an Angel of Light and teaches his Ministers the like art of Imposture It is one of his grand methods of deceit to imitate in and by his Servants the operations of the Holy Spirit of Christ that he may thereby cheat the World and bring the true workings of the Spirit of God into suspicion and disgrace As in former times he made use of Apollonius Thyanaeus and others to do strange wonders the better to discredit the true Miracles of Christ and his Apostles But 3. Without further debate let Mens fruits evidence by what Spirit they are acted If Men be proud boasters self-admirers scoffers at Holiness fierce unpeaceable implacable haters of those that are good greedy Prosecutors of this present World c. These and such like we are sure are not led by the Spirit of Christ but captivated by that unclean Spirit that works effectually in the Children of disobedience But if I see in any the evident fruits of the Spirit of God in humility love meekness self-denial crucifixion to the World and an heavenly conversation I should be as loth to charge such with false pretences as I would be to fall under their coudemnation who call good evil and evil good But perhaps it will be further said That Mens fervour and fluency in exercises of Devotion are made the heights of Godliness and mightily cried up as if they were the whole of Religion I answer It is past all doubt that there are among Persons of all Perswasions some self-deceived Hypocrites who place the All of Religion in Externals Thus many among the Papists place their Religion in saying over so many Prayers though in a Language that they understand not in going on Pilgrimage to the Image of this or that Saint in using certain Rites prescribed them by their Guides and performing the Penances injoined them and other such like outward Observances And I doubt not but amongst Protestants there are too many of several Perswasions that place their Religion in being for this or that particular way of Worship different from others and in the practice of those things which are at the best but subservient means instrumentally conducing to express or excite the inward Devotion of the Heart wherein the life of Religion consists But as they who thus do are in a miserable mistake so who they are that do so falls not under the cognisance of any Mortal unless they discover their hypocrisie by their open wickedness Indeed whoever they be that take up with any though the most plausible costly and laborious services of Religion while they indulge themselves in their sin and walk in contrariety to Christs Gospel By the Grace whereof we are trained up to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and godly in this present World as I fear multitudes do such are self-condemned Hypocrites But where there evidently appears a serious care to credit the truth profess'd by a suitable Conversation by labouring to walk in all good Conscience towards God and towards Men to censure such whatsoever Perswasion they be of for making any outward Exercises of Devotion the All or the Chief of their Religion is such a piece of uncharitableness as is enough to nullifie any Mans Religion in the World who so judgeth Would Men be perswaded to dwell more at home and be better acquainted with searching their own hearts they would not be so ready to step into Gods Throne and take upon them to censure the hearts of others which none can have the immediate inspection of but that Omniscient Spirit to whom all secrets are open And the like reply might serve to the last and bitterest part of the charge viz. That these fervours and fluent expressions in the services of Religion are made use of to drive on some ambitious design to get a name in the World that being cried up for Men divinely inspired they may have the advantage to get power into their hands and rule all and so fill the World with Schisms and Seditions We are now come to the bottom of the Vessel where we have the dregs of the Adversaries passion It seems he would parallel those he thus bitterly calumniates with those Demagogues of old who by their bewitching Oratory charm'd the Hearts of the Vulgar and thereby accomplish'd their own ends upon them For answer to this I shall say in the general as once one said in another case Grave crimen mi homo si verum aeque gravis calumnia si falsum This is indeed a grievous crime if true and as grievous a calumny if false More particularly I shall reply these few things 1. The best Actions in the World are capable of being blackt and blemish'd by a malevolent Spirit fastening the vilest ends upon them Holy Job as upright as he was God himself bearing witness thereto yet was slander'd by the Devil as aiming at base unworthy ends in all the Service he did for God And the like hath been the lot of God's most faithful Servants in all Ages When their Enemies knew not what fault to find with their known and declared Actions they would either feign some horrid crime to accuse them of or more plausibly make use of this malicious artifice of the great Accuser of the Brethren to blemish their most innocent practices as intended for a cunning Engine to carry on some base design by which means they have endeavoured to raise suspicions of them in the minds of their jealous Governors and enrage the Rulers of the World against them Thus when the Jews after their return from Captivity were busie in rebuilding the City Jerusalem in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah their Adversaries calumniate them for it as if they intended to rebel against the Sovereign