the like Passages in my Book my meaning is so evident that no body but an Unmasker would have said that when I spoke of believing as a bare Speculative assent to any Proposition as true I affirm'd that was all that was required of a Christian for Justification Though that in the strict sense of the word is all that is done in believing And therefore I say as far as meer believing could make them Members of Christ's Body plainly signifying as much as words can that the Faith for which they were justified included something more than a bare assent This appears not only from these words of mine p. 196. St. Paul often in his Epistles puts Faith for the whole Duty of a Christian but from my so often and almost every-where interpreting believing him to be the Messiah by taking him to be our King whereby is meant not a bare idle Speculation a bare notional perswasion of any truth whatsoever floating in our Brains but an active Principle of Life a Faith working by Love and Obedience To take him to be our King carries with it a right disposition of the will to honour and obey him joyn'd to that assent wherewith Believers imbrace this Fundamental Truth that Jesus was the Person who was by God sent to be their King he that was promis'd to be their Prince and Saviour But for all this the Unmasker p. 56. Confidently tells his Reader that I say no such thing His words are But besides this Historical Faith as it is generally call'd by Divines which is giving Credit to Evangelical Truths as barely reveal'd there must be something else added to make up the true Substantial Faith of a Christian. With the assent of the Understanding must be joyn'd the consent or approbation of the Will. All those Divine Truths which the Intellect assents to must be allow'd of by this Elective Power of the Soul True Evangelical Faith is a hearty acception of the Messias as he is offer'd in the Gospel It is a sincere and impartial submission to all things requir'd by the Evangelical Law which is contain'd in the Epistles as well as the other Writings And to this practical assent and choice there must be added likewise a firm Trust and reliance in the blessed Author of our Salvation But this late Undertaker who attempted to give us a more perfect account than ever was before of Christianity as it is deliver'd in the Scriptures brings us no tidings of any such Faith belonging to Christianity or discover'd to us in the Scriptures Which gives us to understand that he verily believes there is no such Christian Faith for in some of his numerous Pages especially 191. and 192 c. where he speaks so much of Belief and Faith he might have taken occasion to insert one word about this compleat Faith of the Gospel Though the places above quoted out of my Reasonableness of Christianity and the whole tenor of the latter part of it shew the falshood of what the Unmasker here says Yet I will set down one Passage more out of it and then ask our Unmasker when he hath read them whether he hath the brow to say again that I bring no tidings of any such Faith My words are Reasonableness of Christianity p. 244. Faith in the Promises of God relying and acquiescing in his Word and Faithfulness the Almighty takes well at our hands as a great mark of Homage paid by us poor frail Creatures to his Goodness and Truth as well as to his Power and Wisdom and accepts it as an Acknowledgment of his peculiar Providence and Benignity to us And therefore our Saviour tells us Iohn XII 44. He that believes on me believes not on me but on him that sent me The Works of Nature shew his Wisdom and Power But 't is his peculiar care of Mankind most eminently discover'd in his Promises to them that shews his Bounty and Goodness And consequently engages their Hearts in Love and Affection to him This oblation of an heart fixed with dependance and affection on him is the most acceptable Tribute we can pay him the Foundation of true Devotion and Life of all Religion What a Value he puts on this depending on his Word and resting satisfied on his Promises we have an example in Abraham whose Faith was counted to him for Righteousness As we have before remarked out of Rom. IV. and his relying firmly on the Promise of God without any doubt of its Performance gave him the Name of the Father of the Faithful And gained him so much favour with the Almighty that he was called the Friend of God The Highest and most Glorious Title can be bestowed on a Creature The great out-cry he makes against me in his two next Sections p. 57. â—60 as if I intended to introduce Ignorance and Popery is to be entertain'd rather as the noise of a petulant Scold saying the worst things she could think of than as the arguing of a Man of sense or sincerity All this mighty Accusation is grounded upon these Falshoods That I make it my great business to beat Men off from Divine Truths That I cry down all Articles