tho one rose again from the dead Luke 16. 31. THE LIVELY ORACLES GIVEN TO US Or the Christians Birth-right and Duty in the custody and use of the HOLY SCRIPTURE SECT I. The several Methods of Gods communicating the knowledg of himself GOD as he is invisible to human eies so is he unfathomable by human understandings the perfection of his nature and the impotency of ours setting us at too great a distance to have any clear perception of him Nay so far are we from a full comprehension that we can discern nothing at all of him but by his own light those discoveries he hath bin pleas'd to make of himself 2. THOSE have bin of several sorts The first was by infusion in mans creation when God interwove into mans very constitution and being the notions and apprehensions of a Deity and at the same instant when he breath'd into him a living soul imprest on it that native religion which taught him to know and reverence his Creator which we may call the instinct of humanity Nor were those principles dark and confus'd but clear and evident proportionable to the ends they were design'd to which were not only to contemplate the nature but to do the will of God practice being even in the state of innocence preferrable before an unactive speculation 3. BUT this Light being soon eclips'd by Adams disobedience there remain'd to his benighted posterity only som faint glimmerings which were utterly insufficient to guide them tho their end without fresh aids and renew'd manifestations of God to them It pleas'd God therefore to repair this ruine and by frequent revelations to communicate himself to the Patriarchs in the first Ages of the World afterwards to Prophets and other holy men till at last he reveled himself yet more illustriously in the face of Jesus Christ 2 Cor. 4. 6. 4. THIS is the one great comprehensive Revelation wherein all the former were involv'd and to which they pointed the whole mystery of Godliness being compris'd in this of Gods being manifested in the flesh and the consequents thereof 1 Tim. 3. 16. whereby our Savior as he effected our reconciliation with God by the sacrifice of his death so he declar'd both that and all things else that it concern'd man to know in order to bliss in his doctrin and holy life And this Teacher being not only sent from God Jo. 3. but being himself God blessed for ever it cannot be that his instructions can want any supplement Yet that they might not want attestation neither to the incredulous world he confirm'd them by the repeted miracles of his life and by the testimony of those who saw the more irrefragable conviction of his Resurrection and Ascension And that they also might not want credit and enforcement the holy Spirit set to his seal and by his miraculous descent upon the Apostles both asserted their commission and enabled them for the discharge of it by all gifts necessary for the propagating the Faith of Christ over the whole World 5. THESE were the waies by which God was pleased to revele himself to to the Forefathers of our Faith and that not only for their sakes but ours also to whom they were to derive those divine dictats they had receiv'd Saint Stephen tells us those under the Law receiv'd the lively Oracles to deliver down to their posterity Act. 7. 38. And those under the Gospel who receiv'd yet more lively Oracles from him who was both the Word and the Life did it for the like purpose to transmit it to us upon whom the ends of the world are come By this all need of repeted Revelations is superseded the faithful deriving of the former being sufficient to us for all things that pertain to life and godliness 2 Pet. 1. 3. 6. AND for this God whose care is equal for all successions of men hath graciously provided by causing Holy Scriptures to be writ by which he hath deriv'd on every succeeding Age the illuminations of the former And for that purpose endowed the Writers not only with that moral fidelity requisite to the truth of History but with a divine Spirit proportionable to the great design of fixing an immutable rule for Faith and Manners And to give us the fuller security herein he has chosen no other pen-men of the New Testament then those who were the first oral Promulgers of our Christian Religion so that they have left to us the very same doctrin they taught the Primitive Christians and he that acknowledges them divinely inspir'd in what they preach'd cannot doubt them to be so in what they writ So that we all may injoy virtually and effectively that wish of the devout Father who desir'd to be Saint Pauls Auditor for he that hears any of his Epistles read is as really spoke to by Saint Paul as those who were within the sound of his voice Thus God who in times past spake at sundry times and in diverse manners to our Fathers by the Prophets and in the later daies by his son Heb. 1. 1 2. continues still to speak to us by these inspir'd Writers and what Christ once said to his Disciples in relation to their preaching is no less true of their writings He that despiseth you despiseth me Luk. 10. 