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A64356
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The difference betwixt the Protestant and Socinian methods in answer to a book written by a Romanist, and intituled, The Protestant's plea for a Socinian.
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Tenison, Thomas, 1636-1715.
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1687
(1687)
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Wing T694; ESTC R10714
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38,420
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66
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no part of Religion can be repugnant to Reason whereunto you in particular subscribe unawares in saying From Truth no Man can by good Consequence infer Falshood which is to say in effect That Reason can never lead any Man to Errour And after you have done so you proclaim to all the World as you in this Pamphlet do very frequently That if Men follow their Reason and Discourse they will if they understand themselves be led to Socinianism And thus you see with what probable Matter I might furnish out and justifie my Accusation if I should charge you with leading Men to Socinianism Yet I do not conceive that I have ground enough for this odious Imputation And much less should you have charged Protestants with it whom you confess to abhor and detest it and who fight against it not with the broken Reeds and out of the Paper-Fortresses of an imaginary Infallibility which were only to make sport for their Adversaries but with the Sword of the Spirit the Word of God of which we may say most truly what David said of Goliah's Sword offered by Abimeleck Non est sicut iste There is none comparable to it Thirdly Though the Modern Arians and Socinians do speak of Tradition and not of Scripture only yet our Plea and theirs is not perfectly the same Touching the Holy Scripture we have a greater Veneration for it than many of them and for Tradition though we make it not the very Rule of our Faith nor place Infallibility in it yet in concurrence with Scripture it weigheth not so much with them as with us We have a greater Veneration for the Holy Scripture itself than the right Socinian For such a one makes Reason the Rule of that Rule and though he thinks a Doctrine is plain in Scripture yet if he believes it to be against his Reason he assents not to it Whereas a Man of this Church believes the Scriptures to be written by Inspiration from God And upon that account he assures himself that nothing contrary to true Reason can be contained in the Scriptures Therefore when he finds any thing in Holy Writ which to him is incomprehensible he does not say he believes it though it be impossible and irrational but he believes it to be rational though mysterious and he suspects not Reason itself but his own present Art of Reasoning whensoever it concludes against that which he reads and reads without doubting of the sense of the words And by Meditation he at last finds-his errour The Socinians challenge to themselves Petrus Abailardus as one of their Predecessors For this they cite St. Bernard and they strengthen their challenge with the Testimony of Baronius who says of Abailardus That he made Reason the Judge of Articles of Faith. It is true a Protestant judges whether his Faith be rational or whether it be founded on Divine Revelation but he will not allow his Reasonings to oppose any Principle in Holy Writ For that were either to deny it to be of God or with blasphemous irreverence to reproach the Almighty Wisdom with a Contradiction Yet after this manner Socinians argue though some of them use great caution and few make open profession of it Nay they sometimes tell us That the Scripture contains nothing contrary to manifest Reason However by their manner of objecting against the Doctrine of the blessed Trinity the Sagacious are convinc'd that they first think it to be against plain Reason and then rejecting it as an errour they colour their Aversion with forced Interpretations of Holy Writ The words of Ostorodius hint to us at what end they begin If Reason said he shews expresly that a Trinity of Persons in God is false how could it ever come into the Mind of an understanding Man to think it to be true and that it can be proved by the Word of God And further They own with us from the Principles of Reason that God is just and good but then with the Platonists they measure Justice and Goodness by particular Notions which are their Reasonings but not the Reason of Mankind And when any thing is said in the Scripture which is contrary to such measures they are ready to depart from it Upon this account it is that many of them deny the Doctrine of the Eternal Torments of the finally Impenitent not because it is not plain enough in Scripture but because it seems contrary to their Notions of Justice Goodness and Mercy though to the true Notions of them it may be reconcil'd Thus Ernestus Sonnerus lays it down as his Principle in the first place that the Eternal pains of the Wicked are contrary to Gods Justice and being prepossessed with this prejudice he can thenceforth find nothing in the Scripture which may over-rule his Opinion All this is not my private and as some Socinians may call it uncharitable conjecture there is a Romanist who has said the same thing and in very plain terms The Socinian saith he judgeth the Bible to be the wisest and most Authentical Book that ever was Written such a one as no other humane Writing can contest with it yet not such a one as no slip nor errour may fall into it even in matters of importance and concerning our Salvation And therefore that where reason is absolutely against it he may leave it though for Civility sake he will rather choose to put a wrong Gloss upon it than plainly refuse it It cannot be pretended that Scripture is his Rule for seeing he supposeth Scripture to be Fallible and that upon all occasions he correcteth it by his discourse it is not Scripture but his discourse and his reasoning that is his true and Supreme Rule Which is the cause that they or some of their party did denominate themselves Sanarations from right reason And as we have a greater Veneration for the Scriptures than most Arians and Socinians so have we a truer regard to real Tradition which they use not so much as a witness of any great value as a fit weapon for the encountring those who dispute out of Antiquity to the end that they may overcome them with their own Arms. Socinus had consulted some of the Antient Writers He was one of the first in his Age who suspected some of those Epistles to be spurious which went under the Venerable Name of Ignatius the Martyr But I have not observed in any of his Writings that he puts a value upon any such Authority nay he writes in Divinity in such manner as if no Church-Writers had so gone before him as to give any considerable light to him He promiseth a Tract for the satisfaction of those who were moved in his opinion more than was fit with the Authority of the Fathers And though in this one point of the Father as the one Creator he cites the Antients by way of Argument to the Men who esteem them yet in other Articles he confesses that he stands
