Search the Scriptures A TREATISE Shewing that all CHRISTIANS Ought to READ the HOLY BOOKS WITH DIRECTIONS To them therein In Three PARTS LONDON Printed for R. Royston Bookseller to His most Sacred Majesty 1685. Introduction THE Holy Scriptures as the first Homily of our Church teaches all its Children in the very beginning of it are such a Fountain and Well of Truth that as many as be desirous to enter into the right and perfect way unto God must apply their minds to be acquainted with them without which they can neither sufficiently know God and his Will nor their own Office and Duty For in Holy Scripture is fully contained what we ought to do and what to eschew what to believe what to love and what to look for at God's hands at length And therefore these Books ought to be much in our hands in our eyes in our ears in our mouths but most of all in our hearts Vnto which sort of Discourse which is grounded upon the VI. Article of our Religion they of the Church of Rome are wont to make a double Exception One is That there are some things necessary to be believed and practised which are not to be found there but must be received from ancient Traditions The other is That those Truths which are delivered in the Holy Scriptures are not so clear and perspicuous that common people should be intrusted with the reading of them Now to the First of these there hath been some time ago a plain Answer made in a Discourse about Traditions Therefore this Treatise is intended only as an Answer to the Second Exception For the maintaining of which they are wont to alledge among other places those remarkable words of St. Peter in his Second Epistle the Third Chapter and Sixteenth Verse Where having made mention of St. Paul's Epistles which treated of the same matter that he had just before explained he says In which are some things hard to be understood which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest as they do also the other Scriptures unto their own destruction Behold say they how dangerous it is for common people to meddle with the Holy Scriptures which being compared by St. Paul himself to a two edged Sword ought not to be put into their hands for fear they destroy themselves therewith It is true indeed the same St. Paul teaches us Rom. XV. 4. that whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning and are profitable as he writes elsewhere 2 Tim. III. 16. for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness But this notwithstanding there are say they such difficulties and obscurities in the Holy Scriptures as we learn from this great Apostle St. Peter that they ought not to be thought profitable for all people but rather hurtful to them that are ignorant who therefore ought not to read them By which single Instance the Reader may learn if he mark it well what sort of Interpretations of Scripture we are like to have if we trust to them alone and do not see with our own eyes when these very words of St. Peter do plainly teach us the quite contrary Doctrine to that which they would establish by them I. For they are so far from containing a Reason why the people should not read them that First they evidently suppose the common people even the unlearned among them did in those days read the Scriptures Else they could not have wrested them as the Apostle says they did and complains of that but not of their reading them And II. Secondly These words do not affirm the whole Scripture to be hard to be understood but only some part of it St. Paul's Epistles at the most or rather the things of which St. Peter had been treating And not all of them neither but only some things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 some few things which would require pains and diligent attention of mind to comprehend the meaning of them And III. Thirdly The Apostle doth not say that all who read those difficult passages are in danger to wrest them but only the unlearned and unstable who abuse the plainest Truths to their own ruine As for others they may read even the hardest places in St. Paul's Epistles safely enough nay receive great profit from thence as well as from other Scriptures and they who wrest them are not to leave reading them but to grow in true Christian knowledge and in Stability of mind These are the three Parts of the insuing Discourse In treating and reading of which Let us pray to God as the second Homily concludes that we may speak think believe live and depart hence according to the wholsom Doctrine and Verities of these holy Books And by that means in this World have God's defence favour and grace with the unspeakable solace of peace and quietness of Conscience and after this miserable life enjoy the endless Bliss and Glory of Heaven PART I. THat the Right of God's People to read the Holy Scriptures is not at all prejudiced by these words of St. Peter appears from hence That the Wresting of the Scriptures by the unlearned and unstable doth suppose that even such persons did then read them Which overthrows the Conclusion which they of the Roman Church endeavour to draw from this place For there had been no possibility of perverting their sense if they had not been in their