Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	world_n	write_v	writing_n	115	3	8.2962	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A23752	The lively oracles given to us, or, The Christians birth-right and duty, in the custody and use of the Holy Scripture by the author of The whole duty of man, &c.	Allestree, Richard, 1619-1681.; Sterne, Richard, 1596?-1683.; Pakington, Dorothy Coventry, Lady, d. 1679.; Boyle, Robert, 1627-1691.	1678 (1678)	Wing A1149; ESTC R170102	108,974	240

their posterity then to follow that of their Ancestors som have interest and designs which will be better serv'd by new Tenets and som are ignorant and mistaking and may unawares corrupt the doctrin they should barely deliver and of this last sort we may guess there may be many since it falls commonly to the mothers lot to imbue children with the first rudiments 19. NOW in all these cases how possible is it that primitive Tradition may be either lost or adulterated and consequently and in proportion to that possibility our confidence of it must be stagger'd I am sure according to the common estimate in seculars it must be so For I appeal to any man whether he be not apter to credit a relation which comes from an eie-witness then at the third or fourth much more at the hundredth rebound as in this case And daily experience tells us that a true and probable story by passing thro many hands often grows to an improbable lie This man thinks he could add one becoming circumstance that man another and whilst most men take the liberty to do so the relation grows as monstrous as such a heap of incoherent phancies can make it 20. IF to this it be said that this happens only in trivial secular matters but that in the weighty concern of Religion mankind is certainly more serious and sincere I answer that 't is very improbable that they are since 't is obvious in the common practice of the world that the interests of Religion are postpon'd to every little worldly concern And therefore when a temporal advantage requires the bending and warping of Religion there will never be wanting som that will attemt it 21. BESIDES there is still left in human nature so much of the venom of the Serpents first temtation that tho men cannot be as God yet they love to be prescribing to him and to be their own Assessors as to that worship and homage they are to pay him 22. BUT above all 't is considerable that in this case Sathan has a more peculiar concern and can serve himself more by a falsification here then in temporal affairs For if he can but corrupt Religion it ceases to be his enemy and becomes one of his most useful engins as sufficiently appear'd in the rites of the heathen worship We have therefore no cause to think this an exemt case but to presume it may be influenc'd by the same pravity of human nature which prevailes in others and consequently are oblig'd to bless God that he has not left our spiritual concerns to such hazards but has lodg'd them in a more secure repository the written Word 23. BUT I fore-see 't will be objected that whilst I thus disparage Tradition I do vertually invalidate the Scripture it self which comes to us upon its credit To this I answer first that since God has with-drawn immediate revelation from the world Tradition is the only means to convey to us the first notice that this Book is the word of God and it being the only means he affords we have all reason to depend on his goodness that he will not suffer that to be evacuated to us and that how liable soever Tradition may be to err yet that it shall not actually err in this particular 24. BUT in the second place This Tradition seems not so liable to falsification as others It is so very short and simple a proposition such and such writings are the word of God that there is no great room for Sophistry or mistake to pervert the sense the only possible deception must be to change the subject and obtrude suppositious writings in room of the true under the title of the word of God But this has already appear'd to be unpracticable because of the multitude of copies which were disperst in the world by which such an attemt would soon have bin detected There appears therefore more reason as well as more necessity to rely upon Tradition in this then in most other particulars 25. NEITHER yet do I so farr decry oral Tradition in any as to conclude it impossible it should derive any truth to posterity I only look on it as more casual and consequently a less fit conveiance of the most important and necessary verities then the writen Word In which I conceive my self justifi'd by the common sense of mankind who use to commit those things to writing which they are most solicitous to derive to posterity Do's any Nation trust their fundamental Laws only to the memory of the present Age and take no other course to transmit them to the future do's any man purchase an estate and leave no way for his children to lay claim to it but the Tradition the present witnesses shall leave of it Nay do's any considering man ordinarily make any important pact or bargain tho without relation to posterity without putting the Articles in writing And whence is all this caution but from a universal consent that writing is the surest way of transmitting 26. BUT we have yet a higher appeal in this matter then to the suffrage of men God himself seems to have determin'd it And what his decision is 't is our next business to inquire 27. AND first he has given the most real and comprehensive attestation to this way of writing by having himself chose it For he is too wise to be mistaken in his estimate of better and worse