16. All the contemt that is at any time flung on these sacred Writings rebounds higher and finally devolves on the first Author of those doctrins whereof these are the Registres and Transcripts 7. BUT this is a guilt which one would think peculiar to Infidels and Pagans and not incident to any who had in their Baptism listed themselves under Christs banner yet I fear I may say of the two parties the Scripture has met with the worst treatment from the later For if we mesure by the frequency and variety of injuries I fear Christians will appear to have out-vied Heathens These bluntly disbelieve them neglect nay perhaps scornfully deride them Alas Christians do this and more they not only put contemts but tricks upon the Scripture wrest and distort it to justify all their wild phancies or secular designs and suborn its Patronage to those things it forbids and tells us that God abhors 8. INDEED so many are the abuses we offer it that he that considers them would scarce think we own'd it for the words of a sensible man much less of the great omniscient God And I believe 't were hard to assign any one so comprehensive and efficacious cause of the universal depravation of manners as the disvaluing of this divine Book which was design'd to regulate them It were therefore a work worthy another inspired writing to attemt the rescue of this and recover it to its just estimate Yet alas could we hope for that we have scoffers who would as well despise the New as the Old and like the Husbandmen in the Gospel Mat. 21. 36. would answer such a succession of messages by repeting the same injuries 9. To such as these 't is I confess
Tradition but by the Book of the Law found in the Temple that Josiah was both excited to reform Religion and instructed how to do it 2 Kings 22. 10. And had not that or som other copy bin produc'd they had bin much in the dark as to the particulars of their reformation which that they had not bin convei'd by Tradition appears by the sudden startling of the King upon the reading of the Law which could not have bin had he bin before possest with the contents of it In like manner we find in Nehemiah that the observation of the Feast of Tabernacles was recover'd by consulting the Law the Tradition whereof was wholly worn out or else it had sure bin impossible that id could for so long a time have bin intermitted Neh. 8. 18. And yet mens memories are commonly more retentive of an external visible rite then they are of speculative Propositions or moral Precepts 30. THESE instances shew how fallible an expedient mere oral Tradition is for transmission to posterity But admit no such instance could be given 't is argument enough that God has by his own choice of writing given the preference to it Nor has he barely chosen it but has made it the standard by which to mesure all succeeding pretences 'T is the means he prescribes for distinguishing divine from diabolical Inspirations To the Law and to the Testimony if they speak not according to this Word there is no light in them Isai. 8. 20. And when the Lawier interrogated our Savior what he should do to inherit eternal life he sends him not to ransac Tradition or the cabalistical divinity of the Rabbins but refers him to the Law What is written in the Law how readest thou Luk. 10. 26. And indeed throout the Gospel we still find him in his discourse appealing to Scripture and asserting its autority as on the other side inveighing against those Traditions of the Elders which had evacuated the written Word Ye make the Word of God of none effect by your Tradition Mat. 15. 6. Which as it abundantly shews Christs adherence to the written Word so 't is a pregnant instance how possible it is for Tradition to be corrupted and made the instrument of imposing mens phancies even in contradiction to Gods commands 31. AND since our blessed Lord has made Scripture the test whereby to try Traditions we may surely acquiesce in his decision and either embrace or reject Traditions according as they correspond to the supreme rule the written Word It must therefore be a very unwarrantable attemt to set up Tradition in competition with much more in contradiction to that to which Christ himself hath subjected it 32. Saint Paul reckons it as the principal privilege of the Jewish Church that it had the Oracles of God committed to it i. e. that the holy Scriptures were deposited and put in its custody and in this the Christian Church succeeds it and is the guardian and conservator of holy Writ I ask then had the Jewish Church by vertue of its being keeper a power to supersede any part of those Oracles intrusted to them if so Saint Paul was much out in his estimate and ought to have reckon'd that as their highest privilege But indeed the very nature of the trust implies the contrary and besides 't is evident that is the very crime Christ charges