Powers that were over them Our blessed Saviour and his Apostles were charged with Sedition for Preaching the Gospel And thus were the Primitive Christians after them accused by their Pagan Persecutors for their Religious Assemblies as designed to practise Sedition and hatch mischief Many such instances might be given But all experience doth abundantly witness it that the wisest holiest and most commendable Works that ever were wrought by Men are liable to be thus perverted by the cunning malice of an imbittered Enemy The calumny that we are to encounter is so grosly sensless and irrational that to any considerate and impartial Eye it overthrows it self For whosoever he be that designs to insinuate himself into the minds of Men for his own advancement to rule over them must use such means for the attainment of his ends as shall best comply with the humour of the multitude and gratifie them in what they best like But this is evident that the greatest part of Men every where are at enmity with all seriousness and fervency in Religion and cry it down as not suiting with their careless worldly temper They best relish such a dull kind of outside heartless
Scripture undoubtedly is and whatsoever is indeed contrary to the Voice of God speaking in this Sacred Volume whatever pretence it may have of Reason or Philosophy it is but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 6. 20. It is an honest Speech of Aquinas which I find quoted by our Judicious and Learned Davenant Omnis creata Veritas est defectibilis nisi quatenus per veritatem increatam rectificatur unde nec homo nec Angelus infallibiliter ducit in veritatem nisi quatenus in iis loquentis Dei testimonium consideratur To which I shall subjoin the judgement of Cartesius whose Authority may perhaps be of more credit with some now than either that of a Schoolman or of an Apostle Memoriae nostrae pro summa regula est infigendum ea quae nobis à Deo revelata sunt ut omnium certissima esse credenda Et quamvis fortè lumen rationis quam maximè clarum evidens aliud quid nobis suggerere videretur soli tamen auctoritati divinae potius quam proprio judicio fidem esse adhibendam This says he must be firmly remembred as our chief Rule That those things which are revealed to us of God are to be believed as of all things the most certain And although perhaps the most clear and manifest light of Reason may seem to suggest to us some other thing we are nevertheless to give credit to Divine Authority alone rather than to our own judgment CHAP. IV. 1. A second Argument from the disproportion between Man's Reason and Matters of Divine Revelation 2. An Exception removed MY second Argument is That there is no proportion between Mans Reason and the Mysteries of Divine Revelation These are so sublime they are out of the ken of a Natural Understanding they are of a far different kind from the highest Natural Principles How little is it that Mans Reason by its own Light can discover of the Nature of God and his Eternal Counsels The Heathen who wanted Scripture Light did but grope as Men in the dark Act. 17. 27. How greatly are we to seek in judging of the Wisdom and Goodness and Power and Justice of God if we have no higher light than Natural Reason to direct us Nor need this seem strange when we see how much the most knowing Men are at a loss concerning themselves the nature and faculties of the Soul and the manner of its union with the Body and how little insight they have into many of the minuta naturae Can it then be wondred that Mans Reason should be unable by its own light to have a clear view of the Divine Perfections that are infinite and incomprehensible Whence was it that so many of the wisest Heathens were so gravell'd at the proceedings of a Divine Providence when they saw good Men suffer and bad Men prosper How did Cato that severe Moralist stumble at the success that Julius Caesar had against Pompey But what shall we say to that great Mistery of Mans Redemption by Christ The line of Mans Reason is too short to reach these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 2. 10. Therefore Evangelical Doctrine is frequently called a great Mistery containing such things as Eye hath not seen nor Ear Heard nor have entered into the Heart of Man to conceive things beyond the reach not of Men only but of Angels It is true that all Men could not but know God to be very good they found it and felt it in the daily effects of his sustaining and preserving Providence and his wonderful patience and forbearance towards them and they did know also that God is Just and a Righteous Avenger of Sin this they might see in the Judgments that he brought upon the World beside the inward witness of their own accusing Consciences The wrath of God was revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of Men Rom. 1. 18. And they knew the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the righteous judgment of God that they who do such wickednesses as they were conscious to in themselves were worthy of death Rom. 1. 