think that since he is named in the fore-cited places in the singular number that therefore there is but one Lyon and but one fiery Dragon to deal with all mankind and thereupon begin to be a little more secure since we should have hard fortune if it should light upon us to be singled out by him out of so infinite a crowd as the world is No God knows it is so farr from that that there is an unutterable number of them such an infinite vast Army that one whole Legion which are near about 4000 were at leisure to possess one man And St. Paul tells us We wrestle not against flesh and bloud as if he should say Ephes 6.12 These worldly Enemies are so weak and despicable in comparison of those we are to meet withal that they are not to be reckoned of But says he We wrestle against Principalities and Powers There are it seems many Principalities and Powers against the Rulers of the darkness of this world against spiritual wickednesses in high places the word is in heavenly places 16. Now What have we to oppose against such an innumerable multitude of Spirits whereof each particular for his excessive strength is called a Lion for his fierceness a Dragon for his poysonous malice a Red Dragon for the extream intenseness of that poysonous malice a Red fiery Dragon and for his wisdom and cunning to make use of this strength fierceness and malice he is called the old Serpent one that has been a Serpent continually spitting out his poyson against us within very few dayes since any creature was and therefore if at the first by his own natural wit he was able upon even terms to overcome Adam then innocent and therefore not apt to betray himself as we are What may we conceive of him now after above 5000 years experience I say What shall we who are ready to fall into a sound if we see but an apparition of one of them though he do us no harm How are we likely think you to behave our selves in combat against so many thousands of them 17. Why truly God be thanked notwithstanding all this we may do well enough For we have spiritual Armies on our side too that are able to contend with all these and overcome them in all these advantages which they have against us Are they many Michael and his Angels are more certainly Which to me is evident by that saying in Daniel Dan. 7.10 where it is made an expression of Gods Glory and Majesty His innumerable multitude of attendants the words are Thousand thousands minister unto him and ten thousand times ten thousand stand before him which surely God would not have made choice of as fit language to express his Power and Glory if the Devil had been able to contend with God I and out-vye him too in this Article Again Are they strong These sure are stronger for we read of one that slew an hundred fourscore and five thousand Souldiers in one night We never heard of such an exploit of the Devils Are they malicious against us These are more
Testimonies have I taken as mine heritage for ever And lastly in the Ep. to Philemon He therefore departed from thee for a time that thou shouldst receive him for ever 75. And thus I presume I have shewed sufficiently that this for ever hinders not but that the promise may be appropriated to the Apostles as by many other circumstances I have evinced it must be But what now if the place produced by you as a main pillar of your Churches Infallibility prove upon trial an engine to batter and overthrow it at least which is all one to my purpose to take away all possibility of our assurance of it This will seem strange news to you at first hearing and not far from a prodigy And I confess as you here in this place and generally all your Writers of Controversie by whom this Text is urged order the matter it is very much disabled to do any service against you in this question For with a bold sacriledge and horrible impiety somewhat like Procrustes his cruelty you perpetually cut off the head and foot the beginning and end of it and presenting to your Confidents who usually read no more of the Bible than is alledged by you only these words I will ask my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the Spirit of Truth conceal in the mean time the words before and the words after that so the promise of God's Spirit may seem to be absolute whereas it is indeed most clearly and expresly conditional being doth in the words before restrained to those only that love GOD and keep his Commandments and in the words after flatly denied to all whom the Scriptures stile by the name of the World that is as the very Antithesis gives us plainly to understand to all wicked and wordly men Behold the place entire as it is set down in your own Bible If ye love me keep my Commandments and I will ask my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the Spirit of the Truth whom the world cannot receive Now from the place thus restored and vindicated from your mutilation thus I argue against your pretence We can have no certainty of the Infallibility of your Church but upon this supposition that your Popes are infallible in confirming the Decrees of General Councels we can have no certainty hereof but upon this supposition that the Spirit of Truth is promised to them for their direction in this work And of this again we can have no certainty but upon supposal that they perform the condition whereunto the promise of the Spirit of Truth is expresly limited viz. That they love God and keep his Commandments And of this finally not knowing the Popes heart we can have no certainty at all therefore from the first to the last we can have no certainty at all of your Churches Infallibility This is my first Argument Another follows which will charge you as home as the former If many of the Roman See were such men as could not receive the Spirit of Truth even men of the World that is Wordly Wicked Carnal Diabolical men then the Spirit of Truth is not here promised but flatly denied them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees of Councels which these Popes confirm nor of the Churches Infallibility which is guided by these Decrees But many of the Roman See even by the confession of the most zealous Defenders of it were such men Therefore the Spirit of Truth is not here promised but denied them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees which they confirm nor of the Churches Infallibility which guides her self by these Decrees 76. You may take as much time as you think fit to answer these Arguments In the mean while I proceed to the consideration of the next Text alledged for this purpose by you out of S. Paul 1 Ep. to Timothy where he saith as you say The Church is the Pillar and Ground of Truth But the truth is you are somewhat too bold with S. Paul For he says not in formal terms what you make him say The Church is the Pillar and Ground of Truth neither is it certain that he means so for it is neither impossible nor improbable that these words the pillar and ground of truth may have reference not to the Church but to Timothy the sense of the place that thou maist know how to behave thy self as a Pillar and Ground of the Truth in the Church of God which is house of the living God which exposition offers no violence at all to the words but only supposes an Ellipsis of the Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek very ordinary Neither wants it some likelihood that S. Paul comparing the Church to a house should here exhort Timothy to carry himself as a Pillar in that house should do according as he had given other principal men in the Church the name of Pillars rather then having called the Church a House to call it presently a Pillar which may seem somewhat heterogeneous Yet if you will needs have S. Paul refer this not to Timothy but to the Church I will not contend about it any farther then to say Possibly it may be otherwise But then secondly I am to put you in mind that the Church which S. Paul here speaks of was that in which Timothy conversed and that was a Particular Church and not the Roman and such you will not have to be Universally Infallible 77. Thirdly if we grant you out of courtesie for nothing can enforce us to it that he both speaks of the Universal Church and says this of it then I am to remember you that many Attributes in Scripture are not notes of performance but of duty and reach us not what the Thing or Person is of necessity but what it should be Ye are the Salt of the Earth said our Saviour to his Disciples not that this quality was inseparable from their Persons but because it was their Office to be so For if they must have been so of necessity and could not have been otherwise in vain had he put in them fear of that which follows If the Salt hath lost his savour wherewith shall it be salted it is thenceforth good for nothing but to be cast forth and to be trodden under foot So the Church may be by duty the pillar and ground that is the Teacher of Truth of all Truth not only necessary but profitable to Salvation and yet she may neglect and violate this duty and be in fact the teacher of some Error 78. Fourthly and lastly if we deal most liberally with you and grant that the Apostle here speaks of the Catholike Church calls it the Pillar and Ground of Truth and that not only because it should but because it always shall and will be so yet after all this you have
submit to the Lawes of the King of England but should indeed resolve to obey them in that sense which the King of France should put upon them whatsoever it were I presume every understanding man would say that I did indeed obey the King of France and not the King of England If I should pretend to believe the Bible but that I would understand it according to the sense which the chief Mufty should put upon it Who would not say that I were a Christian in pretense only but indeed a Mahumetan 11. Nor will it be to purpose for you to pretend that the Precepts of Christ are so plain that it cannot be feared that any Pope should ever go about to dissolve them and pretend to be a Christian For not to say that you now pretend the contrary to wit that the law of Christ is obscure even in things necessary to be believed and done and by saying so have made a fair way for any fowl interpretation of any part of it certainly that which the Church of Rome hath already done in this kind is an evident argument that if she once had this power unquestioned and made expedite and ready for use by being contracted to the Pope she may do what she pleaseth with it Who that had lived in the Primitive Church would not have thought it as utterly improbable that ever they should have brought in the worship of Images and picturing of God as now it is that they should legitimate Fornication Why may we not think they may in time take away the whole Communion from the Laity as well as they have taken away half of it Why may we not think that any Text and any Sense may not be accorded as well as the whole 14. Ch. of the Ep. of S. Paul to the Corinth is reconciled to the Latine-Service How is it possible any thing should be plainer forbidden than the worship of Angels in the Ep. to the Colossians than the teaching for Doctrines mens commands in the Gospel of S. Mark And therefore seeing we see these things done which hardly any man would have believed that had not seen them Why should we not fear that this unlimited power may not be used hereafter with as little moderation Seeing devices have been invented how men may worship Images without Idolatry and kill innocent men under pretence of Heresie without murder Who knows that some tricks may not be hereafter devised by which Lying with other mens wives shall be no Adultery taking away other mens goods no theft I conclude therefore That if Solomon himself were here and were to determine the difference Which is more likely to be mother of all Heresie The denial of the Churches or the affirming of the Popes Infallibility that he would certainly say This is the mother give her the childe 12. You say again confidently That if this Infallibility be once impeached every man is given over to his own wit and discourse which if you mean discourse not guiding it self by Scripture but only by principles of nature or perhaps by prejudices and popular errors and drawing consequences not by Rule but Chance is by no means true if you mean by Discourse right Reason grounded on Divine Revelation and common Notions written by God in the hearts of all men and deducing according to the never failing rules of Logick consequent deductions from them If this be it which you mean by discourse it is very meet and reasonable and necessary that men as in all their actions so especially in that of greatest importance the choice of their way to happiness should be left unto it and he that follows this in all his opinions and actions and does not only seem to do so follows alwayes God whereas he that followeth a Company of men may oft-times follow a company of beasts And in saying this I say no more than S. John to all Christians in these words Dearly beloved believe not every spirit but try the spirits whether they be of God or no and the rule he gives them to make this tryal by is to consider Whether they confess Jesus to be Christ that is the Guid of their Faith and Lord of their Action not whether they acknowledge the Pope to be his Vicar I say no more than S. Paul in exhorting all Christians To try all things and hold fast that which is good then S. Peter in commanding all Christians To be ready to give a reason of the hope that is in them then our Saviour himself in forewarning all his Followers that if they blindly followed blinde guides both leaders and followers should fall into the ditch and again in saying even to the people Yea and why of your selves judge yee not what is right And though by passion or precipitation or prejudice by want of reason or not using what they have men may be and are oftentimes led in error and mischief yet that they cannot be misguided by Discourse truly so called such as I have described you your self have given them security For what is Discourse but drawing conclusions out of premises by good consequence Now the Principles which we have setled to wit the Scriptures are on all sides agreed to be infallibly true And you have told us in the fourth Chap. of this Pamphlet That from truth no man can by good consequence infer falshood Therefore by Discourse no man can possibly be led to Error but if he err in his Conclusions he must of necessity either err in his Principles which here cannot have place or commit some error in his Discourse that is indeed not Discourse but seem to do so 13. You say Thirdly with sufficient confidence That if the true Church may erre in defining what Scriptures be Canonical or in delivering the sense thereof then we must follow either the private Spirit or else natural wit and judgment and by them examine what Scriptures contain true or false Doctrine and in that respect ought to be received or rejected All which is apparently untrue neither can any proof of it be pretended For though the present Church may possibly err in her judgment touching this matter yet have we other directions in it besides the private spirit and the examination of the contents which latter way may conclude the negative very strongly to wit that such or such a Book cannot come from God because it contains irreconcileable Contradictions but the Affirmative it cannot conclude because the contents of a Book may be all true and yet the Book not written by Divine inspiration other direction therefore I say we have besides either of these three and that is The testimony of the Primitive Christians 14. You say Fourthly with convenient boldness That this infallible Authority of your Church being denyed no man can be assured that any parcell of Scripture was written by Divine inspiration Which is an untruth for which no proof is pretended and besides void of modesty and full of impiety The