hands at that time as they are in ours now And yet the Apostle doth not reprehend their medling with them but their Ignorance and their heedlesnes which was the cause they misunderstood them and might have been prevented by a little diligence and care without throwing them quite away For the fault was not there but in themselves who came to the perusal of holy things with unprepared minds Now for the establishing of this Truth that the people were not then and therefore ought not now to be debarred the liberty of reading the holy Books which God our Saviour hath left unto his Church as a common Inheritance you may be pleased to weigh these things following which will fully settle your minds in this perswasion I. First That the ancient People of God the Jews were not only permitted but required by God himself to be so conversant in the Law of Moses and so well acquainted with it as to be able to teach their Children God's Commandments and for that end to talk of them when they sate in their houses or walkt by the way when they lay down and when they rose up nay to write them upon the doors of their houses and on their gates that whensoever they went out or came in they might have them before their eyes and be put in mind of them Deut. VI. 6 7 8. This the Lawgiver thought a matter of so great importance that a little after in the very same Book he enjoyns it over again for fear they should neglect it Chap. XI 18 19 20. For the very Root and
according unto Godliness Unto which if men will not attend there is no remedy they will fall into Heresies or worse whether they read the Scriptures or read them not The Scripture it self tells us as much that there must be Heresies 1 Cor. XI 19. that is God will not hinder it unless men will be guided by him and be truly good But he hath a very good end as it there follows in permitting it which is that it may be manifest who are honest-hearted Christians sincerely in love with Truth and Goodness and who are not And that must be the care of every good man not to take or throw away the Scriptures to prevent Heresies but if Heresies do arise to endeavour according to the direction of the Scriptures to approve his integrity unto God by stedfast continuance in Faith and Holiness And after the same manner must he govern himself if the Guides of his Soul do not perform their Duty Which I shall represent in the words of Erasmus out of his Preface to the Reader before his Annotations on the New Testament It is the Pastors Office to distribute the Bread of Life to the people But what if they do not their Duty What must the people do They must implore the help of the Supreme Pastor Christ Jesus who still lives and hath not forsaken the care of his Flock But being solicited by the publick Prayers of his People will do what is promised in Ezekiel Behold I will both search my sheep and seek them out As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that they are scattered so will I seek out my sheep and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day with all the rest that there follows XXX Ezek. 12 13 c. The vulgar people are Sheep but endued with reason and out of those Sheep are Pastors made And sometimes it falls out that a Sheep may know more than his Pastor As a Lay-man therefore ought not seditiously to rebel against the Priests lest that order be confounded which St. Paul would have in the Body of Christ so the Priests ought not to exercise Tyranny over the Flock of Christ for if they do the Sedition will lye at their door When the Pastors do their duty they are to be reverently heard as Angels of God by whom Christ speaks to us And when they teach unsincerely the people must pick out all that 's good if there be any mixed with it But if they teach not at all or teach those things that are plainly repugnant to the Gospel let every man refresh his Soul with private reading And Christ who promises to be present when two or three are gathered together in his Name will not be wanting by his Spirit to one Soul that meditates piously in his Holy Word In vain are six thousand gathered together if it be not in his Name Now they are gathered together in Christ's Name who have respect to Nothing but his Glory and the eternal Salvation of their Souls CONCLVSION I shall conclude all with the sense of that great Man St. Athanasius who wrote a little Treatise on purpose to reprove the audaciousness as he calls it of those who said that it was needless to look into the Scriptures and bad men not to search into them nor to speak out of them but to content themselves with the Faith they had received For searching into the Scriptures said they doth but make things more obscure To which he replies many things which I might digest into Heads but I shall present them to the Reader just as they lie in the Second Tome of his Works pag. 295. of the Paris Edition MDCXXVII This very Assertion saith he shows the inconsistency of their Doctrine and that it hath Nothing to support it He means they would not be afraid men should search into the Scriptures if they thought what was taught by them would be there justified But we trust to the truth of the Mystery i. e. the Scripture