and too kind to chuse the worst for us and yet he has chosen to communicate himself to the latter Ages of the world by writing and has summ'd up all the Eternal concerns of mankind in the sacred Scriptures and left those sacred Records by which we are to be both inform'd and govern'd which if oral Tradition would infallibly have don had bin utterly needless and God sure is not so prodigal of his spirit as to inspire the Authors of Scripture to write that whose use was superseded by a former more certain expedient 28. NAY under the Mosaic oeconomy when he made use of other waies of reveling himself yet to perpetuate the memory even of those Revelations he chose to have them written At the delivery of the Law God spake then viva voce and with that pomp of dreadful solemnity as certainly was apt to make the deepest impressions yet God fore-saw that thro every succeeding Age that stamp would grow more dim and in a long revolution might at last be extinct And therefore how warm soever the Israelites apprehensions then were he would not trust to them for the perpetuating his Law but committed it to writing Ex. 13. 18. nay wrote it twice himself 29. YET farther even the ceremonial Law tho not intended to be of perpetual obligation was not yet referr'd to the traditionary way but was wrote by Moses and deposited with the Priests Deut. 31. 9. And after-event shew'd this was no needless caution For when under Manasses Idolatry had prevail'd in Jerusalem it was not by any dormant

lookt on as one that would head a Sedition or attemt to raise himself to a capacity of rewarding his Abettors Upon all these considerations there appears not the least shadow of probability that either those particular persons who publish'd the cures they had receiv'd or those multitudes who were witnesses and divulgers of those or his other miracles could do it upon any sinister design or indeed upon any other motive but gratitude and admiration 33. IN the next place if we come to those miracles which succeeded Christs death those most important and convincing of his Resurrection and Ascension and observe who were the divulgers of those we shall find them very unlikely to be men of design a set of illiterate men taken from the Fisher-boats and other mean occupation and such as needed a miracle as great as any of those they were to assert the descent of the Holy Ghost to fit them for their office What alas could they drive at or how could they hope that their testimony could be received so much against the humor and interest of the present rulers unless they were assur'd not only of the truth of the things but also of som supernatural aids to back and fortify them Accordingly we find that till they had receiv'd those till by the descent of the holy Ghost they were endued with power from on high Luk. 24. 49. they never attemted the discovery of what they had seen but rather hid them selves kept all their assemblies in privacy and concealment for the fear of the Jews Jo. 20. 19. and so were far enough from projecting any thing beside their own safety Afterwards when they began to preach they had early essays what their secular advantages would be by it threatnings and revilings scourgings and imprisonments Act. 4. 20. 5. 18. 40. And can it be imagined that men who a little before had shewed themselves so little in ●ove with suffering that none of them durst stick to their Master at his apprehension but one forswore and all forfook him can it I say be imagin'd that these men should be so much in love with their own Fable as to venture all sorts of persecution for the propagating it Or if they could let us in the next place consider what probability there could be of success 34. THEIR preaching amounted to no less then the Deifying of one whom both their Roman and Jewish Rulers nay the generality of the people had executed as a malefactor so that they were all engag'd in defence of their own Act to sift their testimony with all the rigor that conscious jealousy could suggest And where were so many concern'd inquisitors there was very little hope for a forgery to pass Besides the avow'd displesure of their Governors made it a hazardous thing to own a belief of what they asserted Those that adher'd to them could not but know that at the same time they must espouse their dangers and sufferings And men use not to incur certain mischiefs upon doubtful and suspicious grounds 35 YET farther their doctrin was design'd to an end to which their Auditors could not but have the greatest reluctancy they were to struggle with that rooted prepossession which the Jews had for the Mosaical Law which their Gospel out-dated and the Gentiles for the Rites and Religion of their Ancestors and which was harder then either with the corruptions and vices of both to plant humility and internal sanctity so contrary to that ceremonial holiness upon which the Jews so valued themselves and despis'd others and Temperance Justice and Purity so contrary to the practice nay even the religion of the Heathen and to attemt all this with no other allurement no other promise of recompence but what they must attend in another world and pass too thro reproches and afflictions torments and death These were all such invincible prejudices as they could never hope to break thro with a lie nay which they could not have encounter'd even with every common truth but only with that which being divine brought its aids with it without which 't was utterly impossible for all the skill or oratory of men to overcome such disadvantages 36. AND yet with all these did these rude inartificial men contest and that with signal success no less then three thousand Proselytes made by Saint Peters first Sermon and that in Jerusalem the Scene where all was acted and consequently where 't was the most impossible to impose a forgery And at the like miraculous rate they went on till as the Pharisees themselves complain they had filled Jerusalem with their doctrin Acts 5. 