he hath set up to them they are half as long in Learning for all that as if he had never given them such a help And therefore it is that we cannot leave our Learning to Posterity Because still the stop is in the Receivers incapacity And he cannot be capable of the plainest precepts but by much time and study 2. Pride maketh men hasty in concluding because they are not humbled to a just Suspicion of their own apprehensions And men stay not to prove and try things before they judge 3. Pride maketh men insensible how much they are ignorant of in all their Knowledge 4. And it causeth men to slight the Reasons and Judgments of other men by which they might learn or at least might be taught to Judge considerately and suspend their own If over-valuing a mans own apprehensions be Pride as it is then certainly Pride is one of the commonest sins in the world and particularly among men professing godliness who upon every poor surmise or report are condemning those that they do not throughly know and in every petty controversy they are all still in the right though of never so many minds III Another cause of Pretended Knowledge is the want of a truly tender Conscience Which should make men fear lest they should err lest they should deserve the curse of putting light for darkness darkness for light evil for good good for evil should make them afraid lest they should defile their minds resist the truth blaspheme God or Dishonour him by fathering Errors on him and lest they should prove snares to mens Souls and a Scandal and Trouble to the Church of God. A tender Conscience would not have espoused such opinions under a year or two or manies deliberation which an Antinomian or other Sectary will take up in a few days if they were true O saith the tender Conscience what if I should Err and prove a Snare to Souls and a Scandal and Dishonour to the Church of God c. IV. Another cause of Pretended Knowledge is a blind Zeal for Knowledge and Godliness in the General while men know not what it is that they are zealous of They think that it is a necessary part of sincerity to receive the Truth speedily without delay And therefore they take a present concluding for a true Receiving it And he that soonest taketh up that which is offered him probably as a part of Godliness is taken for the most resolved down-right convert Which is true in case of Evident Truths where it is the will that by vice suspendeth the mind But not in dark and doubtful cases V. Another cause is an inordinate trust in man When some admire the learned too much and some the Religious and some this or that particular person and therefore build too confidently on their words Some on great men some on the Multitude but most on men of fame for great Learning or great Piety A credit is to be given by every learner to his Teacher But the confounding this with oâ— Belief of God and making it a part of our Religion and not trusting man as man only that is as a fallible Wight doth cause this Vice of Pretended Knowledge to pass with millions for Divine Faith. Especially when men embody themselves into a Sect as the only Orthodox or Godly party or as the only true Church as the Papists do then it emboldeneth them to believe any thing which their Sect or Church believeth For they think that this is the Churches Faith which cannot err or is the safest And that God would not let so many good men err And thus they that should be made their Teachers and the Helpers of their Faith become the Lords of it and almost their Gods. VI. And it much increaseth this sin that men are not sufficiently acquainted with the Original and Additional Corruption of mans nature and know not how Blind all Mankind is Alas man is a dark Creature What error may he not hold What villany may he not do Yea and maintain Truly said David All men are Liars Pitifully do many expound this as an effect of his unbelief and passion because he saith I said it my haste When it is no more than Paul saith Let God be true and every man a Liar Rom. 3. And than Solomon and Isaiah say All men are Vanity And Jeremy cursed be he that trusteth in man All men are untrusty in a great degree Weak False and Bad. And his haste was either as Dr. Hammond translateth it his Flight or else that his Tryal and distress made him more passionately sensible of the Vanity or Untrustiness of man than he was at other times For Vanity and a Lie to the Hebrews were words of the same importance signifying Deceivableness and untrustiness And indeed among mankind there is so great a degree of Impotency Selfishness Timorousness Ignorance Errour and Viciousness as that few wicked men are to be believed where there is any strong Temptation to lying And the Devil is seldom unprovided of Temptations And abundance of Hypocrites are as untrusty as open wicked men And abundance of sincere Godly persons especially Women have loose Tongues and hasty passions and a stretching Conscience but specially injudicious heads so that frequently they know not truth from falshood nor have the tenderness of Conscience to be silent till they know So that if one say it another will say it till a hundred say it and then it goeth for currant truth Good-mens over-much credulity of one another hath filled the Church with Lies and Fables Many of the Papists Sâ—â—â—rstitions Purgatory praying to Saints and Angels prayâ—â— for the dead c. were bred by this credulity It is so visible in Venerable Beda Gregory the first yea before them in Sulpitius Severus of Martius Life and abundance more that to help up Christianity among the Pagans they laid hold of any old Womans or Ignorant Mans Dreams and Visions and stories of pretended Miracles Revelations that it made even Melchior Canus cry out of the shameful Ridiculous filth that hence had filled their Legends Even Baronius upon Tryal retaineth no small number of them and with his Brethren the Oratorians on their Prophesying days told them to the people I am ashamed that I recited one out of him before my Treatise of Crucifying the World though I did it not as perswading any that it was true For I quickly saw that Sophronious on whom he fathered it was none of the reporters of it that Book being spurious and none of Sophronius his work Indeed I know of such impudent false History lately Printed of matters of publick fact in these times yea divers concerning my own Words and Actions by persons that are far from Contemptible that Strangers and Posterity will scarce believe that humane nature could be guilty of it in the open light And I know it to be so customary a thing for the Zealots professing the fear of God on one