and to the help of him who cannot lye who saith Every one that seeks shall find Therefore we seek as we ought and we find what we ought and we speak with demonstration and we hear with a genuine intention that we may perswade our domesticks and that we may confute our Adversaries and that we may by our search be gainers our selves and not propound any thing that is inconsistent unto others Would you have me neglect the Scriptures Whence then should I have knowledge Would you not have me to mind knowledge But whence then should I have Faith Paul cries How should they believe unless they hear And again Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God He then who forbids the Word obstructs hearing and throws out Faith No man can be ignorant of the Roman Laws being a Member of the Empire without danger They then who forbid us to study and learn the great Oracles of the King of Heaven what kind of mischief do they not craftily contrive against us The Scripture is the food of the Soul Cease then O man to starve the inward man and to kill it with hunger introducing a famine not of bread nor of water but of hearing the Word of the Lord. There is one that inflicts wounds and dost thou forbid the application of medicines For shame do not talk as if the various wisdom in the Books of Physicians were vain and to no purpose One may as well he means bid people not mind their Prescriptions though there be many Diseases in the World as not read the Scriptures when their Souls are in danger Reverence that Lover of God's Word the Eunuch who did not neglect reading upon the road Whose good intentions our Lord accepting sent him straightway an Instructer who made him understand what he read and by the Scriptures brought him to his Saviour Hence it is that our Saviour commands Search the Scriptures by searching meaning careful and sober inquiry into hidden things Out of the Scriptures is the manifestation of things obscure the confirmation of hope the event of promises the finding of our Saviour according to that We have found Him of whom Moses and the Prophets wrote Paul himself uses Scriptures for the establishment of the Truth And if he that heard ineffable things he that was thoroughly instructed in secrets he that had Christ speaking in him doth not simply use his own private Authority without the testimony of the Scriptures how can we with safety now neglect the Divine Legislation and speak what we think good out of our own hearts But there are some things transcending our Conceptions I say so too and this we learn out of the Scriptures that we may understand what things are fit for us to seek after as being attainable For it is neither pious to venture upon all things nor is it consistent with Holiness to neglect all things What we worship we ought all to be acquainted withal according to that which is written We know what we worship But how great or what kind or after what manner or where it is the part of mad-men to inquire They that would have none to judge of their Doctrines but themselves deter men from reading the Scriptures pretending it is immodest to pry into such inaccessible things but in truth fearing to be convinced out of them of holding bad Opinions I omit the rest which is but little more than I have represented and shall end all with his words to Macarius in the very beginning of his Works against the Gentiles The holy and divinely inspired Scriptures are sufficient of themselves for the declaration of the Truth and there are many Books composed about the same things by our Teachers of blessed Memory Which if any man peruse he will know in some measure the meaning of the Scriptures and be able to attain the knowledge he desires The End of the Third Part. THE END A Catalogue of some Books Printed for R. Royston at the Angel in Amen-Corner Books written by the Reverend Doctor Patrick THE Christian Sacrifice A Treatise shewing the Necessity End and Manner of receiving the Holy Communion Together with sutable Prayers and Meditations for every Month in the Year and for the Principal Festivals in Memory of our Blessed Saviour In Four Parts The Eighth Edition corrected in Octavo The Devout Christian instructed how to pray and give thanks to God Or A Book of Devotion for Families and particular persons in most of the concerns of Humane Life The Fifth Edition in Twelves An Advice to a Friend The Fourth Edition in Twelves Jesus and the Resurrection justified by Witnesses in Heaven and in Earth In Two Parts in Octavo The Book of Job Paraphras'd in Octavo The Book of Psalms Paraphras'd in Octavo The Truth of Christian Religion in Octavo The Glorious Epiphany with the Devout Christians Love to it in Octavo The Proverbs of Solomon Paraphrased with the Arguments of each Chapter which supply the place of Commenting in Octavo A Paraphrase upon the Books of Ecclesiastes and the Song of Solomon With Arguments to each Chapter and Annotations thereupon In Octavo New A Book for Beginners Or A Help to Young Communicants that they may be sitted for the Holy Communion and receive it with profit A Friendly Debate between a Conformist and a Non-Conformist In Two Parts The Sixth Edition Corrected and Englarged