of the Christian Faith but one That I will not suffer Men to look into Christianity That I blast the Epistolary Wriâ—ings I shall add no more to what I have already said about the Epistles but those few words out of my Reasonableness of Christianity p. 295. The Epistles resolving Doubts and reforming Mistakes are of great Advantage to our Knowledge and Practise And p. 229. An explicit belief of what God requires of those who will enter into and receive the benefits of the New Covenant is absolutely required The other parts of Divine Revelation are Objects of Faith and are so to be received They are Truths whereof none that is once known to be such i. e. of Divine Revelation may or ought to be disbelieved And as for that other Saying of his That I will not suffer Men to look into Christianity I desire to know where that Christianity is locked up which I will not suffer Men to look into My Christianity I confess is contain'd in the written Word of God And that I am so far from hindring any one to look into that I every where appeal to it and have quoted so much of it that the Unmasker complains of being overlaid with it and tells me 't is tedious All Divine Revelation I say p. 300. requires the Obedience of Faith And that every one is to receive all the parts of it with a docility and disposition prepar'd to imbrace and assent to all Truths coming from God and submit his Mind to whatever shall appear to him to bear that Character I speak in the next Page of Mens endeavouring to understand it and of their interpreting one place by another This and the whole Design of my Book shews That I think it every Christian's Duty to read search and study the Holy Scriptures and make this their
me without Vanity in Mr. Chillingworth's the Protestants and Mr. Chillingworth's very words Chap. IV. § 65. will exactly serve for my Answer You trifle affectedly confounding the Apostles Belief of the whole Religion of Christ as it comprehends both what we are to do and what we are to believe with that part of it which contains not Duties of Obedience but only the necessary Articles of simple Faith Now though the Apostles Belief be in the former sense a larger thing than that which we call the Apostles Creed Yet in the latter sense of the word the Creed I say is a full Comprehension of their Belief which you your self have formerly confessed though somewhat fearfully and inconstantly And here again unwillingness to speak the Truth makes you speak that which is hardly sense and call it an Abridgment of some Articles of Faith For I demand those some Articles which you speak of which are they Those that are out of the Creed or those that are in it Those that are in it it comprehends at large and therefore it is not an Abridgment of them Those that are out of it it comprehends not at all and therefore it is not an Abridgment of them If you would call it now an Abridgment of Faith this would be sense and signifie thus much That all the necessary Articles of the Christian Faith are comprised in it For this is the proper Duty of Abridgments to leave out nothing necessary So that in Mr. Chillingworth's judgment of an Abridgment it is not sense to say as you do p. 47. That we are not to think that the Apostles Creed expresly contains in it all the necessary Points of our Belief it being only designed to be an Abstract or an Abridgment of Faith But on the contrary we must conclude it contains in it all the necessary Articles of Faith for that very reason because it is an Abridgment of Faith as the Unmasker calls it But whether this that Mr. Chillingworth has given us here be the nature of an Abridgment or no this is certain that the Apostles Creed cannot be a form of Profession of the Christian Faith if any part of the Faith necessary to make a Man a Christian be left out of it And yet such a Profession of Faith would the Unmasker have this Abridgment of Faith to be For a little lower in the 47. p. he says in express terms That if a Man believe no more than is in express terms in the Apostles Creed his Faith will not be the Faith of a Christian Wherein he does great Honour to the Primitive Church and particularly to the Church of England The Primitive Church admitted converted Heathens to Baptism upon the Faith contain'd in the Apostles Creed A bare Profession of that Faith and no more was required of them to be received into the Church and made Members of Christ's Body How little different the Faith of the Ancient Church was from the Faith I have mentioned may be seen in these words of Tertullian Regula fidei una omnino est sola immobilis irreformabilis Credendi scilicet in unicum deum omnipotentem Mundi conditorem filium ejus Iesum Christum natum ex Virgine Maria Crucifixum sub Pontio Pilato tertia die resuscitatum à Mortuis receptum in Coelis Sedentem nunc ad dextram Patris Venturum judicare vivos Mortuos per carnis