side and the other to receive and rashly tell about lies of one another that I confess I am grown to take little heed of what such say in such a case unless the report continue a year uncontrolled For it 's common for them to tell those things as unquestionable which a few months prove false And yet never to manifest any repentance but to go on with the like one month disproving what the former hatcht and vended And indeed the very wisest and best of men are guilty of so much Ignorance Temerity Suspiciousness of others partiality c. That we must believe them though far sooner than others yet still with a reservâ—â—o change our minds if we find them mistaken 〈◊〉 still on supposition that they are fallible persons and that all men are Liars VII Another great cause of pretended false Knowledge and Confidence is the unhappy prejudices which our minds contract even in our Childhood before we have time and wit and Conscience to try things by true deliberation Children and Youth must receive much upon trust or else they can learn nothing But then they have not wit to proportion their apprehensions to the Evidence whether of Credibility or Certainty And so fame and tradition and education and the Countreys Vote do become the ordinary Parents of many Lies and folly maketh us to fasten so fearlesly in our fâ—rst apprehensions that they keep open the door to abundance of more falshoods And it must be clear Teachers or great impartial studies of a self-denying mind with a great blessing of God that must deliver us from prejudice and undeceive us And therefore all the World seeth that almost all men are of the Religion of their Country or their Parents be it never so absurd Though with the Mahometans they believe the Nonsence of a very sot once reading a quarter of whose Alcoran one would think should cure a man of Common reason of any inclination to his belief And among the Japonians even the eloquent Bonzii believe in Amida and Xaca To mention the belief of the Chinenses the People of Pegu Siam and many other such yea the Americans the Brasilians Lappians c. that correspond with Devils would be a sad instance of the unhappiness of mens first apprehensions and education And what doth the foresaid instance of Popery come short herein which tells us how Prejudice and Education and Company can make men deny all mens common sence and believe common unseen Miracles pretended in the stead VIII Another cause is the mistaking of the nature of the duty of submitting our judgment to our Superiours and Teachers especially to the Multitude or the Church or Antiquity No doubt but much reverence and a humane belief is due to the Judgment of our Teachers credibly made known But this is another thing quite different 1. From knowing by Evidence 2. And from believing God of which before and after IX Another cause is base slothfulness which makes men take up with the judgment of those in most reputation for Power Wisdom or Number to save them the labour of searching after the scientifical Evidence of things or the certain Evidence of Divine Revelations X. Another frequent cause is an appearance of something in the Truth which frighteneth men from it either for want of a clear methodical advantageous representation or by some difficult objection or some miscarriage in the utterance carriage or life of them that seem most zealous for it such little things deceive dark man And when he is turned from the Truth he thinks that the contrary Errour may be embraced without fear XI Another great cause of Confidence in false Conceits is the byass of some personal Interest prevailing with a corrupted Will and the mixture of Sense and Passion in the Judgment For as interested men hardly believe what seemeth against them and easily believe that which they would have to be true so Sense and Passion or Affections usually so bear down Reason that they think it their right to possess the Throne Not but that Sense is the only discerner of its own sensible Object as such and Reason by Sense as it is intelligible But that 's not the matter in hand But the Sensualist forceth his Reason to call that Best for him which his Sense is most delighted with and that Worst which most offendeth Sense The Drunkard will easily judge that his drinking is good for him and the Glutton that his pleasant meats are lawful and the Time-waster that his Plays are lawful and the Fornicator the wrathful revenger c. that their lusts and passions are lawful because they think that they have Feeling on their side It 's hard to carry an upright Judgment against Sense and Passion XII Sometimes a strong deluded Imagination maketh men exceeding confident in Errour some by Melancholy and some by a natural weakness of Reason and strength of Phantasie and some by misapprehensions in Religion grow to think that every strong conceit which doth but come in suddenly at reading or hearing or thinking on such a Text or in time of earnest prayer especially if it deeply affect themselves is certainly some suggestion or inspiration of God's Spirit And hence many Errours have troubled poor Souls and the Church of God which afterward they have themselves retracted Hence are the confidence of some ignorant Christians in expounding difficult Scriptures Prophecies and the boldness of others in expounding dark Providences and also in foretelling by their own surmises things to come XIII And not a few run into this mischief in some extreams by seeing others run into Errour on the other side Some are so offended at the credulity of the weak that they will grow confident against plain certainties themselves As because there are many feigned Miracles Apparitions Possessions and Witchcrafts in the World divulged by the Credulity of the injudicious therefore they will more foolishly be confident that there are no such things at all And because they see some weak persons impute more of their opinions performances and affections to God's Spirit than they ought therefore they grow mad against the true operations of the Spirit and confident that there is no such thing Some deride Praying by the Spirit and Preaching by the Spirit and Living by the Spirit when as they may as well deride understanding willing working by a Reasonable Soul no holy thing being holily done without God's Spirit any more than any act of life and reason without the Soul And they may on the same grounds deride all that Live not after the flesh and that are Christians Rom. 8.5 6 7 8 9 13. or that Love God or that seek Salvation Yea some run so far from spiritual Fanaticisms that they deny the very Being of Spirits and many confidently set up a dead Image of true Religion in bitter hatred and opposition of all that hath Life and serious Holiness So mad are some made by seeing some feverish persons dote XIV Another Cause