A Treatise of the Necessity and Frequency of rece ving the Holy Communion With a Resolution of Doubts about it In three Discourses begun upon Whitsunday in the Cathedral Church of Peterburgh New Winter-Evening Conference between Neighbours In Two Parts The Second Edition Corrected in Octavo The Old Religion demonstrated in its Principles and described in the Life and Practice thereof In Twelves New 22 Sermons preach'd partly before His Majesty at Whitehall and partly before Anne Dutchess of York at the Chappel at St James's By Henry Killigrew D. D. Master of the Savoy and Almoner to his Royal Highness New in Quarto Animadversions upon a Book Intituled Fanaticism Fanatically imputed to the Catholick Church by Dr. Stillingfleet and the Imputation Refuted and Retorted by S. C. By a Person of Honour The Third Edition in Octavo The End of the Catalogue
more plainly than to be humble and modest and that as we ought to fear God so likewise to honour the King and his Ministers and to obey those that watch over our Souls nay to esteem them very highly in love for their work sake Which will dispose us most certainly if we be not carried away with pride or any other vicious affection to be ruled by them in dubious things and as it there follows in the Apostle 1 Thess V. 13. to be at peace among our selves I must beseech therefore every Member of this Church both for the honour of our Religion and for the safety of their own Souls to be as careful in this matter as I would have them to be in reading the Holy Scriptures Take your Guides along with you do not think your selves safe without their conduct be not only willing but desirous to learn of them reverence their Instructions do not easily dissent from them be afraid to oppose them especially when you have reason to think them to be serious studious knowing and conscientious men who take care to inform themselves aright that they may not misinform you For such men look upon themselves to be bound as hath been shown in the Treatise of Tradition pag. 24. to guide themselves in their Direction of others by what the Catholick Fathers and ancient Bishops have taught out of the Doctrine of the Old and New Testament and thereby preserve their Flocks in the Truth of God's holy Word And having a great regard also to the sense of that Church wherein they live which by their Subscriptions they owne to have Authority in Controversies of Faith they will no less preserve them in Unity and in Peace To conclude it is impossible but every body must reap great fruit by the reading of the Scriptures if they read them for no other end but that they may go away better from the reading of them than they came to it and that they may not accommodate them to their own affections but correct all their affections and desires and the whole course of their life by this exact Rule of Righteousness According to which if we square our selves we shall presently learn in difficult things to be wise unto sobriety and in plain things to be wise unto Salvation that is so wise as to do what we certainly know to be our Duty which is the only Wisdom that the Scriptures magnifie Which will be the surest way both to know more and to know it better that is to feel the comfort of what we know in a blessed and assured hope of everlasting life which God who cannot lye hath promised to us in Christ Jesus our Lord. The End of the First Part. PART II. HAving shewn in the foregoing Discourse that those words of St Peter 2. III. 16. which are wont to be alledged against the reading of Holy Scriptures do plainly suppose that the people did then read them I proceed now in the next place to shew that the Apostle doth not deter men from reading them by representing the difficulties that are in them and the danger of wresting them For he doth not affirm that all things are hard to be understood and consequently liable to be wrested but only that some things are of that nature In treating of which three things offer themselves to be considered I. First that most things in the Holy Scriptures are so far from being hard to be understood that they are easy Nay all things absolutely necessary for us are very easy II. Secondly That those things which are not so easy may be understood though there be some difficulty in it That is they will require some pains to understand them which should not deter us from reading but only make us laborious to find out the sense of what we read III. Thirdly When we do thoroughly understand and heartily believe the things that are easie it will abate much of that difficulty and make other things more easie I. I begin with the first of these the Apostle only saith some things are hard to be understood which supposes that most are not but rather easie as all those things especially are which are absolutely necessary to be known and believed and done for the obtaining Salvation That which makes things easie to be understood is the plain and perspicuous delivery of them in the words wherein they are written or spoken Now nothing an be plainer or clearer than the words wherein all the great Christian Truths are revealed and delivered to us which are so far from being obscure that it is not easier to see the light than it is to apprehend and understand the true meaning of them I will instance in some particulars and have an Eye all the way upon St. Paul's Epistles to which S. Peter is commonly thought to have respect wherein though some things be difficult yet these are most clearly discovered First That there is but one God the Father of whom are all things as he expresly writes 1 Cor. VIII 6. Secondly That He alone is to be worshipped as our Blessed Saviour remembers us out of Moses IV. Matt. 10. was the great thing pressed in his very entrance into any place where he preach'd 1 Thess l. 9 10. XVII Acts 23 24. Thirdly As our Lord teaches us that we are ingaged by our Baptism to worship one God in three Persons XXVIII Matth. 