etiam resurrectionem Hâc lege fidei manente caetera jam disciplinae conversationis admittunt novitatem correctionis Tert. de Virg. Velan in Principio This was the Faith that in Tertullian's time sufficed to make a Christian. And the Church of England as I have remarked already only proposes the Articles of the Apostles Creed to the Convert to be baptized and upon his Professing a Belief of them asks whether he will be Baptized in THIS FAITH which if we will believe the Unmasker is not the Faith of a Christian. However the Church without any more ado upon the Profession of THIS FAITH and no other Baptizes them into it So that the Ancient Church if the Unmasker may be believed baptized Converts into that Faith which is not the Faith of a Christian. And the Church of England when she Baptizes any one makes him not a Christian. For he that is Baptized only into a Faith that is not the Faith of a Christian I would fain know how he can thereby be made a Christian So that if the Omissions which he so much blames in my Book make me a Socinian I see not how the Church of England will escape that Censure Since those Omissions are in that very Confession of Faith which she proposes and upon a Profession whereof she Baptizes those whom she designs to make Christians But it seems that the Unmasker who has made bold to Unmask her too reasons right that the Church of England is mistaken and makes none but Socinian Christians or as he is pleased now to declare no Christians at all Which if true the Unmasker were best look to it whether he himself be a Christian or no For 't is to be fear'd he was baptized only into that Faith which he himself confesses is not the Faith of a Christian. But he brings himself off in these following words All matters of Faith in some manner may be reduced to this brief Platform of Belief Answ. If that be enough to make him a true and an Orthodox Christian he does not consider whom in this way he brings off with him For I think he cannot deny that all Matters of Faith in some manner may be reduced to that Abstract of Faith which I have given as well as to that brief Platform in the Apostles Creed So that for ought I see by this rule we are Christians or not Christians Orthodox or not Orthodox equally together But yet he says in the next words When he calls it an Abstract or Abbreviature it is implied that there are more Truths to be known and assented to by a Christian in order to making him really so than what we meet with here The quite contrary whereof as has been shewn is implied by its being called an Abstract But what is that to the purpose 'T is not sit Abstracts and Abbreviatures should stand in Unmasker's way They are Sounds Men have used for what they pleased and why may not the Unmasker do so too And use them in a Sense that may make the Apostles Creed be only a broken scrap of the Christian Faith However in great Condescention being willing to do the Apostles Creed what honour he could he says That all Matters of Faith in some manner may be reduced to this brief Platform of Belief But yet when it is set in competition with the Creed which he himself is making for it is not yet finish'd it is by no means to be allow'd as sufficient to make a Man a Christian. There are more Truths to be known and assented to in order to make a
pleased to dose it no more nor no less than what is in his System He hath put himself into the Throne of Christ and pretends to tell you which are and which are not the indispensable Laws of his Kingdom Which parts of his divine Revelation you must necessarily know understand and believe and in what sense and which you need not trouble your head about but may pass by as not necessary to be believed He will tell you that some of his necessary Articles are Mysteries and yet as he does p. 115. of his Thoughts concerning the Causes of Atheism that they are easy to be understood by any Man when explained to him In answer to that I demanded of him who was to explain them The Papists I told him would explain some of them one way and the Reformed another The Remonstrants and Anti-remonstrants give them different senses And probably the Trinitarians and Unitarians will profess that they understand not each other 's Explications But to this in his reply he has not vouchsafed to give me any answer Which yet I expect and I will tell him why Because as there are different Explainers there will be different Fundamentals And therefore unless he can shew his Authority to be the sole Explainer of Fundamentals he will in vain make such a pudder about his Fundamentals Another Explainer of as good Authority as he will set up others against them And what then shall we be the better for all this stir and noise of Fundamentals And I desire it may be consider'd how much of the Divisions in the Church and bloody Persecutions amongst Christians has been owing to