which the ingredients of a humane body are exposed unto To what is received in the Eucharist the primitive Church in relation to the body attributes the power of Nutrition The Analogy of Faith obligeth us to believe that God will not command inhumanity But if the sence of the Church of Rome be true the greatest inhumanity is practised according to his Will What is more savage than to eat the body of a living man much more must it be to champ with our Teeth and swallow down the living Body of our blessed Lord to whom supreme Veneration is due This made a Pagan to say Who dost thou think Cott. in Cicer. de nat Decr. l. 3. can be so mad as to believe that to be his God which he eats It was an abomination to the Aegyptians to eat with the Hebrews Gen. 43.32 The Chaldee paraphrast gives the reason because the Hebrews eat those Cattle which the Aegyptians use to worship Those words except ye eat the flesh of the son of man c. Joh. 6.55 give no countenance to what is asserted by the Church of Rome By Flesh is meant the bread spoken of v. 51. The bread that I will give you is my flesh and by the Bread we are to understand our blessed Lord himself I am the bread of life v. 35. and by eating believing on him as is evident by the consequent words he that cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth on me shall never thirst As eating and drinking satisfie our natural appetite so believing in Christ our spiritual By faith we draw out of his fulness and plenitude a supply of our necessities This spiritual Sence is pointed at v. 56. and very agreeable to the manner of speaking amongst the Jews with whom Christ conversed when he spoke the words under consideration Maimon More Nevoâ— par 1. c. 30. The Hebrews use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 comedere not only to express the feeding upon that which conduceth to the nourishment of the body but likewise the acquisition of Learning and Wisdom such as faith imports which tends to the nutrition of the Soul Psal 33. or 34 v. 2. S. Basil says that there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an intellectual mouth of the inward Man With this we receive the impressions made by external objects and ruminate upon and digest them by meditation All this being considered it is evident that Transubstantiation is contrary to the Holy Scripture 2. Antiquity Those who assert the Body of Christ to be corporally present in the Sacrament and the substance of the Bread and Wine not speak contrary to the sence of all the primitive Fathers Ignatius who lived in the first Century 〈…〉 calls that which is broken and given in the Sacrament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Justin Martyr in the second Century Apol. 2. stiles it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and attributes to it a nutritive power in relation to the body Tertullian in the third Century asserts L. 4 cont Marc. that Christ made the bread which he took to be his body that is a figure of his body Origen says L. 8. cont Celsum we have a symbol of thanksgiving to God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 bread which is called the Eucharist S. Cyprian affirms 〈…〉 that the Lord calls the bread compounded of many grains his Body Eusebius in the fourth Century terms L. 1 â—emon Evan. c. ult what is received in the Sacrament symbols of the Body and blood of Christ Cyril of Jerusalem stiles it Bread and Wine Catech. Mystagog 1.3 and compares the change which is made by consecration to that in consecrated Oil which doth not lose its old Nature but is dedicated and set apart to a higher use and purpose S. Ambrose affirms L. 4. de Saâ— c. 4. that the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament sunt a â—â—â—e panis vinum altho changed into the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ Gregory Nissen owns that which he calls the Body of Christ by the name of Bread Orat. de San. Bapr and expresseth at large that the Bread and Wine being Consecrated retain their pristine nature even as Baptismal Water an Altar a Priest do after Consecration has passed upon them Gaudentius represents the Sacrament as an image of the passion and figure of the Body and Blood of Christ Tract 2. in Exo. S. Chrysostome in the fifth Century useth these words Epist ad Casâ—arium Monashum Before the Bread is sanctified we call it Bread when the Divine Grace hath sanctified it by means of the Priest it loseth the name of Bread and is held worthy to be called the Lord's Body altho the nature of the Bread doth remain in it and is not called two bodies but the body of the Son S. Austin says Ad Adamantum â— 12. That the Lord doubted not to say This is my Body when he gave the sign of his Body Cyril of Alexandria asserts L. 4. c. 14. in Evang. Joan. that our Lord gave fragments of Bread saying Take eat This is my Body Theodoret affirms 1. Dial. cont Eutyc that our Saviour honoured the visible Symbols with the name of his Body and Blood not changing the nature but adding grace to nature Gelasius is of the same mind De duabus Christi naturis The Sacraments which we receive of the Body and Blood of Christ are a divine thing by means whereof we are made partakers of the Divine Nature and yet the substance of the Bread and Wine doth not cease to be Bellarmine in his Polemical Discourse concerning the Eucharist useth most of the names which I have mentioned to a contrary purpose and brings them into the field with a great deal of pomp His policy seems to resemble that of a great Commander When he had drawn up his Souldiers into a military order and was ready to engage the enemy a great part of them declared they would not fight He being not in a capacity to retreat with honour or security told them that the only kindness which he desired of them was to march to a Hill a little way of and there be Spectators of the courage and fate of their fellow Souldiers hoping they might appear to the enemy as a Reserve and prove as great a discouragement to them as if they had actually engaged them I cannot imagine why these antient Fathers who have so positively declared in the Testimonies above-cited that they will not fight should be continued in view except it be with the like design to impose upon the Faith of those who are strangers to their intentions To the Authorities already produced I might add many more which do evidently manifest that the Church was a stranger to the doctrin of Transubstantiation for many hundred years What might be alledged I will sum up in the following particulars 1. They all agree in an imitation of the stile of Scripture and
call the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament the Body and Blood of Christ 2. They say that they are not so essentially but figuratively and therefore stile them signs Symbols Figures Antitypes Memorials It is usual to call the sign and the thing signified by the same name 3. They affirm that after Consecration the substance of the Bread and Wine remains and the change made is only in respect of Use Office and Dignity 4. They say That they nourish our flesh and blood and have the same effect that other food has and therefore they use to give the remains of the Euchariscical Bread to boyes and to abstain from the Communion upon Fasting days 5. They assert that wicked men do not eat and drink the Body and Blood of Christ but interpret the eating of his flesh Jo. 6. the receiving of him in a spiritual manner namely by Faith 6. When they deny the Eucharist to be a figure or sign they mean a bare sign The Sacrament is more than so It feals and exhibits It is a means whereby we receive the Body and Blood of Christ not only the benefits of them but Christ himself in a spiritual manner as crucified for us and is a real pledge to assure us thereof Tho' the crucified body of Christ is in Heaven yet that spirit which dwells in it being communicated to a worthy Receiver in the Sacramental action we are made to drink into one Spirit it produceth such a union betwixt us and Christ Jesus as laies a clear foundation of Communion with and participation of him 7. When they say there is a mutation in the nature of the Bread they mean by nature the use and property only as is manifest by their own explications Before Consecration it was appropriated to the nourishment of the body but now by Consecration it is exalted to a higher purpose A new dignity is put upon it It becomes a means whereby a worthy Communicant gains Communion with our blessed Lord. 8. When it 's said That the Senses are deceived and no competent judges of the mutation this may be very true altho' the change be Sacramental only The change is not the proper object of sense but of faith The knowledge of it with its effects is conveyed to us by a Divine Testimony extant in the holy Scriptures 9. When it is affirmed That under the species of Bread is given the Body and under the species of Wine the Blood by Species we must not understand the Accidents without their proper subjects This apprehension never entred into the thoughts of the antient Fathers They were perfect strangers to this kind of Philosophy S. Aust l. 4. cal â—â— Tâ—in Serm. de Temp. 38. S. Ambr. l. 4. de Init. By species they understand the specifical nature of a thing and by the species of Bread and Wine True Bread and True Wine as is manifest to any who consult their discourses 10. Where it is said That the Lord who changed Water into Wine could change in the Eucharist Wine into Blood the intention of Cyril is not to make these two conversions in every thing parallel Jerus as is manifest by the words that follow he presently asserts That the eating of Christ's flesh must be understood spiritually and calls the Table mystical and intellectual And therefore all that his words can import is this He who 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 changed Water into Wine by a corporal mutation changed at his mystical Table Wine into Blood not corporally but spiritually and mystically Lastly It must be acknowledged that there are many Hyperbolical expressions in the Fathers Hom 23. in Mat Par. 〈◊〉 as S. Chrysostome and others in relation to the Sacrament The design of them is to secure it from contempt and to elevate and raise the devotion of Communicants They being improper Speeches must not be expounded in such a sence as is inconsistent with what is elsewhere expressed by the same Authors in plain words without any figure They all agree in this in as clear expressions as can be desired That the substance of the Bread and Wine remain in the Eucharist Their Rhetorical flourishes cannot be interpreted to the prejudice of that which is plain and manifest When S. Chrysostome says That Christ mingles himself with us and not by Faith only but indeed makes us to be his Body His meaning is not That there is any corporal mixture or immediate contact betwixt us and his body but that when we receive the figure of his body which is in Heaven the Spirit which dwells in it is communicated to the worthy Receiver and produceth a union betwixt them and therefore what we receive â— 870. he presently calls the Grace of the Spirit Damascen who lived in the eighth Century was one of the first who deserted the Orthodox doctrin of the Fathers He being concerned in the controversie concerning Images and the opposers of them asserting that the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament were the only Image and representation which Christ allowed of himself he was transported with an intemperate zeal and affirmed they were no image or figure at all L. 4. c. sid Oâ—t ◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tho' in these words he did not design any real conversion of the Elements but rather a corporal presence or consubstantiation yet he gave occasion to some in the ninth Age to dispute for a substantial mutation Paschasius Ratbertus was the first who writ seriously and copiously about it as Bellarmine asserts His sentiments about this argument were received with a warm opposition Rabanus Maurus Bertram Joannes Scotus Erigena did strongly assert the contrary doctrin In the tenth Age which was a night of ignorance all things fell asleep controversies were laid aside Darkness did reconcile them as the want of light does various colours In the eleventh Age Berengarius was awakened and did with great perspicuity assert the Truth Tho' the violence of his enemies and infirmity of his nature induced him to submit to a recantation The controversie all this while was managed with so much ambiguity that Joannes Duns Scotus asserts That it was not necessary for any to believe a substantial conversion or Transubstantiation till the Lateran Council held under Innocent the Third in the year 1215. and therefore the master of the Sentences who flourished in the Century before about the year 1145. useth these words What kind of conversion it is 〈…〉 illa 〈…〉 whether formal or substantial I am not able to determine The truth is that Transubstantiation was brought forth by Paschasius confirmed by Innocent the Third and at last so firmly married to the See of Rome by the Council of Trent that there was no possibility of a divorce tho' there is just reason to believe that the most Learned of that Community could heartily desire it The issue produced by this unhappy conjunction is the mutilation of the Sacrament the Adoration of the Host the Sacrince of