would be to end suits if it were given over to the fancy and gloss of every single man 4. This difference betwixt a Judge and a Rule D. Potter perceived when more than once having stiled the Scripture a Judge by way of correcting that term he adds or rather a Rule because he knew that an inanimate writing could not be a Judge From hence also it was that though Protestants in their beginning affirmed Scripture alone to be the Judge of Controversies yet upon a more advised reflection they changed the phrase and said that not Scripture but the Holy Ghost speaking in Scripture is Judge in Controversies A difference without a disparity The Holy Ghost speaking only in Scripture is no more intelligible to us than the Scripture in which he speaks as a man speaking only Latin can be no better understood than the tongue wherein he speaketh And therefore to say A Judge is necessary for deciding Controversies about the meaning of Scripture is as much as to say He is necessary to decide what the holy Ghost speaks in Scripture And it were a conceit equally foolish and pernitious if one should seek to take away all Judges in the Kingdom upon this nicety that albeit Laws cannot be Judges yet the Law-maker speaking in the Law may perform that Office as if the Law-maker speaking in the Law were with more perspicuity understood than the Law whereby he speaketh 5. But though some writing were granted to have a priviledge to declare it self upon supposition that it were maintained in being and preserved entire from corruptions yet it is manifest that no writing can conserve it self nor can complain or denounce the falsifier of it and therefore it stands in need of some watchful and not-erring eye to guard it by means of whose assured vigilancy we may undoubtedly receive it sincere and pure 6. And suppose it could defend it self from corruption how could it assure us that it self were Canonical and of infallible verity By saying so Of this very Affirmation there will remain the same Question still how it can prove it self to be infallibly true Neither can there ever be an end of the like multiplyed demands till we rest in the external Authority of some person or persons bearing witness to the world that such or such a Book is Scripture and yet upon this Point according to Protestants all other Controversies in Faith depend 7. That Scripture cannot assure us that it self is Canonical Scripture is acknowledged by some Protestants in express words and by all of them in deeds M. Hooker whom D. Potter ranketh (a) Pag. 131. among men of great Learning and Judgment saith Of things (b) In his first book of Eccles Polity Sect. 14. p. 68. necessary the very chiefest is to know what Books we are to esteem Holy which Point is confessed impossible for the Scripture it self to teach And this he proveth by the same Argument which we lately used saying thus It is not (c) Ibid. l. 2. Sect. 4. p. 102. the Word of God which doth or possibly can assure us that we do well to think it his Word For if any one Book of Scripture did give testimony of all yet still that Scripture which giveth testimony to the rest would require another Scripture to give credit unto it Neither could we come to any pause whereon to rest unless besides Scripture there were something which might assure us c. And this he acknowledges to be the (d) L. 3. Sect. 8. pag. 1.146 alibi Church By the way If Of things necessary the very chiefest cannot possibly be taught by Scripture as this man of great learning and judgment affirmeth and demonstratively proveth how can the Protestant Clergy of England subscribe to their sixt Article Wherein it is said of the Scripture Whatsoever is not read therein nor may be proved thereby is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an Article of the Faith or be thought requisite or necessary to Salvation and concerning their belief and profession of this Article they are particularly examined when they be ordained Priests and Bishops With Hooker his defendant Covel doth punctually agree Whitaker likewise confesseth that the question about Canonical Scriptures is desined to us not by testimony of the private Spirit which saith he being private and secret is (e) Adv. Stap. l. 2. c. 6. p. 270. to p. 357. unfit to teach and refel others but as he acknowledgeth by the (f) Adv. Stap. l. 2. c. 4. p. 300. Ecclesiastical Tradition An Argument saith he whereby may be argued and convinced what Books be Canonical and what be not Luther saith This (g) L. de cap. Bab. to 2. Witt. f. 88. indeed the Church hath that she can discern the Word of God from the word of men as Augustine confesseth that he believed the Gospel being moved by the Authority of the Church which did preach this to be the Gospel Fulk teacheth that the Church (h) In his Answer to a counterfeit Catholique p. 5. hath judgement to discern true writings from counterfeit and the Word of God from the writing of men and that this judgement she hath not of her self but of the holy Ghost And to the end that you may not be ignorant from what Church you must receive Scriptures hear your first Patriarch Luther speaking against them who as he saith brought in Anabaptism that so they might despight the Pope Verily saith he these (i) Ep. con Anab. ad duos Paroches to 2. Ger. Witt. men build upon a week foundation For by this means they ought to deny the whole Scripture and the Office of Preaching For all these we have from the Pope otherwise we must go make a new Scripture 8. But now in deeds they all make good that without the Churches Authority no certainty can be had what Scripture is Canonical while they cannot agree in assigning the Canon of holy Scripture Of the Epistle of S. James Luther hath these words The (k) Praef. in epist Jac. in ed. Jenen Epist of James is contentious swelling dry strawy and unworthy of an Apostolical Spirit Which censure of Luther Illyricus acknowledgeth and maintaineth Kemnitius teacheth that the second Epistle (l) In Enchirid p. 63. of Peter the second and third of John the Epistle to the Hebrews the Epistle of James the Epistle of Jude and the Apocalyps of John are Apocryphal as not having sufficient Testimony (m) In exam Conc. Trid. part 1. p. 55. of their authority and therefore that nothing in Controversie can be proved out of these (n) Ibid. Books The same is taught by divers other Lutherans and if some other amongst them be of a contrary opinion since Luther's time I wonder what new infallible ground they can alledge why they leave their Master and so many of his prime Schollers I know no better ground than because they may with as much freedom
the Jewish Church endued with an absolutely infallible direction in case of moment as all Points belonging to divine Faith are Now the Church of Christ our Lord was before the Scriptures of the New Testament which were not written instantly nor all at one time but successively upon several occasions and some after the decease of most of the Apostles and after they were written they were not presently known to all Churches and of some there was doubt in the Church for some Ages after our Saviour Shall we then say that according as the Church by little and little received holy Scripture she was by the like degrees devested of her possessed Infallibility and power to decide Controversies in Religion That sometime Churches had one Judge of Controversies and others another That with moneths or years as new Canonical Scripture grew to be published the Church altered her whole Rule of Faith or Judge of Controversies After the Apostles time and after the writing of Scriptures Heresies would be sure to rise requiring in God's Church for their discovery and condemnation Infallibility either to write new Canonical Scripture as was done in the Apostles time by occasion of emergent Heresies or Infallibility to interpret Scriptures already written or without Scripture by divine unwritten Traditions and assistance of the holy Ghost to determine all Controversies as Tertullian saith The soul is h De test aniâ— cap. 5. before the letter and speech before Books and sense before style Certainly such addition of Scripture with derogation or substraction from the former power and infallibility of the Church would have brought to the world division in matters of faith and the Church had rather lost than gained by holy Scripture which ought to be farr from our tongues and thoughts it being manifest that for decision of Controversies Infallibility setled in a living Judge is incomparably more useful and fit than if it were conceived as inherent in some inanimate writing Is there such repugnance betwixt Infallibility of the Church and Existence of Scripture that the production of the one must be the destruction of the other Must the Church wax dry by giving to her Children the milk of sacred Writ No No. Her Infallibility was and is derived from an inexhausted Fountain If Protestants will have the Scripture alone for their Judge let them first produce some Scripture affirming that by the entring thereof Infallibility went out of the Church D. Potter may remember what himself teacheth That the Church is still endued with Infallibility in Points Fundamental and consequently that Infallibility in the Church doth well agree with the truth the sanctity yea with the sufficiency of Scripture for all matters necessary to Salvation I would therefore gladly know out of what Text he imagineth that the Church by the coming of Scripture was deprived of Infallibility in some Points and not in others He affirmeth that the Jewish Synagogue retained infallibility in herself notwithstanding the writing of the Old Testament and will he so unworthily and unjustly deprive the Church of Christ of Infallibility by reason of the New Testament Especially if we consider that in the Old Testament Laws Ceremonies Rites Punishments Judgements Sacraments Sacrifices c. were more particularly and minutely delivered to the Jews than in the New Testament is done our Saviour leaving the determination or declaration of particulars to his Spouse the Church which therefore stands in need of Infallibility more than the Jewish Synagogue D. Potter i Pag. 24. against this argument drawn from the power and infallibility of the Synagogue objects That we might as well inserr that Christians must have one Soveraign Prince over all because the Jews had one chief Judge But the disparity is very clear The Synagogue was a type and figure of the Church of Christ not so their civil Government of Christian Common-wealths or Kingdoms The Church succeeded to the Synagogue but not Christian Princes to Jewish Magistrates And the Church is compared to a house or k Heb. 13. family to an l Cant. 2. Army to a m 1 Cor. 10. Ephes 4. body to a n Mat. 12. kingdom c. all which require one Master one General one head one Magistrate one spiritual King as our blessed Saviour with fict Unum ovile o Joan. c. 10. joyned Unus Pastor One Sheepsold One Pastour But all distinct Kingdoms or Common-wealths are not one Army Family c. And finally it is necessary to Salvation that all have recourse to one Church but for temporal weale there is no need that all submit or depend upon one temporal Prince Kingdom or Common-wealth and therefore our Saviour hath left to his whole Church as being One one Law one Scripture the same Sacraments c. Whereas Kingdoms have their several Laws different governments diversity of Powers Magistracy c. And so this objection returneth upon D. Potter For as in the One Community of the Jews there was one Power and Judge to end debates and resolve difficulties so in the Church of Christ which is One there must be some one Authority to decide all Controversies in Religion 24. This Discourse is excellently proved by ancient S. Irenaeus p Lib. 5. c. 4. in these words What if the Apostles had not lest Scriptures ought we not to have followed the order of Tradition which they delivered to those to whom they committed the Churches to which order many Nations yield assent who believe in Christ having Salvation written in their hearts by the Spirit of God without letters or lake and diligent keeping ancient Tradition It is easie to receive the truth from God's Church seeing the Apostles have most fully deposited in her as in a rich store-house all things belonging to truth For what if there should arise any contention of some small question ought we not to have recourse to the most ancient Churches and from them to receive what is certain and clear concerning the present question 25. Besides all this the doctrine of Protestants is destructive of it self For either they have certain and infallible means not to err in interpreting Scripture or they have not If not then the Scripâ—ure to them cannot be a sufficient ground for infallible Faith nor a meet Judge of Controversies If they have certain infallible means and so cannot err in their interpretations of Scriptures then they are able with infallibility to hear examine and determine all Controversies of Faith and so they may be and are Judges of Controversies although they use the Scripture as a Rule And thus against their own doctrin they constitute another Judge of Controversies besides Scripture alone 26. Lastly I ask D. Potter Whether â—his Assertion Scripture alone is Judge of all Controversies in Faith be a fundamental Point of Faith or no He must be well advised before he say that it is a Fundamental Point For he will have against him as many Protestants as teach that by Scripture alone it
a mans Religion that he was born and brought up in it For then a Turk should have as much reason to be a Turk as a Christian to be a Christian That every man hath a judgment of Discretion which if they will make use of they shall easily find that the true Church hath alwayes such and such marks and that their Church hath them and no other but theirs But then if any of theirs be perswaded to a sincere and sufficient tryal of their Church even by their own notes of it and to try whether they be indeed so conformable to Antiquity as they pretend then their note is changed You must not use your own reason nor your judgement but referr all to the Church and believe her to be conformable to Antiquity though they have no reason for it nay though they have evident reason to the contrary For my part I am certain that God hath given us our Reason to discern between Truth and Falshood and he that makes not this use of it but believes things he knows not why I say it is by chance that he believes the truth and not by choice and that I cannot but fear that God will not accept of this Sacrifice of fools 114. But you that would not have men follow their Reason what would you have them to follow their Passion Or pluck out their eyes and go blindfold No you say you would have them follow Authority On God's name let them we also would have them follow Authority for it is upon the Authority of Universal Tradition that we would have them believe Scripture But then as for the Authority which you would have them follow you will let them see reason why they should follow it And is not this to go a little about to leave Reason for a short turn and then to come to it again and to do that which you condemn in others It being indeed a plain impossibility for any man to submit his reason but to Reason for he that doth it to Authority must of necessity think himself to have greater reason to believe that Authority Therefore the confession cited by Breerely you need not think to have been extorted from Luther and the rest It came very freely from them and what they say you practise as much as they 115. And whereas you say that a Protestant admits of Fathers Councels Church as farr as they agree with Scripture which upon the matter is himself I say you admit neither of them nor the Scripture it self but only so far as it agrees with your Church and your Church you admit because you think you have reason to do so so that by you as well as by Protestants all is finally resolved into your own reason 116 Nor do Heretiques only but Romish Catholiques also set up as many Judges as there are men and women in the Christian world For do not your men and women judge your Religion to be true before they believe it as well as the men and women of other Religions Oh but you say They