upon the Jews in the place above cited And if the Jewish Church had no such right upon what account can the Christian claim any Has Christ enlarg'd its Charter has he left the sacred Scriptures with her not to preserve and practice but to regulate and reform to fill up its vacancies and supply its defects by her own Traditions if so let the commission be produc'd but if her office be only that of guardianship and trust she must neither substract from nor by any superadditions of her own evacuate its meaning and efficacy and to do so would be the same guilt that it would be in a person intrusted with the fundamental Records of a Nation to foist in fuch clauses as himself pleases 33 IN short God has in the Scriptures laid down exact rules for our belief and practice and has entrusted the Church to convey them to us if she vary or any way enervate them she is false to that trust but cannot by it oblige us to recede from that rule she should deliver to comply with that she obtrudes upon us The case may be illustrated by an easy resemblance Suppose a King have a forreign principality for which he composes a body of Laws annexes to them rewards and penalties and requires an exact and indispensable conformity to them These being put in writing he sends by a select messenger now suppose this messenger deliver them yet saies withall that himself has autority from the King to supersede these Laws at his plesure so that their last resort must be to his dictats yet produces no other testimony but his own bare affirmation Is it possible that any men in their wits should be so stupidly credulous as to incur the penalty of those Laws upon so improbable an indemnity And sure it would be no whit less madness in Christians to violate any precept of God on an ungrounded supposal of the Churches power to dispense with them 34. AND if the Church universal have not this power nor indeed ever claim'd it it must be a strange insolence for any particular Church to pretend to it as the Church of Rome do's as if we should owe to her Tradition all our Scripture and all our Faith insomuch that without the supplies which she affords from the Oracle of her Chair our Religion were imperfect and our salvation insecure Upon which wild dictates I shall take liberty in a distinct Section farther to animadvert SECT VI. The suffrage of the primitive Christian Church concerning the propriety and fitness which the Scripture has towards the attainment of its excellent end AGAINST what has bin hitherto said to the advantage of the holy Scripture there opposes it self as we have already intimated the autority of the Church of Rome which allows it to be only an imperfect rule of Faith saying in the fourth Session of the Council of Trent that Christian faith and discipline are contain'd in the Books written and unwritten Tradition And in the fourth rule of the Index put forth by command of the said Council the Scripture is declar'd to be so far from useful that its reading is pernicious if permitted promiscuously in the vulgar Tongue and therefore to be withheld insomuch that the study of the holy Bible is commonly by persons of the Roman Communion imputed to Protestants as part of their heresy they being call'd by them in contemt the Evangelical men and Scripturarians And the Bible in the vulgar Tongue of any Nation is commonly reckon'd among prohibited Books and as such publicly burnt when met with by the Inquisitors and the person who is found with it
we perform our parts of the condition it gives us the most certain assurance engages Gods veracity that he will not fail on his By this it gives us support against all the adversities of life assuring us the sufferings of it are not worthy to be compared with the glory we expect Rom. 8. 18. yea and against the terrors of death too by assuring us that what we look on as a dissolution is but a temporary parting and we only put off our bodies that they may put of corruption and be clothed with immortality 28. THESE and the like are the doctrins the holy Scripture offers to us and we may certainly say they are faithful sayings and worthy of all acceptation 1 Tim. 4. 15. The notions it gives us of God are so sublime and great that they cannot but affect us with reverence and admiration and yet withall so amiable and endearing that they cannot but raise love and gratitude affiance and delight 29. AND which is yet more these milder Attributes are apt to inspirit us with a generous ambition of assimilation excite us to transcribe all his imitable excellencies in which the very Heathens could discern consisted the accomplishment of human felicity 30. AND then the knowledg it gives us of our selves do's us the kindest office imaginable keeps us from those swelling thoughts we are too apt to entertain and shews us the necessity of bottoming our hopes upon a firmer foundation and then again keeps us from being lazy or secure by shewing us the necessity of our own