rule are not First the maxims of naturall reason For 1. they are farre from being infallible many of them being but the product of humane discourse and fallible observation and therefore some of them false if they be extended beyond the sphere of Philosophy for whose meridian onely they were calculated at the first I do not think there is any truth in Philosophy which contradicts any truth in Divinity yet am I sure that many sayings are true in Philosophy which are false in Divinity For maxims and general rules being but collections observed from particulars if the survey be short ad nimis pauca respiciens not taking in all particulars the verdict or maxime must needs be defective and the general rule be liable to exceptions So that a rule may be true in Philosophy as to all those particulars included within the object of Philosophy but false if stretched to take in the things of Divinitie as an observation concerning men may be true of men in France or Italy but false if applyed to those in England who were never attended to in the raising 2. As these maxims are not infallible so neither are they adequate to the things to be believed and therefore cannot make a fit rule of divine faith For there are many divine truths which are nothing at all of kind to any peice of naturall knowledge neither flowing from these maxims nor being reducible to them 3. It is not possible for any of those maxims to be the foundation of any divine faith at all for all assent that is wrought in the soul by them is but either science or opinion both which arise from the evidence of the thing whereas faith assents unto an article without any such respect but meerly for the sake of a testimony and if the faith be divine such also is the testimony which produceth it And yet the Socinians make reason the rule of their faith Quod absurdum est rationi debet esse falsum saith one others more modest or more subtile will seem to grant that reason ought to believe what God sayes be it never so contrary to their apprehensions but then when the question is put whether God say such a thing or no here they will deny it if it agree not with their maxims Thus what they give with the one hand they take away again with the other they passe it in the head but stop it in the house decline the volie but take the rebound which comes all to one at last But how little reason there is for so doing especially in hac foece Romali in this Apostate and fallen condition of humane nature the alone sense of our own infirmities and weaknesses may sufficiently convince O but yet Right Reason Ay where is it many make account they have it and that in those very things wherein yet they contradict one another Some think Aristotle did but bid his scholer go look when he made the judgement of a wiseman the rule of vertues mediocritie many pretend to be wise and many more think themselves such but it 's seldome that either prove so So that indeed a man may sooner find vertue than a wise-man especially considering that he had need to be one himself to know one when he meets him All reason then is not right nor have all men right reason that think they have it reason it self then stands in need of a rule to be tryed by Reason is then right when it is true and then only true when it judgeth according to the truth of things themselves now things to be believed are contained in Scripture let us carry our reason thith'er and trie it by them For as Amesius very well Ratio quaedicitur recta si absoluta rectitudo spectetur non alibi nobis est quarenda quà m ubi existit id est in Scripturis neque differt quatenus spectat bonum aequum à voluntate Dei ad nostrae vita directionem revelatâ Mcdullae lib. 2. cap. 2. So then although the maxims of natural reason may be of singular use in Divinity if rightly limited by the Scriptures yet are they not fit to be canon they are both too short and too weak to make a rule of divine faith of Secondly nor is Antiquity such a rule as is required Antiquity barely considered is no good mark much lesse rule of truth The Romanists in giving marks of the true Church do as Painters who draw the Virgine Mary by their own Mistresses they do not choose the Church by her marks but indeavour to make their marks by their Church In like manner here they do not square their doctrine by the true rule but strive to find out a rule that will fit their doctrine and yet herein too they are oft times much to seek They cry up Antiquity very much bidding us ask for the old way for multitude of dayes shall teach us wisdome and make account they have praised themselves all this while but no such matter unlesse we should look at antiquity and nothing else but then I know who may vie with them the devil was a lier from the beginning For our parts we professe we do very much reverence antiquiry but it must be then in conjunction with truth we cannot admire old errours but as Solomon speaks of the hoary head Prov. 16. 31. The hoary head is a crown of glory if it be found in the way of righteousnesse We shall alwayes rise up before a reverend hoary-headed truth but we must have something else besides its gray hairs to know it by lest in stead of truth we salute her mask and worship a cloud in stead of a goddesse And as for the Papists for all their boasting so much of the antiquity of their doctrine we can easily shew them who brought in this doctrine and that doctrine into their Church this ceremony and that ceremony this corruption and that corruption We need no microscope to see how patcht their coat is of how different a thread and spinning so that it could never hang together but that the new would rend the old in sunder the strong the rotten were it not for that same Catholick plaister of infallibility But while we make the Scriptures to be our rule our doctrine is ancienter than much of theirs pretends to be Thirdly not the writings of the Ancient Fathers nor Canons of Councels neither of these are fit to be made the rule of a divine faith We do attribute much unto the judgements of those ancient Fathers those primitive Saints and Worthies whether exprest in their private writings or signified in lawfull Councels When the Councels were such as they ought to be consisting of holy able and learned Pastours of the Church we look upon them as bright constellations whose light was the greater because of their conjunction They had not onely donum intellectûs and that in a great measure too as they were single Christians but also donum