receive it not because they think it agreeable to Scripture but because the Church tels them so But then I hope they believe the Church because their own reason tels them they are to do so So that the difference between a Papist and a Protestant is this not that the one judges and the other does not judge but that the one judges his guide to be infallible the other his way to be manifest This same pernitious Doctrin is taught by Brentius Zanchius Cartwright and others It is so in very deed But it is taught also by some others whom you little think of It is taught by S. Paul where he sayes Try all things hold fast that which is good It is taught by S. John in these words Believe not every Spirit but try the Spirits whether they be of God or no. It is taught by S. Peter in these Be ye ready to render a reason of the hope that is in you Lastly this very pernitious Doctrin is taught by our Saviour in these words If the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the ditch And Why of your selves judge you not what is right All which speeches if they do not advise men to make use of their Reason for the choice of their Religion I must confess my self to understand nothing Lastly not to be infinite it is taught by M. Knot himself not in one page only or chapter of his Book but all his Book over the very writing and publishing whereof supposeth this for certain that the Readers are to be Judges whether his Reasons which he brings be strong and convincing of which sort we have hitherto met with none or else captious or impertinences as indifferent men shall as I suppose have cause to judge them 117. But you demand What good Statesmen would they be who should idaeate or fancy such a Common-wealth as these men have framed to themselves a Church Tâ—uly if this be all the fault they have that they say Every man is to use his own judgement in the choice of his Religion and not to believe this or that sense of Scripture upon the bare Authority of any learned man or men when he conceives he hath reasons to the contrary which are of more weight then their Authority I know no reason but notwithstanding all this they might be as good Statesmen as any of the Society But what hath this to do with Common-wealths where men are bound only to external obedience unto the Laws and Judgement of Courts but not to an internal approbation of them no nor to conceal their Judgement of them if they disapprove them As if I conceived I had reason to mislike the law of punishing simple theft with death as Sr. Thomas Moore did I might profess lawfully my judgment and represent my Reasons to the King or Common-wealth in a Parliament as Sr. Thomas Moore did without committing any fault or fearing any punishment 118. To the place of S. Austin wherewith this Paragraph is concluded I shall need give no other Reply but only to desire you to speak like an honest man and to say Whether it be all one for a man to allow and disallow in every Scripture what he pleases which is either to dash out of Scripture such Texts or such Chapters because they cross his opinion or to say which is worse Though they be Scripture they are not true Whether I say for a man thus to allow and disallow in Scripture what he pleases be all one and no greater fault than to allow that sense of Scripture which he conceives to be true and genuine and deduced out of the words and to disallow the contrary For Gods sake Sir tell me plainly In those Texts of Scripture which you alledge for the Infallibility of your Church do you not allow what sense you think true and disallow the contrary And do not you this by the direction of your private
Apocalyps is most truly verified in fictions revelations If any (k) Cap. ult v. 18. shall add to these things God will add unto him the plagues which are written in this Book and D. Potter saith to add (l) Pag. 122. to it speaking of the Creed is high presumption almost as great as to detract from it And therefore to say the Church may add false revelations is to accuse her of high presumption and of pernitious error excluding Salvation 10. Perhaps some will here reply that although the Church may err yet it is nor imputed to her for sin by reason she doth not err upon malice or wittingly but by ignorance or mistake 11. But it is easily demonstrated that this excuse cannot serve For if the Church be assisted only for Points Fundamental she cannot but know that she may err in Points not Fundamental at least she cannot be certain that she cannot err and therefore cannot be excused from headlong and pernitious temerity in proposing Points not Fundamental to be believed by Christians as matters of Faith wherein she can have no certainty yea which always imply a falshood For although the thing might chance to be true and perhaps also revealed yet for the matter she for her part doth always expose her self to danger of falshood and error and in fact doth always err in the manner in which she doth propound any matter not Fundamental because she proposeth it as a Point of Faith certainly true which yet is always uncertain if she in such things may be deceived 12. Besides if the Church may err in Points not Fundamental she may err in proposing some Scripture for Canonical which is not such or else err in nor keeping and conserving from corruptions such Scriptures as are already believed to be Canonical For I will suppose that in such Apocryphal Scripture as she delivers there is no Fundamental Error against Faith or that there is no falshood at all but only want of Divine testification in which case D. Potter must either grant that it is a Fundamental Error to apply Divine revelation to any Point not revealed or else must yield that the Church may err in her Proposition or Custody of the Canon of Scripture and so we cannot be sure whether she hath not been deceived already in Books recommended by her and accepted by Christians And thus we shall have no certainty of Scripture if the Church want certainty in all her definitions And it is worthy to be observed that some Books of Scripture which were not alwayes known to be Canonical have been afterward received for such but never any on Book or syllable defined by the Church to be Canonical was afterward questioned or rejected for Apocryphal A sign that God's Church is infallibly assisted by the holy Ghost never to propose as Divine truth any thing not revealed by God and that Omission to define Points not sufficiently discussed is laudable but Commission in propounding things not revealed inexcusable into which precipitation our Saviour Christ never hath nor never will permit his Church to fall 13. Nay to limit the general promises of our Saviour Christ made to his Church to Points only Fundamental namely that the gates (m) Mat. 16.18 of hell shall not prevail against her and that the holy Ghost (n) Joan. 16.13 shall lead her into all Truth c. is to destroy all Faith For we may be that Doctrin and manner of interpreting the Scripture limit the Infallibility of the Apostles words and preaching only to Points Fundamental and whatsoever general Texts of Scripture shall be alledged for their infallibility they may be D. Potter's example be explicated and restrained to Points Fundamental By the same reason it may be farther affirmed that the Apostles and other Writers of Canonical Scripture were indued with infallibility only in setting down Points Fundamental For if it be urged that all Scripture is divinely inspired that it is the Word of God c. D. Potter hath afforded you a ready answer to say that Scripture is inspired c. only in those parts or parcels wherein it delivereth Fundamental Points In this manner D. Fotherby saith The Apostle (o) In his Sermons Serm. 2. pag. 50. twice in one Chapter professed that this he speaketh and not the Lord He is very well content that where he lacks the warrant of the express Word of God that part of his writings should be esteemed as the word of man D. Potter also speaks very dangerously towards this purpose Sect. 5. where he endeavoureth to prove that the infallibility of the Church is limited to Points Fundamental because as Nature so God is neither defective in (p) Pag. 150. necessaries nor lavish in superfluities Which reason doth likewise prove that the infallibility of Scripture and of the Apostles must be restrained to Points necessary to Salvation that so God be not accused as defective in (p) Pag. 150. necessaries or lavish insuperfluities In the same place he hath a discourse much tending to this purpose where speaking of these words The Spirit shall lead you into all Truth and shall abide with (q) Joan. c. 16.13 c. 14.16 you for ever he saith Though that promise was (r) Pag. 151 152. directly and primarily made to the Apostles who had the Spirit 's guidance in a more high and absolute manner than any since them yet it was made to them for the behoof of the Church and is verified in the Church Universal But all truth is not simply all but all of some kind To be lead into all truths is to know and believe them And who is so simple as to be ignorant that there are many millions of Truths in Nature History Divinity whereof the Church is simply ignorant How many Truths lie unrevealed in the infinite Treasury of God's wisdom wherewith the Church is not acquainted c So then the Truth it self enforceth us to understand by all Truths not simply all not all which God can possibly reveal but all pertaining to the substance of Faith all Truth absolutely necessary to Salvation Mark what he saith That promise The Spirit shall lead you into all Truth was made directly to the Apostles and is verified in the Universal Church but by all Truth is not understood simply all but all appertaining to the substance of Faith and absolutely necessary to Salvation Doth it not hence follow that the promise made to the Apostles of being lead into all Truth is to be understood only of all Truth absolutely necessary to Salvation and consequently their preaching and writing were not infallible in Points not Fundamental or if the Apostles were infallible in all things which they proposed as divine Truth the like must be affirmed of the Church because D. Potter teacheth the said promise to be verified in the Church And as he limits the aforesaid words to Points Fundamental so may he restrain what other Text soever that can be
Lord but I deliver my judgment If we will pretend that the Lord did certainly speak what S. Paul spake and that his judgment was God's commandment shall we not plainly contradict S. Paul and that Spirit by which he wrote which moved him to write as in other places divine Revelations which he certainly knew to be such so in this place his own judgment touching some things which God had not particularly revealed unto him And if D. Potter did speak to this purpose that the Apostles were Infallible only in these things which they spake of certain knowledg I cannot see what danger there were in saying so Yet the Truth is you wrong D. Potter It is not he but D. Stapleton in him that speaks the words you cavil at D. Stapleton saith he p. 140. is full and punctual to this purpose then sets down the effect of his discourse l. 8. Princ. Doct. 4. c. 15. and in that the words you cavil at and then p. 150. he shuts up this Paragraph with these words Thus D. Stapleton So that if either the Doctrine or the Reason be not good D. Stapleton not D. Potter is to answer for it 33. Neither do D. Potter's ensuing words limit the Apostle's infallibility to truths absolutely necessary to salvation if you read them with any candor for it is evident he grants the Church infallible in Truths absolutely necessary and as evident that he ascribes to the Apostles the Spirit 's guidance and consequently infallibility in a more high and absolute manner than any since them From whence thus I argue He that grants the Church infallible in Fundamentals and ascribes to the Apostles the infallible guidance of the Spirit in a more high and absolute manner than to any since them limits not the Apostles infallibility to Fundamentals But D. Potter grants to the Church such a limited infallibility and ascribes to the Apostles the Spirit 's infallible guidance in a more high and absolute manner Therefore he limits not the Apostles infallibility to Fundamentals I once knew a man out of courtesie help a lame dog over a stile and he for requital bit him by the fingers Just so you serve D. Potter He out of courtesie grants you that those words The Spirit shall lead you into all Truth and shall abide with you ever though in their high and most absolute sense they agree only to the Apostles yet in a conditional limited moderate secundary sense they may be understood of the Church But says that if they be understood of the Church All must not be simply all No nor so large an All as the Apostles all but all necessary to salvation And you to requite his courtesie in granting you thus much cavil at him as if he had prescribed these bounds to the Apostles also as well as the present Church Whereas he hath explained himself to the contrary both in the clause fore-mentioned The Apostles who had the Spirit 's guidance in a more high and absolute manner than any since them and in these words ensuing whereof the Church is simply ignorant and again wherewith the Church is not acquainted But most clearly in those which being most incompatible to the Apostles you with an c I cannot but fear craftily have concealed How many obscure Texts of Scripture which she understands not How many School-Questions which she hath not happily cannot determine And for matters of fact it is apparent that the Church may err and then concludes That we must understand by All truths not simply All But if you conceive the words as spoken of the Church All Truth absolutely necessary to salvation And yet beyond all this the negative part of his answer agrees very well to the Apostles themselves for that All which they were lead into was not simply All otherwise S. Paul erred in saying we know in part but such an All as was requisite to make them the Churches Foundations Now such they could not be without freedom from errour in all those things which they delivered constantly as certain revealed Truths For if we once suppose they may have erred in some things of this nature it will be utterly undiscernable what they have erred in and what they have not Whereas though we suppose the Church hath erred in some things yet we have means to know what she hath erred in and what she hath not I mean by comparing the Doctrine of the present Church with the Doctrin of the Primitive Church delivered in Scripture But then last of all suppose the Doctor had said which I know he never intended that this promise in this place made to the Apostles was to be understood only of Truths absolutely necessary to salvation Is it consequent that he makes their Preaching and Writing not infallible in Points not Fundamental Do you not blush for shame at this Sophistry The Doctor says no more was promised in this place Therefore he says no more was promised Are there not other places besides this And may not that be promised in other places which is not promised in this 34. But if the Apostles were Infallible in all things proposed by them as Divine Truths the like must be affirmed of the Church because D. Potter teacheth the said promise to be verified in the Church True he doth so but not in so absolute a manner Now what is opposed to Absolute but Limited or restrained To the Apostles then it was made and to them only yet the words are true of the Church And this very promise might have been made to it though here it is not They agree to the Apostles in a higher to the Church in a lower sense to the Apostles in a more absolute to the Church in a more limited sense To the Apostles absolutely for the Churches direction to the Church Conditionally by adherence to that direction and so far as she doth adhere to it In a word the Apostles were lead into all Truths by the Spirit efficaciter The Church is led also into all Truth by the Apostles writings sufficienter So that the Apostles and the Church may be fitly compared to the Star and the Wisemen The Star was directed by the finger of God and could not but go right to the place where Christ was But the Wisemen were led by the Star to Christ led by it I say not efficaciter or irresistibiliter but sufficienter so that if they would they might follow it if they would not they might chuse So was it between the Apostles writing Scriptures and the Church They in their writing were infallibly assisted to propose nothing as a divine Truth but what was so The Church is also led into all Truth but it is by the intervening of the Apostles writings But it is as the Wisemen were led by the Star or as a Traveller is directed by a Mercurial Statue or as a Pilot by his Card and Compass led sufficiently but not irresistibly led as that she may follow not so