endevors In a word it teaches us to be humble and industrious and whoever is so ballasted can hardly be shipwrackt 31. THESE are the excellencies of the doctrinal part of Scripture which also renders them most aptly preparative for the preceptive And indeed so they were design'd the Credenda and the Agenda being such inseparable relations that whoever parts them forfeits the advantage of both The most solemn profession of Christ the most importunate invocations Lord Lord will signify nothing to them which do not the things which he saies Mat. 7. And how excellent how rational those precepts are which the Scripture proposes to us from him is our next point of consideration 32. THE first Law which God gave to mankind was that of nature And tho the impressions of it upon the mind be by Adams fall exceedingly dimm'd and defac'd yet that derogates nothing from the dignity and worth of that Law which God has bin so far from cancelling that he seems to have made it the rule and square of his subsequent Laws so that nothing is injoin'd in those but what is consonant and agreable to that The Moral Law given in the Decalogue to the Jews the Evangelical Law given in the Gospel tho Christians have this natural Law for their basis and foundation They licence nothing which that prohibits and very rarely prohibit any thing which it licences 33. 'T IS true Christ in his Sermon on the Mount raises Christians to a greater strictness then the Jews thought themselves oblig'd to but that was not by contradicting either the natural or moral Law but by rescuing the later from those corruptions which the false glosses of the Scribes and Pharisees had mixt with it and reducing it to its primitive integrity and extent In a word as the Decalogue was given to repair the defacings and renew the impressions of the natural Law so the precepts of the Gospel were design'd to revive and illustrate both And accordingly we find Christ in the matter of divorce calls them back to this natural Law In the beginning it was not so Mat. 19. 8. I say not but that even these natural notions are in som instances refin'd and elevated by Christ the second Adam being to repair the fall of the first with advantage but yet he still builds upon that ground-work introduces nothing that is inconsistent with it 34. AND this accordance between these several Laws is a circumstance that highly recommends Scripture precepts to us We cannot imagin but that God who made man for no other end but to be an instrument of his glory and a recipient of all communicable parts of his happiness would assign him such rules and mesures as were most conducive to those ends And therefore since the Scripture injunctions are of the same mould we must conclude them to be such as tend to the perfection of our being the making us what God originally intend us and he that would not be that will certainly chuse much worse for himself 35. I know there have bin prejudices taken up against the precepts of Christ as if they impos'd unreasonable unsupportable strictnesses upon men and som have assum'd liberty to argue mutinously against them nay against God too for putting such natural appetites into men and then forbidding them to satisfy them 36. BUT the ground of this cavil is the not rightly distinguishing of natural appetites which are to be differenc'd according to the two states of rectitude and depravation those of the first rank are the appetites God put into man and those were all regular and innocent such as tended to the preservation of his being nature in its first integrity mesuring its desires by its needs Now Christs prohibitions are not directed against these he forbids no one kind of these desires And tho the precept of self-denial may somtimes restrain us in som particular acts yet that is but proportionable to that restraint Adam was under in relation to the forbidden tree a particular instance of his obedience and fence of his safety So that if men would consider nature under this its first and best notion they cannot accuse Christ of being severe to it 37. BUT 't is manifest they take it in another acception and mean that corruption of nature which inordinatly inclines to sensitive things and on this account they call their riots their luxuries appetites put into them by God whereas 't is manifest this was superinduced from another coast The wise man gives us its true pedigree in what he saies of death which is its twin-sister By the envy of the devil came death into the world Wis. 2. 24. And can they expect that Christ who came to destroy the works of the devil 1 Joh. 3. 8. should frame Laws in their favor make Acts of toleration and indulgence for them This were to annul the whole design of his coming into the world which was to restore us from our lapst estate and elevate us to those higher degrees of purity which he came not only to â—rescribe but to exemplify to us 38. BUT in this affair men often take nature â—n a yet wider and worse notion and under natural desires comprehend whatever upon any sort of motive they have a mind to do The awe of a superior the importunity of a companion custom and example make men do many ill things to which their nature would never promt them nay many times such as their nature