fountains and returns to it again by the rivers Col. 1.9 10. We desire that ye may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdome and spirituall understanding that ye might walk worthy of the Lord in all well-pleasing there 's the first being fruitfull in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God there 's the second Let it be our care therefore brethren so to try all things as not to let go our hold of the things that are good and hold fast that which is good that we may the better prove all things and let this be the end of all our proofs and of all our trialls that having found out that which is good we may believe and practse accordingly Thus have I done with the words in their relative consideration I come now to speak to them absolutely and in themselves II. Sermon Hold fast that which is good IN handling whereof I shall briefly shew by way of explication First what is meant by that which is good Secondly what it is to hold it fast and then proceed First for the first that which is good There beimany that say Who will shew us any good Worldlings they are and worldly goods they mean such as are corn and wine and oyl these they are apt enough to hold fast quocunque modo rem and vestigia nulla retrorsum Here they are close-fisted enough what they get by diligence they will keep with care and need no exhortation to good husbandry The good here spoken of is a greater good and of another nature Three things there are as I conceive very pertinent to the Apostle's scope and the meaning of the words 1. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} for the Apostle speaking here about doctrines it 's impossible a doctrine should be good that is not true To make one's word good is to make it true True doctrine is good doctrine This was that {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} that good thing committed to Timothie's charge which S. Paul exhorts him for to keep 2 Tim. 1. 14. and this is that which S. Paul himself kept I have fought a good fight I have kept the faith 2 Tim. 4. 7. where faith is put for truth the object of it for 't is no commendation to believe a lie and to persist in errour is but obstinacy Our Saviour Christ commends the Church in Pergamus for holding fast his nam Rev. 2.13 Thou holdest fast my name and hast not denied my faith my faith that is either the true doctrine concerning me or the true doctrine which I taught thee So then Paul charges Timotby to keep the truth he professes himself had kept it and our blessed Saviour commends the Church in Pergamus for keeping of it what hinders then but that we may conclude that S. Paul exhorting the Thessalonians to hold fast good doctrine did partly mean such as was true Ertour has done us the mischief and it must be truth must do us good 2. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Good doctrine is holy doctrine All true doctrine is good but holinesse adds a greater degree of goodnesse to it There are some truths which tend onely to enrich the understanding and to accomplish the intellect but there are others which do change and sanctifie the heart and make it good That doctrine which is agreeable to the holy and good will of God and which tends unto sanctification whereby we are made good is holy and good doctrine as the Law is said to be holy and just and good Rom. 7. 12. in respect of the first it 's called the good and acceptable and perfect will of God Rom. 12. 2. and as it relates unto our sanctification and salvation it 's called {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} 1 Tim. 6. 3. The doctrine which is according to godlinesse {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} 1 Tim. 6. 3. 2 Tim. 1. 13. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} 2 Tit. 8. and {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} 2 Tim. 4. 3. found and wholesome words and doctrine Sound not rotten which will deceive a man if he trust unto it and wholsome both for food and Physick a nourishing word and an healing word With this {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} this sincere milk of the word was Timothy nourisht and brought up {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} from an infant he suckt it in with his mothers milk {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} as the words are of him 1 Tim. 4. 6. nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine which carryes in it both a corrasive to eat off and subdue corruption and also a cordiall to restore and comfort the fainting soul That doctrine which is according to the will of God is such as sanctifies the heart for this is the will of God even your sanctification This all truth cannot do onely the truth of God which is his word whence it is that our Saviour prayes John 17. 17. Sanctific them through thy truth thy word is truth Such doctrine then as kills sinne and corruption by purging it out of the soul and restores the soul to a spirituall health by working saving grace in the heart and nourisheth it unto eternall life by making it like unto God in righteousnesse and true holinesse such I say is holy doctrine and therefore good 3. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} that which is tried and approved This is a further requisite in the doctrine which we are to hold fast It may be true and holy in it self but unlesse we know it to be such we are not yet sufficiently prepared to assent unto it But now when we have proved it compared it with the rule and brought it to the touch-stone and tried in the furnace and upon triall found it to be pure and true and good then must we close with it and hold it fast we must no longer doubt of it or question the goodnesse of it When the Assay-master ha's once tried a piece of gold and it endures the test he pronounces it to be good and so it passes for current So that if a doctrine be true and not false doctrine if it be holy and pure and not corrupt doctrine and if upon examination by the good word of God we find it to be so then 't is good doctrine and such as we are here exhorted to hold fast Which is the second thing to be explained viz. What it is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to hold fast The word is sometimes used to signifie to detain and so the truth is said to be detained both when we conceal and keep it from the knowledge of others and also when we depose it from bearing rule in our hearts and keep it down from springing up and bearing fruit in our lives this is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman}