which the Prince resides and to Worship the Prince residing in that Palace To say that no Catholick is bound to believe more than that Christ in the Sacrament is to be Worshipped because this is enjoyned under a particular Anathema the other of Worshipping the Sacrament not is nothing to the purpose The intent of the Decrees is veritatâ—m dicere to set forth the true doctrin of the Church as the Council has declared Every jot of this doctrin is to be received whether there be a particular Curse denounced against the Refusers of it or no. The Curse doth not make the obligation to comply with the doctrin but shews only the danger which those incur who refuse it If the Church of Rome does not think fit always to set before us the danger in a particular Anathema upon some prudential considerations best known to her self yet the obligation to entertain her doctrin doth not cease but remain in full force Her Authority is as much in a Decree without an Anathema as in a Canon with one and it is her authority which creates the obligation To say that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Council speaks of falls upon the Accidents of the Bread and Wine in an inferiour manner cannot be reconciled with any good reason For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is either internal or external Internal imports a superlative esteem in the mind of infinite Excellency External the doing some action or speaking such words as are appropriated to signifie this internal veneration Neither of these can be terminated upon the Bread and Wine in an inferiour manner For what is outwardly done or spoken being but an expression or indication of internal veneration and the inward veneration being of the highest nature if it falleth upon any thing in an inferiour manner or degree it ceaseth to be what it was the superlative degree being essential to it and not separable from it Neither do they mend the matter who assert that Latria as it is terminated upon the outward Elements is not absolute but relative Christ only under the Elements is adored per se or absolutely the Symbols by virtue of their relation to Christ as the garments with which he was cloathed when he was upon the Earth were worshipped when adoration was given to his person When the Council says that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is due to the Sacrament absolute and not relative Latria is intended It is in express words such a Latria quae debetur vero Deo and that is undoubtedly absolute Tho' there may be relative honour yet if we speak properly there can be no such thing as relative Latria For it is agreed that the word signifies that Veneration which is peculiar to the Supreme Being and if this be divided into two species Absolute and Relative then it may be predicated of both for every Genus is predicated of its species and if so then either equally or unequally not equally for then the relative species will participate as much of the nature of the Genus as the absolute not unequally because Latria as I have before intimated consists in a point of which there can be no unequal participations An inferiour Latria is as much as an inferiour Superiority I grant an honour due to many things upon the account of their relation to God but to make this honour equal to that which is due immediately to God is highly injurious For the relation which the Creature has to the Creator is but a finite mode or accident And a finite mode cannot merit the same species of Worship or Honour which the infinite perfection of the Divine Nature does When our blessed Lord was upon the Earth 〈◊〉 garments were not worshipped by the same individual act with which his person was For Worship is an acknowledgment of excellency and none will assert that the same acknowledgment of excellency can without a palpable injury be terminated upon his Person and his Garment As the Accidents are worshipped so likewise is the substance of the Bread and Wine The Church of Rome believes that by the Priest's pronouncing the words of Consecration the Body and Blood of Christ become corporally present upon the Altar that by the same words in the same moment the substance of the Bread and Wine is changed into them that what the substance of the Bread and Wine is converted into must have the same worship terminated upon it which is peculiar to the person of Christ God-man Now if there be no such change as is pretended but the Bread and Wine retain their pristine nature it must necessarily follow that the substance of the Bread is Worshipped in the place of Christ If it be said that this cannot with justice be charged upon a Romanist because he believes that the substance of the Bread and Wine do not remain and we must not impute the Worshipping of that to him which he believes not to be in the Sacrament I answer that tho' this excuse at the first sight may appear plausible yet upon a due examination it will be found to be of no validity By the same method of Reasoning it may be concluded that a Jew reflects no dishonour upon the True Messias when in the Synagogue thrice a day he curseth Jesus of Nazareth because he believes that Jesus of Nazareth is not the True Messias or that the Persians do not Worship a creature when they make their religious Addresses to the Sun because they apprehend he is the first Being and maker of all things or that the Heathens did not sacrifice to Devils as they are accused in the holy Scripture because they were far from believing that their Idols were animated by infernal Spirits It must be confessed that an error springing from the nature of the object may contribute something to an excuse Suppose there had been a Man when our blessed Lord was upon the Earth every way like him in the features of his face and all the lineaments of his Body and another induced by that similitude had given to him the veneration which is due only to Jesus Christ it had been tolerable in him to have pleaded his error it deriving its original from that which it was not in his power to help But whâ—â— the error springs from a voluntary distemper in the Subject it can have no propitious influence upon his justification And this we have too much reason to believe is the case of those who adhere to the Community of Rome who when they assert the Body of Christ to be corporally present in the Eucharist and the substance of the Bread and Wine not put the highest affront upon those Topicks from which we usually derive our assurance in all other points of Divinity namely the Scripture Antiquity Reason Sence 1. Scripture They affirm that which is contrary to the Words of the institution when Christ says This is my Body he means This is a sign or memorial of it To this interpretation we
are led by the context This do in remembrance of me When he pronounces the demonstrative This he points at that which he took and had in his hand and this is called Bread and therefore in the Latin Translation of the Aethiopick Version these words occur Hic panis Corpus meum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must import his dead body as it is in the Syriack 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hoc cadaver meum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is derived from the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies a dead body 1 Sam. 17.46 Isa 14.19 These we have reason to believe were the words of our blessed Lord who at the institution of the Sacrament did undoubtedly use that language which was then familiar to the Jews and that was the Syriack which by reason of its affinity with the Hebrew is sometimes called by the same name Joh. 19.13 17. Act. 21.20 Now it is evident that what Christ gave at his last Supper could not be his dead body in a literal sence and therefore it must be so in a figurative which will amount to this This is a memorial of my Body as crucified for you Christ's body in the Sacrament is not given as living but dead upon our account and his blood not as contained in his veins but shed for our sins We have not only the Words to justifie our interpretation but the scope aimed at by him that spoke them It is agreed on all sides that God did design by them the institution of a Sacrament It is as unanimously asserted that in every Sacrament there must be a visible Sign and a Thing signified There is nothing here to import the outward Sign but the Demonstrative This or the Thing signified but that which is predicated of it my Body Now the sign is never essentially but always figuratively the thing which is signified by it As when we say of the formal sign or picture of Augustus or Tiberius This is Augustus This is Tiberius we do not mean their persons really but representations of them In the other part of the Sacrament it is said This Cup is the New Testament This cannot be true essentially as tho' the Cup was changed into the nature of the New Testament but figuratively only We have just reason to believe the same concerning the Words under debate that the Bread is no otherwise the Body of Christ than the Cup is the New Testament When this manner of Speech is used in relation to other Sacraments as Circumcision and the Passover Circumcision is my Covenant the Lamb is the Lord 's Passover it constantly bears this sence Neither Circumcision or the Lamb were really and essentially the things which are predicated of them but signs and memorials only The admitting a Trope in the Words is not contrary to the design of Christ in his last Will which undoubtedly was to deliver his mind clearly We may speak as plainly when we use a Trope or Figure as when our speech is without it If we walk in a Gallery adorned with Pictures and say this is Julius Caesar this is Constantine the Great we are as well understood as if we had said this is the Picture of such a Person That is not obscure whether figuratively or literally spoken which is expressed according to the manner which is familiar to those to whom the words are directed The known custom at the time when these words This is my Body were used was to speak after the like manner about the Passover into whose place the Sacrament of the Supper came It was the usual language of the Jews to call the Lamb the Body of the Passover The Lamb being a Figure of Christ our Passover and he putting a period to the old Institution and substituting Bread in the room of it to be a memorial and Type of himself under the Gospel he calls it by the same name As the Paschal Lamb had been his Typical Body under the Old Testament So now he declares that the Bread shall be his figurative Body under the New If a Trope makes the Words obscure and unfit to be a branch of the last Will of Jesus Christ then the interpretation of the Church of Rome is condemned by her own acknowledgment For she believes that when it is said This is my Body a living Body is meant and therefore Body by a Synecdoche is put for the Body and Soul The other part of the Sacrament is contained in his last Will as well as this and yet in the words which set it forth there is no less than two Tropes This Cup is the New Testament in my Blood The Cup is put for the Wine contained in it and the New Testament for the Sacrament of the New Covenant As the scope of our Saviour confirms the sence which we have given So likewise do the antecedents and consequences Before these words This is my Body were spoken it is said Jesus took Bread and blessed and brake it c. what can he mean by This but that which he took into his hand and blessed and brake and that is expresly called Bread After Consecration as that which is termed his Blood is stiled the Fruit of the Vine so that which he named his Body is by his Spirit in the holy Apostle said to be Bread As often as ye eat this bread 1 Cor. 11.26 Whosoever shall eat of this bread v. 27. Let a man examine himself and so let him eat of this bread v. 28. If before and after Consecration that which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This doth import is called Bread then no such mutation is made as is contended for and the words must be interpreted in a Sacramental and Figurative Sence We have not only the Antecedents and Consequences to favour our interpretation but likewise the Analogy of Faith This says that Christ as man was made like unto his Brethren Heb. 2.17 This car not be true if he be corporally in the Sacrament The bodies of his Brethren are naturally confined to a certain place But according to this apprehension his Body may be in a thousand places at once even upon all the Altars in the World Wheresoever the Host is consecrated it is wholly in the whole and wholly in every part of it The Analogy of Faith asserts that Christ it gone to heaven in his bodily presence I am no more in the world Jo. 17.11 The interpretation which the Church of Rome gives of the words under debate makes him to be more in the World than when he conversed with his Disciples upon the Earth For then he was but in one place at a time but now according to the Creed of the Romanists he is the same moment in Millions of places The Analogy of Faith assures us that the body or flash of Christ shall see no corruption Act. 2.27 31. But if it be in the Sacrament then it is corporally eaten turned into Chyle and Nutriment and subject to all the corruption