whereas the will in all other oppressions retains its liberty this tyranny brings that also into vassallage renders our spirits so mean and servile that we chuse bondage are apt to say with the Israelites Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians Ex. 14. 12. 83. AND what greater kindness can be don for people in this forlorn abject condition then to animate them to cast off this yoke and recover their freedom And to this are most of the Scripture exhortations addrest as may be seen in a multitude of places particularly in the sixth chapter to the Romans the whole scope whereof is directly to this purpose 84. NOR do's it only sound the alarm put us upon the contest with our enemies but it assists us in it furnishes us with that whole armor of God which we find describ'd Eph. 6. 13. Nay further it excites our courage by assuring us that if we will not basely surrender our selves we can never be overpower'd if we do but stand our ground resist our enemy he will fly from us Ja. 4. 7. And to that purpose it directs us under what banner we are to list our selves even his who hath spoil'd principalities and powers Col. 2. 15. to whose conduct and discipline if we constantly adhere we cannot miss of victory 85. AND then lastly it sets before us the prize of this conquest that we shall not only recover our liberty manumit our selves from the vilest bondage to the vilest and cruellest oppressors but we shall be crown'd for it too be rewarded for being kind to our selves and be made happy eternally hereafter for being willing to be happy here 89. AND sure these are terms so apparently advantageous that he must be infinitly stupid foolish to destruction that will not be thus made wise unto salvation that despifes or cavils at this divine Book which means him so much good which designs to make him live here generously and according to the dignity of his nature and in the next world to have that nature sublimated and exalted made more capacious of those refin'd and immense felicities which there await all who will qualify themselves for them who as the Apostle speaks by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honor and immortality eternal life Rom. 2. 7. 87. BUT besides the greatest and principal advantages which concern our spiritual interest it takes in also the care of our secular directs us to such a managery of our selves as is naturally apt to promote a quiet and happy life It s injunction to live peaceable with all men keeps us out of the way of many misadventures which turbulent unruly spirits meet with and so secures our peace So also as to wealth it puts us into the fairest road to riches by prescribing diligence in our callings what is thus got being like sound flesh which will stick by us whereas the hasty growth of ill-gotten wealth is but a tumor and impostume which the bigger it swells the sooner it bursts and leaves us lanker then before In like manner it shews us also how to guard our reputation by providing honest things not only in the sight of God but also in the sight of men Cor. 8. 28. by abstaining even from all appearance of evil 1 Thes. 5. 22. and making our light shine before men Mat. 5. 16. It provides too for our ease and tranquillity supersedes our anxious cares and sollicitud's by directing us to cast our burden upon the Lord Psal. 55. 22. and by a reliance on his providence how to secure to our selves all we really want Finally it fixes us in all the changes supports us under all the pressures comforts us amidst all the calamities of this life by assuring us they shall all work together for good to those that love God Ro. 8. 28. 88. NOR do's the Scripture design to promote our interests consider'd only singly and personally but also in relation to Societies and Communities it gives us the best rules of distributive and commutative Justice teaches us to render to all their dues Ro. 13. 7. to keep our words to observe inviolably all our pacts and contracts nay tho they prove to our damage Psa. 15. 4. and to preserve exact fidelity and truth which are the sinews of human commerce It infuses into us noble and generous principles to prefer a common good before our private and that highest flight of Ethnic vertue that of dying for ones Country is no more then the Scripture prescribes even for our common brethren 1 To. 3. 16. 