advantaged by the help of other mens experiments 2. And others rush on Practice in their youth partly because they have not yet knowledge enough to discern uncertainties and difficulties in the Art or to see what is further necessary to be known And partly because they think that seeing Skill must be got by experience use must help them to that experience and all men must have a beginning 3. And when they do their best they say God requireth no more 4. And they hope if they kill one they cure many But O that they had the Sobriety to consider 1. That the Physician is but One man And will his maintenance or livelyhood excuse him for killing many 2. That even one mans Life is more precious than one mans maintenance or fuller supply Is it not honester to beg your bread 3. That killing men by virtue of your trade without danger to you doth but hinder your Repentance but not so much extenuate your sin as many think Which is aggravated in that you kill your friends that trust you and not Enemies that oppose you or avoid you 4. Your experience must not be got by killing men but by accompanying experienced Physicians till you are fit to practice And if you cannot stay so long for want of maintenance beg rather than kill men or betake you to some other trade But if you be too Proud or Confident to take such Counsel I still advise all that love their lives that they choose not a Physician under fourty years old at least and if it may be not under sixty unless it be for some little disease or remedy which hath no danger and where they can do no harm if they do no good Old men may be ignorant but Young men must needs be so for want of experience though some few rare persons are sooner ripe than others And whereas they say that they Cure more than they Kill I wish that I had reason to believe them I suppose that if more of their patients did not live than die they would soon lose their practice But it 's like the far greatest part of those that live would have lived without them and perhaps have been sooner and easier cured if nature had not by them been disturbed And what calling is there in which hasty judging and conceits of more knowledge than men have doth not make great confusion and disappointment If a Fool that rageth and is confident be a Pilot woe to the poor Seamen and Passengers in the Ship. If such a one be Commander in an Army his own and other mens Blood or Captivity must cure his confidence and stay his rage For such will learn at no cheaper a rate How oft hear we such Workmen Carpenters Masons c. raging confident that their way is right and their work well done till the ruin of it confute and shame them If this disease take hold of Governours who will not stay to hear all parties and know the Truth but take up reports on trust from those that please or flatter them or judge presently before impartial tryal and hearing all woe to the land that is so governed The wisest and the best man must have due information and time patience and consideration to receive it or else he may do as David between Mephibosheth and Ziba and cannot be just What an odious thing is a partial blind rash hasty and impatient judge that cannot hear think and know before he judgeth Such the old Christians had to do with among their Persecutors who knew not what they held or what they were and yet could judge them and cruelly execute them And such were Tacitus and other old Historians that from common prejudice spake words of contempt or reproach of them The Christians were glad when they had a Trajan an Antonine an Alexander Severus c. to speak to that had Reason and Sobriety to hear their cause Among the Papists the old Reformers and Martyrs took him for a very commendable judge or Magistrate that would but allow them a Patient hearing and give them leave to speak for themselves Truth and Godliness have so much evidence and such a testimony for themselves in the Conscience of Mankind as that the Devil could never get them so odiously thought of and so hardly used in the World but only by keeping them unknown which is much by expelling and silencing their defenders who speed well sometime if an Obadiah hide them by fifties in a Cave and by tempting their Judges to hear but some superficial narrative of their cause and to have but a glimpse of the outside as in transitu and to see only the back-parts of it yea but the clothing which is commonly such as are made by its Enemies Good men and causes are too oft brought to them and set out by them as Christ with his Scarlet Robe his Reed and Crown of Thorns and then they say Behold the man and when they have cryed out Blasphemy and an Enemy to Caesar they write over his cross in scorn The King of the Jews Cain had not Patience to hear his own Brother and weigh the Case no not after that God had admonished him But he must first hate and murder and afterward consider why when it is too late Judas must know his Masters Innocency and what he had done in despair to hang himself And so wise Achitophel cometh to his end If David would have pondred his usage of Uriah as much in time as he did when Nathan had awakened his reason O what had he prevented If Paul had weighed before the case of Christians as he did when Christ did stop his rage he had not incurred the guilt of Persecution and the Martyrs Blood But he tells us that he was exceedingly mad against them And it is madness indeed to venture on Cruelty and Persecution and not stay first to understand the cause and consider why and what is like to be the end How ordinarily in the world are the excellentest men on Earth for Wisdom and Holiness such as Ignatius Cyprian and the rest of the Antient Martyrs and such as Athanasius Chrysostom c. reviled and used as if they were the basest Rogues on Earth laid in Jails banished silenced murdered and all this by men that know not what they are and have no true understanding of their cause Men of whom the world was not worthy wandred up and down in Dens and Caves and suffered joyfully the spoiling of their goods yea and death it self Heb. 11. from men that Judged before they knew Many a Great Man and Judge that hath condemned Christ's Ministers as Hereticks false Teachers unworthy to preach the Gospel have been such as understand not their Baptism Creed or Catechism and have need of many years teaching to make them know truly but those Principles that every Child should know There needs no great learning wisdom sobriety or honesty to teach them to cry out You are a Rogue a Seducer a