Christianity thus set up against Christianity in multiplied Fundamentals and Articles made necessary by the Infallibility of opposite Systems The Unmasker's Zeal wants nothing but Power to make good his to be the only Christianity for he has found the Apostles Creed to be defective He is as infallible as the Pope and another as infallible as he and where Humane Additions are made to the Terms of the Gospel Men seldom want Zeal for what is their own To conclude What was sufficient to make a Man a Christian in our Saviour's time is sufficient still viz. the taking him for our King and Lord ordained so by God What was necessary to be believed by all Christians in our Saviour's time as an indispensable Duty which they owed to their Lord and Master was the believing all divine Revelation as far as every one could understand it And just so it is still neither more nor less This being so the Unmasker may make what use he pleases of his Notion That Christianity was erected by Degrees it will no way in that sence in which it is true turn to the advantage of his select Fundamental necessary Doctrines The next Chapter has nothing in it but his great Bug-bear whereby he hopes to fright People from Reading my Book by crying out Socinianism Socinianism Whereas I challenge him again to shew one word of Socinianism in it But however it is worth while to write a Book to prove me a Socinian Truly I did not think my self so considerable that the World need be troubled about me whether I were a follower of Socinus Arminius Calvin or any other Leader of a Sect amongst Christians A Christian I am sure I am because I believe Iesus to be the Messiah the King and Saviour promised and sent by God And as a Subject of his Kingdom I take the rule of my Faith and Life from his Will declar'd and left upon Record in the inspired Writings of the Apostles and Evangelists in the New Testament Which I endeavour to the utmost of my power as is my Duty to understand in their true sense and meaning To lead me into their true meaning I know as I have above declar'd no infallible Guide but the same Holy Spirit from whom these Writings at first came If the Unmasker knows any other infallible Interpreter of Scripture I desire him to direct me to him Till then I shall think it according to my Master's Rule not to be called nor to call any Man on Earth Master No Man I think has a right to prescribe to my Faith or Magisterially to impose his Interpretations or Opinions on me Nor is it material to any one what mine are any farther than they carry their own Evidence with them If this which I think makes me of no Sect entitles me to the Name of a Papist or a Socinian because the Unmasker thinks these the worst and most invidious he can give me and labours to fix them on me for no other reason but because I will not take him for my Master on Earth and his System for my Gospel I shall leave him to recommend himself to the World by this Skill who no doubt will have reason to thank him for the rareness and subtility of his Discovery For I think I am the first Man that ever was found out to be at the same time a Socinian and a Factor for Rome But what is too hard for such an Unmasker I must be what he thinks fit When he pleases a Papist and when he pleases a Socinian and when he pleases a Mahometan And probably when he has consider'd a little better an Atheist for I hardly scaped it when he writ last My Book he says hath a tendency to it and if he can but go on as he has done hitherto from Surmises to Certainties by that time he writes next his Discovery will be advanced and he will certainly find me an Atheist Only one thing I dare assure him of that he shall never find that I treat the things of God or Religion so as if I made only a Trade or a Jest of them But let us now see how at present he proves me a Socinian His first Argument is my not answering for my leaving out Matth. XXVIII 19. and Iohn I. 1. Pag. 82. of his Socinianism Unmask'd This he takes to be a Confession that I am a Socinian I hope he means fairly and that if it be so on my side it must be taken for a standing Rule between us that where any thing is not answer'd it must be taken for granted And upon that score I must desire him to remember some Passages of my Vindication which I have already and others which I shall mind him of hereafter which he passed over in Silence and hath had nothing to say to which therefore by his own rule I shall desire the Reader to observe that he has granted This being premised I must tell the Unmasker that I perceive he reads my Book with the same Understanding that he writes his own If he had done otherwise he might have seen that I had given him a reason for my omission of those two and other plain and obvious Passages and famous Testimonies in the Evangelists as he calls them where I say p. 11. That if I have leâ—t out none of those Passages or