19. So S. Paul affirms the same plainly enough in that Solemn Prayer for the Corinthians 2. XIII ult The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Love of God and the Communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all Especially if it be compared with those places wherein he affirms our Saviour to be over all God blessed for ever IX Rom. 5. and the Spirit to search even the deep things of God that is to know his Mind exactly for so it follows 1 Cor. II. 10 11. that as none can know the things of a man save the spirit of man which is in him so the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God Which plainly tells us if we mind it that the Spirit of God is in God as the spirit of man is in man that is the Spirit is God himself and therefore fully acquainted with him in all things There is some little labour indeed in making this deduction but it is very easie if we consider all these places together Fourthly And the Nature of God none can possibly be ignorant of who doth but look into the Holy Books Where he will immediately see Him represented to be Almighty most Wise most Gracious Faithful to his Word and the living God who endures for ever Which are Truths written there in such great Letters that every one who runs as the Prophet speaks and doth but cast a transient eye upon them may easily read them Fifthly Particularly his infinite love and kindness towards us the children of men lies before us so fairly and shines so brightly in our
them for else we shall not use due care not to cross them in our Doctrine if we cross them in our Deeds but rather be content that by false glosses upon other places where the fraud will be less discernable the Light of those glorious Truths should be obscured and the power and force of them enervated and broken For what will not men say and do to defend themselves in their sins even against the clearest Convictions of Gods Holy Word which their bad assections teach them to oppose nay make it their interest to resist And here it may be fit to take this occasion to give a few directions for the right understanding of the Holy Scriptures which if we observe in our reading them we shall not only be preserved from dangerous mistakes but reap great benefit by them And I shall the rather do it because it will be a good introduction to the Third Part of this Discourse I. The first of them is a Rule which is necessary in all Sciences or parts of Knowledge viz to learn easie things first We can have no sound Understanding in the Scriptures unless we will follow their own Method which is to learn first to fear God and keep his Commandments for therein lies the beginning of Wisdom as he often tells us It is against the very direction which the Scripture gives us to be so confident as to venture presently into all the depths that are in it and to lose our time in puzzling our minds to unty the knots of difficult places For they are not to be salved but by those who are well acquainted with what the Scripture principally aims at which it teaches us in plain and easie words and therefore they must be first learnt as our Guides to those things which are of higher contemplation And he who is resolved upon this Method will find plain Truths enow to busie and imploy an honest and pious mind a long time by which he is to prepare and sit himself for more difficult inquiries if it be needful for him to make them Though the truth is ordinary Capacities may safely pass by those things that are hard and obscure and content themselves with the knowledge of easie and perspicuous Doctrines without any further search consulting thereby best for their own ease and quiet and for the Peace of the Church of God And as for those whose profession it is to devote themselves to the study of all Holy Writ even they must be sure for their own safety and others to lay the Foundation well here by thoroughly digesting the Doctrines which are after Godliness and deeply tincturing as I may say their minds therewith before they meddle with other matters For a sense of true Goodness will be as a Light to guide us in the interpreting those things which seem dark and need something to illustrate them And what can we imagine that should be but something contained in the same Book even the true Light of Life the Light which chases away all mens evil desires and the deeds of darkness which makes the Soul pure and without prejudice