he had said Let every man examine himself and so let him eat of this bread and drink of this cup. They which acknowledge S. Paul's Epistles and S. John's Gospel to be the Word of God one would think should not deny but that they are taught these two Doctrines plain enough Yet we see they neither do nor will learn them I conclude therefore that the Spirit may very well teach the Church and yet the Church fall into and continue in Error by not regarding what she is taught by the Spirit 72. But all this I have spoken upon a supposition only and shewed unto you that though these Promises had been made unto the present Church of every Age I might have said though they had been to the Church of Rome by name yet no certainty of her Universal Infallibility could be built upon them But the plain truth is that these Promises are vainly arrogated by you and were never made to you but to the Apostles only I pray deal ingenuously and tell me Who were they of whom our Saviour says These things have I spoken unto you being present with you c. 14.25 But the Comforter shall teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have told you v. 26 Who are they to whom he sayes I go away and come again unto you And I have told you before it come to pass v. 28 29. You have been with me from the beginning c. 15. v. 27 And again These things I have told you that when the time shall come you may remember that I told you of them and these things I said not to you at the beginning because I was with you c. 16. v. 4. And Because I said these things unto you sorrow hath filled your hearts v. 6. Lastly Who are they of whom he saith v. 12. I have yet many things to say unto you but ye cannot bear them now Do not all these circumstances appropriate this whole discourse of our Saviour to his Disciples that were then with him and consequently restrain the Promises of the Spirit of Truth which was to lead them into all truth to their Persons only And seeing it is so is it not an impertinent arrogance and presumption for you to lay claim unto them in the behalf of your Church Had Christ been present with your Church Did the Comforter bring these things to the Remembrance of your Church which Christ had before taught and she had forgotten Was Christ then departing from your Church And did he tell of his departure before it came to pass Was your Church with him from the beginning Was your Church filled with sorrow upon the mentioning of Christ's departure Or lastly Did he or could he have said to your Church which then was not extant I have yet many things to say unto you but ye cannot bear them now as he speaks in the 13 v. immediately before the words by you quoted And then goes on Howbeit when the Spirit of Truth is come he will guide you into all Truth Is it not the same You he speaks to in the 13. v. and that he speaks to in the 14 And is it not apparent to any one that hath but half an eye that in the 13 he speaks only to them that then were with him Besides in the very Text by you alledged there are things promised which your Church cannot with any modesty pretend to For there it is said The Spirit of Truth not only will guide you into all Truth but also will shew you things to come Now your Church for ought I could ever understand doth not so much as pretend to the spirit of Prophecy and knowledge of future events And therefore hath as little cause to pretend to the former promise of being led by the Spirit into all Truth And this is the Reason why both You in this place and generally your Writers of Controversies when they entreat of this Argument cite this Text perpetually by halfs there being in the latter part of it a clear and convincing Demonstration that you have nothing to do with the former Unless you will say which is most ridiculous that when our Saviour said He will teach you c. and he will shew you c. he meant one You in the former clause and another You in the latter 73. Object But this is to confine God's Spirit to the Apostles only or to the Disciples that then were present with him which is directly contrary to many places of Scripture Answ I confess that to confine the Spirit of God to those that were then present with Christ is against Scripture But I hope it is easie to conceive a difference between confining the Spirit of God to them and confining the promises made in this place to them God may do many things which he doth not promise at all much more which he doth not promise in such or such a place 74. Object But it is promised in the 14. Chap. that this Spirit shall abide with them for ever Now they in their persons were not to abide for ever and therefore the Spirit could not abide with them in their Persons for ever seeing the coexistence of two things supposes of necessity the existence of either Therefore the Promise was not made to them only in their Persons but by them to the Church which was to abide for ever Answ Your Conclusion is not to them only but your Reason concludes either nothing at all or that this Promise of abiding with them for ever was not made to their Persons at all or if it were that it was not performed Or if you will not say as I hope you will not that it was not performed nor that it was not made to their Persons at all then must you grant that the word for ever is here used in a sense restrained and accommodated to the subject here entreated of and that it signifies not eternally without end of time but perpetually without interruption for the time of their lives So that the force and sense of the words is that they should never want the Spirit 's assistance in the performance of their function And that the Spirit would not as Christ was to do stay with them for a time and afterwards leave them but would abide with them if they kept their station unto the very end of their lives which is mans for ever Neither is this use of the word for ever any thing strange either in our ordinary speech wherein we use to say This is mine for ever This shall be yours for ever without ever dreaming of the Eternity either of the Thing or Persons And then in Scripture it not only will bear but requires this sense very frequently as Exod 21.6 Deut. 15.17 His master shall bore his ear through with an awl and he shall serve him for ever Psal 52.9 I will praise thee for ever Psal 61.4 I will abide in thy Tabernacle for ever Psal 119.111 Thy
And therefore it was a great fault in you either willingly to conceal these words which evacuate your Objection or else negligently to oversee them Especially seeing your friend to whom you are so much beholding Paulus Veridicus in his scurrilous and sophistical Pamphler against B. Usher's Sermon hath so kindly offered to lead you by the hand to the observation of them in these words To consider of your Coinopista or communiter Credenda Articles as you call them universally believed of all these several Professions of Christianity which have any large spread in the World These Articles for example may be the Unity of the Godhead the Trinity of Persons the immortality of the Soul c. Where you see that your friend whom you so much magnifie hath plainly confessed that notwithstanding the Bishop's words the denial of the Doctrin of the Trinity may exclude Salvation and therefore in approving and applauding his Answer to the Bishop's Sermon you have unawares allowed this Answer of mine to your own greatest Objection 46. Now for the foul contradiction which you say the Doctor might easily have espyed in the Bishop's saying he desires your pardon for his oversight sight for Paulus Veridicus his sake who though he set himself to find faults with the Bishop's Sermon yet it seems this he could not find or else questionless we should have heard of it from him And therefore if D. Potter being the Bishop's friend have not been more sharp-sighted than his enemies this he hopes to indifferent Judges will seem no unpardonable offence Yet this I say not as if there were any contradiction at all much less any foul contradiction in the Bishop's words but as Antipheron's picture which he thought he saw in the air before him was not in the air but in his disturbed phansie so all the contradiction which here you descant upon is not indeed in the Bishop's saying but in your imagination For wherein I pray lies this foul contradiction In supposing say you a man may believe all Truths necessary to salvation and yet superinduce a damnable Heresie I answer It is not certain that his words do suppose this neither if they do doth he contradict himself I say it is not certain that his words import any such matter For ordinarily men use to speak and write so as here he doth when they intend not to limit or restrain but only to repeat and press and illustrate what they have said before And I wonder why with your Eagles eyes you did not espy another foul contradiction in his words as well as this and say that he supposes a man may walk according to the rule of holy obedience and yet vitiate his holy Faith with a lewd and wicked Conversation Certainly a lewd Conversation is altogether as contradictious to holy Obedience as a damnable Heresie to necessary Truth What then was the reason that you espyed not this foul contradiction in his words as well as that Was it because according to the Spirit and Genius of your Church your zeal is greater to that which you conceive true doctrin than holy obedience and think simple error a more capital crime than sins committed against knowledge and conscience Or was it because your Reason told you that herein he meant only to repeat and not to limit what he said before And why then had you not so much candour to conceive that he might have the same meaning in the former part of the disjunction and intend no more but this Whosoever walks according to this rule of believing all necessary Truths and holy Obedience neither poysoning his faith of those Truths which he holds with the mixture of any damnable Heresie nor vitiating it with a wicked life Peace shall be upon him In which words what man of any ingenuity will not presently perceive that the words within the parenthesis are only a repetition of and no exception from those that are without S. Athanasius in his Creed tels us The Catholique Faith is this that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance and why now do you not tell him that he contradicts himself and supposes that we may worship a Trinity of Persons and one God in substance and yet confound the Persons or divide the substance which yet is impossible because Three remaining Three cannot be confounded and One remaining One cannot be divided If a man should say unto you he that keeps all the Commandments of God committing no sin either against the love of God or the love of his neighbour is a perfect man Or thus he that will live in constant health had need be exact in his dyet neither eating too much nor too little Or thus he that will come to London must go on straight forward in such a way and neither turn to the right hand or to the left I verily believe you would not find any contradiction in his words but confess them as coherent and confonant as any in your Book And certainly if you would look upon this saying of the Bishop with any indifference you would easily perceive it to be of the very same kind and capable of the very same construction And therefore one of the grounds of your accusation is uncertain Neither can you assure us that the Bishop supposes any such matter as you pretend Neither if he did suppose this as perhaps he did were this to contradict himself For though there can be no damnable Heresie unless it contradict some necessary Truth yet there is no contradiction but the same man may at once believe this Heresie and this Truth because there is no contradiction that the same man at the same time should believe contradictions For first whatsoever a man believes true that he may and must believe But there have been some who have believed and taught that contradictions might be true against whom Aristotle disputes in the third of his Metaphysicks Therefore it is not impossible that a man may believe Contradictions Secondly they which believe there is no certainty in Reason must believe that contradictions may be true For otherwise there will be certainty in this Reason This contradicts Truth therefore it is false But there be now divers in the world who believe there is no certainty in Reason and whether you be of their mind or no I desire to be informed Therefore there be divers in the world who believe contradictions may be true Thirdly They which do captivate their understandings to the belief of those things which to their understanding seem irreconcileable contradictions may as well believe real contradictions For the difficulty of believing arises not from their being repugnant but from their seeming to be so But you do captivate your understandings to the belief of those things which seem to your understandings irreconcileable contradictions Therefore it is as possible and easie for you to believe those that indeed are so Fourthly some men may
