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A26360 The Christian's manual in three parts ... / by L. Addison ... Addison, Lancelot, 1632-1703. 1691 (1691) Wing A513; ESTC R36716 123,157 421

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Hearers of Sermons have proved wavering and unconstant in their judgments for want of a timely and through Catechizing so likewise upon the same ground they have been very erroneous and Opiniative For this want of a plain Institution in the Principles of Truth hath left them destitute of a proper Test whereby they might be able to explore and try what is preacht and to separate the pretious from the vile Through the want whereof they as greedily imbibe a false as true Doctrine and are ready to change their Opinions according to the impression which the affectionate noise of the last Sermon has made upon their Senses Nor are they happier in their reading Holy Scriptures than in hearing of them thus preacht The Un-catechized run upon the same Rock in both For albeit the Divine Word is in it self the pure Fountain of all saving Truths yet persons not trained up in a competent apprehension of Catechistical Principles make it a sink of pernicious Errors sucking Contention from the Breasts of Peace turning the sincere Milk of Gods Word into the Poyson of Asps and perverting the Scripture to their own destruction while they make the Oracles of God not to speak their own but such a Sense and Language as may best adjust their Designs and Interests And as no malice proves more implacable than that which ariseth out of the Ashes of an Apostate love So no Errors are more dangerous than those which proceed from a wrong interpreting and application of the Word of Truth And as those whose fancy has been playing with sounds think every thing they hear is tunable to their fancy So those whose minds are once infected with evil Opinions think every Text speaks according to the Opinions wherewith they are infected And it is an Hypothesis will meet with few Adversaries That Men who are prejudiced and prepossessed with Errors in Religion cannot be reduced but by getting them therein rightly principled which was never yet attempted but by solid and perspicuous Catechizing it being by this that Men prove in Religion like the House in the Gospel founded upon a Rock which by no force of storms and winds could be subverted And therefore if this ground-work be not surely laid all superstructures in Religion lie upon the loose Sand and are easily washt away by the insinuating suggestions of false Teachers And what is yet further to be considered we see the rest of the Building sink with the Foundation if that be shaken all will go to ruine And Christians not well grounded in the Elements of Truth and Holiness will quickly be perswaded to give themselves up to any wild Opinion or loose Practice and turn Schismatick or Traytor to the great hazard and confusion both of Church and State But if it be objected that Catechizing is a Plaister too narrow for our Sore because it cannot reach those whose Age or some other Circumstance excludes them the number of those for whom this sort of Instruction is appointed notwithstanding they have no less need thereof than others To this it will be enough to return the succeeding considerations viz. 1. That the Church obviated this Scruple when in the last Edition of the Liturgy she appointed the Catechism to be learned of every person And in her Fifty ninth Canon enjoyn'd the Clergy to instruct all the ignorant Persons of their Parishes in the publick Catechism And that those who bear the heavy load of many years might not decline this way of Institution they may see it founded in the Apostolical practice which was to Catechize the adult as before was observed 2. To be duly instructed in the Principles of Christianity is a duty incumbent upon all who by the Knowledg and Practice thereof hope to be eternally saved And therefore if the Aged be therein ignorant they have more reason to blush at their ignorance than to be thus instructed and with diligence and humility to wait at this Gate of Knowledge rather than with scorn to disdain it 3. If the Elder sort have either not been taught at all or have forgot the chief Heads and Catechetical Fundamentals of Christianity they now meet with a fair occasion bo●h to learn and call them to mind For by bei●g present and attentive in hearing the Younger Catechized the Ancient and all may be brought to know what they do not understand to remember what they have forgot and to be inform'd in what they have erred So that at the same time Catechising will instruct the Ignorant remember the Forgetful and inform the Erroneous and therefore administer a Physick proper and sutable to our several Maladies which cannot be pretended to by those other Methods that have hitherto been so eagerly pursued CHAP. XIII The Benefits of Catechizing 1. In respect of the Civil State 2. The Clergy 3. The People The Mischiefs of private Schools Objections against the constant practice of Catechizing removed BUt besides what has been discoursed there are other good Effects of Catechising which at least may be as so many motives to enforce its practice And in the first place Catechising is in an eminent manner conducive to the Peace and Welfare of the State because it takes care that the Younger sort who are the hopes of a Nation be duly educated in those Principles on whose practice the safety and happiness of a State depends For to sowe in the pure minds of Youth the Seeds of Vertue and Truth before the Tares of Vice and Error and the Weeds of the World have canker'd and spoiled the Soil is by the consent of all