28. nor did Judea set bounds to them their sound went out into all nations Rom. 10. 18. and their doctrin spred it self thro all the Gentile world 37. AND sure so wonderful an event so contrary to all human mesures do's sufficiently evince there was more then man in it Nothing but the same creative Power that produc'd light out of darkness could bring forth effects so much above the proportion of the cause Had these weak instruments acted only by their natural powers nothing of this had bin atchiev'd Alas could these poor rude men learn all Languages within the space of fifty daies which would take up almost as many years of the most industrious Student And yet had they not bin able to speak them they could never have divulg'd the Gospel to the several Nations nor so effectually have convinc'd the by-standers Act. 2. that they acted by a higher impulse Yet to convince the world they did so they repeted their Masters miracles as well as his doctrin heal'd the sick cast out devils rais'd the dead And where God communicated so much of his power we may reasonably conclude he did it to promote his own work not the work of the Devil as it must have bin if this whole Scene were a lie 38. WHEN all this is weigh'd I presume there will remain little ground to suspect that the first planters of Christian Faith had any other design then what they avowed viz. the bringing men to holiness here and salvation hereafter The suspicion therefore if any must rest upon later times and accordingly som are willing to persuade themselves and others that the whole Scheme of our Religion is but a lately devis'd Fable to keep the world in awe whereof Princes have made som use but Clergy-men more and that Christ and his Apostles are only actors whom themselves have conjured up upon the stage to pursue their plot 39. IN answer to this bold this blasphemous suggestion I should first desire these surmisers to point out the time when and the persons who began this design to tell us exactly whence they date this politic Religion as they are pleas'd to suppose it If they cannot they are manifestly unjust to reject our account of it when they can give none themselves and fail very much of that rigid demonstration they require from others That there is such a profession

those intrinsic evidences which arise out of the Scripture it self but of these I think not proper here to insist partly because the subject will be in a great degree coincident with that of the second general consideration and partly because these can be argumentative to none who are not qualified to discern them Let those who doubt the divine Original of Scripture well digest the former grounds which are within the verge of reason and when by those they are brought to read it with due reverence they will not want Arguments from the Scripture it self to confirm their veneration of it 45. IN the mean time to evince how proper the former discourse is to found a rational belief that the Scripture is the word of God I shall compare it with those mesures of credibility upon which all human transactions move and upon which men trust their greatest concerns without diffidence or dispute 46. THAT we must in many things trust the report of others is so necessary that without it human society cannot subsist What a multitude of subjects are there in the world who never saw their Prince nor were at the making of any Law if all these should deny their obedience because they have it only by hear-say there is such a man and such Laws what would become of government So also for property if nothing of testimony may be admitted how shall any man prove his right to any thing All pleas must be decided by the sword and we shall fall into that state which som have phancied the primitive of universal hostility In like manner for traffic and commerce how should any Merchant first attemt a trade to any foreign part of the world if he did not believe that such a place there was and how could he believe that but upon the credit of those who have bin there Nay indeed how could any man first attemt to go but to the next Market Town if he did not from the report of others conclude that such a one there was so that if this universal diffidence should prevail every man should be a kind of Plantagnus fixt to the soil he first sprung up in The absurdities are indeed so infinite and so obvious that I need not dilate upon them 47. BuT it will perhaps be said that in things that are told us by our contemporaries and that relate to our own time men will be less apt to deceive us because they know 't is in our power to examin and discover the truth To this I might say that in many instances it would scarce quit cost to do so and the inconveniences of trial would exceed those of belief But I shall willingly admit this probable Argument and only desire it may be applied to our main question by considering whether the primitive Christians who receiv'd the Scripture as divine had not the same security of not being deceiv'd who had as great opportunities of examining and the greatest concern of doing it throly since they were to engage not only their future hopes in another world but that which to nature is much more sensible all their present enjoiments and even life it self upon the truth of it 