PROVE all things HOLD FAST that which is good 1 Thess. 5. 21. Handled In two Sermons at S. Maries in Cambridge the first on the Commencement-Sabbath July 1. 1655. the other since By WILLIAM DILLINGHAM D. D. Master of Emmanuel Colledge in Cambridge PRUDENTER CREDE Nec tardè nec temerè nec titubanter {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} CAMBRIDGE Printed by John Field Printer to the University And are to be sold by William Morden 1656. Imprimatur Febr. 12. 1656. Theophil Dillingham Procan Richard Minshull John Arrowsmith Anthony Tuckney TO THE RIGHT WORSHIPFULL Mr. FRANCIS ASH of the Citie of London Merchant and Master of the Moscovia-Company there Honoured Sir WHat you were pleased to desire might be published I desire you would be pleased to accept this dedication of both as an acknowledgement of the power you have to command me and as a testimony of my thankfulnesse to you for your many favours to my self and your transcendent beneficence unto the Colledge whereunto I stand related The particulars whereof I should have displayed but that I know that this were the ready way to unbespeak your acceptance nor indeed can I hope that this poore paper will ever be able to out-wing that Fame which is already gone forth or to come into the hands of any whose ears have not been already filled with the report of so noble so pious and so seasonable a gift For the perfume of this box of costly ointment which you have expended to further the preaching and propagation of the Gospel hath already filled the whole house of the present age and shall make your name become as an ointment poured forth embalming it to all succeeding generations For this which you have done shall hereafter be told for a memoriall of you yea wheresoever the Gospel shall be preached by those who shall have been bred up here by your bounty even there shall the souls of many have cause to blesse and glorifie God on your behalf But I may go no farther lest I should transgresse and break truce with your humility As for the subject of this discourse it is none other than what hath been often insisted upon at large by many of our learned and judicious Divines whose books I am not worthy and whose works I am not able to carry after them But I do not at all fear that it will be any whit the lesse acceptable unto your self who love the good old way of sober truth however many now a dayes do thirst after novelty a good account I think may be given of both from that of our Saviour Luke 5. 39. No man having drunk old wine straightway desireth new for he saith the old is better nor yet will it I hope be altogether uselesse unto others seeing S. Peter thought good in both his Epistles to stirre up the pure minds of believers by way of remembrance 2 Pet. 3 1. and we therefore indeavour to understand truths that we may be able to call them to mind in the time of our need So that what wants novelty to recommend it to our fansies and understandings may yet prove welcome unto our consciences and may be both profitable and acceptable because seasonable And indeed Sir that which first made me pitch my thoughts upon this subject was the sad consideration of that giddinesse and drunkennesse of spirit in matters of Religion which so many in these our dayes are distempered withall running to and fro and staggering like a drunken man out of one opinion into another and yet after all their seekings they are still to seek for the truth the way whereof they have not known Many causes hereof might be assigned two I shall desire your leave here to remember and make mention of And First I do impute and charge this Vertigo and Megrime in religion this unfaithfulnesse to truth upon the account of newfanglednesse that pica of our nature the unreasonable desire and love of novelty which is so very much predominant in these our times as if S. Paul's prophesie were now fulfilled in the eares of many 2 Tim. 4. 3 4. For the time will come when they will not indure sound doctrine but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching eares And they shall turn away their eares from the truth and shall be turned unto fables Let a man that is a setter-forth of new opinions but open his shop and how doth the multitude throng about him like those Athenians that took S. Paul to be such a one Acts 17.19 Saying may we know what this new doctrine which thou speakest is for thou bringest certain strange things to our eares we would know therefore what these things mean For we must know that all the Athenians and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else but either to tell or heare some new thing But such as desire news onely because it is news will not much care whether it be true or false and those that judge of truth by the newnesse of it may fall into ten errours e're they light upon one truth Antiquiry is no sufficient mark of truth witnesse the Gibeonites who had old shoes on their feet and mouldy bread in their hands and yet at the same time brought a lie in their mouths much lesse is novelty for Truth is of the elder house and as for those that entertain truth onely because it is new though it be truth which they entertain yet are they not like to keep it long for it will not be long new It is much if a news-book be reade over twice The Athenian news-mongers made account they favoured S. Paul highly when they promised to heare him tell his story over again a second time Acts 17. 32. A second-hand truth away with it to the brokers Thus children and fools were ever admirers of new clothes and that which was alwayes the praise of an Almanack is now become with these men the onely taking qualification of doctrine and opinions That luxury went high that had every day a new suite and these can scarce think themselves right drest unlesse they have dayly new changes of opinions But since the Devil knows their humour so well they shall want for no news so long as his invention can afford it and when that fails the old serpent knows how to slip his skin and that which is old in it self will be new to them blanch but an old Arrian and out comes a Socinian spick and span new And indeed what are most of our new-lights but old-heresies the Devils old cards plaid over again and the pieces of the old Serpent crawling to find one another from under the Anathema's of foregoing ages But a second cause to which I think the unsettlednesse of many men may be justly imputed is their not being well-grounded in the first principles of Religion Some never were catechised at all but have been nursed up in grosse and palpable ignorance no wonder