wise men a point of incomparable force and moment for the well ordering and Government of all kind of Societies and for making Common-wealths ever flourishing and happy For by the means of Catechising the Younger sort will be planted and grow up in a due Conformity and Obedience to the Laws in being which is undeniably a proper expedient to uphold States in the Terms wherein they are and to free them from the danger of being so easily obvious to alteration and change For the Opinions of what nature soever wherewith we are first season'd are of double force to any second Perswasion and Usages And this makes the Spanish Nation early and careful in Catechising their Children by which Method ever since its use they have not suffer'd the least disturbance and alteration in Church or State That serious people having largely experienced the Truth of their own saying No es menos importante el ser de la Doctrina que el de la Naturaleza And in confirmation of this remark it were easie to load the Margin with a numerous Quotation and the Line with a tedious recital of many excellent Passages out of Plato Aristotle Socrates Seneca Tacitus Agell and almost all the learned Heathen Plutarch's Education of Children doth abridge them all But we need not go sharpen our Tools with the Philistines seeing an Israelite can do it better For Solomon is plain That the way to
that would make him a Client to the Saints and a constant Votary to the Blessed Virgin and his Guardian Spirit He that is well grounded in the Doctrine of the Second Commandment will never be induced to believe that the Image is to be adored with the same Worship that is due to what is worshipped He will be wary of admitting any bodily representations of the Holy Trinity and look jealously upon all the Doctrine of Image worship which he sees to be vindicated with a few remote and suspicious Distinctions devised by the Fathers of that Doctrine on purpose to maintain its Credit He that is throughly instructed in the Doctrine of the Third Commandment and hath thence been taught to tremble at and reverence the Holy Name of the Almighty will never be induced to believe that frequent Cursing and Swearing if customary is Venial or a Sin which is pardonable in its own Nature and for which the Favour of God cannot be forfeited That equivocating in Oaths is ●awful That our most Solemn Oaths may be dispensed with That the dreadful Name of God may be used in the unwarrantable exorcization of the Creatures That Understanding and Devotion are not necessarily required to our Invocations upon God He that has been throughly informed of the mind of its eternal Author in the Fourth Commandment will never give up himself to a Religion that prefers a Mans Day before Gods or a Saints Day before the Lords Which would alter the Institution of God himself as was designed by Pope Silvester who decreed that Thursday should be kept for the Lords Day He that hath well learned the Fifth Commandment must do great Violence to his Understanding before he can chuse to be of a Religion that loves to drink the Blood of princes That absolves Subjects from their Allegiance to their Lawful Sovereign That gives Power to a Vicar to depose Princes at Pleasure That Arms Subjects with Power to murther their King The like may be said of all the Precepts of the Royal Law of God which is the most perfect Rule of our Obedience and which we are Taught to violate so soon as we have given up our selves to Popery and to the Service of the Roman Moloch And though these are Mysteries which the Romish Seducers carefully conceal and sometime zealously inveigh against while they are compassing easie Proselytes with whom they deal in the most specious Pretences yet they have no sooner deluded them to give up their Names to Popery and thereupon to shake Hands with all liberty of judging for themselves than by degrees they let them know what is to be done And if they startle at doing what is commanded them this is presently censured for a Relick of their Old Heresie and that there was something wanting in their Conversion which cannot be supplied but by acting throughly all the most horrible Injunctions of their New Faith And by the same means of being well Catechised in the Lords Prayer a Man will be able to apprehend and reject the many Errors Popery would impose upon him in that high concern For thereby he will clearly perceive that Prayer ought be made to God only and that none to can share with him in that or any other part of Divine and Religious Worship And that for this reason he ought not to embrace a Religion which enjoyns him to pray unto Saints and Angels and that too not only to have them intercede to God for him but also to help him in his Necessities and to deliver him both in Bodily and Ghostly Dangers And that this may not be thought the fault of Rosaries Hours and Books of private Devotions for which the Church of Rome is accountable as having confirmed them by her Authority it is also the Tenor of her publick Service as is plainly to be seen in the Collects Hymns and Litanies of that Breviary which was restored by the Council of Trent and authorised by several Popes and which is at this day in uncontroulable use through all the Papal Dominions And we might also observe the like concerning the Doctrine of the Sacraments in which whosoever is once fully instructed according to the Catechism of this Church will quickly discern the Abuses thereinto introduced by Popery To mention no more than what belongs to the Author of a Sacrament which our Catechism asserts and which is an undeniablle Truth to be only Christ And therefore all those things are to be excluded the number of