l. 2. c. and as Cardinal Perron though mincing the matter yet confesseth by this very Irenaeus himself in particular admonished that for so small a cause propter tam modicam causam he should not have cut off so many Provinces from the body of the Church and lastly seeing the Ecclesiastical Story of those times mentions no other notable example of any such Schismatical presumption but this of Victor certainly we have great inducement to imagine that Irenaeus in this place by you quoted had a special aim at the Bishop and Church of Rome Once this I am sure of that the place fits him and many of his successors as well as if it had been made purposely for them And this also that be which finds fault with them who separate upon small causes implies clearly that he conceived there might be such causes as were great and sufficient And that then a Reformation was to be made notwithstanding any danger of division that might ensue upon it 12. Lastly S. Denis of Alexandria says indeed and very well that all things should be rather endured than we should consent to the division of the Church I would add Rather than consent to the continuation of the division if it might be remedied But then I am to tell you that he says not All things should rather be done but only All things should rather be endured or suffered wherein he speaks not of the evil of Sin but of Pain and Misery Not of tolerating either Error or Sin in others though that may be lawful much less of joyning with others for quietness sake which only were to your purpose in the profession of Error and practice of Sin but of suffering any affliction nay even martyrdom in our own persons rather than consent to the division of the Church Omnia incommoda so your own Christo pherson enforced by the circumstances of the place translates Dionysius his words All miseries should rather be endured than we should consent to the Churches division 13. Ad § 9. In the next Paragraph you affirm two things but prove neither unless a vehement Asseveration may pass for a weak proof You tell us first That the Doctrin of the total deficiency of the visible Church which is maintained by divers chief Protestants implies in it vast Absurdity or rather sacrilegious Blasphemy But neither do the Protestants alledged by you maintain the deficiency of the Visible Church but only of the Churches visibility or of the Church as it is Visible which so acute a man as you now that you are minded of it I hope will easily distinguish Neither do they hold that the visible Church hath failed totally and from its Essence but only from its purity and that it fell into many corruptions but yet not to nothing And yet if they had held that there was not only no pure visible Church but none at all surely they had said more than they could justifie but yet they do not shew neither can I discover any such Vast absurdity or Sacrilegious Blasphemy in this Assertion You say secondly that the Reason which cast them upon this wicked Doctrin was a desperate voluntary necessity because they were resolved not to acknowledge the Roman to be the true Church and were convinced by all manner of evidence that for divers Ages before Luther there was no other But this is not to dispute but to divine and take upon you the property of God which is to know the hearts of men For why I pray might not the Reason hereof rather be because they were convinced by all manner of evidence as Scripture Reason Antiquity that all the visible Churches in the world but above all the Roman had degenerated from the purity of the Gospel of Christ and thereupon did conclude there was no visible Church meaning by no Church none free from corruption and conformable in all things to the doctrin of Christ 14 Ad § 10. Neither is there anyr epugnance but in words only between these as you are pleased to stile them exterminating Spirits those other whom out of Courtesie you intitle in your 10. § more moderâ—te Protestants For these affirming the Perpetual Visibility of the Church yet neither deny nor doubt of her being subject to manifold and grievous corruptions and those of such a nature as were they not mitigated by invincible or at least a very probable ignorance none subject to them could be saved And they on the other side denying the Churches Visibility yet plainly affirm that they conceive very good hope of the Salvation of many of their ignorant and honest Fore fathers Thus declaring plainly though in words they denyed the Visibility of the true Church yet their meaning was not to deny the perpetuity but the perpetual purity incorruption of the Visible Church 15. Ad § 11. Let us proceed therefore to your 11. Section where though D. Potter and other Protestants granting the Churches perpetual Visibility make it needless for you to prove it yet you will needs be doing that which is needless But you do it so coldly and negligently that it is very happy for you that D. Potter did grant it 16. For What if the Prophets spake more obscurely of Christ than of the Church What if they had fore-seen that greater contentions would arise about the Church than Christ Which yet he that is not a meer stranger in the story of the Church must needs know to be untrue and therefore not to be fore-seen by the Prophets What if we have manifestly received the Church from the Scriptures Does it follow from any or all these things that the Church of Christ must be always visible 17. Besides What Protestant ever granted that which you presume upon so confidently that every man for all the affairs of his soul must have recourse to some Congregation If some one Christan lived alone among Pagans in some Countrey remote from Christendom shall we conceive it impossible for this man to be saved because he cannot have recourse to any Congregation for the affairs of his soul will it not be sufficient for such a ones salvation to know the doctrin of Christ and live according to it Such fancies as these you do very wisely to take for granted because you know well 't is hard to prove them 18. Let it be as unlawful as you please to deny and dissemble matters of faith Let them that do so not be a Church but a damned crew of Sycophants What is this to the Visibility of the Church May not the Church be Invisible and yet these that are of it profess their faith No say you Their profession will make them visible Very true visible in the places where and in the times when they live and to those persons unto whom they have necessary occasion to make their profession But not visible to all or any great or considerable part of the world while they live much less conspicuous to all ages after them
be Heretiques because they separated from the Communion of the visible Church and therefore also from the Communion of that which they say was invisible In as much as the invisible Church communicated with the visible 35. Answ I might very justly desire some proof of that which so confidently you take for granted That there were no persecuted and oppressed maintainers of the Truth in the days of our Fore-fathers but only such as dissembled their opinions and lived in your Communion And truly if I should say there were many of this condition I suppose I could make my Affirmative much more probable than you can make your Negative We read in Scripture that Elias conceived There was none left beside himself in the whole Kingdom of Israel who had not revolted from God and yet God himself assures us that he was deceived And if such a man a Prophet and one of the greatest erred in his judgment touching his own time and his own countrey why may not you who are certainly but a man and subject to the same passions as Elias was mistake in thinking that in former ages in some countrey or other there were not always some good Christians which did not so much as externally bow their knees to your Baal But this answer I am content you shall take no notice of and think it sufficient to tell you that if it be true that this supposed invisible Church did hypocritically communicate with the visible Church in her corruptions then Protestants had cause nay necessity to forsake their Communion also for otherwise they must have joyn'd with them in the practise of impieties and seeing they had such cause to separate they presume their separation cannot be schismatical 36. Yes you reply To forsake the external Communion of them with whom they agree in faith is the most formal and proper sin of Schism Answ Very true but I would fain know wherein I would gladly be informed whether I be bound for fear of Schism to communicate with those that believe as I do only in lawful things or absolutely in every thing whether I am to joyn with them in superstition and Idolatry and not only in a common profession of the faith wherein we agree but in a common dissimulation or abjuration of it This is that which you would have them do or else forsooth they must be Schismatiques But hereafter I pray you remember that there is no necessity of communicating even with true Believers in wicked actions Nay that there is a necessity herein to separate from them And then I dare say even you being their judge the reasonableness of their cause to separate shall according to my first observation justifie their separation from being schismatical 37. Arg. But the property of Schism according to D. Potter is to cut off from the hope of salvation the Church from which it separates And these Protestants have this property Therefore they are Schismatiques 38. Ans I deny the Syllogism it is no better than this One Sympton of the Plague is a Feaver But such a man hath a Feaver Therefore he hath the Plague The true Conclusion which issues out of these Premisses should be this Therefore he hath one Sympton of the Plague And so likewise in the former Therefore they have one property or one quality of Schismatiques And as in the former instance The man that hath one sign of the Plague may by reason of the absence of other requisites not have the plague So these Protestants may have something of Schismatiques and yet not be Schismatiques A Tyrant sentencing a man to death for his pleasure and a just judge that condemns a malefactor do both sentence a man to death and so for the matter do both the same thing yet the one does wickedly the other justly What 's the reason because the one hath cause the other hath not In like manner Schismatiques either always or generally denounce damnation to them from whom they separate The same do these Protestants and yet are not Schismatiques The reason because Schismatiques do it and do it without cause and Protestants have cause for what they do The impieties of your Church being generally speaking damnable unless where they are excus'd by ignorance and expiated at least by a general repentance In fine though perhaps it may be true that all Schismatiques do so yet universal affirmatives are not converted and therefore it follows not by any good Logick that all that do so when there is just cause for it must be Schismatiques The cause in this matter of separation is all in all and that for ought I see you never think of But if these rigid Protestants have just cause to cut off your Church from the hope of salvation How can the milder sort allow hope of Salvation to the Members of this Church Ans Distinguish the quality of the Persons censur'd and this seeming repugnance of their censures will vanish into nothing For your Church may be considered either in regard of those in whom either negligence or pride or worldly fear or hopes or some other voluntary sin is the cause of their ignorance which I fear is the case of the generality of men amongst you or in regard of those who owe their Errours from Truth to want of capacity or default of instruction either in respect of those that might know the truth and will not or of those who would know the truth but all things considered cannot In respect of those that have eyes to see and will not see or those that would gladly see but want eyes or light Consider the former sort of men which your more rigid censures seem especially to reflect upon and the heaviest sentence will not be too heavy Consider the later and the mildest will not be too mild So that here is no difference but in words only neither are you flatter'd by the one nor uncharitably censur'd by the other 39. Your next blow is directed against the milder sort of Protestants who you say involve themselves in the sin of Schism by communicating with those as you call them exterminating Spirits whom you conceive your self to have proved Schismatiques And now load them further with the crime of Heresie For say you If you held your selves obliged under pain of damnation to forsake the Communion of the Roman-Church by reason of her Errours which yet you confess were not fundamental shall it not be much more damnable to live in confraternity with these who defend an Errour of the failing of the Church which in the Donatists you confess to have been properly Heretical 40. Answ You mistake in thinking that Protestants hold themselves obliged not to communicate with you only or principally by reason of your Errours and Corruption For the true reason according to my third Observation is not so much because you maintain Errours and Corruption as because you impose them and will allow your Communion to none but to those that will hold them
his judgment in this matter this express limitation of his former resolution he makes in the very same Section which affords your former quotation and therefore what Apology can be made for you and your Store-house M. Brerely for dissembling of it I cannot possibly imagine 111. D. Potter p. 131. sayes That errors of the Donatists and Novatians were not in themselves Heresies nor could be made so by the Churches determination But that the Churches intention was only to silence disputes and to settle peace and unity in her government which because they factiously opposed they were justly esteemed Schismatiques From hence you conclude that the same condemnation must pass against the first Reformers seeing they also opposed the commands of the Church imposed on them for silencing all Disputes and setling Peace and Unity in Government But this Collection is deceitful and the reason is Because though the first Reformers as well as the Donatists and Novatians opposed herein the Commands of the Visible Church that is of a great part of it yet the Reformers had reason nay necessity to do so the Church being then corrupted with damnable errors which was not true of the Church when it was opposed by the Novatians and Donatists And therefore though they and the Reformers did the same action yet doing it upon different grounds it might in these merit applause and in them condemnation 112 Ad § 43. The next § hath in it some objections against Luther's person and none against his cause which alone I have undertaken to justifie and therefore I pass it over Yet this I promise that when you or any of your side shall publish a good defence of all that your Popes have said and done especially of them whom Bellarmine believes in such a long train to have gone to the Divel then you shall receive an ample Apology for all the actions and words of Luther In the mean time I hope all reasonable and equitable judges will esteem it not unpardonable in the great and Heroical spirit of Luther if being opposed and perpetually baited with a world of Furies he were transported sometimes and made somewhat furious As for you I desire you to be quiet and to demand no more whether God be wont to send such Furies to preach the Gospel Unless you desire to hear of your killing of Kings Massacring of Peoples Blowing up of Parliaments and have a mind to be askt Whether it be probable that that should be Gods cause which needs to be maintained by such Divellish means 113 Ad § 44 45. In the two next Particles which are all of this Chapter that remain unspoken to you spend a great deal of reading and wit and reason against some men who pretending to honour and believe the Doctrin and practice of the visible Church you mean your own and condemning their Forefathers who forsook her say they would not have done so yet remain divided from her Communion Which men in my judgment cannot be defended For if they believe the Doctrin of your Church then must they believe this doctrin that they are to return to your Communion And therefore if they do not so it cannot be avoided but they must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so I leave them only I am to remember you that these men cannot pretend to be Protestants because they pretend to believe your Doctrin which is opposite in Diameter unto the doctrin of Protestants and therefore in a Work which you profess to have written meerly against Protestants all this might have been spared CHAP. VI. That Luther and the rest of Protestants have added Heresie unto Schism BEcause Vice is best known by the contrary Vertue we cannot well determine what Heresie is nor who be Heretiques but by the opposite vertue of Faith whose Nature being once understood as far as belongs to our present purpose we shall pass on with ease to the definition of heresie and so be able to discern who be Heretiques And this I intend to do not by entring into such particular Questions as are controverted between Catholiques and Protestants but only by applying some general grounds either already proved or else yielded to on all sides 2 Almighty God having ordained Man to a supernatural End of Beatitude by supernatural means it was requisite that his understanding should be enabled to apprehend that End and Means by a supernatural knowledge And because if such a knowledge were no more than probable it could not be able sufficiently to overbear our will and encounter with human probabilities being backed with the strength of flesh and blood It was further necessary that this supernatural knowledge should be most certain and infallible and that Faith should believe nothing more certainly than that it self is a most certain Belief and so be able to bear down all gay probabilities of humane Opinion And because the aforesaid means and end of Beatifical Vâ—sion do fat exceed the reach of natural wit the certainty of faith could not always be joyned with such evidence of reason as is wont to be found in the Principles or Conclusions of humane natural Sciences that so all flesh might not glory in the arm of flesh but he who glories should glory (a) 2 Cor. 1â— in our Lord. Moreover it was expedient that our belief or assent to divine truths should not only be unknown or inevident by any humane discourse but that absolutely also it should be obscure in it self and ordinarily speaking be void even of supernatural evidence that so we might have occasion to actuate and testifie the obedience which we ow to our God not only by submitting our will to his Will and Commands but by subjecting also our Understanding to his Wisdom and words captivating as the Apostle speaks the same Understanding (b) 2 Cor. 10.5 to the Obedience of Faith Which occasion had been wanting if Almighty God had made clear to us the truths which now are certainly but not evidently presented to our minds For where truth doth manifestly open it self not obedience but necessity commands our assent For this reason Divines teach that the Objects of faith being not evident to humane reason it is in mans power not only to abstain from believing by suspending our Judgments or exercising no act one way or other but also to disbelieve that is to believe the contrary of that which faith proposeth as the example of innumerable Arch-heretiques can bear witness This obscurity of faith we learn from holy Scripture according to those words of the Apostle Faith is the (c) Heb. 11. substance of things to be hoped for the argument of things not appearing And We see by a glass (d) 1 Cor. 13. in a dark manner but then face to face And accordingly S. Peter faith Which you do well attending unto as to (e) 2 Pet. 1.19 a Candle shining in a dark place 3 Faith being then obscure whereby it differeth from natural Sciences and yet being