interpretationis as they were Pastours of the Church and while they conferred together seeking God they were in the use of the best means to find out truth and under a promise also but not of infallibility and therefore although we cannot make them the rule of our faith yet ought we not rashly to reject them when they are offered to us nor to slight their judgements as if they were nothing worth but seriously to examine their reasons and grounds on which they went We honour the Fathers as men whom God's providence raised up and indued with gifts to quell the growing heresies of their times and doubtlesse if they were more lookt into they would furnish us with tried weapons armour approved to subdue the self-same heresies risen again among us in these our dayes and prove as successefull as that stratagem of the Scythians was who put their rebel-slaves to flight by but shewing them the rods where with they had been wont to whip them But though we honour the Fathers yet we dare not worship them we may not believe in them nor make their writings the rule of our faith This is that which themselves did never desire but forbid and abhorre the thought of they seem to say to us Stand up for we also were but men subject to like infirmities with you {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Worship God believe in him I doubt not but they that mended many faults in their own writings left some behind and I wish others had not added more We admit them as witnesses but not as a rule since they also were but fallible The Church of Rome ha's boasted so long of the Fathers till at length they grow almost weary of it At first they had like to have put the Centuriatours out of countenance but afterwards Bishop Jewell was so bold as to challenge them in a Sermon at Paul's Crosse afterward printed and to offer that if they could produce any one ancient Father General Councel or example of the Primitive Church for the first six hundred yeares that sided with them against us in any one of 27 articles by him named and in controversie between us he would subscribe to them This challenge Dr. Humfryes thought was more than he needed to have made yet having made it he made it good against Harding and yet died a Protestant and this was no more than we all promise sayes learned Dr. Whitakar against Campian's fifth reason So that the Jesuite needed not to have arrogated to the Church of Rome that priviledge of the Jews Whose are the Fathers and Malone might have spared his scurrilous title-page against the Reverend and learned Primate Though you have ten thousand USHERS yet have ye not many FATHERS We boast not of ten thousand but are glad that we have one worth ten thousand of their Popish-Fathers and as many head-masters of their schools to boot But we hope we have the Fathers with us and I am sure we honour them more than they and yet make them not the rule of our faith neither They honour them not as Fathers but as Lords and Masters as Peter Cotton was wont to call him My Lord St. Austin At servum scis te genitum blandéque fateris Dum dicis dominum Sosibiane Patrem Let them therefore be the vassals if they please while we are the true and genuine sonnes of those ancient Fathers And yet some of the Papists to say the truth cared not overmuch for the judgement of the Fathers when it made against them Cardinal Cajetan will not fear to go against the generall torrent of all the ancient Doctours for which Canus indeed blames him but then Andradius takes his part and I am sure what Cajetan said was no other than what was put in practise by Maldonate Jansenius and divers others Fourthly Nor is the judgement or testimony of the Church a sufficient rule of divine faith The Papists cry up the Church as much as the Jews of old did the Temple but by the Church they mean their own which by that time the Jesuites have done with it is nothing else but the Pope But wee 'll keep their tearm the Church whose testimony they say is infallible and necessary to a divine faith of any one article in religion and although de-Valentia and Canus would fain mince the matter and make it onely necessary as a condition yet that will not serve the Romanists turn which Bellarmine and a-Sacro-bosco knew well enough and therefore make the testimony of the Church necessary as a medius terminus and Cause of assent in all divine faith and so they must say or come over to us Now infallibility as it is required to a rule of doctrine is nothing else but the constant assistance of the holy Ghost which the Papists require a man to believe that their Church hath before he can believe so much as that there is an holy Ghost for that 's one article of faith none of which say they can be believed without the infallible testimony of their Church Wee 'l leave the Jesuites to distinguish themselves out of this contradiction if they can and i' th' mean while let us examine their proofs They offer us Tradition for proof but for them to go about to prove the Churche's infallibity from the tradition of the Church is to beg the question Let them first convince us that the Church is infallible as it gives the tradition and then wee 'l spare them any further pains to prove that it is infallible They often attempt to prove it to us by Scripture by which very practise they do but condemn themselves For First then it seems the Scriptures infallibility may be first known before and without the believing of the Churches infallibility quod minimè vellent for then the latter may be spared And secondly hereby once for all they appeal to mens private judgements and that in a point on which their whole cause turns and if they think the Scriptures so cleare for the Churche's infallibility that a private Christian may discern it I do appeal to themselves whether many other articles be not laid down more clearly in Scripture we say all Well but it may be some will say the Churches infallibility is first known before we know the Scriptures to be infallible I say then 1. let them prove it 2. why do they go about to prove it by Scripture 3. let them avoid the above-named contradiction Or if they 'l be willing to draw stakes with us and have neither the infallibility of the one nor of the other to be first believed Then first let them never more quote Scripture for the Churche's infallibility Secondly let them not require us to prove the Scriptures by the testimony of the Church Thirdly they must give us leave to fetch all the articles of our faith immediately from the Scriptures without the midwifry of their Porphyry-chair and then wee 'l casily grant them if it