Sacraments that are not of his immediate and clear appointment And that Orders Penance Confirmation Marriage Extream Unction all Romish Sacraments are not of Christ's Institution is easily discernable to Men but slenderly versed in the Holy Bible and therefore not to be received for the Sacraments of Christ but Inventions of those who teach for Doctrines the Commandments of Men. Now by these imperfect intimations we may safely infer That those who have had their Foundation in Religion surely laid according to the publickly allowed Catechism of this Church must have other Ends to serve than those of Religion and drive other projects than Gods Honour and their own Salvation who forsake her Communion for that of Rome But to return What ever hath unhappily contributed to our Revolting to the one hand or the other from the Established Religion of this Church there is none that will deny but that the lack of a plain and solid Catechising has had therein a very large share And therefore we may conlude That the careful practice of that will be a chief means to restore Union and Peace the Omission whereof hath occasioned the contrary And indeed Catechising seems the only proper way not only to strengthen those that do stand but to raise up those that are faln if we consider how ineffectual all other ways have proved which have been managed to this end Which now come to be surveyed CHAP. VIII The Methods used for our reclaiming surveyed proving ineffectual c. AND here we need not be told how Indulgence and Clemency Acts of Amnesty and Grace have been so far unable so much as to work us up to a good Humour that like fresh Pastures to unruly Beasts they have only served to strengthen us for a sturdier resistance Nor need we be told of making Converts with the Churches Patrimony for though by this means some may be invited to bear the Ark of God yet they do it but like the Philistins Kine who were still lowing after the Calves they had left behind them It needs not be demonstrated that our frowardness and opiniastrè are not to be cured by such Methods But that which I would chiefly take notice of is that Disputation and Preaching which out of an agreeableness that they are generally thought to bear to our distempers and the powerfulness of their management have obtained a Name to be the only proper remedies But the continuance of the Malady is a convincing Argument that these are not so proper for
Opinions by which the Devil withstands the Power of Truth and restore Christians to their just and full liberty of captivating their Understandings to Scripture only and as Rivers whose Passage is not interrupted run all to the Ocean so it may well be hoped by Gods Blessing that Universal Liberty thus moderated may quickly reduce us to Truth and Unity These thoughts of Peace may come from the God of Peace to whose Blessing I recommend them And that this may not be looked upon for some singularity in my own Perswasion I have transcribed the Words out of Mr. Chillingworth and he out of another and enclosed them in a Parenthesis But taking no delight to travel further in search of those Distempers which I am unable to remedy the only comfort is that they cannot be looked upon as the Issues of our Religion nor any way be charg'd upon the Principles we profess And therefore we must seek elsewhere to lay the Imputation and I shall go no further than to what I mentioned in the Introduction even the Omission or Luke-warm use of Catechising And here in the First place it cannot be denyed how that the generality of the People of this Kingdom have for many Years at least during the time of our Intestine Wars either been destitute of all Catechising or have been Catechised only in such Principles as were good for nothing but to establish the Elder in a cursed Schism and Rebellion and to infect the Younger with the same Contagion The sad effects whereof are still visible in the unpeaceable Tenets of some and in the want of a due understanding of Religion in most In respect of which we have need to be taught again which be the first Principles of the Oracles of God being become such as have need of Milk and not of strong Meat The greatest part of the common People being so far unable to reap any benefit from the handling of abstruser Mysteries in Eloquent and Elaborate Discourses which is so studiously pursued by our Junior and Florid Theologues that they want instruction in the plainest parts of Catechistical Doctrines For notwithstanding that we boast much of our Knowledge of Christ and that our Proficiency is so great in Religion that we conceive our selves wiser than our Teachers yet if the Tree may be judged by its Fruits we shall be found shamefully ignorant of what we assume to know and to have little of that Wisdom which descends from above which Christ came to teach and infuse and which is Pure Peaceable Gentle easie to be entreated merciful without Hypocrisie and Wavering In the Second place we cannot but with deep Resentments observe that since the time God turned again our Captivity and restored this Church to the free use of his Ordinances Catechising has met but with cold Entertainment even from those by whom it ought to have been most lovingly caressed For in most places it has been looked upon rather as a Foreigner than a Native of the Church and as Fruits of their Mouth never in Season but for a few Days in Lent And even then too the Church-Catechism is generally taught without any such explanation as is needful in respect of those slender Capacities to whose instruction it is chiefly devoted And if in the Third place we consider who those are which on the one hand hinder the progress and