89. BUT besides these generals it descends to more minute directions accommodated to our several circumstances it gives us appropriate rules in reference to our distinct relations whether natural civil ecclesiastical or oeconomical And if men would but universally conform to them to what a blessed harmony would it tune the world what order and peace would it introduce There would then be no oppressive Governors nor mutinous Subjects no unnatural Parents nor contumacious Children no idle Shepherds or straying Flocks none of those domestic jars which oft disquiet and somtimes subvert families all would be calm and serene and give us in reality that golden Age whereof the Poets did but dream 90. THIS tendency of the Scripture is remarkably acknowledg'd in all our public Judicatories where before any testimony is admitted we cause the person that is to give his testimony first to lay hold of with his hands then with his mouth to kiss the holy Scriptures as if it were impossible for those hands which held the mysteries of Truth to be immediatly emploi'd in working falsehood or that those lips which had ador'd those holy Oracles should be polluted with perjuries and lies And I fear the civil Government is exceedingly shaken at this day in its firmest foundation by the little regard is generally had of the holy Scriptures and what is consequent thereto the oaths that are taken upon them 91. 'T IS true we are far remov'd from that state which Esaiah prophecied of under the Gospel tho we have the Bible among us that when the Law should go forth of Sion and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem they should heat their swords into plow-shares and their spears into pruning hooks Es. 2. 4. but that is not from any defect in it but from our own perversness we have it but as the Apostle speaks in another sense as if we had it not 1 Cor. 7. 29. We have it that is use it to purposes widely different from what it means Som have it as a Supersedeas to all the duty it injoins and so they can but cap texts talk glibly of Scripture are not at all concern'd to practice it som have it as their Arsenal to furnish them with weapons not against their spiritual enemies but their secular applying all the damnatory sentences they there find to all those to whose persons or opinions they have prejudice And som have it as a Scene of their mirth
a topic of raillery dress their profane and scurrilous jests in its language and study it for no other end but to abuse it And whilst we treat it at this vile rate no wonder we are never the better for it For alas what will it avail us to have the most soveraign Balsom in our possession if instead of applying it to our wounds we trample it under our feet 92 BUT tho we may frustrate the use we cannot alter the nature of things Gods design in giving us the Scripture was to make us as happy as our nature is capable of being and the Scripture is excellently adapted to this end for as to our eternal felicity all that believe there is any such state must acknowledg the Scripture chalks us out the ready way to it not only because 't is dictated by God who infallibly knows it but also by its prescribing those things which are in themselves best and which a sober Heathen would adjudg fittest to be rewarded And as to our temporal happiness I dare appeal to any unprejudic'd man whether any thing can contribute more to the peace and real happiness of mankind then the universal practice of the Scripture rules would do Would God we would all conspire to make the experiment and then doubtless not only our reason but our sense too would be convinc'd of it 93. AND as the design is thus beneficial so in the second place is it as extensive also Time was when the Jews had the inclosure of divine Revelation when the Oracles of God were their peculiar depositum and the Heathen had not the knowledg of his Laws Ps. 147. ult but since that by the goodness of God the Gentiles are become fellow-heirs Eph. 3. 6. he hath also deliver'd into their hands the deeds and evidences of their future state given them the holy Scriptures as the exact and authentic registres of the covenant between God and man and these not to be like the heathen Oracles appropriated to som one or two particular places so that they cannot be consulted but at the expence of a pilgrimage but laid open to the view of all that will believe themselves concern'd 94. IT was a large commission our Savior gave his Disciples go preach the Gospel to every creature Mar. 16. 15. which in the narrowest acception must be the Gentile world and yet their oral Gospel did not reach farther then the writen for wherever the Christian Faith was planted the holy Scriptures were left as the records of it nay as the conservers of it too the standing rule by which all corruptions were to be detected 'T is true the entire Canon of the New Testament as we now have it was not all at once deliver'd to the Church the Gospels and Epistles being successively writ as the needs of Christians and the encroachments of Heretics gave occasion but at last they became all together the common magazine of the Church to furnish arms both defensive and offensive For as the Gospel puts in our hands the shield of Faith so the Epistles