apprehensions of other men But besides this knowledge there is another kind of assent found in all believers quà tales given to a truth onely in respect to the divine testimony this is faith which though it be much helped by that other assent when in conjunction with it yet it is often found without it and this is that assent upon which God will have our salvation to depend and this must we therefore yield unto truth 1. Because this is God's way wherein he will save souls by Faith not by Philosophy although it may be man would have liked that way best but it pleased God through the foolishnesse of preaching to save them that believe that the glory of the power might be of God S. Paul tells us 2 Thess. 2.13 that God hath from the beginning chosen you to Salvation through Sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth and on the other side our Saviour tells us plainly and without a parable he that believes not shall be damned Mark 16. 16. 2. Because this way of faith makes most for a christian's security against falling away Faith takes the surest and fastest hold of truth By faith ye stand 2 Cor. 1. 24. but if ye will not believe surely ye shall not be established Isai. 7.9 {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Faith and firmnesse are very neare of kind in the originall the word for faith grows upon a root that signifies to nourish no danger then of withering or fading away the just by faith shall live shall indure shall persevere Heb. 10. 38. And it signifies to be firm also Hence {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Being grounded and settled and unmoved through faith as it may be well translated Col. 1. 23. But wherein may some say doth this great strength of faith lie or how comes it to be so sure an hold-fast I answer briefly 1. It is in its own nature a depending grace and doth chain the soul to God who is Adon an immoveable basis even truth it self Its root is fastened in God and from him it draws and sucks continuall supply of strength and nourishment yea further it doth link the soul to God's truth by a mutual clasping of hands as it were The soul layes hold on God by faith and God holds our faith in his own almighty hand and none can take it thence If faith do shrink and faint at any time yet God almighty will not let go his hold and so long no danger of Apostasie This mutuall complication we may see variously exprest in Scripture Sometimes the doctrine of faith is said to be delivered unto the Saints Jude 3. Sometimes they are said to be delivered into that Rom. 6. 17. Sometimes we are said to be in the truth and on the other side that to be in us we to abide in that and that to dwell in us we to keep that and that again to keep us Our faith and God's truth are as it were mutuall hostages and pawns between God and the believing soul God he engages his truth to the soul and the soul trusts God with its faith God deposites his truth in the soul and that again places its faith in God and commits it self also into his hand by believing 1 Pet. 4. 19. God trusts Paul with his Gospel counting him faithfull 1 Tim. 1. 5. as an Ambassadour 2 Cor. 5. 19. as a steward 1 Cor. 4. 1. and Paul again trusts God with his soul for he knew whom he had trusted 2 Tim. 1. 12. In which verse also we reade of Paul's {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} which was in God's keeping and in the next verse but one we heare of another {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} committed to Timothies trust and keeping If we keep God's truth he will keep our souls Christ hath praied and God hath promised that our faith should not fail but he never did so much for our rational knowledge There is faith's first advantage 2. The second advantage which faith hath above other knowledge in holding fast the truth against temptation and persecution is this That in believing the soul rests it self upon the veracity and infallibility of God whereas in other knowledge it relies upon the goodnes of its own eye-sight in observing the principles consequents the pedigree and off-spring of truth wherein it is very subject to be mistaken and is oftimes imposed upon The Devil will sooner perswade a man's reason that the world was not created by raising difficulties and puzzling his arguments than he can perswade a believers faith that God is fallible who sayes it was created The Devil wants no sophistry the more we have to do with syllogisme and deduction the more room will he find to get in his nails Again faith overcomes the flatteries and frowns of the world by seeing through them it believes God and dare not offend him knows what heaven is and will not be cheated of it as a child for a butterflie it knows what hell is and fears God rather than men who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell Thus doth faith overcome the world by believing the promises and threatnings of God and thus hath faith a preeminence over all our natural knowledge as to closing with and keeping possession of the truth Knowledge that holds it may be till a better Oratour or a more subtile disputant come but when we shall be beaten from these out-works faith will be acitadel that will hold out against all opposition for by it the heart is fixed trusting in God and the gates of hell shall never prevail against it Thus have you the first way of holding fast that which is good viz. by believing it stedfasly I shall be briefer in those that follow Secondly We must hold fast that which is good by loving it unfeignedly We have truth here presented to us under the notion of good and surely then we cannot but love it goodnesse being love's load-stone and the proper object about which it is conversant When once the soul having entertained truth doth tast and relish it delight and take pleasure in it then doth it cleave unto it as David's soul did to Jonathan's Love is an uniting affection twining it self about the thing beloved and if it be in an intense degree the thing may possibly by violence be torn from its embraces but it will first raise all its posse to prevent it And therefore the Apostle Paul bids Timothy to hold fast the form of sound words as in faith so in love 2 Tim. 1. 13. and by this we are said to cleave unto that which is good Rom. 12. 9. Let love be without dissimulation abhorre that which is evil and cleave to that which is good {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} being glewed to it as it were which is by love as the opposition there shews That we be not as children tossed to and fro and carried about with every