settlement of Unity Peace and Concord in this Church by an undutiful froward resisting of her Laws Or who they are that on the other hand Apostatize and utterly forsake her Communion it will be found upon due examination that we have laid the ground of the Disobedience of the one and of the defection of the other in a want of a timely and diligent Catechising And as for the First sort namely the disobedient and refractory who are now known by the very candid Name of Dissenters they cannot pretend to a more plausible excuse of their Undutifulness than that they were never du●y Catechised to the contrary For granting them to be Persons not totally forsaken of all Ingenuity and right Reason we cannot imagine that they should so foully violate their bounden Duties both to God and Man had they ever been fully taught or did clearly retain any thing but an imperfect and prejudicate knowledge of those Duties as they are plainly set down in the Church-Catechism And as for the Latter sort to wit those who have Apostatized and faln from ours to the Roman Perswasion they have been so far from having their first Tinctures and Foundation in Religion according to our publick Catechism that they might say thereof as those in Acts 19.2 did of the Holy Ghost But we must limit this Observation chiefly to those who had the unhappiness to be born in this Church when she was under the Cross and wore the Marks of her great Master And as for those who had been instructed in our Church Catechism yet before they left us they had so far unlearnt it as that they had retain'd of that System of our Religion such loose rambling and incoherent Notions as if it were wholly Enthusiastick or had been compiled by Persons deeply Hypochondriacal And for closure of this Paragraph I shall only add That none could ever be met with who for Ends truly Spiritual and Religious did ever abandon this for the Roman Church who had been throughly grounded in her Catechism And there will want no Reasons to ●upport this Assertion if it be duly con●idered how the very Frame and Con●exture of the Catechism doth obviate and oppose all the main Errors of Po●ery as they relate either to Faith or Practice to Prayer or Doctrine And First he that has been duly Ca●echised in the Apostles Creed will not only be armed against a spurious Explication of the Old Articles of our Faith but also against a needless addi●ion of New ones For he will find that the first Twelve contain such a perfect Summary of all saving Truths simply necessary to be believed that those Articles added thereunto by the Council of Trent ought to be rejected upon the account of being Superfluous And ●t the same time he will find ground enough to explode that Implicite Faith so much relyed upon in the Romish Church who considers the necessity of a personal Belief as it is clearly required in the ●irst Word of the Creed which in La●ine gives name to the whole And in the next place as to those Errors of Popery that concern our Practice they will be certainly discovered and refuted by a right understanding of the Decalogue which by all is granted to be a clear and perspicuous Rule of what we are to do both toward God and our Neighbour And a Man that is well grounded in the Doctrine of the First Commandment knows that he must reserve all Divine Honour Trust Devotion to God alone and that he may bestow no part thereof upon the Creature and therefore cannot but avoid and abhor those Romish Doctors
publick Audience and Judgment and the offer of open Disputation greatly assured the People of the soundness of their Cause when they saw they were ready to put it upon publick Tryal And more may be supposed to have followed the first Essays of the Reformation out of an Opinion that it was good and true being defended with such freedom simplicity and assurance than by the strength of those Arguments which were at first brought to assert it But then it is to be considered that the Reformers offer'd this kind of tryal to those with whom they began to be at no less distance than with members of a distinct and different Communion and in places where they were in hope to gain but in no danger to lose Proselytes For they wisely invaded the Adversary in his own Country and challeng'd him to a Dispute in his own Cities and in the throng of his Adherents But upon how different Terms Disputes can now be managed either with Dissenters or the common Enemy I leave the truly considerate to determine But since we are resolved to fight I could wish our valour were more discreet than to encounter the Enemy within our own Bowels to controvert our Religion in the place where it is legally established A thing not heard of in other Countries where there is a greater Peace and more outward Religion But I shall close up this Topick with setting down what is usually observed upon this Subject viz. 1. That Religion is like neither to get nor save by Disputes 2. That Disputes on this subject may have the ill-luck to make some suspect the truth of all Religion because it is so much controverted For weaker Heads seeing the Roof totter are apt to suspect there is no firmness in the foundation and to conclude nothing is certain if any thing be question'd 3. That in so great a mist of Disputes many may grow halting and luke-warm and think it their only safety to stand still or sit down in Neutrality 4. That for one sin Disputes have cured they have begot innumerable 5. That the strength and practice of Religion have been sensibly impaired since by the distemper'd heats of Mens Spirits it hath been rarified into subtil Controversies 6. That suspence of Judgment and exercise of Charity were safer and seemlier for