48. BuT because it must be confest that we who are so many Ages remov'd from them have not their means of assurance let us in the next place consider whether an assent to those testimonies they have left behind them be not warranted by the common practice of mankind in other cases Who is there that questions there was such a man as William the Conqueror in this Island or to lay the Scene farther who doubts there was an Alexander a Julius Caesar an Augustus Now what have we to found this confidence on besides the faith of History And I presume even those who exact the severest demonstrations for Ecclesiastic Story would think him a very impertinent Sceptic that should do the like in these So also as to the Authors of Books who disputes whether Homer writ the Iliads or Virgil the Aeneids or Caesar the Commentaries that pass under their names yet none of these have bin attested in any degree like the Scripture 'T is said indeed that Caesar ventured his own life to save his Commentaries imploying one hand to hold that above the water when it should have assisted him in swimming But who ever laid down their lives in attestation of that or any human composure as multitudes of men have don for the Bible 49. BUT perhaps 't will be said that the small concern men have who wrote these or other the like Books inclines them to acquiesce in the common opinion To this I must say that many things inconsiderable to mankind have oft bin very laboriously discust as appears by many unedifying Volumes both of Philosophers and Schole-men But whatever may be said in this instance 't is manifest there are others wherein mens real and greatest interests are intrusted to the testimonies of former Ages For example a man possesses an estate which was bought by his great Grand-father or perhaps elder Progenitor he charily preserves that deed of purchase and never looks for farther security of his title yet alas at the rate that men object against the Bible what numberless Cavils might be rais'd against such a deed How shall it be known that there was such a man as either Seller or Purchaser if by the witnesses they are as liable to doubt as the other it being as easy to forge the Attestation as the main writing and yet notwithstanding all these possible deceits nothing but a positive proof of forgery can invalidate this deed Let but the Scripture have the same mesure be allowed to stand in force to be what it pretends to be till the contrary be not by surmises and possible conjectures but by evident proof evinc'd and its greatest Advocats will ask no more 50. A like instance may be given in public concerns the immunities and rights of any Nation particularly here of our Magna Charta granted many Ages since and deposited among the public Records to make this signify any thing it must be taken for granted that this was without falsification preserved to our times yet how easy were it to suggest that in so long a succession of its keepers som may have bin prevail'd on by the influence of Princes to abridg and curtail its concessions others by a prevailing faction of the people to amplify and extend it Nay if men were as great Sceptics in Law as they are in Divinity they might exact demonstrations that the whole thing were not a forgery Yet for all these possible surmises we still build upon it and should think he argued very fallaciously that should go to evacuate it upon the force of such remote suppositions 51. Now I desire it may be consider'd whether our security concerning the holy Scripture be not as great nay greater then it can be of this For first this is a concern only of a particular Nation and

severals First the Historical secondly the Prophetic thirdly the Doctrinal fourthly the Preceptive fifthly the Minatory sixthly the Promissory These are the several veins in this ●ich Mine in which he who industriously labors will find the Psalmist was not out in his estimate when he pronounces them more to be desir'd then gold yea then much fine gold Psal. 19. 10. 2. To speak first of the Historical part the things which chiefly recommend a History are the dignity of the subject the truth of the relation and those plesant or profitable observations which are interwoven with it And first for the dignity of the subject the History of the Bible must be acknowledged to excel all others those shew the rise and progress of som one people or Empire this shews us the original of the whole Universe and particularly of man for whose use and benefit the whole Creation was design'd By this mankind is brought into acquaintance with it self made to know the elements of its constitution and taught to pu● a differing value upon that Spirit which was breath'd into it by God Gen. 2. 7. and the fle●● whose foundation is in the dust Job 4. 19. And when this Historical part of Scripture contracts and draws into a narrow channel when it records the concerns but of one Nation yet it was that which God had dignified above all the rest of the world markt it out for his own peculiar made it the repository of his truth aud the visible stock from whence the Messias should come in whom all the Nations of the earth were to be blessed Gen. 18. 18. so that in this one people of the Jews was virtually infolded the highest and most important interests of the whole world and it must be acknowled'gd no Story could have a nobler subject to treat of 3. SECONDLY as to the truth of the relation tho to those who own it Gods Word there needs no other proof yet it wants not human Arguments to confirm it The most undoubted symptom of sincerity in an Historian is impartiality Now this is very ●minent in Scripture writers they do not record others faults and baulk their own but indifferently accuse themselves as well as others Moses mentions his own diffidence and unwillingness to go on Gods message Ex. 4. 