wind of doctrine but that we may grow up unto him who is the head and so {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} we must {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Ephes. 4. 15. Follow the truth in love not out of fansie as children do That Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith we must be rooted and grounded in love Ephes. 3. 17. and therefore where the love of truth once decayes there truth it self staies not long after it We reade of some Rom. 1. 28. who not liking to retain God in their knowledge he gave them over to a reprobate mind And it a remarkable place that of 2 Thess. 2. 10 11 12. where it is said that the man of sinne should come after the working of Satan with all power and signes and lying wonders and with all deceivablenesse of unrighteousnesse in them that perish See what becomes of those who are deceived by the man of sinne they perish and if ye ask why so the words following will give you an answer Because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved See there how necessary the love of truth is to salvation For indeed where there is no sineere love of the truth there can be no true belief of it For as the Apostle there goes on For this cause God shall send them strong delusions that they should believe a lie that they all might be damned who believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousnesse Observe the opposition A sad place it is and I wish it were well considered by all that are so coldly affected to the truth especially by such as hate it and are so much inclined in their minds and affections to the errours of that man of sinne whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth and will destroy with the brightnesse of his coming as he there threatens In the 10 verse 't is they received not the love of the truth and by the 12 verse 't is come to they believed not the truth they had lost the truth for want of love to it Would we hold truth fast we must hold it in corde as well as in capite hold it fast by loving it unfainedly Thirdly hold fast that which is good by remembring it faithfully and doubtlesse where truth is believed and beloved the mind will often be upon it quae curant meminerunt 1 Cor. 15. 1 2. Moreover brethren I declare unto you the Gospel which I preached unto you which also you have received and wherein ye stand by which also ye are saved {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} if ye hold fast keep in memory what I preached unto you unlesse ye have believed in vain Those that do truly believe the truth will be carefull to keep it in memory which is a speciall means to preserve the faith and love of it in their hearts Memory holds fast the truth while faith and love renew their acts upon it for this cause ought we to give the more earnest heed to the things that we have heard {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} lest we leak and let them slip and so we that I say not they be spilt and perish irrecoverably Heb. 2.1 The Spirit of God confirms us in the truths taught by bringing them to our remembrance The Scriptures were written that we might believe that by hearing them preached by frequent reading them and meditating upon them as David did we might have faith begotten increased in us Therefore we ought {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to be taken up with these duties As Paul to Timothy The minister is appointed for a remembrancer to us 1 Tim. 4.6 If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things then shalt thou be a good minister of Jesus Christ and when S. Paul himself went over again the cities where he had formerly preached the word the text tells us what the succese was And so were the Churches est ablished in the faith Acts 16. 5. And S. Peter thought it meet as long as he continued in his earthy tabernacle to put Christians in remembrance of the truths delivered that so they might have them alwayes in remembrance after his decease and that although they knew them already 2 Pet. 1. 12. Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you alwaies in remembrance of these things though you know them and be established in the present truth Though they were already established and therefore might seem not to need putting in remembrance which is the means of establishment yet the Apostle thought it meet to do it alwayes even as long as he lived for it would further confirm them and be a means to keep them from falling from their stedfastnesse and to persevere in holding fast that which is good Fourthly another way of holding fast that which is good is by practising it conscientiously To keep the commandments is to obey them Jesus Christ tells his disciples John 15.10 if ye keep my commandments ye shall abide in my love as many branches as bring forth fruit abide in the vine and are fastened in it by the sap they draw S. John 1. cpist 3.c last verse He that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him and he in him and hereby we know that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given us S. Peter 2. cpist 1. chap. exhorts to give all diligence to adde unto faith vertue temperance godlinesse charity and the rest of the graces there reckoned up for if these things be in you and abound they will make you fruit full in the knowledge of Jesus Christ they will put forth themselves into acts and what then vers. 10. if ye do these things ye shall never fall Oft times custome engages men to continue in evil practises while they are ashamed of their principles but when good practises are backt with good principles the engagement is the stronger to continue in them and defend them An honest and good heart having heard the word keeps it and brings forth fruit with patience A good heart is the fittest cabbinet to keep the good word of God in And indeed when once the word is ingraffed upon the soul by faith it over-rules the sap of the stock and sanctifies the fruit Truth being espoused to the soul by faith and bedded by love brings forth fruit unto holinesse faith working by love and proles firmat conjugium If we would be stedfast and immoveable let us be alwayes abounding in the work of the Lord 1 Cor. 15. 58. If we would but follow that which is good as we are exhorted in the 15 verse before my text we should find that one means and a good one too of holding fast that which is good Fifthly a fifth way that we must hold fast that which is good is by professing of it constantly S. Paul was not ashamed to preach the Gospel no more must we be