32. But now how to reconcile these two the Goodness of God to his Creatures and his severe Indignation against Sinners so as with any satisfaction to hope for pardon and acceptance with him here their Principles of Reason faill'd them They saw themselves in a very ill case and that there was a necessity of somewhat to appease the provoked Anger of the Divine Majesty but how or which way this should be they could not tell and therefore lost themselves in a Maze of infinite Mistakes in their attempts about it Now it being so it is impossible that Reason by its Natural Principles should be a competent Judge of Scripture-Revelations It must therefore submit its own conceptions and Dictates to the Doctrine of Faith contained in the Scripture Here possibly it will be replied as before to the precedent Argument That all this may be granted of those that enjoyed not the Gospel and Written Word but where this is Reason may be allowed to judge and determine by its Principles concerning the things there revealed To this I answer two things First This implies a contradiction for it is not the Words or Sentences of Scripture that reveal any Mistery to us further than thereby the Mind of God is made known to us Now if this cannot be found out from the Scripture it self but from Principles of Reason then it is Reason it self that first discovers the Mistery I grant that Reason that is the faculty of Reason is and must be the instrument whereby we apprehend what God speaks in the Scripture But if there be any part of Scripture so dark as that its meaning cannot be gathered from the Words neither considered by themselves nor compared with other Passages of Sacred Writ I would know how comes Reason in Interpreting such an obscure place supposing it to be obscure to find that such and such Words so placed do contain in them such an Assertion when the Words and Sentences themselves cannot resolve us You 'll say our Reason teaches us by the light of its own common notions that this and no other must be the meaning of such a place Is it not then plain that Human Reason fetcheth that Truth if it be a Truth from it self and not from the Scriptures For the Scripture according to this Hypothesis gives an uncertain sound onely Reason determines it Remember we are speaking of matters of pure Revelation Now if the Sentences of Scripture under debate do neither by themselves nor with the help of any other clearly and certainly signifie any such thing as is fasten'd upon them such Arguers cannot say they have it by Divine Revelation unless they will pretend to that Enthusiastick Inspiration which they profess to decry and falsly charge upon their Opposites Secondly I add further that there are sundry things revealed in Scripture whereof God gives us no other Reason than his
miraculous Works spoken of in Scripture were not any thing against or besides the established order of nature absolutely concludes that whatsoever the Scripture affirms to have been done did all necessarily come to pass according to the Laws of Nature and if any thing contrary to this could be found in Scripture or truly gathered from any thing in it that was certainly added to the Scripture by some sacrilegious hand as being against Nature and therefore against Reason Secondly Men that resolve to make their Reason the Rule of Interpretation will not stick to charge the Scripture with obscurity in its plainest Propositions if they suit not with their preconceived notions The experience of the present age puts it past all denial or dispute that when Men have espoused an Hypothesis which they are not willing to relinquish they will quarrel with the most evident Scripture accusing it of obscurity and to make their charge good they will endeavour by their strain'd glosses to raise a dust and darken the Sense of it though it shine never so clearly by its own light to every impartial and unprejudiced Reader Hence it is that the Papists do so frequently with open mouth charge the Apostle Paul with obscurity in his Writings because indeed he speaks more clearly and plainly than they would have him for that great Doctrine of Justification by the imputed Righteousness of Christ and against Justification by our own Works And it may be some will be as ready to find fault with the same Apostle when he says Ephes. 5. 18. Be not drunk with Wine wherein is excess but be filled with the Spirit as speaking too darkly because indeed they think he speaks too broadly against the debauchery that they practice and so plainly for the Spirit which they scorn and deride Thirdly Nay more some are grown to that heighth as I shall have occasion to shew more fully in my second Part as to assert that the Scripture is plain in nothing but universally obscure and make this their great ground for their setting up Reason and Philosophy as the Rule to determine the Sense of the Bible And let this be granted them they will soon make the Scripture speak whatsoever themselves please and so the Bible shall be but as a dead Image and Mans depraved Reason like the Daemon within shall give the Oracle 2. Come we next to matters of Practice It is easie to instance in several commands of God in Scripture that are directly opposite to the whole corrupt interest of lapsed nature As when he requires the mortifying of our earthly desires the love of our deadliest Enemies the denying our of selves in whatsoever is dear to us in this World even to the laying down of our lives for the defence of his Truth upon the bare hope of an invisible happiness in another World Now considering how Mans Reason is darkned and enslav'd and no where perfectly cured if Mens Reason must by its own Principles interpret the Sense of Scripture how numerous are the objections that will be made against these and all other Precepts that are not to the Gust of Mans degenerate nature Thus did the Gnosticks of old plead for denying the Faith in persecuting times to save their life for what said they Doth God delight in the death of Men he stands in no need of our Bloud Christ came to save Mens lives and not to