Brother odious as a Schismatick and a Fanatick and worse than words can describe him and another to reproach others as Antichristian and Carnal whom he never understood Nothing but Pride could make men so ready and bold and fearless in their most foolish censures 13. And it further sheweth their proud presumption when they dare do all this upon bare rumors and hear-say and ungrounded suspicions Were they not proud and presumptuous they would think Alas my understanding is not so clear and sure nor my Charity so safe and strong as that I should in reason venture to condemn my Brother upon uncertain rumors and so slight reports Have I heard him speak for himself Or is it Charity or common Justice to condemn a man unheard What though they are godly men that report it So was David that committed Adultery and Murder and hastily received a Lie against Mephibosheth and perhaps many of those Corinthians against whose false censures Paul was put so largely to vindicate himself 14. Yea when they dare proceed to vend these false reports and censures upon hear-say to the destruction of the Charity of those that hear them And so entangle them all in sin As if it were not enough to quench their own Love to their Brother by false Surmises but they must quench as many others also as they can 15. Yea when they dare venture so far as to unchurch many Churches yea most in the World and degrade most Ministers if not unchristen most Christians or at least themselves withdraw from the Communion of such Churches and all for something which they never understood about a Doctrine a Form a Circumstance where self-opinion or self-interest draweth them to all this bold adventure To say nothing of Condemnations of whole Churches and Countreys the tyrannical proud Impositions the cruel Persecutions which the Papal Faction hath been guilty of by this Vice judge now whether it be not too common a case to be guilty of an unhumbled understanding and of pretended knowledge Obj. If it be so is it not best do as the Papists and keep men from reading the Scriptures or medling with divine things which they cannot master any further than to believe what the Church believeth Ans 1. It is best no doubt to teach men to know the difference between Teachers and Learners and to keep in a humble learning state and in that state to grow as much in knowledge as they can But not to cast away knowledge for fear of over-valuing it nor renounce their reason for fear of errour No more than to put out their Eyes for fear of mistaking by them or chusing madness lest they abuse their wits Else we might wish to be Brutes because abused Reason is the cause of all the errours and mischiefs in the World. 2. The Popish Clergy who give this counsel for the blinding of the vulgar are worse themselves and by their proud Contendings Censures and Cruelties shew more self-conceitedness than the vulgar do 3. The truth is the cause is the common frailty of man and the common pravity of corrupted nature and it is to be found in Persons of all Ranks Religions and Conditions of which more after in due place Chap. 12. Of the mischievous effects of this proud pretence of more knowledge than men have IF the mischiefs of this sin had not been very great I had not chosen this subject to treat of 1. It is no small mischief to involve mens Souls in the guilt of all the sins which I named in the last Chapter as the discovery of this Vice. Sure all those disorders censures slanders and presumptions should not seem small in the Eyes of any man that feareth God and loveth holiness and hateth sin 2. Pretended knowledge wasteth men some time in getting it and much more in abusing it All the time that you study for it preach for it talk for it write for it is sinfully lost and cast away 3. It kindleth a corrupt and sinful Zeal such as James describeth Jam. 3.1 15. which is envious and striving and is but Earthly Sensual and Devilish A Zeal against Love and against good Works and against the Interest of our Brother and against the Peace and Concord of the Church a hurting burning devouring excommunicating persecuting Zeal And a Feaver in the Body is not so pernicious as such a sinful Zeal in the Soul. Such a Zeal the Jews had as Paul bears them witness Rom. 11.1 Such a Zeal alas is so common among persecuting Papists on one side and censorious Sectaries and Separatists on the other that we must all bear the sad effects of it And self-conceited knowledge is the fuel of this Zeal as James 3. fully manifesteth 4. This pretended knowledge is the fixing of false Opinions in the minds of men by which the truth is most powerfully kept out A Child will not wrangle against his Teacher and therefore will learn but these over-wise Fools do presently set their wits against what you say to keep out knowledge You must beat down the Garrison of his pride before you come within hearing to instruct him He is hardlier untaught the errours which he hath received than an unprejudiced man is taught to understand most excellent truths 5. By this the gifts of the most wise and excellent Teachers are half lost It is full Bottles that are cast into these Seas of knowledge which have no room for more but come out as they went in If an Augustine or an Aquinas or Scotus were among them yea a Peter or Paul what can he put into these Persons that are full of their own conceits already Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit there is more hope of a Fool than of him 6. Yea they are usually the perverters of the Souls of others Before they can come to themselves and know that they were mistaken what pains have they taken to make others of their own erroneous minds whom they are not able afterward to undeceive again 7. It is a vice that blemisheth many excellent qualifications To hear of a man that valueth his own Judgment but according to its worth and pretendeth to know but so much as he knoweth indeed is no shame to him though knowledge is a thing fitter to be Used than Boasted of But if a man know never so much and can never so well express it if he think that he is wiser than he is and excelleth others more than indeed he doth and over-valueth that knowledge which he hath it is a shame which his greatest parts cannot excuse or hide 8. It exposeth a man to base and shameful mutability He that will be hasty and confident in his apprehensions is so oft mistaken that he must as oft change his mind and recant or do much worse I know that it cannot be expected that any man should have as sound apprehensions in his youth as in his age and that the wisest should not have need of mutations for the better and
