of Gods Nature as if I mistake not Iacob Bemen does and then secundum hanc partum of illam will do the work and gives a true sence to both sides of the contradiction You should do any thing which could by any means make it seem possible rather than question a plain Divine Revelation Nay perhaps you do not think you can demonstrate the contrary to the solution I have helpt you out with at least that your Demonstration is but a seeming one and then I challenge your candour to own your sayings and demand why you are not bound to use this shift and a thousand others rather than violate your avow'd Rule of Faith and deny and hold against the clear Letter of Scripture If you alledge you have perfect Science of the contrary by Metaphysicks then though I expect not this from you your Science rules your Rule of Faith glossing or rather violently wresting the plain Letter and so is so absolutely your Rule of Faith that it controls and even baffles the other though clearly revealing Or if to be in express terms in Scripture be not to be clearly revealed I would fain know what those words clearly revealed in Scripture signifie 12. Perhaps you I say that notwithstanding your new Rule Reason must be your GVID still even in Faith though not your Rule But I ask if your Reason must guide you sometimes so as to deny the clear Letter of Scripture since a Guid in any thing must be regulated by some Knowledges in that Affair by what Principles or Knowledges Reason is to regulate it self while it guides you in that particular now in question By Principles of Faith How can that be in your Grounds antecedently to the known Sence of the Scripture By Principles of Human Science Then those Principles of Human Science give you the certain Sence of the Written Word when it self is insufficient and therefore are still truly your Rule of Faith and so you are forc't to fly back for refuge to the old Rule Human Reason which you seemingly renounc't when you had found your new Rule of the Scripture 'T is Evident then that some Maxims of your Reason are your Rule and not Scripture's Letter And this is what we reprehend in the Socinian and you too that chusing a wrong Rule of Faith so to avoid the Church you both gloss it as seems best to your Reason regulating her self by her own and those fallible Maxims They by certain acute and ingenious Sophistries proper to themselves you by the more school-boy way of Grammar and Dictionary Learning and so both of you make your Rule the thing Ruled Nor think to retort any part of this Discourse upon our Rule of Faith For this being the living voice of the Church delivers us a Determinate Sence of the Points we are to profess whereas Yours needs skils and helps of studious Reason to tell you what it would say Ours is alive and in the Breast and Actions of the Faithful yours is dead characters waxen-natur'd and pliable to the Dedalean fancies of the ingenious molders of new Opinions and so alone can satisfie no man as you handle it 13. No wonder now if having no certainer a Ground or Rule of Faith for her self your Church is shamefast of obliging others to believe her Man's nature could scarce own or permit so irrational a tyrannie Yet whether she does or does not we must not know from your words which run so backwards and forwards that none can tell which is the true face of the Ianus First p. 99. you seem to deny it stoutly from the carriage of your Convocations and Bishops and from your own Tenets Yet afterwards you seem to grant they do require a positive assent somtimes and justifie them as not doing it upon pretence of any Infallibility but because the thing determin'd is so Evident in Scripture that all denying it must be wilful A rare Discourse and worthy a deep consideration Pray who must be Judge it is so Evident in Scripture as to render the Dissenters guilty of flat Wilfulness The Bishops or your Church Nothing less In the beginning of this Discourse p. 93. you plainly deny'd them to be Judges of Faith Now in your sence to be clearly reveal'd or evident in Scripture and to be of Faith is all one so that they must not be Judges of what is evident in Scripture lest by necessary consequence they become Judges of Faith and yet without having power to judge what is evident in Scripture they must have power to require assent to Points as evident in Scripture nay and punish the dissenters too For 't is a madness for Governours to require any thing of their Subjects without having Rewards and Punishments in their hands to make what they require to be duely observâ—d Nay p. 93. you absolutely refus'd to admit them as Guides of your Faith A moderate word and less than to be a Iudge Which signifies they may have power to require our Assents in matters in which they have no power to guide us that is they may have power to require us to go wrong for any thing we or they know An excellent honour for the Church of England that her Champions profess in Print her Supreme Pastors have no power at all to guide their Flock in their Faith or to it when they are out of it Again I would ask whether the Trinity be not Evident in Scripture and the Socinians wilful for denying it Why are they then so kindly dealt with Or what could be reply'd to a Socinian answering when his Assent to the Trinity were required that he humbly submitted to Scripture that he us'd all the means he could but discover'd it not so evident there and thereupon complain'd