Christian men than the hot pursuit of those Controversies wherein they that are most fervent to dispute are not always the most able to determine But what is more natural to the present purpose it should seriously be considered That the People are neither to be confuted of their false nor established in the true Notices of Religion by Doubtful Disputes but plain Catechistical Doctrines And as to our selves of this Church seeing there can come nothing of our Contentions but the mutual waste of the parties contending till a common Enemy dance in the Ashes of us both I shall ever wish and most heartily pray that the strict commands of Peace and Unity so frequent in the Gospel may at the last so prevail in this Nation to the burying and utter oblivion of strife together with the causes that have either bred or brought it up That things of small moment never disjoyn them whom one God one Lord one Faith one Spirit one Baptism bands of so great force have linked together That a respective Eye towards things wherewith we should not be disquieted make us not unable to speak peaceably one to another Finally that no strife may ever be heard of again but who shall hate strife most and pursue peace with the swiftest paces CHAP. XI Preaching what it is the several ways thereof used by the Church What kind of Preaching among the Old Jews and Primitive Christians The Homilies considered HAving in the antecedent Chapter discharged Disputes and Controversies from being any suitable and proper means of reducing the Dissenters of our own Church or winning the Members of the Roman The next thing pretending to our healing is Preaching which I here take to be An open solemn and Authoritative publication of Divine Mysteries And this the Church doth two several ways 1. As a Witness 2. As an Expositor And first The Church Preacheth as a Witness by publick reading the Sacred Scriptures and by relating and testifying the Divine Truths which God in the inspired Volumes hath consigned her And that this is no spurious sense of Preaching we have him to assure us who well understood the sense and importance both of the Word and Thing For in Acts 15.21 the reading of Moses in the Synagogues every Sabbath-day is by St. Paul in the genuine and native signification of the Word styled Preaching That this Preaching of Moses was a naked reading of his Law we have a whole cloud of Expositors to attest it besides the clearness of the thing it self But I cannot be of their judgment who assert That neither the Ancient nor Modern Jews had any such thing as weekly Preaching upon any part of the Law of Moses and that upon this ground solely conclude the preaching of Moses to be meer reading For we find that the Old Jews had divers Men among them who used to contribute their Talents to the Exposition of the Lesson that was read and these in ordinary course were the Sons or Schollars of the Prophets who were trained up in learning of the Law and at the age of Thirty received the Title of Doctors and till they obtained the Grace of immediate Inspiration or the Spirit of Prophesie they continued to expound the Scriptures not by Revelation but according to that knowledge which the ordinary blessing of God upon their Studies was able to compass Answerable whereunto as some think was that custom among the Christians mentioned 1 Cor. 14.29 And also those Disciples of the Prophets of the New Testament called Doctors because they were admitted to teach in the Church But for mine own part I rather understand the Word Doctor in St. Paul of all such Presbyters as had abilities of Preaching and Teaching the People in their Assemblies And that Presbyters and Doctors were all one we may conclude from Tertull. de Prescript c. 3. Quid ergò si Episcopus c. What then if a Bishop if a Deacon if a Widow a Virgin if a Doctor if even a Martyr shall fall from the Rule In this Catalogue of principal Ecclesiastick Orders Presbyters must be understood by Doctors unless we will deny them to have any room among the chief Ranks of the Church which were both false and absurd And that incestuous person with an Opinion of whom the Corinthians were puft up was as is observed out of Chrysostom and Theoderet one of their Doctors that is one of the Presbyters of that Church that exercised the Office of Preaching and by that means bore a great sway among the People But to return to the reading of Moses which began with the Moral Service of the Synagogue when we find that the Mosaical Law was distinguished into Divisions
answerable to the number of Weeks in the Year that the whole Law in that space might be read over correspondent to which Lessons out of the Law there were others out of the Prophets one of which the Holy Jesus took for his Subject at Nazareth when after the manner of the Jewish Doctors he made his Exposition St. Luke 4.16 And he did the like St. Mat. 9.35 where he is said to teach 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Synagogue which might be done without any pretension to such Authority as was supposed in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Preaching which in the Christian use of the word in the New Testament differs from Teaching Christ did both St. Mat. 9.35 He taught the Law and preacht the Gospel At Thirty years old he expounded Moses as a Doctor before which time the ancient Church made none Presbyters and at the same time he preacht the Gospel of the Kingdom But still the matter is plain enough that the bare reading of Moses in the Synagogues is Preaching in the proper meaning which sort of Preaching is still practised in the appointed Lessons of the Church The former out of the Old Testament being derived like