Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
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A30995
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A sermon preached before the King at White-hall, October 17, 1675 by Miles Barne ...
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Barne, Miles, d. 1709?
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1675
(1675)
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Wing B859; ESTC R12524
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14,181
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47
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Virgins Womb and that He might become a Sacrifice for Sin was content to be dis-array'd of His own Eternal Glory to take upon Him the Form of a Servant and to humble Himself to the Death the shameful Death of the Cross so likewise when He took upon Him the Office of a Teacher by a wonderful Condescent He accomodated His Doctrines to the reason humane Affections of His Auditors His Laws obtain'd as much by their suitableness to our natures as the Authority of the Speaker When He preach'd His Divine Sermon to the Multitude He did not Amuse them with Mystical Theology or torture their Understandings with profound Subtilties but as He was the Brightness of His Fathers Glory and the express Image of His Person so He declar'd the Law of God in a most Plain and Perspicuous manner Mahomet indeed that grand Impostor was well Advis'd to Pen his Alcoran in swelling Words and mystical Phrases and as in some things to Restrain so in others to Indulge the sensual Appetite For by this Stratagem that sottish People with whom he had to do were content to part with their natural Right to gain an Unlawful Freedom and to Admire what they were never like to Understand But our new and perfect Law giver Christ Jesus having no other design but the Salvation of Souls and being every way Adorn'd for so noble a Purpose though He made the Gate Narrow and the Path Strait yet He hath Promised it shall be Open'd to all that Knock and none unless Wilfully need Mistake the VVay which leads to Eternal Life But then because He knew there was no Rule so plain but it might be Mistaken no Precept so clear but it might be Perverted no Doctrine so pure but it might be Corrupted Because He foresaw there would arise false Prophets and false Teachers whose business it would be to Seduce the Ignorant and Debauch the Credulous Because He foresaw a perpetual Succession of Gnosticks who in all Ages would set up the Dagon of their own lascivious Fancies in opposition to the Ark of His Covenant and be so audacious as even to confront Divine Revelations with carnal reasoning therefore to obviate and prevent the mischiefs of such grievous Wolves before He took His Journey into his far Country out of a tender care of that Flock which He had purchas'd with his Blood He appointed Overseers and Pastors of His Flock committed to them and them only the care of Feeding his Flock amplified their Commission with the like Authority which he had receiv'd from his Father promis'd to be with them unto the End of the World and to assist them with that Spirit which should guide them into all Truth If then the Scriptures be so Clear as to be understood even by the Multitude then much more by the Disciples in general If by the Disciples in general much more by the College of the Apostles who were His special Favourites and of his Cabinet-Council If the Nations to whom these Ministers in Chief and Plenepotentiaries for Christ made known the Will of God were throughly instructed for the Kingdom of Heaven then much more both They and Their Successors upon whom they in obedience to their Masters Command conferr'd the same Pastoral power which they had receiv'd from Him The Clearness then of Scripture cannot reasonably be urg'd in Prejudice of Christs Ministers for whatsoever is from hence alledg'd in favour of the People the advantage will be still greater on their side Thus hath God promis'd the Assistance of his Spirit to all private men who sincerely endeavour to find out the Truth then much less will He be wanting to the Governors of his Church to whom He hath committed the care of the Souls of those private men and given power even to confer the Holy Ghost Are the Scriptures clear to them much more to those whom the Son of God hath signaliz'd and set apart for the Lights of the World Two Things are usually brought to hinder this Procedure Either that those Promises of Assistance were made only to the Apostles or else that they depend on the conditioned Righteousness of Men. Where by the way it may be Observ'd that by the First of these the Claim of the People is utterly cut off and by the Second they have