Now that which such persons do sensibly apprehend they are confident of because that Nature teacheth them to trust their senses But not knowing the rest their little partial conceptions are lame defective and deceitful For most will hence rashly conclude of the Negative that There is no more because they know no more But if any be more wise and modest yet do they want the conception of the unknown parts to make the rest to be true Knowledge or to tell them what is yet unknown And such use to turn a Judicial Rule into a Physical that non apparere non esse are to them all one 2. And an Ignorant man doth not know what Conceptions other men have of the same things which he is ignorant of So that he neither knoweth the thing intelligible what it is nor yet the Act of Knowing it which he never had But as a man born blind hath no formal conception either of sight or of light or visible objects so is it here 3. Nor hath he usually a true Knowledge of his own Ignorance how imperfect his understanding is and how much to be suspected as liable to mistake Though in some sensible matters it is easie to convince men of a total Ignorance yet when they know any thing it is hard to convince them what more is to be known and to keep them from false and hasty conclusions A man that cannot read at all is easily convinced that he cannot read But he that can read a little is apt to think that he readeth rightly when he doth not A man that never heard of Physick is easily convinced that he hath no skill in it But if he have read heard of and tryed a few Medicines he is apt to grow conceited and venture mens lives upon his skill A man that never saw Building Navigation or any Art or Manufacture is easily convinced that he is ignorant of it But if he have got some smattering knowledge he is ready to think that it is more than it is because he knoweth not what he wants And to err and know that a man erreth at the same time about the same thing is a contradiction For he that erreth judgeth a falshood to be a truth But to know that so to judge is to err is certainly not so to judge For Intellectus vult verum that is Truth is the object which it is naturally inclined to The same light which discovereth Errour cureth it And that light which discovereth the Thing it self is it that must convince me that I before erred about it by misapprehensions 4. And an ignorant man doth not so much as know the difficulties of the case and what may be said on the other side What contrary Evidence convinceth others or what weight there is in the objections which are or may be brought against him So that all men being naturally ignorant and little being known for much that 's unknown even to the wisest alas the temptation to Errour and false Confidence is so strong that few escape it II. Another cause of it is the Radical Master sin of Pride An unhumbled mind never well acquainted with its own dark and erroneous condition and its great need of natural and supernatural helps I find it hard to convince men of this but the formentioned Effects do certainly prove it The Vice is Born with us at the very Heart It is the Devils Image He that is not naturally proud is not a Son of Adam It liveth first and dieth last And there is nothing that a man is apter to be proud of than his Reason which is his Humanity and next to that of his Goodness and of his Greatness Men perceive not this in themselves because they know not what Pride is while it ruleth in them They think that it is only some womanish or childish extrinsical Ostentation boasting or perking up above others in Garb and Place or Peacock-like looking upon their own Train or setting it up for others to look on But Pride is as I said before an over-valuing our selves and a desire that others should over-value us And how few be there that be not tickled when their wisdom is applauded and netled when it is accounted small It 's hard to bear to be accounted and reported a Fool or a Person of little Wit. Many a man spendeth all the studies of his Life more for a Fame of Learning than for Learning it self what is Pride if this be not What grosser Pride than for a Woman or unexperienced Lad to scorn and despise the eldest and hardest Students in Divinity as dark Souls in comparison of them The Quakers in their Shops when I go along London Streets say Alas poor man thou art yet in darkness They have oft come into the Congregation when I had liberty to Preach Christs Gospel and cryed out against me as a Deceiver of the people They have followed me Home Crying out in the Streets The day of the Lord is coming when thou shalt perish as a Deceiver They have stood in the Market-place and under my Window year after year Crying out to the people Take heed of your Priests they deceive your Souls And if they saw any one wear a Lace or neat clothing they cryed to me These are the fruit of thy Ministry If they spake to me with greatest ignorance or nonsence it was with as much fury and rage as if a bloody Heart had appeared in their Faces so that though I never hurt or occasioned the hurt of one of them that I know of their truculent countenances told me what they would have done had I been in their power This was 1656 57 58 59. And yet they were poorly clothed Some of them went through the Streets stark naked and cryed out over and over all the year Woe to the Proud. Wonderful wonderful O the blindness of a corrupted mind That these poor Souls did not perceive their superlative Pride How highly did these people think of their own wisdom and holiness while they cryed down Laces Points and Cuffs And when did I ever know either a true Church-Tyrant or a true Sectarian Separating Humorist which were not both notorious proud over-valuers of their own conceits To which those that bowed not must be persecuted as unruly Schismaticks by the one sort and Excommunicated Separated from and Damned as Ungodly Carnal or Antichristian by the other sort Several ways doth PRIDE cause pretended knowledge 1. By thinking that our understandings are so good as that without great study we can know truth from falshood and so making us venture to judge of things at the first hearing or reading which we cannot be capable of judging of under long and diligent studies Because recipitur ad modum recipientis Therefore it is that when a man by great success in Studies hath made things as plain as words can make them so that you would think that all Students should presently be wise at easie rates by the light which