that you obtruded upon his equally-learned party your own conceit or opinion for Scripture-Evidences What therefore you alledge here as in your Churches behalf that she requires not a positive assent upon pretence of any Infallibility more condemns Her seeing t is most absurd and irrational that one should require any man to assent to any point or proposition whatever as evident in Scripture without Infallible Certainty at least imagin'd and pretended that it is thus evident there for should it happen to be otherwise how ridiculous were his Authority how damnable and diabolical his Tyrannie to oblige men to the hazard of falshoods in matters of Faith that is in matters belonging to his eternal Salvation and in the mean time profess himself Ignorant whether they be false or no. 14. Now our Church goes another way which ere I declare I would let your party see that Interiour Assent may be required by Governours lawfully and rationally which your Principles can never make sence of Suppose a thousand witnesses from several places each of them held alwayes men of good consciences should swear in open Court that they had seen such and such actions done by such a man or that they had seen spoken or converst
be rendred interpretable that way Whence there are almost as many minds as men about the time when any change was made nay some of their best Champions Dr Whitaker and Mr Powel profess the time of the Romish Churches change cannot easily be told and that they cannot tell by whom or at what time the Enemy did sow the Papists Doctrin This I say being so 't is most Evident they decline the pretence of any Tradition against ours and the very way of deriving down orally and practically Sence writ in mens Hearts by matter of Fact working on their Senses and instead of that recurr to pittiful shreds and fragments oâ— words utterly unauthoriz'd if the Tradition for that Books Goodness can fail And if Catholick Tradition which in its source was so largely extended visible and practicable by all can faulter ten thousand times more easily may the Tradition for any particular Book which in comparison of the other can be but of a very obscure Original fail and deceive us Now that no Tradition is alledgeable against us by Protestants appears hence that their immediate Forefathers little more than an 100. Years ago being Catholicks that is holders of their Faith no Novelty but uninterruptedly descended could never conspire to deliver to them any such sence that the Roman Church had alter'd her Faith since they had the contrary sence writ in the Tables of their hearts Nor can they have recourse to the Greek Church for a Tradition opposit to ours for any points of Faith in which they differ from us for they will find none such Nor is the Greek Church Progenitours to them here in England nor by consequence can they derive traditionarily from them 18. No solid Argument from Reason or intrinsecal Principles is producible against Christian Tradition For since Arguments if solid are taken from Things or Nature and the Certainty of Christian Tradition is built on the best Nature that is Man 's not according to what is alterable in it but what is abstracting from disease absolutely unalterable that is on Knowledge imprinted by natural Sensations and this Knowledge strengthen'd and made most lively by the oft-repeatedness of those Sensations and the import of the Things known Also since most efficacious Causes actually appli'd that is impossible not to do the Effect and Effects impossible to be without such a Cause's Existence are engag'd for the ever-continuance or Uninterruptedness of Tradition as hath been shown Disc. 6. 8. and the force of those preserving Causes strengthen'd by the most powerful assistances of the Holy Ghost Disc. 9. or by best Graces superadded to best Nature 'T is impossible any solid Argument from Reason should be brought against Tradition 19. The arguing by way of some few Instances as the manner is can have no force against Tradition's Certainty and Indefectiveness For seeing a pretended Instance of Tradition's failing is a particular action presumed to be long ago past and particulars out of the very nature of being particulars are surrounded by a thousand individuating circumstances or rather constituted by them that is are plac't in the proper sphere of Contingency and that particular Action is put to be long ago past and â—o affects not our Senses by Experience in which is founded the force of Instances in regard Experimental Knowledge is a necessary Effect of the Things being such as it is known Nor have we or can we have without Tradition any certain knowledge Coroll 16. that the Points of Faith pretended to have miscarried or to have been alter'd then or else the manner of expressing them were not mistaken then or misrepresented to us now nor that Interest for example of one party passion between both ambiguity of words slightness or confusedness of report grounding the Historians narration rashness of belief in him corruption of his Books since they were writ and innumerable other chances apt to occasion mistake did not intervene any of which would render the Instance uncertain and the Argument from it Inconclusive Again seeing we can have certainty of our own meaning of our words when we demonstrate and also of our consequence it follows that the way for a solid man to answer Traditions pretended demonstrableness must be to show the incoherence of the Terms and not to bring some old story against it which were to produce Uncertainty known to be such against pretended Certainty and not yet known to be other than such nay whos 's Evidence we cannot in reason deny till we can solve the connexion of Terms drawn from intrinsecal Mediums on which 't is built 20. The denying Tradition is a proper and necessary disposition to Fanatickness For since no Argument taken from any dead or written Testimony Coroll 12. 