13. his provocation of God at the wa●ers of Meribah Num. 20. Jonah records his own sullen behavior towards God with as great aggravations as any of his enemies ●ould have don Peter in his dictating Saint Marks Gospel neither omits nor extenuates his sin all he seems to speak short in is his ●epentance Saint Paul registers himself as the greatest of sinners 4. AND as they were not indulgent to their own personal faults so neither did any ●earness of relation any respect of quality ●ribe them to a concelement Moses relates the ossence of his sister Miriam in muti●ing Num. 12. 1. of his brother Aaron in the matter of the Calf Ex. 32. 4. with as little disguise as that of Korah and his company David tho a King hath his adultery and murder displaied in the blackest characters and King Hezekiahs little vanity of shewing his tresures do's not escape a remark Nay even the reputation of their Nation could not biass the sacred Writers but they freely tax their crimes the Israclites murmurings in the wilderness their Idolatries in Canaan are set down without any palliation or excuse And they are as frequently branded for their stubborness and ingratitude as the Canaanites are for their abominations So that certainly no History in the world do's better attest its truth by this evidence of impartiality 5. IN the last place it commends it sell both by the plesure and profit it yields The rarity of those events it records surprizes the mind with a delightful admiration and that mixture of sage discourses and well-coucht Parables wherewith it abounds do's at once please and instruct How ingenuously apt was Nathans Apologue to David whereby with holy artifice he ensnar'd him into repentance And it remains still matter of instruction to us to shew us with what unequal scales we are apt to weigh the same crime in others and our selves So also that long train of smart calamities which succeeded his sin is set out with such particularity that it seems to be exactly the crime reverst His own lust with Bathsheba was answer'd with Amnons towards Thamar his murder of Vriah with that of Amnon his trecherous contrivance of that murder with Absoloms traiterous conspiracy against him So that every circumstance of his punishment was the very echo and reverberation of his guilt A multitude of the like instances might be produc'd out of holy Writ all concurring to admonish us that God exactly marks and will repay our crimes and that commonly with such propriety that we need no other clue to guide us to the cause of our sufferings then the very sufferings themselves Indeed innumerable are the profitable observations arising from the historical part of Scripture that flow so easily and unconstrain'd that nothing but a stupid inadvertence in the reader can make him baulk them therefore 't would be impertinent here to multiply instances 6. LET us next consider the prophetic part of Scripture and we shall find it no less excellent in its kind The prophetic Books are for the most part made up as the prophetic Office was of two parts prediction and instruction When God rais'd up Prophets 't was not only to acquaint men with future events but to reform their present manners and therefore as they are called Seers in one respect so they are Watch-men and Shepherds in another Nay indeed the former was often subservient to the other as to the nobler end their gift of fore-telling was to gain them autority to be as it were the seal of their commission to convince men that they were sent from God and so to render them the more pliant to their reproofs and admonitions And the very matter of their prophecies was usually adapted to this end the denouncing of judgements being the most frequent theme and that design'd to bring men to repentance as appears experimentally in the case of Nineveh And in this latter part of their office the Prophets acted with the greatest incitation and vehemence 7. WITH what liberty and zeal do's Elijah arraign Ahab of Naboths murder and foretel the fatal event of it without any fear of his power or reverence of his greatness And Samuel when he delivers Saul the fatal message of his rejection do's passionately and convincingly expostulate with him concerning his sin 1 Sam. 15. 17. Now the very same Spirit still breaths in all the propheties Writings the same truth of prediction and the same zeal against vice 8. FIRST for the predictions what signal completions do we find How exactly are all the denunciations of judgments fulfill'd where repentance has not interven'd He that reads the 28. chap. of Deut. and compares it with the Jews calamities both