of Children in general and their inception of a new life so in special he seemeth to respect them as Disciples set Children to School and their business is to hear and learn all day They set not their wits against their Masters and do not wrangle and strive against him and say It is not so we know better than you But so abominably is humane nature corrupted by this Intellectual Pride that when once Lads are big enough to be from under a Tutor commonly instead of Learning of others they are of a teaching humour and had rather speak two hours than hear one And set their wits to contradict what they should learn and to conquer those that would instruct them and to shew themselves wiser than to learn to be more wise and we can scarce talk with Man or Woman but is the wisest in the Company and hardliest convinced of an errour But two things here I earnestly advise you 1. That you spend more time in Learning than in Disputing Not but that disputing in its season is necessary to defend the Truth But usually it engageth mens wits in an eager opposition against others and so against the truth which they should receive And it goeth more according to the ability of the disputants than the merits of the cause And he that is worsted is so galled at the disgrace that he hateth the truth the more for his sake that hath dishonoured him and therefore Paul speaketh so oft against such disputing and saith that the Servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle and apt to teach and in meekness instruct opposers I would ordinarily if any Man have a mind to wrangle with me tell him If you know more of these things than I if you will be my Teacher I shall thankfully hear and learn and desire him to open his Judgment to me in its fullest evidence And I would weigh it as the time and case required And if I were fully satisfied against it I would crave leave to tell him the reasons of my dissent and crave his patient audience to the end And when we well understood each others mind and reasons I would crave leave then to end in peace unless the safety of others required a dispute to defend the Truth 2. And my specially repeated counsel is that you suspend your judgment till you have cogent evidence to determine it Be no further of either side than you know they are in the right cast not your self into other mens opinions hastily upon slight reasons at a blind adventure If you see not a Certainty judge it not Certain If you see but a Probability judge it but Probable Prove all things and hold fast that which is good The Bereans are commended for searching the Scripture and seeing whether the things were so which Paul had spoken Truth feareth not the light It is like Gold that loseth nothing by the fire Darkness is its greatest Enemy and Dishonour Therefore look before you leap you are bid Believe not every Spirit but try the Spirits whether they be of God. Stand still till you know that the ground is safe which you are to tread on When Poysoners are as Common as Physicians you will take heed what you take It 's safer when once you have the essentials of Christianity to take too little than too much For you are sure to be saved if you are meer true Christians but how far Popery Antinomianism c. may corrupt your Christianity is a controversie Wish them that urge you to forbear their haste in a matter of everlasting consequence These are not matters to be rashly done And as long as you are uncertain profess your selves uncertain and if they will condemn you for your ignorance when you are willing to know the truth so will not God. But when you are certain resolve in the strength of God and hold fast whatever it cost you even to the death and never fear being losers by God by his Truth or by Fidelity in your Duty PART II. Of true saving Knowledge I. Causing our Love to God. II. Thereby Qualifying us for his Love. 1 Cor. 8.3 But if any man Love God the same is known of him Chap. I. Knowledge is to be estimated more by the end it tendeth to than by it self HAving done with that Epidemical mortal disease SELF-CONCEITEDNESS or PREFIDENCE or overhasty judging and Pretending to know that which we know not which I more desire than hope to cure I have left but a little room for the nobler part of my Subject True saving Knowledge because the handling of it was not my principal design The meaning of the Text I gave you before The true Paraphrase of it is as followeth As if Paul had said You overvalue your barren notions and think that by them you are wise whereas Knowledge is a means to a higher end is to be esteemed of as it attaineth that end And that end is to make us Lovers of God that so we may be known with Love by him For to Love God and be beloved by him is mans felicity and ultimate end and therefore that which we must seek after and live for in the world and he is to be accounted the wisest man that loveth God most when unsanctified Notions Speculations will prove but folly This being the true meaning of the Text I shall briefly speak of it by parts as it containeth these several Doctrines or Propositions Doct. 1. Knowledge is a means to a higher end according to which it is to be estimated Doct. 2. The End of Knowledge is to make us Lovers of God and so to be known with Love by him Doct. 3. Therefore knowledge is to be valued sought and used as it tendeth to this holy blessed end Doct. 4. And therefore those are to be accounted the wisest or best-knowing men that Love God most and not those that are stored with unholy knowledge For the first of these that Knowledge is a means to a higher end I shall first open it and then prove it I. Aquinas and some other Schoolmen make the Vision or Knowledge of God to be the highest part of mans Felicity And I deny not but that the three faculties of mans Soul Vital Activity Intellect and Will as the Image of the Divine Trinity have a kind of inseparability and coequality And therefore each of their perfections and perfect Receptions from God and operations on God is the ultimate end of man But yet they are Distinguishable though not divisible and there is such an Order among them as that one may in some respects be called the Inceptor and another the Perfecter of humane operations and so the Acts of one be called a means to the Acts of the other And thus though the Vision or Knowledge of God be one inadequate conception if not a part of our ultimate end yet the Love of God and Living to God are also other conceptions or parts of it yea