14. 16. nor living Testimony of Tradition Coroll 13. 17. nor from any thing in Nature Coroll 18. that is from any thing without us which is a second Cause is valid against Tradition It follows that Tradition cannot be denied but by pretending some Light or Knowledge within us deriv'd from the immediate Influence of the First Cause To which pretence helps its difficulty to be confuted in regard 't is easie to stand stiff in this Tenet that they see clearly such Truths by an inward Light and that therefore it were a madness to go about to confute their own manifest Experience whereas were Arguments produc-t openly they and their confutations might be publisht together and the Truth would lie expos'd to the scanning and decision of the Indifferent part of the world and be clear'd by a few Replies if a right method of discourse be taken Wherefore since Nature will easily teach the obstinate deniers of any Principle to avail themselves by the best plea they can to escape confuting 't is manifest that Nature will connaturally carry the deniers of Tradition to Fanatick Pranciples and that men are so long and no longer preserv'd from Fanatickness than they follow Tradition or the openly declar'd Sence of Forefathers either in our Church or some other Congregation Again Tradition being the way of coming to Faith by the open use of our Senses the denying it must drive the deniers to deny that way and to recurr to Knowledge had some other way Not to Knowledge acquir'd by human skill the Knowledge of such high mysteries being confessedly more than human therefore to infus'd Knowledge and this not infus'd by ordinary wayes as preaching teaching of Forefathers and such like as we experience such Knowledges to be infus'd into us for this again falls into the way of Tradition therefore they can onely have refuge to inward Light or Knowledge infus'd extraordinarily or without connatural means to make which the common road of receiving Heaven's Influences is the very definition of Fanatickness 21. Fanatick Principles can have no force against Tradition though unconfutable but by it For since they pretend for their ground a Light within imprinted on such a manner as manifests God the Authour that is an Effect
true Sence of that Letter in Points of Faith deliver'd See Coroll 29. 30 it follows that Scripture alledged by the Church relying on Tradition for its Rule engages certainly and fully the very Authority of the Divinely inspir'd Writer himself and gives that Testimony the whole Effect upon our understanding which that Sacred Writers Authority deserves to have given it No wonder then the Council proceeding upon Traditionary Interpretation as it constantly declares it self to do honours Scripture-Testimony so as to put it before Tradition or the delivery of Christs Doctrin from hand to hand Scripture thus alledg'd and securd having the same force as if the Apostle or Evangelist himself should sit in the Council and by way of living voice declar'd his own Sence in the matter to whom thus present what deference the Council would have given is obvious to be imagin'd Hence also the Protestant may see what high esteem our Church gives to Gods Word truly so calld that is having Gods Sence certainly-known to be such in it and that 't is onely the outward Letter as us'd to hammer a Faith out of by wordish skills that is indeed their Method of interpreting it which by reason of its Uncertainty falls short of engaging the Sacred Authority of Gods Word we fleight and scorn And most justly since 't is the having no better way to work on Scripture which has brought Scripture it self thus usâ—d to scorn and contempt as appears in the carriage of our Bedlam of new Sects in England I expect here some mighty man of talk but very weak Speculator should object that this is an excellent way to bring all into our Churches hands But till he can prove that both Letter Sence of Scripture are knowable with such a Certainty as to build on them that most firm Assent call'd Faith by any other way than this of Tradition I can neither hinder my Inferences nor will he ever be able to confute my discourse 20. Thus much to show evidently that the Substance of the Doctrin we have given in our former Discourses is the very Sence of our Church at present and that her present Sence in this matter is agreeable to the Judgment of Antient Fathers and Councils I have no more to do now but to show that at the very time of the Breach here in England the Catholick was found adhering fast to this Rule of Tradition renounc't by the Protestant This is evident by the Protestants own confession For as oft as you hear them alledge that England was formerly overgrown with Popery that the new Light of the Gâ—spel hath of late discovered it self that they reformâ—d in Faith that the former Church errd and such like expressions which naturally must burst out from them so oft you hear them acknowledge themselves Deserters of