and acceptance or else upon some person who is willing to become a surety for the Delinquent and is able by his sufferings to restore that honour which publick order has been impaired in and by this means content the mind of the Supreme Rector and this is properly satisfaction What is usually said That if the nature of God doth oblige him to punish sin then he is by the same necessity ingaged to punish it in the offender is of no moment His hatred being not primarily terminated upon the person but the sin if the guilt be transferred by imputation to a Surety it is not incongruous to assert That the sin may be punished in him Some acts which are in general natural to God are free and undetermined in respect of the modification To Govern the World supposing the Creation is essential to him yet the mode whether he will do it immediately by himself only or make use of the Ministry of Men is his free choice So tho' to punish Sin is natural yet the manner of doing of it whether in the person offending or his undertaker is at his election If it be further added That if it be natural to punish it must be done so soon as the transgression is committed and in the extremity That which is natural admits of no delay The reply is easie This is true of that which is natural in Creatures which want freedom and life but it is otherwise in the Creator who is an Intellectual Being Supposing the Creation it is natural to him to do good and yet it is free for him to time his bounty as he pleaseth and to communicate it in what degrees and methods he judgeth most convenient It is natural for him to give a Law to his Creature but he is not determined to the circumstances of publication whether by innate Ideas only or by revelation The necessity he is under is intellectual which admits of the interposal of Counsel about the modes and circumstances of his actions If it be replied That what is natural in God tho' it may be free in these respects yet it must be always expressed in some measure or other which cannot be affirmed of his punishing sin I answer That Sin in some measure is always punished Jans Augtom 2. l. 3. cap. 3. so soon as it is committed from the first moment the Transgressour is deprived of that contentment which doth naturally emerge from a sence of a compliance with the Law of Creation The Worm of Conscience presently grows out of the feculency and pollution the Soul is defiled with The serenity of mind wherein our present beatitude consists is instantly lost and the anticipations of future torments succeed The sparks of infernal fire are quickly kindled A sence of the just judgment of God That he who doth such things is worthy of death fills the Soul with horrour and the deepest consternation Those blessings which before the Delinquent was encircled with are Metamorphised into curses Plough-shares converted into Swords Pruning-hooks into Spears every thing assumes a direful shape and menacing aspect If it be added That punishment is a debt and every one has power freely to remit his debts I answer this is not true of all kinds of debt There is a debt of Active Obedience which we owe to God from which he cannot give us a full discharge The Law of Nature is as unchangeable as his Essence Those who are guilty of open defamation are indebted to the defamed and obliged by pensive agnitions to re-invest them with that honour they have robbed them of This debt the persons injured have no more right to remit than they have to murder themselves their credit being as valuable as their lives Sin deprives God of his glory which he can by no means part with and therefore in justice must require restitution by some convenient satisfaction before he remit the penalty due to the Transgressour and receive him into favour This satisfaction which is so necessary before we can have an interest in the divine acceptance Jesus Christ has made He has repaied the damae which publick order and the Laws of Heaven received from our Sins and fully contented the mind of the Supreme Rector who in justice was obliged to vindicate the honour of his appointments This will be manifest if we consider the following particulars Jesus Christ has suffâ—red the punishment of our sin What he suffered was in our stead The damage done by sin is repaired and the mind of the Supreme Rector fully appeased and reconciled unto us upon the terms of the New Covenant 1. Christ Jesus has suffered the punishment of our Sin It is plain to every one who consults the Sacred Oracles That his sufferings were of the highest nature if we consider the words by which they are represented 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sets forth the extremity of his grief ad satietatem usque 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speaks his sorrow to be so great That it produced a stupefaction in him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports nothing short of these two words his Soul was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 beseized on every side with grief Heaven above did forsake him in his apprehension Hell below did conspire against him The Jews on the one hand stood ready to betray him The Gentiles on the other were prepared to crucifie him Nothing but occasions of grief were administred to his Senses His Eyes beheld the fury of his adversaries His Ears were filled with their blasphemies The most Nervous parts of his body were pierced with instruments of cruelty The drops of Blood which fell from his sacred Body argue That nothing was wanting to consummate the most exquisite torment The circumstances of his Passion were so amazing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That Dionysius in Aegypt when he saw the Sun in mourning at his crucifixion used these words Either the Divinity suffers or sympathizeth with him that does For all this there must be some important reason It cannot be imagined That he who was interested in the highest degree of the Love of his Father That never had done any thing to merit the least unkindness should be treated with so much severity upon some unnecessary grounds The could be no motives of an inferiour Nature which did induce the eternal Father to suffer his only Son the Lord of Life to die The Lord of Glory to be obscured with the clouds of ignominy and reproach There must be something in the case which could not be accomplished in any other method All confess that What the Socinians alledge as the reason might have been brought to pass upon far easier terms They tell us That Christ suffered to confirm the Covenant induce us to perform the conditions of it to make way for his ingress into Heaven in order to the performing the Office of a Priest The First of these might have been done by the working of Miracles which are the broad Seal of Heaven What can
Upon this piece of Spiritual Homage an agnition of divine perfection is as conspicuous as Caesar's Image upon the Roman Penny When we pray for wisdom and holiness we cannot give a more lively signification of our acknowledgment that these perfections reside in God in a peerless degree As Prayer so Praises in Hymns and Psalms is a part of Natural Worship All Nations have expressed their esteem of their Deities in this way It was in use among the Greeks as appears by their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first sung to the gods or goddesses which they believed did favour them the second to those whom they accounted not to be propitious to them Amongst the Romans the same way of Worship obtained as is evident by their Assamenta Junonia Minervia Poems composed in the Honour of those Deities whose names they bear Amongst the Hebrews as is manifest from the poetical compositions in the old Testament the Christians as is plain from the Apostolical exhortation to the Ephesians and Colossians and Pliny's report to Trajan concerning their practice Tho' Prayers and Praises may be directed to men upon a civil account yet this doth not hinder them from being appropriate parts of the Worship of God When we say that they with other actions are by nature peculiar to the Deity we mean not as they are taken materially So they are of a common nature like matter considered in the abstract without any particular form But we take them formally together with their individuating circumstances which do determine and limit them We may pray to men but to do it when they are not present for such things which none but the Supreme being can confer in such an assembly as is met solely upon a Religious account would be by all impartial Expositors interpreted an invading the right of Heaven and an inexcusable injury to the Divine Glory To Prayer and Praise we may add the taking an Oath the making a solemn Vow to God as parts of natural Worship All the Heathens which had nothing to direct them but the light of Nature were fully acquainted with them as appears by clear testimonies in their writings which to mention would be superfluous They both involve a plain acknowledgment of the perfections of the Divine Nature He who takes an Oath invocates God to be a witness and a revenger which address includes a confession of his Omniscience that he is privy to that which is secret and unknown to others his Veracity that he takes pleasure in truth and has a perfect detestation of that which is opposite to it his Power that he is able to take vengeance and assert the dignity of the Law which is violated He who makes a solemn Vow if it be to engage himself to some expressions of gratitude doth thereby declare his deep sence of the Divine Benignity if to bind himself the faster to a loyal deportment in his conversation the dominion of Heaven over him If any doubt notwithstanding what has been represented whether this part of Worship is to continue under the Evangelical dispensation he may satisfie himself by considering that this is plainly foretold by the Prophet Isaiah c. 19.21 The taking away of what was given to God by Vow is condemned by the Apostle Rom. 2.22 and death was afflicted upon Ananias and Saphira for their miscarriage in this particular Act. 5.5 10. The devoting of things to God by Vow is grounded upon reason common to all ages as well the times of the Gospel as the Law The whole world is a Community under the regency of one supreme Monarch This Community he has parcell'd out into Kingdoms and committed the government of them to his Vicegerents In every kingdom the members have their properties bounded and limited by Law These rights they are so invested in that they have withal a power of alienation The natural signs of their will when they exert this power are promissory words There is no reason why this way of exchange may not as well prevail in the universal Community betwixt the Supreme Rector and his Subjects as in any particular betwixt his Vicegerents and those who are under their regency A Vow is nothing but a solemn promise made unto God 9. Instituted Acts are such as have their foundation in positive institution For the right understanding of them it must be premised that the new Covenant of which our blessed Lord is the Mediator was made by the positive pleasure of the Divine Will It is the product of free Grace as is apparent by the case of the fallen Angels They have no overtures of reconciliation made to them Christ did not shed his blood to quench the fire of Hell for them God having a design to publish and make known this gracious Covenant he has made choice of his Word and Sacraments to do it by The preaching hearing reading this Word and receiving the Holy Sacraments may be truly stiled acts of instituted Worship they become a duty to us by the positive institution of the new Covenant and import an acknowledgment of the benignity and goodness of God to mankind Preaching and publishing with integrity of heart the methods of divine Grace in the work of redemption is an undeniable expression of a serious and devout sence of the benignity of Heaven Those who preach Christ who is the brightness of the divine Glory must necessarily by the same action give Glory and Worship to God Tho' preaching the Gospel as it imports teaching is a religious duty and looks down upon men only yet as it signifies the proclaiming before men the inestimable goodness of Heaven it looks upwards to God and may challenge a place amongst the parts of his Worship Upon this account Ministers are said to be a sweet favour unto God whether their Hearers will be saved or perish admit or refuse their instructions The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 alludes to the perfumed offerings under the Law and intimates that God is as really worshipped by the preaching of the Gospel as he was by those Oblations Upon this account the Apostle represents himself as one that sacrificeth the Gospel 2 Cor. c. 2. v. 14 15. Rom. 15.16 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 S. Chrysostom interprets 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He calls a Preacher 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hom. 