another age Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended but there are few or none to be found No Tradition but only of Scripture can derive it self from the Fountain but may be plainly prov'd either to have been brought in in such an age after Christ or that in such an age it was not in In a word there is no sufficient certainty but of Scripture only for any considering man to build upon This therefore and this only I have reason to believe This I will profess according to this I will live and for this if there be occasion I will not only willingly but even gladly lose my life though I should be sorry that Christians should take it from me Propose me any thing out of this Book and require whether I believe or no and seem it never so incomprehensible to human reason I will subscribe it with hand and heart as knowing no Demonstration can bee stronger than this God hath said so therefore it is true In other things I will take no mans Liberty of judgement from him neither shall any man take mine from me I will think no man the worse man nor the worse Christian I will love no man the less for differing in opinion from me And what measure I mete to others I expect from them again I am fully assured that God does not and therefore that men ought not to require any more of any man than this To believe the Scripture to be God's word to endeavour to find the true sense of it and to live according to it 57. This is the Religion which I have chosen after a long deliberation and I am verily perswaded that I have chosen wisely much more wisely than if I had guided my self according to your Churches authority For the Scripture being all true I am secur'd by believing nothing else that I shall believe no falshood as matter of faith And if I mistake the sense of Scripture and so fall into error yet am I secure from any danger thereby if but your grounds be true because endeavouring to finde the true sense of Scripture I cannot but hold my error without pertinacy and be ready to forsake it when a more true and a more probable sense shall appear unto me And then all necessary truth being as I have prov'd plainly set down in Scripture I am certain by believing Scripture to believe all necessary Truth And he that does so if his life be answerable to his faith how is it possible he should said of Salvation 58. Besides whatsoever may be pretended to gain to your Church the credit of a Guide all that and much more may be said for the Scripture Hath your Church been ancient The Scripture is more ancient Is your Church a means to keep men at unity So is the Scripture to keep those that believe it and will obey it in unity of belief in matters necessary or very profitable and in unity of Charity in points unnecessary Is your Church universal for time or place Certainly the Scripture is more universal For all the Christians in the world those I mean that in truth deserve this name do now and alwayes have believed the Scripture to be the word of God so much of it at least as contains all things necessary whereas only you say that you only are the Church of God and all Christians besides you deny it 59. Thirdly following the Scripture I follow that whereby you prove your Churches infallibility whereof were it not for Scripture what pretence could you have or what notion could we have and by so doing tacitely confess that your selves are surer of the truth of the Scripture than of your Churches authority For we must be surer of the proof than of the thing proved otherwise it is no proof 60 Fourthly following the Scripture I follow that which must be true if your Church be true for your Church gives attestation to it Whereas if I follow your Church I must follow that which though Scripture be true may be false nay which if Scripture be true must be false because the Scripture testifies against it 61. Fifthly to follow the Scripture I have God's express warrant and command and no colour of any prohibition But to believe your Church infallible I have no command at all much less an express command Nay I have reason to fear that I am prohibited to do so in these words Call no man Master on earth They fell by infidelity Thou standest by faith Be not high minded but fear The spirit of truth the world cannot receive 62. Following your Church I must hold many things not only above reason but against it if any thing be against it whereas following the Scripture I shall believe many mysteries but no impossibilities many things above reason but nothing against it many things which had they not been reveal'd reason could never have discover'd but nothing which by true reason may be confuted many things which reason cannot comprehend how they can be but nothing which reason can comprehend that it cannot be Nay I shall believe nothing which reason will not convince that I ought to believe it For reason will convince any man unless he be of a perverse mind that the Scripture is the word of God And then no reason can be greater than this God sayes so therefore it is true 63. Following your Church I must hold many things which to any mans judgement that will give himself the liberty of judgement will seem much more plainly contradicted by Scripture than the infalliblity of your Church appears to be confirm'd by it and consequently must be so foolish as to believe your Church exempted from error upon less evidence rather than subject to the common condition of mankind upon greater evidence Now if I take the Scripture only for my Guide I shall not need to do any thing so unreasonable 64. If I will follow your Church I must believe impossibilities and that with an absolute certainty upon motives which are confess'd to be but only Prudential and probable That is with a weak foundation I must firmly support a heavy a monstrous heavy building Now following the Scripture I shall have no necessity to undergoe any such difficulties 65. Following your Church I must be servant of Christ and a subject of the King but only ad placitum Papae I must be prepar'd in mind to renounce my allegiance to the King when the Pope shall declare him an Heretique and command me not to obey him and I must be prepar'd in mind to esteem Vertue Vice and Vice Vertue if the Pope shall so determine Indeed you say it is impossible he should do the later but that you know is a great question neither is it fit my obedience to God and the King should depend upon a questionable foundation And howsoever you must grant that if by an impossible supposition the Pope's commands should be contrary to the law of Christ that they of your Religion
God he should not rest in quiet he should soon perceive we were not of his faction 2. We that are able to tell David an Article or two of faith more then ever he was acquainted with Nay more Can we with any imaginable ground of reason be supposed liable to any suspition of Atheism that are able to read to David a Lecture out of his own Psalms and explain the meaning of his own Prophecies much clearer then himself which held the pen to the holy Spirit of God Though we cannot deny but that in other things there may be found some spice of folly and imperfection in us But it cannot be imagined that we who are almost cloyed with the heavenly Manna of God's Word that can instruct our Teachers and are able to maintain Opinions and Tenents the scruples whereof not both the Universities of this Land nor the whole Clergy are able to resolve that it should be possible for us ever to come to that perfection and excellency of Folly and Madness as to entertain a thought that there is no God Nay we are not so uncharitable as to charge a Turk or an Infidel with such an horrible imputation as this 3. Beloved Christians be not wise in your own conceipts If you will seriously examine the 3 d. of the Romans which I mentioned before you shall find that St. Paul out of this Psalm and the like words of Isaiah doth conclude the whole posterity of Adam Christ only excepted under sin and the curse of God which inference of his were weak and inconcluding unless every man of his own nature were such a one as the Prophet here describes and the same Apostle in another place expresses Even altogether without God in the world i. e. not maintaining it as an opinion which they would undertake by force of argument to confirm That there is no God For we read not of above 3 or 4 among the Heathens that were of any fashion which went thus farr But such as though in their discourse and serious thoughts they do not question a Deity but would abhor any man that would not liberally allow unto God all his glorious Attributes yet in their hearts and affections they deny him they live as if there was no God having no respect at all to him in all their projects and therefore indeed and in God's esteem become formally and in strict propriety of speech very Atheists 4. That this is most true and that therefore many who because they are Orthodox in opinion have thereupon a great conceit of their faith towards God yet being strictly examâ—ned shall be found to have built such glorious buildings in shew upon Sand or which is worse to have made hay and stubble matter fit only for the fire foundations of many golden hopes and glorious presumptions must be shewed at large hereafter 5. The words now read are a secret confession which the Fool whispers to his own heart He neither can nor dare profess this openly and when he cals his reason to counsel about this business the question is farr otherwise stated The words do not run thus The Fool being convinced by evidence of reason and demonstration hath concluded There is no God no this is no Heathenish Philosophical fool he is quite of another temper This is a worldly proud malitious projecting wise fool a fool that knows it is for his advantage to put God out of his thoughts and therefore doth forcibly captivate and wilfully hoodwink his understanding and thinks he hath obtained a great victory if he can contrive any course to bring himself to that pass that no cold melancholy thoughts of God or Hell may interrupt or restrain him from freely wallowing in the lusts and uncleanness of his heart without any remôrse without any reluctance or griping within him It is for his Heart's sake the love that he bears to the lusts thereof that makes him an Atheist If it could stand with that course and trade of life that he is resolved upon to entertain contrary thoughts he would as soon work his judgment and thoughts another way And therefore in his open profession it sometimes fals out that even when he wishes there were no God yet he is a very forward zealous acknowledger in general of God and his glorious Attributes So that the same desire of a quiet and uninterrupted enjoying the scope and freedom of the lusts and affections of his heart makes him both a resolute secret Atheist and withal wise enough to keep his folly to himself and to make none else acquainted with his curious art and method of such woful self-deceiving but his dearly beloved Heart The Fool c. 6. The discussion of these words does not engage me to a dividing or descanting upon the whole Psam Let it suffice that we may most probably conceive that David in this Psalm intends the description of the woful estate of that Kingdom after God had taken away his good Spirit from Saul wherein the secret Enemies of God did greedily lay hold on that occasion to vex and despite and as much as was in their power to lay waste the heritage of God 7. The Fool who is the person that through the whole Psalm works all the mischief in the Original is Nabal which hath the signification of fading dying or falling away as doth a leaf or flower Isai 40.8 And is a Title given to the foolish man as having lost the juyce and sap of wisdom reason honesty and godliness being fallen from grace ungrateful and without the life of God As a dead carkass which of this word is called Nebalah Levit. 11.40 and therefore ignoble and of vile esteem oppos'd to the Noble-man Isa 32.5 The Apostle in the Greek turneth it imprudent or without understanding Rom. 10.19 from Deut. 32.21 8. Hath said in his Heart There c. i. e. Not so much perswadeth himself in secret that there is no God But rather expresseth so in his life or in his affections which are called the Heart in the phrase of God proportionable to the same expression of David Psal 10.4 Psal 10.4 The wicked through the pride of his countenance will not seek after God God is not in all his crafty purposes If you would have the full sense of my Text more largely express'd Tit. 1.16 turn to Tit. 1.16 where persons of the same mould that the Prophet here complains of are thus described They profess that they know God but in works they deny him being abominable and disobedient and to every good work void of judgment 9. Where are observable First the cause of this Practical Atheism in these last words of the verse They were to every good work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that was Ignorance or rather Imprudence Inconsiderance Implying not a bare want of knowledg but an abusing thereof in not reducing it to practise in hiding the light which was in them under a bushel Secondly Then we have the manner