many wholesom things from the Synagogue and the Second Lesson out of the New Testament which was appointed as most suppose by the 16th Canon of the Council of Laodicea celebrated in the year of Grace 364. Albeit Justin Martyr who lived in the Second Age seems to give the Lessons an elder date For in his second Apology he tells us how all those who abide in Cities and the adjacent Countries meet in one place on the day called Sunday and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Memoires and Records of the Apostles together with the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Writings of the Prophets are read unto them as far as the time and occasion serves And that the Reader ceasing the President in a Speech makes an Exhortation that they would imitate those good things which had been read From which it is evidently to be concluded that the Church in the first and best Ages of Christianity preacht as a Witness when she read and thereby attested the truth of the Holy Scriptures And all men are in some degree capable thereby to be edified For there is none understands the Scriptures so well but he may improve by hearing them read in the Church And if we look into the Efficacy of the Word it is wonderful that it should be less as it is read than as it is expounded seeing that the one is the Word of God as it was inspired by the Holy Ghost and the other can no farther be so accounted than as it keeps close to the sense and meaning thereof which is not so easie so long as Men are subject to Errors and Mistakes and have base Ends to serve and carnal Circumstances to be accomplished 2. But because all men ought to have such a knowledge in God's Word as may be sufficient to Salvation and because all will not attain to so much by bare reading thereof therefore the Church Preacheth as an Expositor by discovering and explaining what in Sacred Scripture is mysterious and obscure and by a seasonable application of those things which are more obvious and evident And in this sense Preaching is an Office in our own Church which cannot be too highly magnified nor too frequently celebrated if it be agreeable to those Homilies which were intended not only to supply those who have not the Gift of Preaching sufficiently to instruct the people committed to their Cure but also to be a wholsom Rule by which even those who are able to preach should guide themselves in that publick Ministry But if Discourses at this day made in Pulpits ought only so far forth to be accounted Preaching as they are agreeable to the Churches Sermons then all is not Preaching which bears that name and takes up the Circumstances thereunto allowed In the pious Sermons of the Church we find Principles of Christianity solidly explained Rules and Motives of honest and holy Life clearly laid down and Perorations and Perswasions to continue therein devoutly and charitably directed and applied I shall not draw this into comparison but only say That I hope there is none need think it any diminution or disparagement to his Parts and Learning to write after such a Copy And however the Homilies may be decried through popular Ignorance Prejudice and Passion yet no doubt but they are still necessary upon their first design which was to help the Inabilities of some to restrain the Indiscretions of others and to take away those strifes about what is fitting to be preacht caused by the variety of Mens Judgments the extravgance of their Fancies and the Byasses of several Interests And as for the Homilies of this Church they deserve a much better esteem than generally they receive and would need no elaborate Vindication if duly considered in their circumstances For in the first place they are be to looked upon as popular Sermons fitted unto the Capacities and Conditions of the Vulgar who being more led by Passion than Reason have need of such Discourses as will rather regulate their will than inform their judgment They standing in more need to have their Hearts and Consciences wrought upon for good Life and Conversation than their understanding and apprehension with any curious piece of Learning or Science And that the greatest share of the Church-Homilies deals herein there will need no other proof than their diligent perusual In the Second place The Church-Homilies are not to be looked upon as her Dogmatical Resolutions and Positions but as they contain godly and wholesom Doctrine Teaching and necessary for the times when they were composed For so much we are taught in the 35. Article And therefore I humbly suppose that every passage in the Homilies is not to be pressed for the Faith and Doctrine of the Church but that the whole ought to be considered as confronting the evil Opinions and Manners that at their composing were held and practised and if ought of either be remaining the Homilies may still be needful upon their Primitive account In the last place the very time in which the Homilies were compiled may excuse many a Period therein For our Ancestors were lately come out of Popery and conversed daily with Persons of that Perswasion and therefore severe dehortations were requisite to preserve them from Apostacy into those Practices out of which they had so lately been recovered which makes it no wonder if Enforcements and Exhortations to that purpose c. are sometime too hardly stretched And as for mine own part I am so far from undervaluing the pious Sermons of the Church that considering their circumstances I greatly esteem them for their own Worth and respect them above any other for their Authority And as to those who reject Homilies upon the account that Apochryphal Writings are not to be used in the Church it may