holding fast the faith and that in the midst of persecution as Christ himself bears her witnesse yet because there were some such hereticks in it whom it had not supprest therefore Christ threatens her as you have heard and 't is observable how he styles himself when he begins to speak to that Church These things saith he which hath the sharp sword with two-edges vers. 12. O my beloved when I reade this I cannot but think should now the Lord Jesus Christ from heaven thus endite England Thou hast there in the midst of thee those that maintain the doctrine of the Papists of the socinians of the Arminians which things I hate yea thou sufferest those that publickly oppose my truth revile my faithfull Ministers blaspheme my word yea even deny my very Godhead Should Christ I say plead thus against us I besecch you sadly to consider it what could we be able to answer for our selves Beloved if Christ be God let us follow him and let us follow him throughly with a perfect heart Let us not with Gallio think our selves unconcerned and so stand by and look on while truth and errour fight it out Say not God stands not in need of our help no more did he need the help of Meroz how mighty soever the enemies were but if he please to make use or means Meroz must afford her help or else Meroz must be cursed And though the Lord could have wrought the deliverance of his people and rescued them from the cruelty of cursed Haman by an out-stretched and immediate arm from heaven yet Mordecay is bold to tell Queen Esther that if she held her peace she and her fathers house should be destroyed and deliverance should come some other way Esther 4. 14. Neither let any man say Let truth alone it will be sure to prevail and be victorious For be it true that not all the malice and subtilty of Satan nor all the powers of darknesse shall ever be able to make any one syllable of the truth of God prove false though they should coelum terrámque miscere heaven and earth should passe away but not the least iota of God's truth should fail yea though they do Acheronta movere the gates of hell shall not prevail against it all this we grant and avow yet let me tell you that truth would be truth though never a man in England did acknowledge it The truth of the Gospel abides still though the seven once famous churches of Asta be at this day engulfed in the abysse of Mahumetan superstition It is not truth in the Idea but in the subject that we are to contend for not truth in heaven but truth upon the earth that we must be valiant for Jeremy 9. 3. God doth not require of us that we should make his truth to be true but that we should entertain it in our hearts and hold it fast that we should own it and countenance it and maintain it in its possession of our selves and others that so the truth may runne and be glorified and God may be glorified amongst us least for our ingratitude and want of zeal for his truth he remove the candlestick and bestow it upon some other Nation Then our crown is gone our glory is departed our day is done And England will be nothing else but a kennel and denne of night-monsters Ziim and Jim and Ochim with the rest of that dismall crew and so much the more dark then it was before it entertained the faith of Christ by how much a blaze of thorns doth leave the house darker than it found it When the light of the Gospel shall be removed moved the Prince of darknesse will double his guards and heap on irons even chains of darknesse O let it therefore be our care to hold fast the truth while we have it to contend for it earnestly that we be not spoiled and robbed of it But that we may contend aright take these two rules 1. It must not be out of contentiousnesse a minister is forbidden being contentious and yet is commanded to contend and that earnestly for the faith A quarelsome contentious humour will raise up strife about words when there is no ground or fundamentum in re A proud man though perhaps orthodox in his judgement will not content himself with the received form of sound words the usuall language of Christians in all ages but will invent a new set of phrases and uncouth expressions which no man else can without pain it is well if himself can understand He will not trade with the world but in a coin and language of his own what a troublesome man is this that imposeth upon the world a necessity of making new Dictionaries if they mean to converse with him if every man should do the like what a prety Babel should we have and all this is but that he may seem to be singular and to differ something from other men But we must not contend out of a {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} but {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} not out of a love of contention or affectation of singularity but out of a sincere love and affection to the truth and a pure zeal for the glory of God Neither may we make these pretensions of our own private quarels as too many are apt to do I have read of one Matthias King of Hungary and one George a King of Bohemia that fought a ten years warre upon a difference in point of Religion and then at length agreed that their two fools should decide the controversie by fifty-cuffs By the warre they shewed how much they pretended to truth and religion and by the way of agreement how little indeed they cared for it and I think if Plutarch were now alive it would be no hard matter for him to find a parallel 2. Our zeal and contention for the truth must be proportionable unto the matter wherein it is as fire burns hotter in iron than in straw so must we contend more earnestly for truths of greater weight moment and importance wherein the glory of God and the salvation of souls is more emphatically concerned We must not contend for all alike much lesse be more earnest for minth and cumine and neglect the greater things because our private stomach or other interest is bound up more in those than these But I have now done with the sixth and last way of holding fast that which is good viz. contending for it earnestly It now remains that I should close up all with a word of use and application and very briefly Use 1. If then it be the duty of every Christian to hold fast that which is good hence then are to be reproved diverse sorts of persons I will but point at them 1. The Sceptick that holds nothing at all 2. Those that hold fast indeed but it is that which is not good that hold errours and heresies and of these they are tenacious enough
even unto obstinacy though brayed in a mortar they will not part with them It is said of the Pharisees and their traditions Mark 7.4 {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} they received them to hold them fast they took them with a resolution not to let them go for better for worse Zeal is good in a good matter but this their holding fast is to their own mischief as a sinking man holds fast the weeds that help to drown him 3. This reproves those that hold and it is good which they hold but they do not hold it fast all wavering and inconstant persons But these also I have already spoken something to in the aforegoing part of my discourse Use 2. I will therefore conclude all with a word of exhortation which yet I perceive is nothing else than what I have been doing all this while I will adde onely to what hath been said a motive or two and a few means or directions 1. Motive 1 The first motive let be the consideration of our own concernment how much it is our interest to hold fast that which is good Truth is our treasure and a wise man doth not use to be over easily perswaded to part with that 'T is