oft also so over-rule the Hearts of Men and the Course of the World as to make the knowledge and gifts of bad Men serviceable to his Church as wicked Souldiers oft fight in a good Cause and save the lives of better men yet a worldly mind is likest to follow the way of worldly interest and it is but seldom that worldly interest doth suite with and serve the interest of truth and holiness but more commonly is its greatest adversary Therefore most usually it must be expected that such worldly men should be adversaries to the same truth and holiness which their worldly interest is adverse to And hence hath arisen that Proud and Worldly and Tyrannical Clergy which hath set up and maintained the Roman Kingdom under the Name of the Holy Catholick Church and which hath by their Pope and pretended General Councils usurped a Legislative and Executive Power over the whole Christian World and made great numbers of Laws without Authority and contrary to the Laws of Christ multiplying Schisms on pretence of suppressing them and making so many things necessary to the Concord of Christians as hath made such Concord become impossible presumptuously voting other men to be Hereticks while their own Errours are of as odious a kind yea when holy Truth is sometime branded by them as Heresie And when they cannot carry the Judgments Consciences and Wills of all men along in obedience to their Tyrannical Pride and Lust and Interest they stir up Princes and States to serve them by the Sword and Murder and Persecute their own Subjects and raise bloody Wars against their Neighbours to force them to obey these proud Seducers Yea and if Kings and States be wiser than thus to be made their Hangmen or bloody Executioners to the ruine of their best Subjects and their own Everlasting Infamy and Damnation they stir up the foolish part of the Subjects against such Rulers and in a word they will give the World no peace So that I am past all doubt that the Ten Heathen Persecutions so much cryed out of was but a small matter as against the Christians Blood in comparison of what hath been done by this Tyrannical Clergy And the cruelest Magistrates still seem to come short of them in cruelty and seldom are very bloody or persecuting but when a worldly or proud Clergy stirs them up to it And all the Heresies that ever sprang up in the Church do seem to have done less harm on one side than by pretences of Unity Order and Government they have done on the other O how unspeakably have been and still are the Churches Sufferings by a proud and worldly Clergy and by mens abuse of pretended Learning and Authority 5. I will add yet one more considerable mischief that is that your unholiness and carnal minds for all your Learning corrupteth your judgments and greatly hindereth you from receiving many excellent truths and inclineth you to many mortal errours To instance in some particulars 1. About the Attributes and Government of God a bad man is inclined to doubt of Gods particular Providence his holy Truth and Justice and to think God is such a one as he would have him to be Whereas they that have the love of God and goodness have his Attributes as it were written on their Hearts that he is Good and Wise and Holy and Just and True they know by an Experimental certain knowledge which is to them like Nature and Life it self Joh. 17.3 Hos 2.20 Psal 34.8 c. 2. The very truth of the Gospel and Mystery of Redemption is far hardlier believed by a man that never felt his need of Christ nor ever had the operations of that Spirit on his Soul which are its Seal than by them that have the witness in themselves and have found Christ actually save them from their sins Who are regenerated by this holy Seed and nourished by this Milk. 1 Joh. 5.10 11 12. 1 Pet. 1.22 23. and 1 Pet. 2.2 3. Yea the very truth of our Souls Immortality and the Life and Glory to come is far hardlier believed by them who feel no inclination to sucâ— a future Glory but only a propensity to this present Life and the interest and pleasures of it than by them that have a Treasure a Home a Heart and a Conversation in Heaven and that long for nearer Communion with God and that have the Earnest and First-fruits of Heaven within them Math. 6.20 21. Phil. 3.20 21. Col. 4.1 2 3 4. Rom. 8.17 18 19 20. 4. The evil of sin in general and consequently what is sin in particular is hardlier known by a man that loveth it and would not have it to be sin than by one that hateth it and loveth God and holiness above all They that love the Lord hate evil 5. Most Controversies about the Nature of Grace are hardlier understood by them that have it not than by them that have it as a new Nature in them And consequently what kind of Persons are to be well thought of as the Children of God The Pharisees were strict and yet haters of Christ and Christians Many Preach and Write for godliness that yet when it cometh to a particular judgment deride the godly as Hypocrites or Superstitious 6. In cases about the worship of God a carnal Mind how Learned soever is apt to relish most an outside carnal ceremonious way and to be all for a dead formality or else for a proud ostentation of their own Wits Opinions and Parts or some odd singularity that sets them up to be admired as some extraordinary Persons or teacheth their own Consciences so to flatter them When a Spiritual Man is for worshipping God though with all decent Externals yet in Spirit and in Truth and in the most understanding sincere and humble manner and yet with the greatest joy and praise Rom. 8.16 26 c. 7. Specially in the work of self-judging how hard a work have the most Learned that are ungodly truely to know themselves When Learning doth but help their Pride to blind them And yet none so apt to say as the Pharisees John 9.10 Are we blind also And to hate those that honour them not as erroneously as they do themselves And therefore Augustine so lamenteth the misery of the Clergy and saith that the unlearned take Heaven by violence when the Learned are thrust down to Hell with all their learning who are prouder and more self-ignorant Hypocrites in the World expecting that all should bow to them and reverence them and cry them up as wise and excellent men than the Unholy Worldly Fleshly Clergy 8. And in every case that themselves are much concerned in their Learning will not keep them from the most blind in Justice Let the case be but such as their honour or profit or relations and friends are much concerned in and they presently take all Right to be on their side and all these to be honest men that are for them and