as small Advantage But they who argue thus might do well to consider that this Objection may strike at the very Foundation of the Faith For if those promises of Assistance which Christ made to His Church be Hypothecal if they depend on the Performance of Men then may the Foundation Totter the Gates of Hell prevail Christianity decay and the Gospel it self be lost out of the World before the End thereof notwithstanding all Christs fair Promises to the Contrary If they had been confin'd only to the Apostles its Christian Religion had not long surviv'd the Author every Martyrdom of an Apostle had pull'd down a Pillar of the Church and by consequence the whole Fabrick must have fallen to the ground in the very first Century of our Lord. Happy indeed had it been for Christendom that the Imperiousness of some Modern Bishops of Rome had not brought an Odium though unjustly upon Episcopacy in general that their too much Lording it over the Flock had not given Advantage to the Enemies of Church-Authority and their Challenging to themselves at least an indirect Power in Temporals had not Alarm'd the Kings of the Earth to stand up and take Counsel how they might Destroy so dangerous an Vsurpation of the pretended Vicegerent of the Lords Anointed Happy had it been if for the Support of their Secular Greatness they had not Wrested the Scriptures to countenance such Doctrines as have no clear and solid foundation therein and that under pretence of making the Church all Glorious Within Her Governours all Triumphant Without they had not defac'd Her Innocent Beauty and made Her Militant in the worst of Senses However they can no way be Excused who think they can never be Secure from Papal Supremacy but by Demolishing the Evangelical Hierarchy and introducing a Presbyterial Parity into the Catholick Church and to avoid the Necessity of having an Infallible Judge leaving every private prepossessed Fancy to the Perspicuity of Scripture whereby men are often bewildred in a Labyrinth of Errors seduc'd into those by-paths which lead to the Pit of Destruction For notwithstanding that Beam of Divine Light which shines so Bright in the Scriptures it seems some men have Eyes either so weak as to be dazled at the sight of it or else so blind with Pride or Malice as not to perceive it For St. Peter tells us there are in the Scriptures some things hard to be Understood which unlearned and unstable men Wrest unto their own Destruction And therefore the Unlearned should do well to consult their Teachers the Unstable those that are sound in the Faith which brings me to my second general Consideration That though the Scriptures be
clear in themselves yet Private men abandoning their Guides and following their own corrupt Fancies may deprave and distort them to their own destruction Who those Wresters were or what those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are wherewith St. Peter chargeth the Epistles of His beloved Brother Paul I shall not strictly enquire the Apostle having pass'd them over in a profound silence it will be difficult at this distance of time exactly to define yet 't is not improbable that either the Gnostick or Cerinthian Hereticks were here chiefly aim'd at who upon a mistake of some Predictions became the Founders of a Temporal Dominion of Christ after His Resurrection wherein His Followers in their New Jerusalem should wallow in sensual Lusts and Pleasures spend the space of a Thousand Years as in a Nuptial Festivity and enjoy the all that is in the World the Lusts of the Flesh the Lusts of the Eye and the Pride of Life in as ample and exquisite a manner as the most Epicurean soul could effect or covet A fancy in its first original meerly Jewish afterwards entertain'd by some Judaizing Christians and finally rather rectified than abandon'd by some of the Fathers in the Primitive times And if those sublime Wits who had all the Learning which either Jerusalem Athens or Rome could Boast were never less Mistaken in their Expositions of some abstruse Texts of Scripture whilst they deliver'd their Opinions but as private Doctors what wonder if the unlearned and unstable Wrest them to their own Destruction That they have de facto done this is manifest since 't will be hard to instance in any one Century which is not either chargeable with new Heresies or the reviving and improving of Old And the most extravagant Opinions which ever yet saw the light have still shrouded themselves under the Patronage of Holy Writ What shall we say then shall we condemn the Scriptures of Sin Shall we say That the Scriptures are of themselves either productive of Error or not a sufficient store-house of Truth God forbid The Scriptures are Holy Just and Good but private men Wrest them to their