help us to hold it that it may not be wrested out of our hands again either by the force of persecution or the sly insinuations of vice or heresy 95. THUS the Apostles like prudent leaders have beat up the Ambushes discover'd the snares that were laid for us and by discomfiting Satans forlorn hope that earliest Set of false teachers and corrupt practices which then invaded the Church have laid a foundation of victory to the succeeding Ages if they will but keep close to their conduct adhere to those sacred Writings they have left behind them in every Church for that purpose 96. Now what was there deposited was design'd for the benefit of every particular member of that Church The Bible was not committed like the Regalia or rarities of a Nation to be kept under lock and key and consequently to constitute a profitable office for the keepers but expos'd like the Brazen Serpent for universal view and benefit that sacred Book like the common air being every mans propriety yet no mans inclosure yet there are a generation of men whose eies have bin evil because Gods have bin good who have seal'd up this spring monopoliz'd the word of Life and will allow none to partake of it but such persons and in such proportions as they please to retail it an attemt very insolent in respect of God whose purpose they contradict and very injurious in respect of man whose advantage they obstruct The iniquity of it will be very apparent if we consider what is offer'd in the following Section SECT IV. The Custody of the holy Scripture is a privilege and right of the Christian Church and every member of it which cannot without impiety to God and injustice unto it and them be taken away or empeacht BESIDES the keeping of the divine Law which is obsequious and imports a due regard to all its Precepts commonly exprest in Scripture by keeping the commandments hearkning to and obeying the voice of the Lord walking in his waies and observing and doing his statutes and his judgments there is a possessory keeping it in reference to our selves and others in respect whereof Almighty God Deut. 6. and elsewhere frequently having enjoin'd the people of Israel to love the Lord their God with all their heart and with all their soul and with all their might and that the words which he commanded them should be in their heart he adds that they shall teach them diligently to their children and shall talk of them when they sit down in their houses and when they walk by the way and when they lie down and when they rise up and that they bind them for a sign upon their hand and that they shall be as froutlets between their eies and that they shall write them upon the posts of their house and on their gates So justly was the Law call'd the Scripture being writen by them and worn upon the several parts of the body inscrib'd upon the walls of their houses the entrance of their dores and gates of their Cities and in a word placed before their eies wherever they convers'd 2. AND this was granted to the Jews as matter of privilege and favor To them saies Saint Paul Rom. 9. 4. pertaineth the adoption and the glory aud the covenants and the giving of the Law And the same Saint Paul at the 3. chap. 2. v. of that Epistle unto the question what advantage hath the Jew or what prosit is there of circumcision answers that it is much every way chiefly because unto them were committed the Oracles of God This depositum or trust was granted to the Fathers that it should be continued down unto their children He made a covenant saies David Ps. 78. v. 5. with Jacob and gave Israel a Law which he commanded our Fore-fathers to teach their children that their posterity might know it and the children which were yet unborn to the intent that when
they came up they might shew their children the same Which Scripture by a perpetual succession was to be handed down unto the Christian Church the Apostles on all occasions appealing unto them as being read in the Synagogues every Sabbath day Act. 13. 27. and also privatly in their hands so that they might at plesure search into them Jo. 5. 39. Act. 17. 11. Hereupon the Jews are by Saint Austin call'd the Capsarii or servants that carried the Christians Books And Athanasius in this Tract of the Incarnation saies The Law was not for the Jews only nor were the Prophets sent for them alone but that Nation was the Divinity-Schole of the whole world from whence they were to fetch the knowledg of God and the way of spiritual living which amounts to what the Apostle saies Galat. 3. 24. That the Law was a Schole-master to bring us unto Christ. 3. AND 't is observable that the very same word Rom. 3. 2. in the Text even now recited which expresses the committing of the Oracles of God to the Jews is made use of constantly by Saint Paul when he declares the trust and duty incumbent on him in the preaching of the Gospel of which see 1 Cor. 9. 17. Gal. 2. 7. 1 Thes. 2. 4. 1 Tim. 1. 11. Tit. 1. 