which disposes it to know God and to love him and to love all men for his sake This will instruct us how to interpret all the rest and not suffer us to entertain any sense of them in our minds which is repugnant to the Nature of God and hinders the practice and increase of true Godliness or prejudices Charity and disturbs Christian Society but conform all our thoughts unto a happy agreement with those great and obvious Truths Which therefore let us observe and mark as the very Life and Soul of Religion nay let us imprint them on our minds as the most necessary to be known and remembred and carried constantly in mind that we may never admit any thing to their prejudice For unless we be thus disposed we shall not only trouble our selves to no purpose but confound all things and overturn the whole Frame of Religion We shall be just like that Fool whom Melancthon speaks of whose work it was to carry fuel daily to the Kitchin and coming to a great Pile of Wood where little pieces lay uppermost and the greatest below he would needs begin at the bottom for which he gave this wise reason That it was good to do the hardest work first and then he should be better able to deal with that which was easie I need not make the application to those who love to perplex themselves with some deep and I may say dangerous Points if not well understood before they are well studied in the common Doctrines of Godliness and have learnt what it is to be a Christian This is a preposterous course contrary to the clear light and guidance of the Holy Books which teach us in the first place to make this inquiry What shall we do to be saved And we are sure none can be saved but they who are obedient to the Lord Jesus whose Faith therefore teaches us to study his Precepts before we meddle with other matters And these Precepts as they are not grievous to those that obey them so they are not hard to be learnt in order to that obedience But whatsoever concerns our Duty to God and Man and the Duty of every particular person in the relation wherein they stand of Parents and Children Husbands and Wives Masters and Servants Princes and People Teachers and Learners are all I have shown delivered here with such plainness and simplicity that no Book in the World ever taught them in this manner About these therefore in all reason together with the common Principles of Christian Faith we must imploy our most earnest care to settle them in our minds and make them the Rule of all the rest But it is not enough to bring these things into our minds I must add another Rule no less necessary than this which is II. That to do what we know is the way to know more what we have to do This I have suggested already in the body of the foregoing Discourse and therefore shall only commend the serious practice of one particular Duty which is so frequently mentioned in the Holy Scriptures that from thence we ought to conclude it is of exceeding great moment It is Humility not to think of our selves more highly than we ought to think nor to be wise in our own conceits but to think soberly and to be lowly in our own eyes There is a number of Precepts of the same import with these the meaning of which he ought to study diligently and then heartily obey who would advance to a higher degree of knowledge for the meek i. e. the humble will he guide in judgment and the meek will he teach his way If a man begin at first to think wrong of himself he is not like to hit right in other things but the easier mistake in them when he hath suffered such a cheat to be put upon him as to have a
against vain Philosophy II. Col. 8. From whence we may note that the Scriptures themselves assign the Original of Heresies and teach us to beware of it so far are they from leading us into them Thirdly And there is a third Cause of them mentioned in Scripture also viz. the Traditions of men VII Mark 7 8. And thus Firmilian observes in his Letter to St. Cyprian That Marcion the Disciple of Cerdo a great while after the Apostles induxit sacrilegaem adversus Deum traditionem brought in a sacrilegious Tradition against God Apelles also consenting to his Blasphemy added multa alia nova many other Novelties which were more grievous and directly opposite to Faith and Truth And so did Valentinus and Basilides who rebelled against God's Church by their wicked Forgeries And thus St. Hierom introduces Hereticks maintaining their Errours in the very Dialect of the now Roman Doctors We are the Sons of those wise men who from the beginning delivered unto us the Apostolical Doctrine c. Lib. VII in Esaiam Cap. XIX But S. Cyprian every where appeals from all pretended Tradition whatsoever unto the Dictates of our Lord and his Apostles i. e. unto Scripture-Tradition Particularly in that famous Epistle of his to Pompeius All religious and simple minds have a compendious means both to lay aside Errour and to find out Truth nam si ad divinae traditionis caput originem revertamur cessat error humanus for if we go back to the Head and Original of Divine Tradition there is an end of humane Errour And a little after he tells us what he means by this Divine Tradition when he saith If there be any doubt any