own Destruction And this they do first By their Ignorance Secondly By their Instability I. First by their Ignorance where it will be presently Objected that Ignorance is so far from being a cause of Error or impiety that in a sober sence 't is truly the Mother of Devotion The Wisdom of this World is given in by Tertullian as the prime Cause of Heresie None were greater Tormentors of the Scriptures than the Phylosophers for which Reason they are Branded by the same Author with the Title of Arch-Hereticks Particularly the Valentinian Heresie concerning the portentous production of the Gods comes from the Platonists Marcious Vnconcern'd and Lazy God was first set up by the Stoicks the mortality of the Soul was the Doctrine of the Epicureans the Impossibility of the Resurrection of the Flesh of the whole stream of Phylosophers The Apostles tells us Not many Mighty not many Wise not many Noble were Chosen Cautions his Proselytes against Philosophy and vain Deceit and concludes the Wisdom of this World Foolishness with God Wherefore by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vnlearned in this place we are not to understand Ideots and those who never knew Letters but we must understand those who will not be Instructed by the Masters of Divine Wisdom the Nolentes discere those who refuse to hear the Church of the Living God which alone is the Pillar and Foundation of Truth And so their Learning like Julians only qualifies them to deride the Doctrines of a Crucified God and by their Wisdom they become the more formidable Enemies of Christ's Kingdom Thus if Lucifer the Son of the Morning fall from his Allegiance whole Legions of the Heavenly Host are involv'd in the Rebellion That Heresie spreads like the Contagion of a Leprosy which hath an Arrius for its Founder and a Constantius for its Promoter And the Mahumetan Religion owes as well its monstrous Birth as its fatal Encrease to the Malice and Munning of an Apostate Jew and a Renegado Christian And to give but one instance more but of a far more Modern Daâ—â— and therefore of more Dangerous consequence That unhappy man Socinus a person otherwise of singular Wit and Learning but being in this sense unlearned i. e. Having entertain'd so slender a Notion of the Church as to date a general Defection from the very Deaths of the Apostles upon this Perswasion thought it not Robbery to make himself equal to the most Oecumenical Councils to contradict the most receiv'd Doctrines of the Church and from this Contempt of his Mother to proceed to that daring pitch of Impiety as to deny even the Lord that Bought him so dangerous is it for private men to rely solely upon the perspicuity of Scripture or to measure the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Incarnation of the Godhead his Consubstantiality with the Father by the scantling of Humane Reason Cedat curiosit as fidei gloria saluti was the Advice of as great a Wit as any Age hath bred Our Curiosity must give place to our Faith the thirst of Temporal Glory to the benefits of Eternal Salvation 'T is true by our Reason we are first dispos'd to be Christians for no Creature beneath the Rational is capable of Divine Revelation but when once we have given up our Names to Christ 't is by our Faith we are Saved but if we Assent to no Doctrines but such as our Reason fully Comprehends this is no longer Faith but Science and so we may continue Infidells whilst we go under the Notion of Christians And since We live in such a Knowing Age wherein all captivating the Vnderstanding though it be to the Obedience of Faith is made the subject of Grievance and Complaint And that we have to deal with men of such a sceptical Genius as that they do not only enquire into the Grounds and Reasons of our Faith but moreover deny our very Creed with whom a Treatise of Humane Reason is of more Force than the Revelation of St. John the Divine To the Consideration of these Men I offer Two Things which I judge most proper I. First the Answer which Origen made to Celsus when 't was objected by that Calumniator against the Christians that their Religion was built on a very sandy Foundation which durst not undergo the Test of Reason but commanded its Converts not to Examine but Believe and their Faith should Save them In part he owns the Objection but wisely Retorts it upon his Adversary by telling him that the Philosophers were the greatest Dictators in the World Witness the Ipse dixit of Phythagoras that their Systems contain'd some such secret Dogmata which their Disciples swallowed solely upon the Credit of their Masters And if the Masters of the Wisdom of this World which is either Foolishness or at best but Science fasly so called required so great submission from their Scholars how