〈◊〉 Cor. 2. c. 3. a royal censer upon which this spiritual oblation is offered This is part of that pure offering which Malachi foretold should in every place as well among the Gentiles as the Jews be tendered unto God This Sacrifice is like the Peace-offerring of which some was given unto God and some to the people It is stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the sacrifice of Faith Phil. 2.17 The Faith of the Gospel is of so excellent nature that the Ministerial publishing of it implies a solemn oblation of Praise to him who is the fountain of it To this part
of Worship we may add Hearing Reading receiving the Sacraments The Liturgy joyns together the setting forth the Praise of God and the hearing his Word when we with holy reverence hearken to it we set forth the Praise of his Wisdom and Goodness which by our devout and serious attention we acknowledge to be sufficient and ready to instruct us He who reads the Scripture as the Word of the living God with an intention to be made wise unto Salvation by it doth thereby manifest his deep sence of the incomprehensible and profound understanding of the Author of it When Proselytes are admitted into the Church by Baptism and have the remission of their sins sealed unto them upon the terms of the new Covenant it is an evident indication of their humble resentments of the infinite goodness of God in granting an act of Amnesty and pardon after the violation of the first Covenant Their being baptised in the name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost is an expression of a reverential acknowledgment of and an entire devotion to the sacred and blessed Trinity The receiving the Symbols of the body and blood of our Lord imports a laudatory agnition of him It is not an empty remembrance which is intended but a solemn commemoration attended with the most emphatical expressions of Praise and Gratitude It is stiled a shewing forth in allusion to the Jewish 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which was a declaration made in praise of the benignity of Heaven in procuring redemption from the Aegyptian servitude The Wine is stiled by S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Cup of Blessing and the Bread by Justin Martyr 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Bread of Thanksgiving These two Sacraments were not designed for the primitive times only but to continue to the last period of the World The reason of their continuance is common to all Ages we have now as much need to renounce our ghostly enemy profess our repentance promote sanctification be received into the Church commemorate the death of Christ renew our covenant gain a fuller Communion as they which lived in the first age And it is not now inexpedient that we should be taught by some visible signs our intellectual powers are in as much dependence upon sence as formerly Were the attainments of the present Age equal to the state of Paradise this way of instruction would not be disagreeable Eden was not without Two Sacramental Trees Their permanency is likewise ascertained to us by a Divine Revelation In the Commission to Baptise it is said I will be with you to the end of the world To interpret baptising nothing else but an initiating by Doctrine without Water and the end of the world the end of the age in which the Apostles lived is to offer too much violence to the Text. The proper Notion of Baptism includes Water We are not to depart from the proper signification of words and comply with a Metaphorical without a peremptory necessity The Context is so far from obliging us to this departure that on the contrary it holds forth a manifest discrimination betwixt baptising and initiating by Doctrine v. 19. v. 20. The first is expressed by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the second by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is of the same importance with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mat. 13. v. 40. and there without controversie it signifies the last period of the world when the Angels shall sever the wicked from the just If 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 import the Age it must be remembred that the Jews divided the time from the Creation to the dissolution of all things into two Ages the first expiring at the coming of the Messias the second at the final period of the Universe and so I will be with you to the end of the age is as much as I will be with you to the end of the world The Age before the coming of the Messias cannot be understood he being in our nature when he spake these words therefore the age after must When the Apostle says as often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup ye shew forth the Lord's death till he come He evidently declares that the institution of the Supper is to continue till the last appearing of Jesus Christ There are but four comings of his usually spoken of The First in the Flesh when he assumed our nature the Second in the Spirit to sanctifie and rule his Church the Third in his vindicative Justice to destroy Jerusalem the Fourth in the last day to Judge the World The two first cannot be understood They were past when the Apostle wrote his Epistle The Messias was then come in the Flesh to all mankind In the Spirit at the solemn feast of Pentecost and in particular to the Corinthians they were sanctified in Christ Jesus 1 Ep. 1.2 But the coming which the Apostle aims at is future until I come Neither can we understand his coming to destroy Jerusalem For these words are inserted with a design to awake the Corinthians to a greater degree of circumspection in their preparations for the holy Communion intimating that it shall continue till Christ come to summon them before his Tribunal and judge them for their unworthy Approaches There was no summons of the Corinthians at the overthrow of Jerusalem and therefore the last coming must be understood These Acts which have been enumerated some in savour of the Mass would perswade us that sacrificing is to be added as a part of Divine Worship under the Gospel If this be so it must be warranted by some Divine Law and this must be either natural or positive Natural it is not as will be evident by the following considerations 1. A Sacrifice is an Oblation of some material thing unto God and in the offering destroyed The essential difference whereby it is distinguished from other Oblations is the destructive mutation This change cannot reasonably be esteemed an act of Worship but so far as it is an acknowledgment of some excellency appertaining to the Divine Nature as Sovereignty Wisdom Goodness c. In its self before it has an institution enstamped upon it it imports no such agnition Were we left to the conduct of natural light it would rather induce us to believe that the Godhead is dishonoured than worshipped by a dissolution of the creature in whose composure divine Power and Wisdom are eminently conspicuous 2. If the light of nature leads us to this practice it must be because it conduceth to the Honour of God and if so we being under an obligation to honour him in the superlative and most exalted degree the same reason will dictate that mankind the most excellent part of the visible Creation is to be singled out for this sacred purpose Nay that Abraham wanted not the warranty of a revelation for the offering up of Isaac but was sufficiently instructed by the light of Nature in that concernment
adversaries were as peremptory in this as the other charge Tertullian reckons the report that the Christians were Crucis religiosi amongst those scandals which were raised by malice in order to the eclipsing their reputation As for the Relicks of Saints we find no mention of any religious respect which was paid to them Those who have the greatest zeal for them are usually mounted upon tradition but finding it not able to carry them thro' the first Centuries in this particular they think good to alight and content themselves with some instances in Scripture which are nothing to the purpose as the hemm of Christ's garment the shadow of S. Peter the Handkerchiefs and Aprons that touched the body of S. Paul Because the Woman diseased with an issue of blood was healed by touching the first the sick were brought into the streets that they might be overshadowed by the second many were delivered from evil spirits by the third They have a mind to perswade us without any good reason that these particulars with all Relicks of an equivalent Nature challenge religious veneration No doubt Peter himself was every way as valuable as his shadow and yet when Cornelius made an attempt to worship him he prevented him by an express prohibition The Fathers in the ages next to the Apostles were not such good husbands as to make such an advantagious improvement of these instances but on the contrary we find them charging the Heathens with Superstition of a like nature as the worshipping the Monuments of the Dead and we never read that the Heathens did retort upon them their guilt in the same kind which no doubt they would have done in case there had been any such practice among them Celsus Lucian c. were not so dull as to overlook so signal an advantage They which use to charge them with too much would have paid them their own in case there had been the least appearance of reason for it As the most early Writers next to the Apostles never mention the Worshipping any else but God so all the words which import Divine Worship are by them exclusively applied to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Justin Martyr Apel. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Theophilus Antiochenus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Tatianus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Origen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 L. 1. Cont. Cels Servire by Irenaeus Huic servire soli oportet discipulos Christi Colere adorare by Tertullian Apol. c. 17. Inst l. 1. c. 20. Quod colimus unus Deus est Praescribitur ne quem alium adorem Venerari by Lactantius veneratio nulla alia nisi unius Dei tenenda est Hitherto I have asserted the verity of this Proposition God only is to be Worshipped In the next place I will consider the opposition that has been made against it by the Church of Rome and those who adhere to Her Maldonate makes no scruple to pronounce n Mat. 5. v. 34. that it is a wicked error to maintain that religious Honour is to be tendered to none but God The Inquisitors have blotted out such Words and Sentences out of Books as cast a favourable aspect upon this Doctrine In a Sentence cited out of Gregory Nyssen by Antonius in his mellifluous Sermons in these words eam verò folummodò naturam quae increata est colere venerari didicimus they condemn the word Index Exp. solummodò to an expunction The Index to Athanasius's Works Printed at Basil has been treated with the same respect These words adorari solius Dei est are not permitted to remain in it The Gloss in the Margin of the Bible upon 1 Sam. 7.3 Prepare your hearts unto the Lord and serve him only has not escaped their severity Their decree concerning it runs in these terms deleantur illa verba serviendum Deo soli They have done with these Testimonies as Caesar Borgia used to do with men namely contrive the death of those who did impede the accomplishment of his designs This practice doth evidently declare that they are conscious that their Worship cannot stand without this Principle be taken out of the way The sence of it is opposed by them in many particulars as the Worship of the Sacrament the Invocation of Saints the Adoration of Images c. 1. The Worship of the Sacrament The Church of Rome hath given too much occasion to believe that the Accidents of the Bread and Wine are to be honoured with supreme Veneration The Council of Trent in plain words asserts that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is granted to signifie supreme honours is to be given to the Sacrament It does not say to a part only of it but useth the Word in general which must necessarily imply the whole and extend to all which is appointed to be received Now it is evident that the Accidents are a part of the Sacrament which is to be received They constitute the outward and visible sign L. 4. Saâ—r Bellarmine represents them as the principal ratio Sacramenti magis convenit speciebus ut continent Corpus quà m corpori Christi ut est sub speciebus The following words of the Council confirm this Interpretation nec enim minùs adorandum c. neither is it the Sacrament to be less adored because it hath been instituted by Christ the Lord that it may be taken for him the same God we believe to be present in it whom the eternal Father bringing into the World saith Let all the Angels adore him c. Here the Sacrament is represented as that in which our blessed Lord is present and contained under and by consequence as distinct from it That which contains any thing is always diverse from that which is contained in it Now what is there left for the Word Sacrament to import but the outward Elements the signifying part under which it is supposed that the Sacred Body of our blessed Lord is latent His Presence in the Sacrament is alledged as the reason of the Adoration given to it Tho' this is not sufficient to justifie the practice for then every thing in which God is present would be an adorable object as the Sun and Moon and whole Creation yet it leads us into the meaning of the Word Sacrament as it lies in the Council and assures us that it imports some thing besides our blessed Saviour which can be nothing but the outward Elements whereby he is represented A command to give civil honour to the Throne of a Prince because the Prince himself sits in it evidently implies that the Throne and the Prince are distinct one from the other To expound the Decree by the Canon in which there is mention only of Worshipping Christ in the Sacrament is very preposterous They aim at two distinct things The first obligeth us to Worship the Sacrament the second to Worship Christ who is present in the Sacrament These two are as different as to Worship the Palace in
no evidence in Courts of Justice sufficient to ground a condemnatory Sentence upon Eye-witnesses tho' of the greatest integrity will be of no signification all will be left in a perfect state of Scepticism The grand pillars which support Religion will be utterly overthrown and demolished How can we be assured that there is a God but by his Word and Works And how can we perceive the Contents of his Word or be acquainted with his Works without using our Senses We cannot be sure that The Heavens declare the Glory of God or that this Proposition This is my Body is contained in the New Testament if we may not conside in our eyes Miracles the great Seals of Evangelical Verity are rendered insignificant if the Senses of those who were present when they were wrought may not be trusted to their attestation will be of no value Indeed we are told that the Sense is not deceived in the Sacrament The accidents of the Bread and Wine are its proper objects and they remain there according as they appear but as for the Substance that is miraculously changed and Sense is no competent Judg about it To which the reply is easie Accidents alone are not the proper objects of Sense but Accidents together with those material subjects in which they inhere It is matter which properly makes the impression upon our Nerves the Particles of it are under diverse modes and figures commonly stiled Accidents The Essence of these consists in inhesion Accidentis esse est inesse So that if they be separated they presently cease to be and by consequence have no power to make any impulse upon Sense They can have no more a solitary existence than the height breadth and length of a house with all the colours and modes of every room may remain after the whole fabrick is demolished If there be any miraculous change in the substance of the Bread and Wine nothing can be more sit to discern it than our Senses The essential effect of a Miracle is to work wonder and admiration and nothing can produce this but that which is manifest to our faculties Tho' the mode of doing is latent yet the thing done is clear and accommodated to the apprehension of every Spectator These four Topicks Scripture Antiquity Reason Sense standing in an irreconcileable opposition to the doctrin of Transubstantiation nothing is left to support it except these two pretences the Declaration of the present Church and an impossibility that what she declares should be an Innovation As for the first If by the Church we understand the Universal no such thing is done by her The Eastern Churches declare the contrary The Greeks in their Liturgies have nothing of this nature expressed They adhere to the seven first General Councils only which are wholly silent in this matter Tho' they have a proper word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to express Transubstantiation by yet they never use it when they speak of the Eucharist When they call the Bread the Body of Christ it is with an extenuating term as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quasi or the like After Consecration they give no adoration to it They deny that an unworthy Communicant receives the Body and Blood of Christ Cyril Patriarch of Constantinople says in the name of the Greek Church Vid. Hotting An. Appen p. 422. We confess and believe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the true and firm Presence of our Lord Jesus to wit that which Faith offers and gives us and not that which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the invented Transubstantiation doth inconsiderately teach These are his words in his Oriental Confession of the Christian Faith To say notwithstanding all this that Transubstantiation is the declared belief of the Universal Church is to cut off the Greeks from being any part of it altho' they receive the Holy Scriptures embrace the ancient Creeds submit to the seven first General Councils have an uninterrupted succession of Bishops If it be said That Schism and Heresie has deprived them and all other Churches of this priviledge and dignity who do not submit to the Papal Supremacy this may be as easily denied as asserted The Universality of jurisdiction contended for is a perfect usurpation which can never be legitimated by length of time against the institution of our blessed Lord who constituted all the Apostles in a parity No Man can with justice be charged with Schism or Heresie for not owning of that which bears an opposition to the appointment of the Supreme Head of the Church If we must believe the declaration of the present Church in the point under consideration what were those obliged to do who lived in the time of Pope Gelasius when there was a declaration diametrically opposite The present Pope declares That the Bread and Wine do not remain in the Sacrament Gelasius a person of equal Authority and every jot as Infallible declares That they do Both these we cannot be obliged to believe they being contrary one to the other If the present Church of Rome must be credited whensoever she thinks sit to declare her self How is this to be known She has no peculiar promise made to her That to the Universal is nothing to the purpose she being but a part and a very corrupt one too All that the promise imports is that there shall be always a people with their Pastors in the World retaining all the points which are fundamental and of peremptory necessity to Salvation which may be tho' the Community of Rome utterly cease As for any Universal Tradition about this matter it is but a futilous and vain pretence as is evident by the contests betwixt the Roman and African Bishops If the last had known of any such Tradition and believed the first to be infallible a sudden stop would have been put to all contradiction No man will dare to oppose a Church which he believes cannot err Neither are there any motives of Infallibility efficacious enough to induce us to receive this doctrin Bellarmine has reckoned up fifteen but they are so far from evincing that the Church of Rome is Infallible in her declarations that they will not amount to prove her a True Church as will be manifest in the Fourth Section As for the Second pretence the impossibility of Innovation it is in vain to alledge it against so much evidence as may be produced for the matter of fact The antient Church for many Centuries did assert That the substance of the Bread and Wine remains after Consecration as I have already proved The doctrin of the present Church of Rome is That it doth not remain Here is an undeniable change To set up an imaginary demonstration against so clear a matter of fact and to commend it to our belief with all the advantages of Art is a method not unlike to that of Pericles who when he had received a fair fall by his Antagonist attempted to impose upon his Spectators with his Rhetorical flourishes and
continues its pursuit that which is now good in the appetitive faculty will presently become evil because it acts contrary to its immediate rule Tho' there may be policy yet there is but little piety in the practice of those who perswade their Proselytes That light puts out the fire of devotion and an implicit belief is the perfection of Religion The truth is They are so conscious of the infirmity of the foundation they build upon that they use their best endeavours to deprive others of their sight that they may be in no capacity to discover it As we must Worship with our Understanding so likewise with our Will that which is free and of our own election is most acceptable to God Josephus says That God rejected Cain because he offered a Sacrifice which was extorted by force out of the earth and accepted Abel because his victim was free and natural Tho' he missed of the true Reason yet he hit upon a great Truth That a free and uncompelled obedience is most agreeable to the Divine Will God being a Spirit is concerned chiefly in the frame of our Spirits and disvalues that Service which doth not proceed from them 1 Kin. 6.4 The windows of the Temple which Solomon dedicated to him were broad within and narrow without his eye looks more within upon the temper and composure of our hearts than without upon our external performances All the faculties of our Soul must be screw'd up to the highest pitch In the Intellect there must be a superlative esteem of the Divine Majesty in the Will the deepest devotion Every sacred performance challengeth the most reverential regards Altho' there may be culpable excesses in the imperate acts of the Body yet there is no fear of them in the elicite operations of the Soul It is impossible to value love and obey God too much An infinite good requires the utmost vigour of a finite Spirit when it is conversant about it 2. God must be worshipped outwardly with the Body It is to be presented as a living Sacrifice Rom. 12.1 holy and acceptable to him We must not imitate them who use to take to themselves all the flesh of their victims and offer up nothing but the Blood and Soul to their Deities Our Bodies being the Lords as well as our Spirits and very proper instruments to commend the practice of Religion to others they are not to be exempted from this Service Outward profession which cannot be without the acts of the body is a duty as well as inward devotion Adam did wear the skins of the beasts which he sacrificed to God The Scripture never censures bodily Service but the want of the heart and a right direction of the intentions in the performance of it He who Worships God with his Body and suffers his Soul at the same time to be under irrelative motions is like a Souldier who imploys his Scabbard in the service of his Commander and his Sword to some other purpose 3. All the modes of the Body must be decent orderly and tending to Edification It is the pleasure of him who is the Supreme Head of the Church to give this general rule and to furnish subordinate Governours with such discretion as will enable them to make convenient deductions from it in particular cases Upon this account the Apostle appeals to Nature that is natural reason when he treats about matters of order 1 Cor. 11. and asserts That disorder will administer occasion to unbelievers to charge the Congregation with madness that is with a deportment contrary to the rule of common reason 1 Cor. 14. 