be it spoken do after the true one Having such advantages even above the blessed Apostles and ancient Martyrs Let us walk as becometh the children of God having our eyes fastened upon the Lord our Salvation and conforming our selves freely and unconstrainedly to whatsoever it shall please him to prescribe unto us Not admitting our own carnal reason and wordly wisdom into counsel about his Worship nor believing any thing which he has propos'd unto us in his Word but for the authority of him that spoke it not accepting the persons of men nor perswading our selves to the belief of horrible and unworthy Opinions of God because men affected by us have so delivered It was a grievous complaint that God made by the Prophet Isaiah Cap. 29. v. 13. Their fear towards me is taught by the Commandements of men Isaith 29.13 39. Again we must subdue our Affections to be ruled and squared according to the good Will of God rejoycing to see our most beloved sins discover'd and rebuk'd and even crucified by the powerful Word and Spirit of God Lastly We must be ready for Christ his sake to root out of our hearts that extravagant immoderate Love of our own selves that private affection as Basil calleth it resolving rather to undergo a shameful horrible death then to maintain any inordinate base desire or to take part with our filthy lusts against our Saviour who hath so dearly redeem'd us 40. Thus have you heard in General tearms largely and I fear tediously delivered the sum and effect of this Doctrin of Self-Denyal for the restraining of it to particular Cases I have reserved to another hour Now I will according to my promise as earnestly as I can inforce this necessary duty upon you from the two Circumstances before-mentioned viz. 1. From the greater reasonableness in the thing commanded And 2. Extream Love and Kindness of the Law-giver that hath in his own person given us a perfect example directing us how we should fulfill his command 41. For the first namely the reasonableness of the thing commanded To omit how all creatures in acknowledgment of that duty which they owe to God their Creator do willingly submit themselves to his disposition denying their own specifical private natures for the general good of the world For example The Elements are subject to alterations and deportations to be destroy'd and revived to be Instruments of Gods favour and again of his wrath Surely Man above all the World beside not excepting that glorious heavenly Host of Angels is by a more indissoluble Adamantine chain oblig'd and bound to his Maker For to which of the Angels said he at any time Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee 42. Again when a great portion of those glorious Spirits had mutinously rebelled against God and Man following the example of their prevarication had with them plung'd himself irrecoverably into extream unavoidable destruction In that necessity God had no respect to those heavenly Spirits which were by nature much more admirable and perfect then we for he did in no wise saith the Apostle take upon him the nature of Angels but he took on him the seed of Abraham and therein performed the glorious work of our Redemption 43. Surely after this great Love than which I dare not say God cannot but I may well say he will never show a greater we his unworthy creatures are bound to express some greater measure of thankful obedience then we were for our Creation And yet even then the least that could be expected from us was a full perfect resignation of our selves to the disposition of that God that gave us our being Therefore now after a work that has cost God all that pains and study in inventing and contriving and so much sorrow and labour in performing Certainly after all this it is no great thing if the Lord should require our whole selves souls and bodies for a whole burnt-offering a Sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving If he should require from us our whole substance whole Rivers of Oyl and all the Cattel feeding on a Thousand Hills 44. Yet now he is content that less thanks shall satisfie then was due before ever he perform'd that glorious work Nay he hath after all this taken off and subducted from that debt which we ow'd him for our Creation For whereas then one actual offence against this Law did necessarily draw along with it inevitable destruction yet now our gracious God perceiving that we are but dust accepts of our imperfect sinful obedience nay sometimes of the inward desire and willingness to perform where there is not power to put it in execution Nothing then can be more reasonable then that a Christian should be commanded not to prefer the fulfilling of his own will before Gods Will nor to suffer that his carnal desires should have greater power and sway with him then the command of such a God or Lastly not to withdraw his Allegiance and Obedience due to his Redeemer and place them upon a creature but equal or may be inferiour to himself 45. Secondly Consider the wonderful love and kindness of the Law-giver that hath already tasted unto us tasted nay hath drunk the dregs of this unpleasant bitter potion He by whom all things were made even the Eternal Almighty Word He which thought it no robbery to be equal with God became his own creature and submitted himself to be trod upon reviled hated despised by the worst of all creatures cruel ungodly and perverse sinners He of whose fulness we have all received did utterly evacuate and empty himself of his Glory and Majesty denying to himself such things which he would not even to the most despised creatures For saith he The Foxes have holes and the Birds of the air have nests but the Son of Man hath not whereon to lay his head 2 Cor. 8.9 Ye know saith St. Paul 2 Cor. 8.9 the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that though he was rich he became poor that ye through his poverty might be made rich So poor he was that he was forced to borrow Tribute money of a Fish and was fain to strain himself to a Miracle to get the Fish to bring it So poor that he was forc'd to borrow a young Colt of strangers never known to him Say saith he The Lord hath need of him A strange unheard of speech The Lord that created the world and can as easily annihilate it Yet he hath need and hath need of a Colt the Foal of an Ass Time would fail me for I suppose the World it self would not contain the Books that might be written of his dangers his temptations his fastings his travels his disgraces torments and death all perform'd without any end propos'd to himself besides our good and happiness 46. It behoved him saith St. Paul to be made like his Brethren in all things Heb. 2.17 18. that he might be a merciful and faithful High-Priest in things pertaining
use sometimes to allure us and win our hearts to do that which shall please him other times to startle and affright us when we are about something contrary to his command And to say the truth This must of necessity be the issue of the former Doctrin For how is it possible to make these things hold together We are already perfectly reconciled to God by the death of his Son without any consideration had to our personal Faith and Repentance And yet unless we do earnestly repent us of our sins and with a lively Faith adhere to God's Promises we shall never be reconciled unto God! Or these All our sins are already remitted and that only for the vertue of Christ's satisfaction And yet unless we believe our sins shall never be forgiven us 25. So that by this reckoning we must be forced to purge the Gospel of those troublesome dangerous terms of Covenants and Conditions of those fruitless affrighting Conjunctions Si Credideris Si non poenitentiam egeris Or which is all one soften them into a sense utterly repugnant and warring against the natural force and signification of the words on this wise Where the Scripture saith If thou repentest not thy sins shall not be forgiven thee Thou art not to conceive that forgiveness of thy sins is a work yet to be done or that it has any dependance upon any thing in thee But this great blessing shall be hid from thine eyes thou shalt never come to the knowledg of it and thereby shalt live here a discontented pensive suspicious life Again If thou believest thou shalt be saved that is Thou shalt obtain a comfortable assurance of Hope nay an infallible faith of thy future Salvation though that was intended thee without any consideration of thy faith 26. So that the Gospel of Christ is not the power of God unto Salvation for How can the Word be an Instrument of that which was long ago absolutely perform'd and purchased And therefore Christ his preaching his miracles and tears The Apostles travels and persecutions The sending of the Holy Spirit Baptism Eucharist Imposition of hands Absolution and many more blessed means of our Salvation were not instituted for this end to make us capable of Remission of our Sins for that it seems was already not only meritoriously but effectually procured and without all manner of Conditions infallibly destin'd to Gods Elect but only for this end That whilst they live here to their thinking in danger and hazard but they are Fools for thinking so they may now and then be a little cheared and comforted with apprehending what Christ hath done for them and to what a comfortable state and Inheritance he hath destin'd them Thus the Covenant which God hath sworn shall be everlasting is by the improvidence and ignorance of some men rendred unprofitable yea utterly abrogated But Ne quid inclementius dicam we have not so learned Christ 27. The second Reason destroying the former Doctrin I told you should be taken from the necessity of Christ's Resurrection For if the immediate effect of Christs Death be the purchasing of a perfect reconciliation with God and full remission of Sins for us the Elect of God Then I will not say what Benefit but What necessity is there of Christ's Resurrection in respect of us For by this accompt after the Consummatum est upon the Cross when the satisfaction was perfected and our debts pay'd Though Christ had afterwards miscarryed though he had been detain'd by death though his Soul had been left in Hell and he had seen corruption Notwithstanding we should stand upon good terms with God unless we shall conceive of Him worse then of the most oppressing Usurer that when a debt is dischar'gd and the Bond cancell'd will notwithstanding not release the Prisoner unless the undertaker come in Person or by main force deliver him 28. I confess that to see a friend that had ventur'd so farr for us as our Saviour did that to do us good had put himself in such extream danger I say to see such a one to be utterly cast away without all hopes and possibility of being able to pay him our thanks would be a spectacle which would grieve and pierce our very souls it would be a renting to our bowels But this is only Charity and Gratitude or good nature in us which would procure this grief not that it stands upon our safety his preservation being a matter only of convenience not extream necessity to us 29. We all do worthily condemn and detest that blasphemous Heresie of the Socinians who exclude the meritorious death and sufferings of Christ from having any necessary influence into our Justification or Salvation making it of no greater vertue then the sufferings of the blessed Martyrs who by their death set their Seal and Testimony to the Truth of the Gospel which freely offers forgiveness of sins to all penitent believers Now the same injury which these Hereticks do to the merit of Christ's death In proportion the former doctrin fastens upon his Resurrection and new life by taking from it the chief and proper effect thereof which is an actual vindication of us from the power of sin into the glorious liberty of the sons of God by the power of Christs Spirit plentifully by him diffused and shed abroad in our hearts and making the chief vertue thereof to consist in affording us only matter of comfort and hope that God will deal no otherwise with us then he hath dealt with Christ and after a life full of disturbance and misery revive us to glory and immortality with his Son for evermore whereas St. Paul hath another kind of conceit of Christs Resurrection for saith he in Heb. 5.9 Christ being made perfect i. e. glorified c. 2.10 becomes Author of eternal Salvation to all that obey him And if Christ be not risen your faith is vain you are yet in your sins and if Christ be not risen neither shall we ever be raised but be utterly irrecoverably condemned to everlasting rottenness 30. And thus I am unawares fallen upon my second Proposition Prop. II. Namely That by the Dominion and power of Christ which at his Resurrection and not before he received as a reward of his great Humility we are not only enabled to the performance of the conditions of this New Covenant and by consequence made capeable of an actual application of his satisfaction But also by the same power we shall hereafter be raised up and exalted unto everlasting Happiness 31. Though by the vertue of the Incarnation of our Saviour the Humane Nature was raised to a state and condition of unspeakable glory Notwithstanding if in this place as well as before we shall be content to submit our Reason to Scripture We shall find that according to a Covenant made between Christ and his Father he was content not to challenge to himself any right of Dominion and Rule over us till he had perfectly deserv'd
it self but in comparison with those twinkling cloudy stars of Jewish Ordinances and that once glorious but now eclipsed light the Law of Works since then this is the day which the Lord hath made for us we will rejoyce and be glad in it and we will be ready to hearken especially to any thing that shall be spoken concerning our Epiphany concerning that blessed light for many ages removed out of our sight and as on this day beginning to appear in our Horizon 3. The words of my Text I find so full and swelling with expression so fruitful and abounding in rich sense that I am almost sorry I have said so much of them to fit them to this day But in recompence I will spare the labour of shewing their dependance and connexion with the preceding part of the Epistle and consider them as a loose severed Thesis In which is contain'd not only the sum and extract of this Epistle but likewise of Christian Religion in general in opposition both to the Mosaical Law given to the Jews and the Law of Works call'd also the Moral Natural Law which from the beginning of the world hath been assented to and written in the hearts of all mankind The sense of which words if they were inlarg'd may be this We Christians by the tenour and prescript of our Religion expect the hope of Righteousness i. the reward which we hope for by righteousness not as those vain Teachers newly sprung up among you Galatians would have us by obedience unto the carnal Ceremonial Law of Moses but through the Spirit i. by a spiritual worship neither by performing the old Covenant of works which we are not able to fulfil but by faith by such an obedience as is prescribed unto us in the Gospel We through the Spirit wait c. 4. In these words then which comprehend the compleat essence of the Covenant of Grace we may consider First the conditions on mans part required in these words through the Spirit and by Faith Secondly upon the performance of our duty there follows Gods promise or the condition which God will make good unto us and that is the hope of Righteousness or Justification In the former part namely the obedience which is required from us Christians we may consider it first in opposition to the Mosaical Law by these words through the Spirit which import that it is not such an outward carnal obedience as Moses his Law required but an internal Spiritual worship of the heart and soul Secondly the opposition of this new Covenant to the old Covenant of Works in these words by Faith which signifie that we do not hope for salvation by the works of the Law but by the Righteousness of Faith or the Gospel In the second General we may likewise observe first the nature of Justification which comprehends the promises which God has been pleased to propose to us as the reward of our obedience Secondly the interest which we Christians in this life after we have perform'd our duties may have in these promises which is Hope express'd in these words We wait for the hope c. Of these 5. First then of the Covenant of Grace as it is distinguish'd from the Mosaical Law by these words through the Spirit Where we will consider the nature of the Jewish Law and wherein it is distinguish'd from the Christian When Almighty God with a high hand and a stretched out arm had rescued the people of Israel from the Aegyptian slavery and brought them in safety into the Wilderness intending then to settle and reduce them into good order and government himself and by common voluntary consent they all agree to submit themselves to whatsoever laws he shall prescribe unto them as we find Exod. 19. from 3d to the 9th verse Exod. 19.3 c. Judg. 8. So that afterwards Judg. 8. when the people after an unexpected glorious victory obtain'd by Gideon would have made him a King and have setled the