Tradition and Innovators Which Expressions of theirs by the way easily manifest to the most vulgar understanding who â—tis that hath renounct Tradition whence it being also easily evidenceable to the rudest capacity that Tradition is a most certain way of bringing down Faith Disc. 5. § 8. the most vulgar Soul is capable of knowing which Profession it is to follow For the two former points being known they are Certain by motives within their own Ken that Protestants have renounct the Certain way to bring down Faith but that we renounct Tradition of old is unacknowledged by us disputable and onely knowable by skills they are not Masters of Common Sense then teaching them they must guide themselves by reasons they are capable of and not by reasons of which they know nothing and that God requires no more at their hands than they can do Gods goodness has provided for those weak people out of the very Confessions of Traditionâ—s deserters Certain means to judge whether they ought to be Catholicks or Protestants But to return whence we diverted 21. It is not onely the Protestants own Confession but the open Profession of the Catholick Clergy in the very nick of the Breach manifests our claim and constant adherence to Tradition Whose Declaration found in the Synodal Book 1559. begins thus Because by relation of publick Fame it hath lately come to our knowledge that many Tenets of Christian Religion hitherto received and approvâ—d by the Publick and 〈◊〉 Consent of Christian Nations and BROVGHT DOWN BY HANDS even from the Apostles to Vs are callâ—d into doubt Therefore c. Where we find them stick firmly to Tradition And insisting on this Principle they proceed to make a Profession of their Faith which they exhibit to the Bishops to be given to the Lord Keeper but the State by power over-bearing the Votes of the Reverend Convocation and persecuting them for their constancy the Breach ensuâ—d The Catholick cleaving fast to his Old Rule Tradition the Protestants chusing a new one of Scripture privately interpreted whose vanity a little reason makes them see but experience perfectly find and relinquishing the Antient Rule so demonstrably self-evident secure and solid By which means they became cut off from the onely Certain way to know Christs Sence that is from the Root of Faith and consequently from the Body of the Church The Guilt of which Fact neither Human Authority Multitude Prosperity Continuance nor yet all their Voluminous wordish Excuses will ever be able to Efface ANIMADVERSIONS On Dr. Pierce's Sermon Also on Mr. Whitby and Mr. Stillingfleet where they touch the Way lay'd in the foregoing Discourses In Three Appendixes Psalm 63. Sagittae parvulorum factae sunt Plagae eorum Anno Dom. 1665. TRANSITION To The following APPENDIXES I Have finisht my Discourse how dexterously must be determin'd by the Iudgment of my Readers and Confutation from mâ—â—e Adversaries But I account those onely my proper Iudges competent Adversaries who lay their Principles ere they discourse and weigh the efficaciousness of their Testimonies in the Scales of Reason ere they alledge them If I find a man laying no Principles of his own but supposing them and making account all men must admit them out of respect to him or his party and yet bend all his endeavours to cavil at Principles laid by others to ascertain and establish the Groundwork of Christianity If I find one ignorant of or resolv'd against the onely-Certain method and Rule of Discourse which is that No Position deserves Assent unless the Connexion of its Terms be Evident which must either be when they are Evidently connected of themselves of which nature ought to be all First Principles or made evidently-connected by the interposition of some other which we call Evident-by-consequence or Deduction Lastly if I find a man wedded to Parrat-talk of Ayr and Sounds that he thinks it a rare thing to load margents with Citations without first distinguishing them and considering what strength each ought to have according to rational Principles I decline such an empty Soul for my Iudge and sleight him as mine Adversary And lest any should impute this carriage to me
the most vulgar that every Man has a Principle in him impelling him to Act which we agree to call a Will Such likewise are all Propositions of this Nature which the Church uses upon occasion of some emergent Heresie to explain her self and put the point of Faith out of danger of being equivocated Examples of the later sort are Theological Conclusions in which a Natural Truth is one of the Premises joyning with the Supernatural one to infer them To omit this as little to our purpose at present Of the former sort the Church is necessitated to make use upon occasion that is when any Heretick questions Those and eâdem operâ the whole point of Faith it self of which they were a part Upon occasion I say For what concern'd its the Faithful or who ever heard much noise of this Proposition Christ has two Wills thus singled out and exprest apart till the Monothelite granting him but one forc't the Church that she might preserve the main Tenet of Christ's having two Natures or being God and Man to maintain publish and define that other 6. To apply this then since none can have Obligation to believe what they have not obligation to think of and that in some Age the Generality of the Faithful have no Occasion nor consequently Obligation to minde reflect or think on