4. Different deductions from this general rule is no just ground for distinct Churches to commence a contest one against another and by this means violate the Unity of the Universal Decency is not confined to a point but has a certain latitude Under a Genus there are more Species than one The Carthaginian and Roman Army at Cannae were not drawn up in the same form and yet in both there was a mode agreeable to the rules of Military Order Upon this account the present Church has no quarrel with the antient altho' she differs from her in matters of this nature Formerly it was thought to be very decent to stand at Prayer on the Lord's day in token of the Resurrection To plunge three times those who were to be Baptised in signification of the Trinity to cloath them when they came out of the water with a white garment Altho' these customs are now laid aside yet we are so far from reproaching those who did use them that we highly value their authority in the important concerns of Religion The several parts of the ancient Church altho ' they differed in things of this Nature yet they had communion together Euseb l. 5. c. 24. Irenaeus in his Letter to Victor says That some conceived that they were to fast but one day before the Passover some Two some Forty nevertheless they had Peace Those Churches which dissented in such matters Sozom. use to send the Sacrament one to another as a token of their agreement in the Faith They thought it a vain thing to be divorced upon the account of some different customes when there was a harmony betwixt them in the great concerns of Religion Firmilianus asserts Epist ad Cypr. That the same Rites were not at Rome and Jerusalem and the like differences were in other places yet the Unity and Peace of the Catholick Church was not broken S. Austin takes notice Ep. ad Casulan 86. That in the garment of the King's Daughter there is variety of work to import that there may be diverse Rites in the Church and yet all reconcileable with the Unity of the Faith 5. Tho' this variety is very excusable in different Churches yet it is highly expedient and desirable that in the same Church there should be the same external mode of Religion Edification is the great design which ought to be aimed at in an Ecclesiastical Community There is nothing which is more opposite to this end than discord and contention and nothing will sooner kindle and blow up the fire of contention than differences of this nature Tho' Men at distance do bear one with another in such variations yet when they are near and in frequent Communion under the same constitution they are apt to take great distaste We like well the different fashions of another Country and treat Strangers which are in them with significations of a due respect yet if any of our own Community affect such an exotick Garb they are usually the object of vulgar scorn and derision The different dress of one is a reproach to another and charges him with folly and weakness as tho' he was not able to discern what is convenient and under such an imputation Men are commonly very uneasie and break out into an exchange of the greatest unkindness The animosity occasioned by a variation in Religious Rites
third and fourth generation That one may be punished for another was not accounted unjust amongst those who were governed by the light of Nature as is evident by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or sureties in capital matters which did engage life for life There can be no pretence of injury where the person suffering freely consents and has a dominion over his own life he having power to dispose of himself in his submission to the greatest passion he does no injury to any other and he consenting upon the clearest considerations no injury is done to himself When the understanding is weak and not a competent guide an injury may be done altho' the party concerned be willing But the case before us is quite otherwise Our Blessed Lord upon the clearest dictate of reason became willing to bear our sins He did in this comply with the propensities of his own benignity serve the necessities of Mankind justifie publick Order and assert the Majesty of the Law against all that contempt which our Sins had exposed it unto The Premises being well considered will make it manifest That Christ suffered the punishment of our Sins 2. What He suffered was in our stead This will be evident if we consider his blood which he shed either as a Sacrifice or a ransom as a Sacrifice The offering which he made to God was expiatory a Sacrifice for sin Heb. 10.20 This oblation must necessarily have the nature which is common to all offerings under the Old Testament of the same kind They were figures of this great Oblation and there must be an agreement betwixt the Type and the thing typified in that which is essential to the nature of the Type Now it is manifest That all the expiatory offerings in the Old Testament were in lieu of those persons for whom they were offered The Law did require death of every one that did not remain in the obedience of it The offences against it were of two sorts either such as were punished with the death of the offender as Murder and Idolatry c. without the benefit of Sacrifice Or else such for the expiation of which a Sacrifice was appointed and slain in the room of the Transgressour The blood of the beast in which the life consists was given upon the Altar to make atonement for the Souls of Men Lev. 17.11 As the Law was satisfied by the death of the offender in the first case So likewise by the death of the Sacrifice in the second The sin of the Delinquent was symbolically derived upon the Piacular Sacrifice and therefore he which carried the skin and flesh without the Camp to be burnt did by touching of them contract pollution and might not be admitted into the Camp again before he had washed his cloaths and bathed his flesh in water Lev. 16.28 This was the cause why he for whom the offering was made was obliged to lay his hand upon the head of it Theodoret says That the hand did import action and signifie That the actions of the Transgressour were laid upon the Sacrifice This was the apprehension of the ancient Jews as is evident by the form of words used when a sin-offering was made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 haec sit expiatio mea which they expound thus The evil which I have deserved let it fall upon the head of the Sacrifice Now If the expiatory offerings under the Mosaical Oeconomy were Types of the offering of Jesus Christ and it was essential to them to be slain in the room of the Transgressour we have just reason from hence to infer That our blessed Lord suffered not only for our good and advantage but in our stead and place In order to the disappointing the force of this argument Crellius says That Christ was not a Priest till he came into Heaven and that those Sacrifices only which were offered for the whole Congregation and at some stated times especially That upon the day of expiation were Types of his oblation and that those which were designed for this use did not represent him in his mactation but in that one action only whereby their blood was carried into the holy place and sprinkled before the Lord. To all which I will reply in order 1. Christ did execute the office of a Priest here upon the earth The Apostle says he gave himself as an Offering and Sacrifice unto God Eph. 5.2 The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports such a Sacrifice as is put to death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is as much as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jo. 10. v. 10. Reconciliation the proper effect of a Sacrifice is attributed to the blood of the Cross Col. 1.20 His purging our sins did precede his sitting down on the right hand of the Majesty on high Heb. 1.3 His having obtained eternal redemption is antecedent to his entring into the holy place Heb. 9.12 He is said to be once offered up Heb. 9.28 And after this to sit down at the right hand of God Heb. 10.12 If this offering has been in Heaven it would not have been said to have been once done The representation of this oblation there is every day He continually makes intercession The offering upon which the Apostles words have an aspect imports passion For he says in case it was to be repeated then Christ must have often suffered since the foundation of the World but the Passion of Christ was over before he entred into Heaven Those words If he were on earth he should not be a Priest Heb. 8.4 do not imply That he did not execute his Sacerdotal Function when he was upon the earth All that can be collected from them is That if after he had made an offering upon the Cross he had remained upon the earth he could not have been our High-Priest Because He who was to bear this office was not only to die for us upon the Earth but to appear in Heaven and there by presenting the merit of that oblation which was made here below procure those aids which we stand in need of 2. Those Sacrifices which were offered for the whole Congregation at some set times were not the only Types of the offering of the Messias The Apostle when he tells us That the Sacrifice of Christ was substituted in the room of the Legal Offerings and that the first was taken away that the second might be established Heb. 10.9 He must necessarily have his eye upon such oblations which as if they were shadows which when the body came did disappear and vanish Now it is plain That the Apostle there has his eye upon more Sacrifices than those which were offered for the whole Congregation He useth so many words as can comprehend no less than all the Mosaical Oblations as Sacrifice Offering Burnt-offerings Offering for sin 3. It is not true That those Sacrifice which typified Christ did represent him only in that action whereby the blood was carried into the holy place and sprinkled before the Lord. The