government in his house No V. 23. saith Gideon v. 23. I will not rule over you neither shall my Son rule over you The Lord shall rule over you And likewise afterward when Samuel complained to God of the perverseness of the people who were weary of his government and would have a King as the Nations round about them had Thou art deceived saith God It is my government that they are weary of They have not rejected thee but they have rejected me and now are risen up in rebellion against me to depose me from that Dominion which with their free consents I assumed For which intolerable base ingratitude of that Nation in his wrath he gives them a King he appoints his Successour which revenged those injuries and indignities offered to Almighty God to the uttermost upon them 6. Now during the time of Gods reign over them never any King was so careful to provide wholesome laws both for Church and Common-wealth as He was Insomuch as he bids them look about and consider the nations round about them If ever any people was furnished with Laws and Ordinances of such equity and righteousness as theirs were which Laws because they were ordained by Angels in the hand of a Mediator namely Moses are commonly called by the name of the Mosaical Law and are penned down at large by him in his last four Books 7. The Precepts and prohibitions of this Law are of several natures For some duties therein enjoyn'd are such as in their own natures have an intrinsecal essential goodness and righteousness in them and the contrary to them are in themselves evil and would have been so though they had never been expresly prohibited Such are especially the 10. Words or Precepts written by Gods own finger in the two Tables of stone Other Precepts concern matters of their own nature indifferent and are only to be termed good because they were commanded by a positive divine Law such are the Ceremonial Washings Purifications Sacrifices c. A third sort are of a mixt nature the objects of which are for the most part things in their own nature good or evil but yet the circumstances annex'd unto them are meerly arbitrary and alterable as namely those things which are commanded or forbidden by that which is commonly called the Judicial Law for example The Law of fourfold Restitution of things stollen Theft of its own nature is evil and deserves punishment But that the punishment thereof should be such a kind of Restitution is not in it self necessary but may be chang'd either into a corporal punishment or it may be into a civil death according as those who have the government of Kingdoms and States shall think fit and convenient for the dispositions of the times wherein they live as we see by experience in the practise of our own Kingdoms For the due execution of which Laws and punishment of transgressours God appointed Judges and Rulers and where they failed through want of care or partiality himself
their fore-fathers intolerable 23. I will conclude this whole point of the difference between Moses his Law and the Law of Faith or the Gospel in Gods own words by the Prophet Jer. 31.31 Jer. 31.31 twice quoted by St. Paul in Heb. ch 8. ch 10. where God saith Behold the dayes come saith the Lord that I will make a New-Covenant with the House of Israel and with the House of Judah Not according to the Covenant which I made with their Fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt which my Covenant they brake although I was an husband unto them saith the Lord But this shall be the Covenant that I will make with them After those dayes saith the Lord I will put my Laws in their hearts and write them in their inward parts c. As if he should say The former Covenant which I made with them by Moses was only written in two Tables of Stone as the Roman Laws were in 12. Tables and required only an outward conformity and obedience for the which they did not need an inward sanctifying spiritual Grace to enable them as the New Covenant of Grace doth And therefore for the performiâ—â— of that I will abundantly afford and supply them with all the Graces oâ— my Holy Spirit 24. But a little to interrupt this Text You will say What had not the Jews God's Law written in their hearts also did not they worship him in Spirit as well as we No question But this they did not as commanded by Moses his Law but by that Covenant made with Abraham and by him traduced unto them It follows And I will be their God and they shall be my people i. e. I will be their God after a more especial manner then I was unto them in the Wilderness I will not only be their King to govern them in peace and tranquillity out of the danger and fear of their Enemies the Nations about them and preserve them safe in the promised Land but I will keep them from the fury and malice of their spiritual Enemies that would seek to destroy their souls and I will bring them to a Land infinitely exceeding theirs and whereof the Land of Canaan was but a most unproportionable type and shadow even mine own blessed and glorious Kingdom reserved in the highest Heavens for them who sincerely perform the conditions of my New Covenant Thus farr as largely as so small a measure of time would permit me I have told you the difference betwixt the Covenant of Grace and Moses his Law imply'd in these words of my Text through the Spirit I come now to my second particular namely the distinction of the same Covenant of Grace from the Law of works wherein I shall proceed by the same method i. e. shewing you first absolutely the nature of those Laws and then the several differences betwixt them 25. The Law of Works is the same with that to the obedience whereof Adam was oblig'd in Paradise with this exception that besides the Moral natural Law written in his heart the substance whereof is to this day reserved in the minds of all the sons of Adam Adam had a second positive Law injoyn'd him by God namely the forbidding him to eat of the Tree of Good and Evil which one Precept cannot properly be call'd a part of the Law of Works or Nature since the Action thereby forbidden was not of its own nature evil but only made unlawful by vertue of God's prohibition Excepting therefore this one particular Precept the Law which was given to Adam call'd the Law of Works comprehended in it all kind of moral duties referr'd either to God his Neighbour or Himself which have in them a natural essential goodness or righteousness and by consequence the prohibition of all manner of actions words or thoughts which are in themselves contrary to Justice and Reason All these Precepts are generally suppos'd to be contained in the Ten Words written by Gods own finger in two Tables of Stone though with submission I think that those two Tables contain only directly the moral duties of man to God and his Neighbour for it will require much forcing and straining to bring in the duties and sins of a man against his own person within that compass as Temperance Sobriety and their opposites Gluttony Drunkenness Self-incontinency c. 26. The Obligation to this Law is so strict severe and peremptory That it required not only an universal Obedience to whatsoever is contained in that Law in the full extent latitude and perfection thereof but that continual without interruption through the whole couâ—â—â— of a man's life Insomuch that he that should but once transgress it 〈◊〉 least point or circumstance should without redemption or dispensation be rendred culpable as of the breach of the whole Law and remain lyable to the malediction thereof And to this Law in this strictness mentioned are all men living oblig'd who are out of Christ and who either know not of him or are not willing to submit themselves to his New Covenant 27. The Justification which was due to the performance of this Law by Justice and as the wages thereof that is the condition wherein God oblig'd himself to such as fulfill'd it was the promises of this life and that which is to come Long happy and peaceable days in this world and in their due time a translation to the joys and glory of heaven This Justification did not comprehend Remission of Sins as ours does for the Law excluded all hope of pardon after sin no promise made to repentance repentance would do no good The Court wherein they were to be judg'd was a Court of meer rigorous Justice Justice rejoyc'd over and against Mercy Grace Loving-kindness and all those blessed and glorious Attributes whereby God for our Saviour Jesus Christ his sake is pleased and delighted to be known unto the world 28. This Law in the rigour thereof might easily have been perform'd by Adam he had that perfection of grace and holiness given him which was exactly equal and commensurable to whatsoever duties were enjoyn'd him But by his wilful voluntary God forbid we should say enforc'd or absolutely decree'd prevarication he utterly undid both himself and his posterity leaving them engag'd for his debts and as much of their own without almost any money to pay them Without Christ we are all oblig'd to the same strictness and severity of the Law which by reason of our poverty and want of grace is become impossible to be perform'd by us As the blessed Apostle St. Paul hath evidently proved by Induction in the beginning of his Epistle to the Romans In the first chapter declaring that the Gentiles neither did nor could perform the Law in the second saying as much for the Jews and in the third joyning them both together in the same miserable desperate estate The conclusion of his whole discourse is All have sinned
the description thereof with all We have besides the experience of several men who have seen and tasted as much of that glory as a mortal creature is capable of S. Paul and S. John the Divine Surely the consideration hereof might serve our turn if not quite to disrelish unto us and even to make us hate the vain pleasures of this world yet at least not to prefer them when they come in competition with the other And I would to God we would suffer them but so far to prevail upon us But I cannot stay 23. I have rank'd the three Armies of our enemies just after the Roman fashion reserving the Triaries the old experienced Souldiers to the last For though in shew the first rank of the Devils appear most terrible yet in very deed all their power is nothing unless the lusts of our hearts take part with them and give them advantage against us The lusts of the flesh are those Traytors which continually keep us company we cannot be quit of them without the Devils assistance they are able to captive us what think you then are they able to do being manag'd by so powerful so wise an enemy without them all the power of Hell and darkness are insufficient to withdraw us from our obedience and by consequence from the love and favour of God For suppose the Devil for example present a lustful object to our fancy as it were holding a lascivious picture before our eyes if we consent not in our minds to any base delight in such a spectacle if we settle not our thoughts upon it as upon a pleasing sight it will be so far from doing us any harm that it will rather prove a means to root us more deeply in the favour of God as persons unwilling to take Pay of his and our enemies 24. But alas as we are ordinarily so far from this nobleness of mind from this bravery of a Christian-like Spirit that as if the Devil were too slow to object such Temptations to us we will not await his leisure but on all occasions be ready and desirous to raise up and then settle such unworthy thoughts in our minds we will be content to spend many hours sometimes in the acting of this inward contemplative Adultery S. Paul speaking of those lusts of our flesh calls them our members when he saith Col. 3.5 Mortifie your members which are on earth fornication uncleanness inordinate affection evil concupiscence c. And indeed we by our practise make good the Apostles expression For we account our selves as same unperfect creatures without them we know not what to do with our selves especially when we are alone unless we set our selves on work this way by acting to our selves such filthy sins which perhaps natural bashfulness want of money or opportunity will not suffer us to put in practise What strength have we now to oppose to these most pernicious enemies which are so closely cemented and even incorporated within us that they are become as it were flesh of our flesh and bones of our bones 25. Why surely as naturally we have received this root of Bitterness in our hearts which is apt to give an infections tincture to all the thoughts and actions issuing from thence So likewise it hath pleased Almighty God to imprint a new Principle in our minds to plant as it were a new Spirit in our souls I mean that active powerful Grace which without any co-operation of our own he infuses into us especially in our Baptism and which is afterward 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strengthened and enlivened daily by a constant frequent exercising our selves in the use of those manifold blessed means of our salvation the hearing reading and meditating on his holy Word and participation of his heavenly mysteries For surely if Reason alone by the help of those worthy grave precepts which are extant in the Treatises of Moral Philosophy hath been able to change many men from the habitual practise of several vices to a vertuous I had like to have said also a Religious life why should any man think so meanly of God's holy Word and Sacraments as to doubt but that much rather they should be able to make us new creatures to make us wise unto salvation especially considering that continual assistance of Gods Holy Spirit which infallibly attends the use and exercise of those his blessed means Do you think God is so favourable to the Devil or his instruments our lusts that he is unwilling to have them subdued and mortified in us And if he be not unwilling surely much less is he unable to perform this great work in us even to the end 26. Therefore as before speaking of those outward forces God and his holy Angels which are ready to take our parts and fight on our sides against the Devil and his Angels we apply'd that saying of Elisha to his servant If thine eyes were opened thou shouldest perceive that they which are with us are more then they which are against us So likewise in the Case in hand we may make use of that saying of S. John Greater is he which is in you than he which is in the world implying 1 Joh. 4.4 that God is not only in himself stronger than the Devil but also as considered in us i. e. as working in our hearts by his Grace This way I say he is stronger than the Devil His Spirit co-operating with the means of our salvation is more vigorous and powerfuul to reuew us unto the Image of his Holiness if we will but do that which lies in our own power then the Devil though taking his advantage of that concupiscence which in some measure is continually resident in us is or can be to corrupt and so to destroy us For his power is not considerable unless we be willing to joyn with him Thus you see though our enemies be allowed all the advantages they can challenge yet in exact esteem without any flattering of our selves we may conclude that they who are ready and desirons to joyn forces with us are greater in all respects than they which are against us 27. But yet for all this since the conducting and managing of those forces is left to our discretion for God will not fight single against the Devil in our behalf unless we lend him our aid and assistance And therefore Curse ye Meroz saith the Angel of the Lord in the Victorious Song of Deborah curse bitterly the inhabitants thereof And why must poor Meroz be so bitterly cursed Because they came not to the help of the Lord to the help of the Lord against the Mighty Hereupon it may seem that Almighty God will not put to his strength in our defence unless we joyn with him He will not be our Champion to fight whilest we sit still only spectators of the combat And therefore this consideration alone may be sufficient to abate that confidence which the foregoing discourse might be apt to raise in