expose them to hazard And with these reasonings they shisted off the-command of owning the Truth in the face of danger And what the Author of the Leviathan hath written of this with a specious though falacious pretence of Reason is not unknown But I shall instance in two extraordinary commands given to particular persons The one is that which God did by immediate Revelation give to Abraham requiring him to offer up his onely Son Isaac for a Burnt-offering What would the Principles of Natural Reason have said to this might they have been admitted to interpret this Command What Can infinite goodness require such an unnatural act as this for a Father to lay violent hands on his own Child Hath not God strictly forbidden Murder Hath he not always manifested his tender regard to the life of Man And hath he not planted that tender affection in the Heart of a Parent that makes him abhor to embrue his hands in Childs Bloud Therefore surely would Mans Reason say the meaning of this injunction is something else far different from what the words seem to sound there is some more mysterious sense to be found out and a milder interpretation to be made of this Divine Oracle such as may consist with those Notions of God which we are taught by that Internal Light that shines in the Hearts of all Men. It is most rational therefore to interpret it by an Allegory Isaac must be sacrificâ—d in Effigie or a Lamb out of the Flock must have Isaac's name put upon it and so offer'd up to God or according to the notation of his name we must sacrifice that joy and delight that we have had in our Son Isaac wherein perhaps we have exceeded by mortifying our affectious to him and have him hereafter as if we had him not The other instance shall be in the command given by our Saviour to the Rich young Man to sell all and give to the Poor and follow Him in hopes of a Treasure in Heaven We may probably suppose by the Mans turning his back what objections his Reason made against it Are not my Possessions the good Gifts of God and shall I unthankfully cast away what he hath given me I am to love my Neighbor as my self therefore surely not to strip my self of my subsistence to help my Neighbor and so lose the use and benefit of what I have True here is a plain Command But could not this mans Reason have excogitated some hidden Sense to satisfie the Command and yet save his Goods Yes sure had the Man learnt but this new Art of Interpreting that some have got now adays he might have thought within himself That selling all was the disengaging of his affections from them and giving to the poor his relieving them in a convenient proportion so as still to preserve his Estate and follow Christ he might in a good and holy life though he did not always personally attend him But now would not this way of Interpretation in either of the forenamed instances have been a plain eluding of an express command And yet I am sure the bold attempts of some in our Age who are great Pretenders to Reason have in sundry considerable and clear Points of Religion gone as far as this comes to and much further in torturing the Scriptures into a Sense as contrary to that which they fairly give us of themselves as darkness is to light And indeed by the help of this Engine what will not be adventured by audacious Wits that have cast off the awe of God and of
Interpreter preclude them 3. Were this Argument allowed it would for ever debarr us from alledging Scripture against the Romanists in any Controversie that we have with them it being notorious to all Men that this is one great difference betwixt us and them who must be the Supreme Interpreter of Scripture which they challenge as the Priviledge of their Church and we ascribe to the Scripture it self But it is a miserable Plea that this Author makes elsewhere for himself viz. That he had to do with one whom he esteemed to be no Christian but an Heathen for so he accounts the Exercitator who would no more regard the Testimony of Scripture in this Case than a Jew would regard any proof from the New Testament and therefore it was that he declined dealing with him about those Testimonies from Scripture It seems then he would make the World believe that what he had said about this was onely spoken ad hominem By which it plainly appears that our Author began to see he could not stand his ground but was not so ingenuous as to confess his Error and therefore runs behind this Bush to hide himself For 1. His Words which I quoted before out of his Book De Scripturarum Interprete do evidently shew that he speaks according to his own Mind that it was a preposterous thing in this Controversie to alledge the Testimony of Scripture and that in this Case no such proof was to be allowed see him page 217. 