was conceiv'd in the Body of the Virgin That the Question Whether Christ was before the World or after it is of no moment That his Blood is not a proper Sacrifice That the Holy Spirit is not any Person at all either Divine or Created That those who are not Ordained by others may step forth and preach the Gospel and administer the Sacraments That although Officers are generally employ'd in those Functions yet other Christians are not under Obligation to forbear the performance of them That Baptism is none of Christ's perpetual Precepts in his Church That it may be used in admitting those of riper years into a Church but not as a necessary Christian Rite That to hold it to be such is to add to the Scriptures That it is an indifferent Ceremony and if to be us'd it is to be us'd in the admission of those who come from some other Religion to Christianity That in the words of Christ This Cup is the New Covenant in my Blood which is shed for you there is a Solaecism or false Grammar and that there are many such Incongruities in the New Testament That it is an abuse of the Lords Supper to believe that it confers any benefit upon us conveighs any Grace from God or give us any further assurance of his favour That it is Idolatry to kneel at the Sacrament of the Lords Supper and that it may be Celebrated with the Head cover'd If these Doctrines be the results of due Industry in searching the Scriptures Prejudâ—…ce and Negligence may likewise put in their Plea as Preparatives to true Interpretation But farther in the very manner of Socinian Exposition there is apparent failure For though the Holy Writers express the same thing very differently and without respect to nicety of Words as is evident from the several forms of Words us'd in representing Christs Institution of the Lords Supper yet the Socinians make Interpretations of places which relate to the great Articles of Christian Faith to turn upon subtleties of Grammatical construction For Example sake they perplex the most comfortable Doctrine of Christs satisfaction with curious observations about the Particle For Whereas our Churchmen make the Old Testament the Key of the New and finding plainly that the Sacrifices of Attonement under the Law were the Types of the Offering the Blood of Jesus upon the Cross they conclude that God with respect to Christs Death in the quality of the great Expiation did admit the guilty World into a reconcileable Estate I might add that by coming to particulars the Socinian Prejudice and insincere Artifice in expounding such places of Holy Writ as concern their Scheme will appear to all unbyassed Readers I will instance in the Interpretation of that place in S. Iohn No Man hath Ascended up to Heaven but he that came down from Heaven even the Son of Man which is in Heaven Socinus for the avoiding a twofold nature in Christ by which he might be both in Heaven and in Earth and exist before he was born of a Virgin sets down a twofold Evasion in the place of an Explication First he interprets Ascending into Heaven by seeking after Heavenly things and Descending from Heaven by having Learned such Celestial things And to make all sure he takes the hardiness to say in the Second Place that as S. Paul was snatch'd up into the third Heavens and let down again so the Man Christ Jesus was taken up into Heaven somewhile before his Death and made some stay there And by his coming down again he explaineth his going forth from the Father his Ascending into Heaven his being in Heaven If this be Interpreting what is Perverting Sixthly Whereas in the end of this first-Conference the Author himself speaks as a third Person and a Romanist and raises a doubt about the certainty any Man can arrive at in having rightly used his Industry I would only ask him Whether a Man cannot be as sure of his industry in consulting his Reason and the Scriptures as in attending on Councils Fathers Decrees of Popes and the Method of the Major part of Church-Governors in the Universal Church of all Ages For the Argument of the Second Conference this is the Substance of it THE Socinians Plead that they ought not to receive the Article of the Divinity of Christ from the Major part of Church-Governors That it was not originally in the Creed That no Article ought to be receiv'd from Church-Authority till Men are convinc'd that it is grounded on the Scripture which Conviction they want Now unless the Church were Infallible in all she determin'd or at least in distinguishing those necessaries in which she cannot err from Points which are not of such necessity she cannot justifie her self in putting her Definitions into a Creed Protestants not withstanding they own the Article of Christs Divinity and urge the whole Creed into which it is put do yet argue after the manner of the Socinians against Church-Authority and plead the Scripture as their Ground and a necessity of Conviction therefore whilst they continue this kind of Plea they cannot by Church-Authority either justifie themselves or confute their Adversaries All this reasoning may be confuted by these distinct Answers 1. We have no need of confuting Arians and Socinians by Church-Authority seeing we can do it more effectually out of the Scriptures and if they say that the Scriptures are on their side their saying so does not alter the Nature of Truth And the Romanists allow that they say not true and they may be confuted when they are not silenc'd Protestants decline not a disputation with Socinians by the Rule of Primitive Church-Authority But if they undervalue this rule it is discretion in Protestants to debate the matter with them in a way which they themselves best like of seeing that is also a more certain as well as a more speedy way to Victory 2. Protestants do not well understand what Romanists mean by Church-Authority for some of their Doctors can by a new figure of their own make a part and the whole of the Church to be the same They do not think that the present Major part of Church-Governors throughout the Church can be their Rule because the People cannot always know which is that Part or that it ought to be their Rule because in some Ages the Minor part is the wiser and better Let not the Roman Church be griev'd at this as said from me Vincentius Lirinensis said it long ago that in the Arian times there was a general darkness even over the face of the Latin Church In the mean time they are made to suppose by this Author what they do not suppose that the judgment of the Catholick Church is not Infallible in judging what points are necessary what are not For though this or that Church or party of Christians may fail yet all cannot at once for then the Church