all those to be wicked Hypocrites Hereticks Schismaticks Factious or Liars that are against them and dare print to the world that most notorious truths in matters of fact are lies and lies are truths and corrupt all History where they are but concerned So that experience hath taught me to give little credit to any History written by men in whom I can perceive this double Character 1. That they are worldly and unconscionable 2. And concerned by a personal Interest especially when they revile their Adversaries And money friends or honour will make any Cause true and just with them and can confute all evidences of truth and innocency Learned Judges are too oft corrupt 9. And in cases of great Temptation how insufficient is Learning to repel the Tempter when it 's easily done by the holy Love of God and Goodness How easily is a man's Judgment tempted to think well of that which he loveth and ill of that which his heart is against Many such Instances I might give you but these fully shew the misery and folly of ungodly Scholars that are but blinded by dead notions and words of Art to think they know something when they know nothing as they ought to know and to hate truth and goodness and speak evil of the things they know not while for want of holy Love these tinkling Cymbals do but deceive themselves and ascertain their own damnation II. I should next have said as much of the vanity and snare of the Knowledge of such Gnosticks as in an over-valuing of their own Religious skill and gifts cry out as the Pharisees This people that know not the Law are cursed But what is said is applicable to them Chap. XVI Love best the Christians that have most Love to God and Man. IF God Love those most that have most Love and not those that have most barren Knowledge then so must we even all that take God's Wisdom as infallible Of whom can we know better whom to Love and Value than of him that is Wisdom and Love it self There is more savoury worth in the experience affections and heavenly tendency of holy Souls than in all the subtilties of Learned Wits When a man cometh to die who savoureth not more Wisdom in the Sacred Scripture and in holy Treatises than in all Aristotle's Learned works And who had not then rather hear the talk and prayers of a holy person than the most accurate Logick or Mathematicks Alas what are these but trifles to a dying man And what they will be to a dying man they should be much to us all our life unless we would never be wise till it is too late And among men seeming Religious it is not the Religious wrangler or disputer nor the Zealous reviler of his Brethren that can hotly cry down on one side These men are Heretical or on the other These are Antichristian that are the Lovely persons Not they that on one side cry out Away with these from the Ministry and Church as disobedient to us Or on the other Away with these from our Communion as not holy enough to join with us It is not they that proudliest persecute to prove their Zeal nor they that proudliest separate from others to prove it but it is they that live in the love of God and Man that are beloved of God and Man. Nature teacheth all men to love those that love them And the Divine Nature teacheth us to love those much more that love God and goodness Though love be an act of obedience as commanded yet hath it a Nature also above meer obedience and bare commanding will not cause it No man loveth God or man only because he is commanded so to do but because he perceiveth them to be good and amiable And the most loving are the most lovely so be it their love be rightly guided Doth it not kindle love in you to others more to hear their Breathings after God and Grace and Glory and to see them loving and kind to all and delighting to do all the good they can and covering tenderly the infirmities of others and practising 1 Cor. 13. and living at peace among themselves and as much as is possible with all men and loving their Enemies and blessing those that curse them and patiently bearing and forgiving wrongs than to come into one Congregation and hear a Priest teach the people to hate their Brethren as Schismaticks or Hereticks or in another and hear a man teach his Followers to hate others as Antichristian or Ceremonious Or to hear silly Men and Women talk against things that are quite beyond their reach and shaking the Head to talk against Dissenters and say Such a one is an erroneous or dangerous man take heed of hearing him Such a one is for or against Reprobation Free Will Universal Redemption Mans Power and such like which they little understand In a word the proudly Tyrannical and the proudly Schismatical with all their pretence of Learning on one side or of the Spirit and Holiness and Gifts on the other are no whit so amiable as the single-hearted honest peaceable Christian who preacheth love and prayeth love and liveth and breatheth and practiseth love Paul saith that all the Law is fulfilled in love and fulfilling is more than knowing it And Christ himself did not in vain sum up all the Commandments in the love of God and Man Nor in vain ask Peter thrice Lovest thou me nor in vain so often charge it on them as his new that is his last Commandment that they love one another Nor doth his beloved Apostle John in vain so earnestly write for love Chap. XVII Exhort Plead not against Love or works of Love upon pretence of a cross Interest of Learning Knowledge Gifts Church-order Discipline c. or any other thing IF LOVE be that which is most amiable in us to the God of Love then as nothing in the World can excuse him that is without it nor render him lovely indeed to God and Man so nothing must be made a pretence against it And no pretence will excuse that man or that Society that is against it Even corrections and severities when they must be used must come from love and be wholly ordered to the ends and interest of love And when necessity calls for destructive Executions which tend not to the good of him that is Executed yet must they tend to the good of the Community or of many and come from a greater love than is due to one or else that which otherwise would be laudable Justice is but Cruelty For the punishment of Offenders is good and just because tending to the common good Debentur Reipublicae the Community have Jus a Right to them as a means to their good So that it is Love that is the Amiableness of Justice it self If any think that Gods Justice is a cross instance let him consider 1. That though the most publick or common good be our end next the ultimate