wavering about the Truth let us return ad originem Dominicam Evangelicam Apostolicam Traditionem to our Lord 's Original or beginning both the Evangelical and Apostolical Traditions that is to the Doctrines delivered in the Goâ—pels and in the Writings of the Apostles Fourthly Another Spring of Heresie were pretended Revelations Thus the Cataphrygae as the same Firmilian tells us novas Prophetias usurpare conantur endeavoured also to make use of new Prophecies And a little after We know they cannot have Christ who challenge to themselves their false Prophecy against the Faith of Christ And whence they had their Illuminations who in the bosom of the Roman Church invented a Fifth Gospel which threatned the overthrow of our four is not hard to resolve Not out of the Holy Scriptures we may be sure and therefore the taking away them from the people will not prevent all Heresies but they will start up as they have done from other Causes and they will the sooner start up if the Scriptures be neglected II. But I desire it may be further considered that as Heresies will spring up from other Causes though men do not read the Scriptures so Lay-men have not been always the Devisers of them but they to whom none deny the liberty of reading the Holy Books For the most pernicious Heresies that have been in the Church had their beginning from Priests as appears by Arius and Nestorius And indeed no man can frame an Heresie but he that is of excellent Parts as St. Hierom's opinion is whose words are these upon the X. of Hosea No man can devise and set up a Heresie but he that is ardentis ingenii of an extraordinary Wit and hath gifts of Nature created by God the great Artificer such was Valentinus such was Marcion whom we read to have been most learned such was Bardesanes whose Wit the Philosophers themselves admired And therefore either the Scriptures must be wholly laid aside the greatest men for Learning and Parts being apt to abuse them if they be not humble and thoroughly good or men must be taught how to prepare themselves for the reading of them and what to seek for there and then any body may safely take them into their hands and make them their constant Companions III. It must likewise be further considered that there is something else to be feared beside Heresie and that is stupid ignorance or gross Infidelity which Experience shows us have followed upon the taking the Scriptures from the people even as darkness comes and covers the Earth when the light is withdrawn from it And ought we not in all reason to be as studious and solicitous to prevent these as to prevent Heresie Since they are no less dangerous or rather more dangerous by far even for this reason because they make men liable to fall into the most sottish Superstitions if not into down-right Idolatry which is a worse thing than Heresie How Images came to be Lay-mens Books it is needless to relate the matter being very plain and how Image-Worship thence arose and how fatal this hath been to the vulgar people I have not room to discourse nor how Legends of Saints were invented full of absurd and incredible stories which have disgraced the Doctrine of Christianity and tempted many to disbelieve the true History of our Saviour's and his Apostles Miraculous Operations But this is certain that they were devised to supply the place of the Holy Scriptures that the people might have something to entertain them when they were taken away from them It was the effect at least of that these fabulous stories being recommended to the peoples affection when they were frighted from medling with the Bible as a dangerous Book nay when it 's credit was disgraced by many words of reproach Which we in this Church think our selves bound to wipe off by recommending it to the peoples best affection and constant perusal as a means to preserve them from sottish ignorance and stupid Impostures and all vain Superstitions and false Worship IV. Nor is it easie for our people by this means to fall into Heresie because they have the liberty of reading the Scriptures but interpreted to them by the Ministry of the Church whereby they are taught continually to have recourse to their Pastors and by sundry Tracts Expositions and Paraphrases allowed by publick Authority Particularly in the beginning of the Reformation care was taken that Erasmus his Paraphrase should be placed in every Parish-Church of the Realm in which he doth not follow his own private Fancy but like a truly great Man represents the sense of the ancient Doctors of the Church V. Now if after all this men do fall into Heresie it must be imputed to some other Cause than their reading the Scriptures For if they had minded them they would have learnt to be humble modest peaceable tractable to their Guides and to take heed of those who cause Divisions and are proud and dote about Questions and strises of Words and that creep into houses to instill private Doctrines and very frequently lead men from the Scriptures to pretended Revelations or Traditions That is they would not have faln into any sort of Heresie but kept unto the wholesom words of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the Doctrine which is