Apostle says That the very burning their bodies without the Camp was a Type of him Heb. 13.11 12. for the bodies of those beasts whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high Priest for sin are burnt without the Camp Therefore Jesus also that he might sanctifie the people with his own blood suffered without the Gate There was nothing in the ceremonial constitution less probable to be in the number of the Types of the Law than this circumstance of place The mactation has a more obvious correspondence with the design of our Redeemer And if that which has the least appearance of being in that number was notwithstanding prefigurative and typical much more that which has a greater Now I have considered Christ under the notion of a Sacrifice In the next place if we look upon him as a Ransome it will be evident that what he suffered was in our stead By Sin we brought our selves into a state of bondage under an obligation to undergo the penalty of the Law The sentence of condemnation was denounced against us and we juridically bound to suffer In order to the redeeming of us from this condition Jesus Christ has been pleased to lay down a sufficient price in our stead agreeable to the expectation of the Law This is stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which includes both a commutation and a compensation It was laid down in the place of that which was due from us Our Blessed Lord redeemed us from the Curse of the Law by being made a curse He suffered that which was a valuable consideration and did answer all the ends of the legal Sanction The Socinians to disappoint the strength of this Argument say That the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not taken properly Moses is said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet he laid down no price when he redeemed the Israelites out of Aegypt Every proper price is paid to some body It could not be paid to God because he procured it and those who are redeemed by it are bought for his service He for whom the redeemed are purchased and who procures the price of redemption doth not use to receive it A price in a proper sence would destroy the nature of remission To which I reply 1. If 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be not taken properly then the blood of Christ is stiled a price only because the effusion of it intervenes before we are delivered from our bondage as a price doth altho' it hath no such influence as a price upon our redemption And if so then some reason ought to be given why our redemption is attributed more to the blood and death of Christ than to his Doctrin Miracles Promises the blood of Martyrs All these have an influence upon our Salvation of the same nature with that which Crellius attributes to the blood of Christ The Doctrin of Christ doth shew us the way to it His Miracles confirm the truth of that way His Promises excite us to walk in it The blood of Martyrs and their Heroick Patience eminently conduce to the establishment of our Faith If the blood of Christ did not contribute to our redemption in some peculiar way which is not common to these things why is it never attributed to them 2. Moses is stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 7.37 because he was a Type of the true Redeemer and the blood of the Paschal Lamb a Type of the price of redemption which he laid down It is no good consequence because Moses did not pay a price properly so called therefore Christ did not The similitude betwixt the figure and the thing prefigured must not be extended beyond the bounds intended in the institution to every punctilio Jonah in the Fish's belly was a Type of Christ in the grave Because Jonah was alive it doth not follow That Christ in the grave was not dead The Brazen Serpent when it was lifted up was a Type of Christ Crucified From thence we must not infer That Christ's blood was not shed upon the Cross because none did slow from the Brazen Serpet 3. The price of our redemption was paid unto god He held us captive The Apostle says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we were kept as prisoners in a garrison under the Law Gal. 3. v. 23. By whose warrant we were committed to this prison is expressed in the precedent verse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Scripture hath concluded or shut up all under sin This Warrant was written with God's own hand Parallel to this is what is expressed in the Epistle to the Romans God hath shut up all under disobedience c. 11.32 We were imprisoned for our delinquency and by a divine appointment under an obligation to suffer punishment 4. Tho' God procures the price and the redeemed are ransomed for his service yet it doth not follow That the price was not paid to him When a Subject violates the Law of his Prince and by his enormous deportment precipitates himself into a state of thraldom and it cannot be reconciled with the interest of the community and the immutable rule of justice to set him at liberty without satisfaction first made to the Law the Prince out of his benignity may contrive how this may be done and when it is done accept it and release the person with a design that he may be in capacity to serve him 5. The price of Redemption properly taken doth not destroy the nature of Pardon and Remission He on whom the Pardon is conferred contributes nothing of his own towards the meriting of it The debt is cancelled without any payment made by him to the Creditor Forgiveness is an entire act of Divine Benignity It is no diminution of the bounty of Heaven to make choice of such a way to do it in as hath a consistence with Wisdom and Justice There is more grace expressed in pardoning in and thro' Christ than in pardoning without him Immediate Remission is but a single favour Remission in and thro' Christ a double For God doth not only pardon sin but give his own Son for the procuring of it in such a method as contributes no inferiour degree of glory to every attributed in the Divine Essence and is equally advantageous to the transgressour All this duely considered will evidence That our Blessed Lord suffered in our stead 3. By what He suffered in our stead the damage done by sin is repaired and the mind of the Supreme Rector fully appeased and reconciled unto us upon the terms of the New Covenant The damage is repaired By punishment Laws are vindicated and their just authority asserted The greater the punishment is the clearer is the vindication There cannot be a greater penalty than That which was suffered by the Son of God Penalties are estimated according tot he dignity of the person who suffers It is a higher punishment for a Prince to have marks of disgrace fastned upon him than for a Peasant Our Blessed Lord infinitely transcending all
because the Literal is decayed and vanished we say the whole Law is annulled The Law and the Letter of it always fall together Therefore If the Church had not believed every Law in the Decalogue in the Letter to be binding to us she would not have called every one of them a Law in that known form Lord incline our hearts to keep this Law Against all this it is objected Epilog l. 3. c. 21. p. 194. That the first and last Command of the Second Table are by the terms of them appropriated to God's antient People The Land of Promise in the Letter belongs to none but Israelites The Tenth Command forbiddeth to covet another man's wife altho' adultery was forbidden before and therefore to covet onother man's wife is to compass another man's wife which might be done where the Law alloweth divorces as Moses's Law doth To which I reply 1. If these words appropriated to the antient People of God import no more than the being delivered with some accommodation to them it is no good consequence because the first and last Precept in the second Table are thus appropriated That therefore they concern no body else The ritual Law was adapted to the circumstances of those Israelites More Nevochim p. 46. which were in being at the time when it was enacted The Law whereby the eating of blood is interdicted was therefore given because the Zabiists thought blood to be the food of infernal Gods and conceived the way to contract an acquaintance with them was to eat of it The Law which forbiddeth the eating of the fruits of the first three years was occasioned by an Idolatrous custome of the same People who use to offer part of the First-fruits of Trees to their Idol and to eat the other part in their Idol-Temple being possessed with an apprehension That the Trees would wither and die in case this custome was intermitted The preceptive part of the Writings of the Prophets is plainly accommodated to the Nation of the Jews Many parts of the New Testament are adapted to the condition of the Primitive times S. John's Gospel was intended to affront the assertions of Ebion and Cerinthus S. Paul's Epistles are proportioned to those distempers which some particular Churches conflicted with The Sermons of Christ were preached to the lost sheep of the house of Israel Both his Sacraments are not without their peculiar aspects In Baptism there is a special regard to the Jews who were no strangers to the custome of admitting Proselytes by Water Some rites in the Eucharist were derived from their Passeover Because the Law had a particular aspect upon the circumstances of the Israelites then living when it was first enacted it is no good consequence That it was not obliging to future generations which were in a different condition Or Because the Prophets were chiefly sent to the Jews That therefore Christians are not concerned in the mandatory part of their Writings Or Because the New Testament in the doctrinal and sacramental part of it was calculated for a Meridian different from that which the Church is now under That therefore it does not oblige the Church in her present state We see the same art which is used in undermining the perpetuity of the Decalogue should it prevail would be as forcible against the Old and New Testament Dominicus à Soto who maintained the principle did likewise own the consequence so far as it concerns the Old Testament Bellarm. de justif l. 4. c. 6. p. 930. He did assert Nullum testimonium ex libris Veteris Testamenti quoad vim obligandi adduci posse Christianis If those words appropriated to the ancient people of God be taken strictly it does not appear from any thing which has been produced that there is any such appropriation of those two Commands The first runs in these terms Honour thy father and thy mother This is the whole which appertains to the Precept properly taken what is annexed is a Promise and not of the essence of the Mandatory part of the Decalogue Neither is the Promise so peculiar to the Jews but that it may be applied unto others which will be evident if we consider the words That thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee Long life was not only the reward of obedience amongst the Jews but likewise the Gentiles Iliad 4. Homer says That the life of Simoisius was short because he did not cherish his loving Parents 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a word very general and may import any land where the sons of Adam dwell The Lord did not only give Canaan to the Israelites but Mount Seir to the children of Esau and Ar to the children of Lot The Earth being the Lord's what any Prince or People enjoy it is by his donation This title was so well known that the Heathens used to stand upon it Wilt not thou possess that which Chemosh thy God giveth thee to possess Judg. 9.24 This being manifest there is no Nation in the World but may lay a claim to this promise upon a supposition of obedience to the Precept As for the last Command I cannot find the least appearance of an appropriation in it The sence of what the Epilogue asserts must amount to this Because under the Law Divorce was allowed and for that reason Men might be induced to attempt the getting another man's wife from him by suggesting something against her which might occasion a Bill of Divorce therefore God enjoyned in the Tenth Command That no Man should covet another's Wife If this was so How comes it to pass that S. Paul represents this Command as in force among Christians who are not concerned in the Law of Divorce Why is it said not only that Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife but his maid-servant which was never married and his ox and his ass If the Law of Divorce was the only reason which did induce the supreme Legislator to give out this Law it must necessarily follow That a Man might give a Bill of Divorce not only to his Wife but likewise to his Ox or his Ass which supposeth him to be married to them I cannot see how to covet should signifie to compass For to compass or procure is an external act but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we translate to covet is an internal and therefore it is interpreted by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to put the mind upon an object The mind being conversant about that which is evil either it passeth thro' it without consent or else it is entertained with some unadvised delight or else it procures not only a sudden delight but a full and perfect consent In the first place the mind doth not sin in the second and third it doth and this is that which is interdicted in the Tenth Command altho' Adultery is prohibited before In the Precept concerning Adultery the outward act is forbidden explicitly the inward implicitely only Now because