they came up they might shew their children the same Which Scripture by a perpetual succession was to be handed down unto the Christian Church the Apostles on all occasions appealing unto them as being read in the Synagogues every Sabbath day Act. 13. 27. and also privatly in their hands so that they might at plesure search into them Jo. 5. 39. Act. 17. 11. Hereupon the Jews are by Saint Austin call'd the Capsarii or servants that carried the Christians Books And Athanasius in this Tract of the Incarnation saies The Law was not for the Jews only nor were the Prophets sent for them alone but that Nation was the Divinity-Schole of the whole world from whence they were to fetch the knowledg of God and the way of spiritual living which amounts to what the Apostle saies Galat. 3. 24. That the Law was a Schole-master to bring us unto Christ. 3. AND 't is observable that the very same word Rom. 3. 2. in the Text even now recited which expresses the committing of the Oracles of God to the Jews is made use of constantly by Saint Paul when he declares the trust and duty incumbent on him in the preaching of the Gospel of which see 1 Cor. 9. 17. Gal. 2. 7. 1 Thes. 2. 4. 1 Tim. 1. 11. Tit. 1. 3. And therefore as he saies 1 Cor. 9. Tho I preach the Gospel I have nothing to glory of for necessity is laid upon me yea wo is unto me if I preach not the Gospel for if I do this thing willingly I have a reward but if against my will a dispensation of the Gospel is committed unto me So may all Christians say if we our selves keep and transmit to our posterities the holy Scriptures we have nothing to glory of for a necessity is laid upon us and wo be unto us if we do not our selves keep and transmit to our posterity the holy Scriptures If we do this thing willingly we have a reward but if against our will the custody of the Gospel and at least that dispensation of it is committed to us But if we are Traditors and give up our Bibles or take them away from others let us consider how black an apostacy and sacrilege we shall incur 4. THE Mosaic Law was a temporary constitution and only a shadow of good things to come Heb. 10. 1. but the Gospel being in its duration as well as its intendment everlasting Rev. 14. 6. and to remain when time shall be no more Rev. 10. 6. it is an infinitly more precious depositum and so with greater care and solemner attestation to be preserv'd Not only the Clergy or the people of one particular Church nor the Clergy of the universal are intrusted with this care but 't is the charge the privilege and duty of every Christian man that either is or was or shall be in the world even that collective Church which above all competition is the pillar and ground of truth 1 Tim. 3. 15. against which the assaults of men and devils and even the gates of hell shall not prevail Mat. 16. 18. 5. THE Gospels were not written by their holy Pen-men to instruct the Apostles but to the Christian Church that they might believe Jesus was the Christ the son of God and that believing they might have life thro his name Jo. 20. 31. The Epistles were not addrest peculiarly to the Bishops and Deacons but all the holy brethren to the Churches of God that are sanctified in Jesus Christ and to all those that call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ Rom. 1 7. 1 Cor. 1. 2. 2 Cor. 1. 1. Galat. 1. 2. Eph. 1. 1. Col. 4. 16. 1 Thes. 5. 27. Phil. 1. 1. Jam. 1. 1. 1 Pet. 1. 1. 2 Pet. 1. 1. Revel 1. 4. Or if by chance som one or two of the Epistles were addrest to an Ecclesiastic person as those to Timothy and Titus their purport plainly refers to the community of Christians and the depositum committed to their trust Tim. 6. 20. And Saint John on the other side directs his Epistles to those who were plainly secular to fathers young men and little children and a Lady and her children Epist. 1. chap. 2. 12. 13 14. and Epist. 2. 1. 1. 6. BUT besides the interest which every Christian has in the custody of the Scripture upon the account of its being a depositum intrusted to him he has also another no less forcible that 't is the Testament of his Savior by which he becomes a Son of God no more a Servant but a Son and if he be a Son it is the Apostles inference that he is then an heir an heir of God thro Christ Gal. 4. 7. Now as he who is heir to an estate is also to the deeds and conveiances thereof which without injury cannot be detain'd or if they be there is a remedy at Law for the recovery of them So it fares in our Christian inheritance every believer by the privilege of faith is made a son of Abraham and an heir of the promises made unto the fathers whereby he has an hereditary interest in the Old Testament and also by the privilege of the same Faith he has a firm right to the purchast possession Eph. 1. 14. and the charter thereof the New Therefore the detention of the Scriptures which are made up of these two parts is a manifest injustice and sacrilegious invasion of right which the person wrong'd is impower'd nay is strictly oblig'd by all lawful means to vindicate 7. WHICH invasion of right will appear more flagrant when the nature and importance of it is consider'd which relating to mens spiritual interest renders the violation infinitly more injurious then it could be in any secular I might mention several detriments consequent to this detention of Scripture even as many as there are benefits appendant to the free use of it but there is one of so fundamental and comprehensive a nature that I need name no more and that is that it delivers men up to any delusion their teachers shall impose upon them by depriving them of means of detecting them Where there is no standard or mesures 't is easy for men to falsify both and no less easy is it to adulterate doctrins where no recourse can be had to the primary rule Now that there is a possibility that false teachers may arise we have all assurance nay we have the word of Christ and his Apostles that it should be so and all Ecclesiastic Story to attest it has bin so And if in the first and purest times those Ages of more immediat illumination the God of this world found instruments whereby to blind mens minds 2 Cor. 4. 4. it cannot be suppos'd impossible or improbable he should do so now 8. BUT to leave generals and to speak to the case of that Church which magisterially prohibits Scripture to the vulgar she manifestly stands liable to that charge of our Savior Luk. 11. 52. Ye have taken away