219. and 247. and not only so but alledges the Reasons beforementioned such as they are for this wilde Position 2. He knows very well that the Jews to whom he compares his Antagonist do not at all own the Authority of the new Testament but professedly reject it Whereas the Exercitator whatever his Religion be does avowedly own the Divine Authority of the Scripture and delcares himself willing to be dealt with in that way in that he cites our Divines Arguments from thence and endeavors to answer them for which this Author reproves him So that the case is not the same And yet I appeal to the Authors Reason Should any Jewish Writer either cite any Testimonies out of the New Testament for himself or endeavor by his own Interpretations to evade any Testimonies thence alledged against him which is plainly the Case here whether should a Christian that pretends to answer him do well to say That the New Testament is not here to be heard and that it were a preposterous thing to alledge it Should he not rather endeavor to answer the objections that are made and clear the places cited And if in case he should do as this Author doth here might he not justly be condemned for a Betrayer of the Christian Cause If it be said that though the Exercitator acknowledge the Divine Authority of the Scriptures yet he holds them to be universally ambiguous and obscure further than Humane Reason expounds them and therefore it was to no purpose to use Scripture to him till they had agreed about the Rule of Interpretation I answer The Exeroitator does indeed charge the Scripture with obscurity because of its ambiguity but it is upon this ground because hesays all words whatsoever are ambiguous If therefore this should shut out the Scripture from bearing witness in the Controversie then all Arguments from Reason must upon the same account be excluded too for they must be made up of Words and Phrases the ambiguity whereof according to the Exercitators Doctrine will render them obscure as well as the Scripture Come we now to speak something to the Scriptures alledged by our Divines which the Exercitator labors to evade But methinks it is a pleasant thing to see how he betrays his own Cause by acting against his own Method and Principles For having all along cried up Philosophy as the onely Interpreter of Scripture when himself comes interpret the Scriptures brought against him one would think he should bring his own Tools to this Work and labor by Philosophick Principles to make out the Sense that he gives of these Scriptures But he waves this and seeks to fetch out his own Sense from the Scripture it self by examining the Antecedents and Consequents and the Authors scope Now he either takes this way of Interpretation to be right or he does not If he do not he doth but juggle with his Reader and designs to cheat him but if he do indeed think it to be right he yields the Cause that not Philosophy but the Scripture it self is the Rule of Interpretation Now for the Scriptures alledged The first is that in 1 Cor. 1. 19 20 21. where the Apostle speaks very contemptibly of Humane Wisdom the like may besaid of the next 1 Cor. 2. 6. Now in these places saith the Exercitator the Apostle does not go about to deny or condemn true Wisdom but the earthly sensual Wisdom of the World that is grounded upon vain opinions and puts Men upon the eager pursuit of earthly things such as Riches and Honors and Sensual Pleasures I answer The Apostle having to do with those who thought meanly of the Doctrine of Christ Crucified and affected a name for that which the world counted Wisdom endeavors to lay all Humane Wisdom in the dust and to discover its insufficiency to conduct man to true happiness for which he prefers the Doctrine of the Gospel which was so derided as foolishness above that which the World so much admired This therefore is no impertinent allegation against the Exercitators opinion That in 1 Cor. 2. 14. I have already pressed in the prosecution of my first Argument and have vindicated it from the corrupt glosses that some have put upon it The last is that in Coloss. 2. 8. Beware lest any man spoil you through Philosophy and vain deceit Here saith the Exercitator the Apostle doth not condemn sound Philosophy but that which is vain and useless I answer Undoubtedly he doth not condemn Philosophy truely so called But he gives a caution to take heed of being deceived by it as Men may be when the use of it is extended beyond its Line and is not kept within its own proper Bounds Thus saith our learned Davenant Philosophy or Humane Reason which is the Mother of Philosophy is always found vain and deceitfull when it is carried beyond its proper limits That is says he when it attempts to determine of those things that fall not under the cognisance of Natural Reason such are those that belong to the Worship of God and to the Salvation of Man as the Points of Justification Reconciliation with God and other Matters of Faith that are above the reach of Reason and depend altogether upon Divine Revelation CHAP. XVII 1. That Sound Philosophy asserts nothing contrary to Scripture granted 2. Two Principles instanced in and Wolzogen's Tergiversation taxed 3. The two great Articles of the Creation of all things out of nothing and the
Resurrection of the same numerical Body proved against the Exercitator to be asserted in Scripture THE Exercitators next Work is to answer the great Argument which he says some urge against his opinion viz. Philosophy and consequently Humane Reason asserts many things that are repugnant to Divinity and the Scriptures and therefore they cannot be allow'd for the Rule of Interpreting Scripture He denies the Antecedent and so do I. What Authors they be in the Reformed Churches that thus argue I know not But this I know that it is no uncommon thing for pugnacious Wits to draw the Sword upon the shadow of a Dream and make Hector-like declamations against Utopian Adversaries Set aside those Authors who are engaged by some Atheological Hypothesis which they have espoused as the Papists and the Lutherans in the Doctrine of the Eâ—charist I know not any Man of Learning and Understanding who hath such a thought that there is any thing in Scripture derogatory or contradictory to true Philosophy or Sound Reason or that believes any thing true in Philosophy to be false in Divinity Whatsoever is