close a confinement takes its flight with the other two blended with it into the upper region of the Earth where they constitute Minerals Plants and whatsoever the earth we tread upon is adorned with This Hypothesis is no prejudice to us for it supposeth an intelligent Being as the first Creator of matter and Moderator of its motion And when it is managed with the greatest dexterity comes very short of giving true satisfaction about many terrestrial Phaenomena how they are produced in a Mechanical way In it no provision is made for any reasonble account of the variety of Plants how it comes to pass that out of one and the same soil should spring such great diversity as the earth is beautified with If these did originally emerg out of a combination of various Particles ascending from the interior region of the Earth there must be a continuation of the like emanations for the nourishing of them and if so it is unaccountable how the several streams of Particles should be able to find out amidst such great variety as is sometimes in a little spot of ground all those roots which they properly belong to Neither can any good reason be given in case all these should be pull'd up and Wheat or any other Grain sown in the room of them how all those Particles of which some are supposed inflexible when they miss of the roots they are accustomed to should presently change their figure and become as nutritive of the new body as they had been formerly of the old To say the Succus of the Earth is modified by the figure of the Root or Seed is contrary to the Hypothesis under consideration for it is supposed in it that the interior region of the Earth is the shop where all the Particles are forged But let it be so it is but necessary that those who say it should give some account in a Mechanical way how the Seed came to be in such a mode or figure This Hypothesis likewise leaves us as much at a loss about the curiosities which appear in the composure of Plants Whatsoever Particles may be drawn out of the bowels of the Earth and elevated to the surface of it yet it doth not appear by any Mechanical Law how they should fall into such exact order as to produce the elegant colours and curious proportions which are visible in them Were Archimedes present with his Compasses or Michael Angelo with his Pencil their imitations would fall very short of that exactness which is obvious to every eye There are as great difficulties about their various virtues Whatsoever Succus ascends to the exterior part of the Earth it is not conceivable how it should cause a Plant to spring up which is hot in its operation and within an inch of it another cold one astringent another laxative one poisonous another nutritive one grateful another displeasing to the palate If this variety were the product only of some juice modified within the Earth this juice must be Homogeneous or Heterogeneous NOt the first because it could not be the cause of so much variety Not the second because the soil many times where such Plants grow is found in every part of it to be of the same Nature as appears by its administring an equal nourishment when the Plants are rooted up to any kind of Seed which is sown in the room of them Lastly The Hypothesis we speak of gives no account how a little kernel comes to be improved into the vast body of a Tree How a grain of Mustard the least of all Seeds should become the greatest of Herbs Why the Thistle in Lebanon should not be as tall as the Cedar or the Oak in Bashan as low as the Hyssop upon the wall It has not yet been made to appear by what force the Succus ascends contrary to its own gravity How it comes to climb in some Trees a yard in others five by what Law it is engaged to spread it self into Arms and Branches and what Principle has set bounds which cannot be exceeded So inscrutable is the Wisdom of him who framed the Earth that the most profound inquiries into Nature are not able to discover all the methods of it Something is industriously concealed to teach us that the Wisdom which formed the Earth far transcends all finite capacities As the Earth so the Men which inhabit it declare the existence of a Deity in their Bodies and Souls 1. Their Bodies He who takes a deliberate view of the composure of them must necessarily be convinced of the interposals of Wisdom in the contrivance The usual indications of Wisdom are the aiming at some worthy design the election of congruous means for the accomplishment of it and the actual bringing to pass what is designed All these are manifest to any who consider the frame of a humane Body It is manifestly intended to be a convenient habitation for the Soul This immortal Tenant having a considerable term of time to spend in it and being of an active and vigorous nature delighted with variety of objects it is necessary that its dwelling should be repaired be moveable and furnished with avenues whereby it may entertain and perceive those objects it meets with In order to repairs there could not be a better provision of means contrived by all the Wisdom in the World Two rowes of Teeth are formed to prepare the nourishment by Mastication an acid humor in the Ventricle for the conversion of it into Chyle strait passages in the Intestines for the separation of the purer part from the excrementitious a conveiance for it to the common Receptacle Ductus to derive it from thence into the Veins where by the potency of the Blood it is converted into the same nature Ventricles in the Heart for the entertainment of it Valvulae to prevent the recess and the Hearts being charged with too great a quantity at one time which might occasion a suffocation a passage out of the Ventricle into the Lungs where the Air thro' the Larynk communicates a temper to it a passage out of the Lungs into the left and from thence by the branches of the great Artery into all the parts of the Body Anastomoses or pores for the transmission of it out of the Arteries into the Veins again that the circulation may be continued for the repetition of the same work That every part of the body may move there is likewise a wise and accurate provision The immediate instruments of motion are the Muscles Besides the Flesh which is predominant in their composition they have Filaments or Fibres which constitute the tendon or ligament whereby the Muscle is tied to the part which it is designed to move Besides the Fibres there are Nerves which serve as channels to convey the Spirits For the providing matter for the generation of Spirits a vast quantity of Blood is prepared far exceeding what is found in other Animals The Blood in the body of Man bears the same
proportion to the other parts of it as one does to ten So that if a Man weighs two hundred pounds the Blood makes twenty of them Whereas in other Animals it is but as one to twenty For the distiling and straining of the Spirits out of this matter there is an elaboratory namely the Brain which in a Man is twice as much as in a Beast four times bigger in body As Men are designed for more action than brute Animals so the preparations conducing to that purpose are greater these Spirits commanded by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Soul into any part of the Body swell the Muscle and cause it to attract and pull the part which it is tied unto That the Soul may have a sensation of external objects their preparations are not inferior to those for motion and nutrition The Nerves which arise in the Brain are dispersed into all the parts of the Body So that no member can be touched by any object but the impression is presently conveyed into the Head Tho' there is great variety in the modification of the external Senses yet there is nothing superfluous I will instance only in the Eye It is lapped about with two coats to defend it against the injuries of the Air the outward is diaphanous in the forepart for the admission of the raies of light The inward has an aperture for the same reason which like a Curtain is moveable that the Pupilla may be greater or less according to the dimensions or distance of the object These Coats are filled with three Humours which refract the raies proceeding from the same point and make them to meet again at the bottom of the Eye which very much promotes distinct Vision The Crystalline Humor has on both sides the Processus Ciliares which serve as Tendons to alter the figure of it according as the object is nearer or farther off It will never enter into the belief of any intelligent Man that this provision for nutrition motion and sensation should be accidental and if any Wisdom be interested in the contrivance of it it must be our own or our Parents or the Wisdom of an invisible Being neither we or they know any thing of it and therefore there must be a Being in the World infinitely Wise which can be no other than what the true notion of a God imports As the Body so the Soul of Man evidently demonstrates the existence of a Deity the Powers of it are Two Understanding and Will These Two are so linked together that what conduceth to the perfection of the one never tends to the prejudice of the other The Will is no loser by any accomplishment of the Understanding nor the Understanding by any thing which is of sincere advantage to the Will If there be no God the contrary will be true For it is the perfection of the Understanding to know it truth being its proper object but the greatest damage to the Will No immorality will be disgusted when it comes to be informed that there is no Supreme Being to punish Vice and reward Virtue If the Understanding know it not this ignorance is a blemish to it but a true advantage to the Will there being nothing more efficacious to confine it within the bounds of Sobriety than this perswasion that there is a God The Principles as well as the Powers of the Soul give evidence in this matter As the false gods had their characters impressed upon the bodies of those who worshipped them So the True God has set his signatures upon the Soul there is a Law and a Conscience in every Man a Rule and a Judge a Law which points out the difference betwixt Just and Unjust Good and Evil Virtue and Vice This Rule is reduced in the Imperial Institutions to these Maximes Nothing must be done which is a violation of Piety Modesty Reputation We must not prejudice the estimation liberty and safety of others We must give to every one that which is his own These Axioms have the immediate effect of a Law which is to bind and take away our freedom to do that which is contrary Every Man is sensible that he is not at liberty to oppose the sence of these Propositions in his conversation In case he does if there be any remains of humane nature in him he finds himself under remorse and is really punished in the loss of that contentment which a sence of being employed in a good action is always accompanied with There cannot be a stricter obligation than this that a man must either do that which the propositions import or else lose his true felicity If this rule has the effect of a Law which is to bind it must have the essence and nature the operation is always a true indication of the nature of every thing and if the nature it must be made and impressed by some Sovereign Power The Legislative Power is never vested in an Inferior This Sovereign which made and impressed this Law must have a dominion over all mankind because all whether Princes or Peasants are sensible of their obligations in this particular Therefore there must be a Superior and invisible Power in the World which is that which we mean by the Deity As there is a Law in the Soul which argues the existence of God so likewise a Conscience This signifies the judgment of every Man imployed about his own actions as they bear a proportion or disproportion to the Divine Law Upon a discovery of guilt condemnation presently passeth and as great a consternation follows as that in a malefactor when he hears the sentence of death denounced against him Tho' in a time of prosperity when all things are quiet and serene the intellectual pulse may be very slow yet when a storm ariseth it is quickly awakened in the most exorbitant persons Every clap of Thunder is believed to be a messenger sent from Heaven to serve an Arrest upon them When they make the fairest appearance in the World they are like a Tragedy bound up in guilt leather without there is splendor within tumults and murder Their external Triumphs like the Drums of Tophet help only to drown the unwelcom reports of their uneasie Spirits These direful fears which haunt the Soul when it is no way obnoxious to the animadversions of humane justice evidently declare that there is an invisible power in the World which has impressed them and stands prepared to give it a taste of the most severe animadversions of his displeasure They cannot be imputed to melancholy because persons of all humours the most airy Tempers have been molested by them The Poet speaks of all in general But thinkst thou Curtman hoâ— in a vasâ—sse puteâ— c. they go free whose conscience make Whips that unheard their guilty Soul doth shake The Apostle asserts of the whole Community of the Gentiles Rom. 2. that their thoughts accuse them Neither are they the injections of politick Princes to keep their