those Propositions involvd in the main stock of Faith and truly parts of it that is indeed It It follows that a Thing may be de fide or obligatory to be believ'd in one Age and not in another Perhaps Mr. Stillingfleet may ask how the Church can have Power to oblige the Generality to Belief of such a point I answer she obliges them to believe the main Point of Faith by virtue of Tradition's being a Self-evident Rule and these Imply'd Points by virtue of their being self-evidently-connected with those main and perpetually-us'd Points so that the vulgar can be rationally and connaturally made capable of this their Obligation Whence the Government of our Church is still justify'd to be sweet and according to right Nature and yet forcible and Efficacious to hold her Subjects in a strict Union Not to mention how these Points also descended by a kind of Tradition for I doubt not but the Apostles had occasion in explaining Faith to speak of These however the no Necessity brought them not so much into play but left them unreflected on by the Generality 7. But to return to Mr. Stillingfleet who acts here like a Politician and would conquer us by first dividing us and making odious Comparisons between two parties of Divines But he may please to reflect how we all hold firmly the same divinely-constituted Church-Government and the same self-evident Rule of Faith to give our understandings the same principles as Christians and so our wills the same Actions And those are firmly rooted in all our hearts to have been recommended to us by the wisdom of the Eternal Father Whence 't is Impossible for all the Wit of Man or even Malice of Hell to disunite us as we are Faithful As private Discoursers our different Natures and Circumstances must needs distinguish us Every one believes the same but coming to explicate this Belief they vary according to the several degrees of perfection in their understanding Powers And yet M. Stillingfleet is not aware how little we differ even as Divines For though some Speculaters attribute to the Church a power of defining things not held before yet few will say she has New Revelations or New Articles of Faith those only some Lawyers who talk ultra crepidam no Divines that I know of and none that Christ was not a perfect Law-giver which are necessary Consequents or rather in a manner Identical to the other And when it comes to the point those men explain themselves that all was deliver'd Faith either Explicitly or Implicitly which I have shown to bear a very good Sence in my Explication of de fide He tells us Popes and Councils challenge a power to make things de fide in one Age which was not in another he speaks onely in common and proves it not Had he brought Instances it might have been better clear'd In the mean time I have shown him how take them right this is both perfectly innocent and unavoidably necessary to a Church What would avail him is if a Pope and Council should define a new Thing and declare they ground themselves on new Lights as did their first Reformers in England But he will finde no such fopperies in Faith-definitions made by the Catholick Church He tells us that this is the common Doctrin maintain'd By which I perceive he is at an end of his Argument against our Church there being no evidenter signe of it than to leave off assaulting Her confound her with the Schools or some private Opinaters and then carp at these mens Tenets Whereas M. Stillingfleet wants not Wit to know that no sober Catholick holds Human deductions the Rule of our Faith Schoolmen Definers of it nor the Schools the Tribunal whence to propose it authoritatively and obligingly to the Generality of the Faithful much less a few Divines which are far from reaching the Authority of the Schools Yet how much of his Book would need no Answer were this Impertinent Topick laid aside But well Let Schools and Church be all one that is let every master of divinity be a Bishop what means he to conclude from the words common Doctrin Does he make account every School-Doctrin must be equally in vogue or that an Opinion's being Common defines it Faith and condemns the other for Heretical Where 's his Reason The direct contrary follows from its being Common and that 't is not Faith which others though not so many may contradict and he is but meanly vers't in our Schools if he sees not very many publikely maintain that there are no new Revelations without dreading Excommunication or being held Heretical and seditious So they grant the Church power as they ought by new Propositions and new but expressive Words yet both the same in sence and so not new in substance to meet with the new blundering Cavils of Innovators 8. Yet all this while M. Stillingfleet cannot see how to satisfie himself of the Sence of our Church as to this particular Nor ever will while he wilfully looks the wrong way that is towards some particular Schoolmen or Divines not towards the Universality of the Faithful or Church What need he counterfeit this puzzle Did he never hear of such a thing as the Council of Trent Or is it so hard to finde it Again does not he know all the Catholick Church allow more a thousand times to It than to all the Schoolmen in the World Yes very well How comes it then that he runs to some Schoolmen and neglects the Church speaking in her Representative Because he may finde there a clear Solution of his doubt by the constant procedure of that most grave