true any where is true every where Here therefore our Author may put up his Dagger But there is one thing which I cannot well pass over That the Exercitator pretending to confute those who assert a contrariety between the Principles of Philosophy and Divinity and instancing in these two Ex nihilo nihil fit and Idem non potest numericè reproduci Instead of solving the knot he cuts it and plainly affirms both these Principles to be true absolutely and without limitation both in Philosophy and Divinity confidently asserting that the Scripture doth no where teach us That the World was made of nothing or that the same numerical Body shall rise at the last day And here Wolzogen unworthily deserts the Christian Cause not vouchsafing to write one word in vindication of these grand Truths against this bold Adversary but tells us he is content the Man should enjoy his own opinion though he says he could easily have refuted him Which makes his silence the more inexcusable and brings him under greater suspition of Heterodoxy notwithstanding all his Rhetorical Flourishes But it is time I should return to our Author who if he had not been too much in love with Novelty might without the least prejudice to his Cause unless it have some other Monster in the Belly of it that is not yet come to the birth have answered that these Axioms are true in a limited Sense both in Philosophy and Divinity viz. That by a finite created Power nothing can be made of nothing and that by the like limited power the same numerical Body that perisheth cannot be reproduced But that nevertheless to an infinite Power all things that imply not contradiction are possible But it seems by this Authors words that he disowns the received Doctrine of the worlds Creation out of Nothing and the Reproduction of the same individual Body 1. By denying the former he must necessarily maintain the Eternity of Preexistent Matter whereas if God be the Maker of all Beings besides himself as the Scripture sufficiently assures us then nothing besides himself could be Eternal but he must in making the World make the Matter whereof the World consists which Matter therefore must be made of nothing The first Article in the most ancient Creeds as the Reverend Bishop of Chester hath observed had instead of these words Maker of Heaven and Earth or together with them this Clause The Maker of all things visible and invisible agreeably to that of the Apostle Coloss. 1. 16. which distribution is so comprehensive that it will not admit of any Exception all things whatsoever being either visible or invisible and whatsoever can be supposed necessary to the making of the World it must of necessity come under one of these two Members of the distribution and consequenly be of Gods making And indeed if it were otherwise then something else besides God must have a necessary uncreated independent Being which carries with it so broad a Contradiction as Mans Reason left fair to it self cannot allow Again 2. By disclaiming the latter this Author evidently denies the Resurrection for that imports the rising again of the same Body that fell according to that known Speech of Damascen so oft cited by our Divines 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And if the same numerical Body rise not but another is made de novo for the Soul to animate this is not a Resurrection but a new Creation and then the first Creation of the World may as aptly be called a Resurrection as that which is so stiled by the Holy Ghost in Scripture But I think the Scripture speaks plain enough in this Case though this Author will not own it when it says that at the last day This corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality And that our Lord Jesus Christ shall then change our vile Body that it may be made like unto his glorious Body And that If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in us he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken our mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in us Add to this that Argument from the description of the place whence the Resurrection shall begin which I cannot better represent to the Reader than in the words of the learned Bishop of Chester They which sleep in the dust of the Earth Dan. 12. 2. and they which are in the Graves Joh. 5. 28. shall hear the Voice and Rise And Rev. 20. 13. The Sea shall give up the dead which are in it and Death and the Grave deliver up the dead which are in them But if the same Bodies did not Rise they which are in the dust should not revive If God should give us any other Bodies than our own neither the Sea nor the Grave should give up their dead That shall Rise again which the Grave gives up the Grave hath nothing to give up but that Body which was laid into it therefore the same Body which is Buried shall at the last day be revived And whereas the Socinians who are our Adversaries in this as well as in many other Articles of our Faith to evade this Argument will have the Graves spoken of in Joh 5. 28. to be the Graves of ignorance and impiety there meant and the Rising to be Mens coming to the knowledge of Christ c. the aforesaid learned Person answers them That Christ expresly speaks of bringing Men to Judgement vers 27. and divides those that are to come out of their Graves into two Ranks vers 29. neither of which can be so understood The first are those which have done good before they come out of their Graves these therefore could not be the Graves of Ignorance and Impiety from which no good can come The second are such who have done evil