our possession a man will sue hard before he will suffer himself to be ejected out of his inheritance 'T is our evidence our evidence for a Kingdome and shall we not look carefully to it It is our fortresse while we keep that that will preserve us like Ulysses his mast tie our selves fast to it and we shall be safe yea 't is our life as Solomon of wisdome keep her for she is thy life our eternal salvation depends upon our holding of it If we give over believing he that believes not shall be damned If we grow weary of well-doing without holinesse no man shall see God If any love not Christ and his truth let him be anathema If any man deny them before men him will Christ deny before his Father which is in heaven It is abundantly then our manifold interest to hold fast that which is good 2. Hold truth fast considering the danger we are in of loosing it in respect of deceivers who would cheat us of it and juggle it from us in respect of open enemies that would by force wrest it from us The Devil goes about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devoure And as at all times we had need to hold fast the truth so especially in times of seduction and apostasie in times of temptation and in time of persecution we had need to double our guards when the Enemy is at hand But of this before 3. Let us consider how the Lord Jesus Christ stands affected towards his truth and such as adhere unto it We may see both in his speech to the Church in Pergamos Rev. 2.13 Thou holdest fast my name and hast not denied my faith Even in those dayes when Antipas was my faithfull martyr who was slain among you where Satan dwelleth Observe how he doth aggrandise and amplisie their faithfulnesse to him and his truth from the consideration of time and place they adhered to him in times of persecution and in a most dangerous place where Satan dwelleth He that was wont to go about like a roaring lion and to go to and fro up and down the earth had now it seems taken up in Pergamos resolving to make that the seat of his tyranny where he would display the bloudy ensignes of his rage and cruelty and yet in this very place there were not wanting those who under his nose and to his very teeth did professe themselves the sworn servants of Christ and truth and his utter enemies What an honour was this to christ who maintained himself a Church in Satans own Imperial city and how kindly doth he take it from those who at such a time and in such a place did stick so close unto him and to his truth Which he calls my faith and my name he can as soon forget his own name and neglect his own glory as his truth But then how feelingly how pathetically doth he remember and even by name make mention of Antipas In those dayes when Antipas was my faithfull martyr c. In those dayes he keeps an exact account of the time and makes Antipas his death the Epocha to compute other things by when Antipas he had kept Christ's name and you see Christ keeps his he had born witnesse and set his seal unto Christ's truth and Christ wears him as a signet upon his right hand and engraves him upon the palms of his hands he is neare and deare unto him Christ knows him and calls him by name Antipas my faithfull martyr O what a pang of affection was there Sirs I am not able to conceive it much lesse expresse it I beseech you assist me with your thoughts and supply by your meditations what my expression cannot reach Antipas my faithfull martyr Pretious in the sight of the Lord is the death of all his Saints and blessed are they that die in the Lord but much much more pretious is their death and thrice happy are all they whom the Lord calls forth and inables to die for his sake and to lay down their lives in witnesse-bearing to his truth I wonder no longer that the Primitive Christians were so ambitious of martyrdome who would not be martyr many times over to have such a testimoniall such an affectionate commemoration from his blessed Saviour which will afterwards be seconded with an {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} well fought My sonne and with that Euge bone serve fidelis well done good and faithfull servant enter thou into thy masters joy So much for motive now a few directions which I will but name leaving them to be enlarged by your own private meditations 1. That thou maist be sure to hold fast take thy hold on that rock of diamonds the holy Scriptures for sand will crumble and wash away 2. Make sure of heaven and then sufferings will be light Facile est quidvis suadere persuasis mori Let me say paratis mori They will not fear shipwrack who have sent their souls before and ensured them in heaven that man need not fear death whose life is hid with Christ in God 3. Turn all traitours out of thy heart which else will betray both truth and thee Such are lusts hypocrisie by-respects curiositie carelesnesse Get thy self cured of thy natural levity and slipperinesse it is good that the heart be established with grace 4. Hold not too fast your own prejudicate opinions if you mean to hold truth fast or indeed to entertain it For then non persuaseris etiamsi persuaseris They do but pretend to be suitours unto truth who are before wedded to their own opinions 5. Fifthly and lastly grasp not the world too hard for {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and is seldome a friend to sometimes incompetible with that which is good Catch not at honour applause profit or interest in your holding of truth these will winnow from truth sometime or other and then the dog will hunt no longer in the roade when the hare hath left it but Demas will take his leave of truth and embrace the present world I will end all in those words of the Apostle 2 Thess. 2. and the later end Therefore brethren stand fast and hold the faith which ye have been taught which ye have believed Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God even our Father which hath loved us and hath given us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace Comfort your hearts and stablish you in every good word and work CUI LAUS IN SECULA FINIS Doctr. Reas. 1. Object Answ. Reas. 2. Consid. 1. Consid 2. 1. Requisite A faculty 1. Reasonable 2. Enlightened 2â— 2â— q. 8 art 4. 3. sanctified 2. Requisite A Rule 1 Not Reason 2. Antiquity 3. Councels and Fathers Praefat. in Pentat 4. Church 5. Teachers But Scriptures Mark 1. Mark 2. Mark 3. Object 1 Answ. Object 2 Answ. Object 3 Answ. 1. Part of the text considered 1 Relatively As a caution A means An end 2. Absolutely 2. Dectr Six wayes to hold fast truth 1. Believing 2. Loving 1. Remembring 4. Practising 5. Professing 6. Contending Asa 1 Kings 15. 14. So Jehoash Amasia Azariâ— Jotham Jehoshaphal Use 1. Use 2. Direction