3. And therefore as he saies 1 Cor. 9. Tho I preach the Gospel I have nothing to glory of for necessity is laid upon me yea wo is unto me if I preach not the Gospel for if I do this thing willingly I have a reward but if against my will a dispensation of the Gospel is committed unto me So may all Christians say if we our selves keep and transmit to our posterities the holy Scriptures we have nothing to glory of for a necessity is laid upon us and wo be unto us if we do not our selves keep and transmit to our posterity the holy Scriptures If we do this thing willingly we have a reward but if against our will the custody of the Gospel and at least that dispensation of it is committed to us But if we are Traditors and give up our Bibles or take them away from others let us consider how black an apostacy and sacrilege we shall incur 4. THE Mosaic Law was a temporary constitution and only a shadow of good things to come Heb. 10. 1. but the Gospel being in its duration as well as its intendment everlasting Rev. 14. 6. and to remain when time shall be no more Rev. 10. 6. it is an infinitly more precious depositum and so with greater care and solemner attestation to be preserv'd Not only the Clergy or the people of one particular Church nor the Clergy of the universal are intrusted with this care but 't is the charge the privilege and duty of every Christian man that either is or was or shall be in the world even that collective Church which above all competition is the pillar and ground of truth 1 Tim. 3. 15. against which the assaults of men and devils and even the gates of hell shall not prevail Mat. 16. 18. 5. THE Gospels were not written by their holy Pen-men to instruct the Apostles but to the Christian Church that they might believe Jesus was the Christ the son of God and that believing they might have life thro his name Jo. 20. 31. The Epistles were not addrest peculiarly to the Bishops and Deacons but all the holy brethren to the Churches of God that are sanctified in Jesus Christ and to all those that call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ Rom. 1 7. 1 Cor. 1. 2. 2 Cor. 1. 1. Galat. 1. 2. Eph. 1. 1. Col. 4. 16. 1 Thes. 5. 27. Phil. 1. 1. Jam. 1. 1. 1 Pet. 1. 1. 2 Pet. 1. 1. Revel 1. 4. Or if by chance som one or two of the Epistles were addrest to an Ecclesiastic person as those to Timothy and Titus their purport plainly refers to the community of Christians and the depositum committed to their trust Tim. 6. 20. And Saint John on the other side directs his Epistles to those who were plainly secular to fathers young men and little children and a Lady and her children Epist. 1. chap. 2. 12. 13 14. and Epist. 2. 1. 1. 6. BUT besides the interest which every Christian has in the custody of the Scripture upon the account of its being a depositum intrusted to him he has also another no less forcible that 't is the Testament of his Savior by which he becomes a Son of God no more a Servant but a Son and if he be a Son it is the Apostles inference that he is then an heir an heir of God thro Christ Gal. 4. 7. Now as he who is heir to an estate is also to the deeds and conveiances thereof which without injury cannot be detain'd or if they be there is a remedy at Law for the recovery of them So it fares in our Christian inheritance every believer by the privilege of faith is made a son of Abraham and an heir of the promises made unto the fathers whereby he has an hereditary interest in the Old Testament and also by the privilege of the same Faith he has a firm right to the purchast possession Eph. 1. 14. and the charter thereof the New Therefore the detention of the Scriptures which are made up of these two parts is a manifest injustice and sacrilegious invasion of right which the person wrong'd is impower'd nay is strictly oblig'd by all lawful means to vindicate 7. WHICH invasion of right will appear more flagrant when the nature and importance of it is consider'd which relating to mens spiritual interest renders the violation infinitly more injurious then it could be in any secular I might mention several detriments consequent to this detention of Scripture even as many as there are benefits appendant to the free use of it but there is one of so fundamental and comprehensive a nature that I need name no more and that is that it delivers men up to any delusion their teachers shall impose upon them by depriving them of means of detecting them Where there is no standard or mesures 't is easy for men to falsify both and no less easy is it to adulterate doctrins where no recourse can be had to the primary rule Now that there is a possibility that false teachers may arise we have all assurance nay we have the word of Christ and his Apostles that it should be so and all Ecclesiastic Story to attest it has bin so And if in the first and purest times those Ages of more immediat illumination the God of this world found instruments whereby to blind mens minds 2 Cor. 4. 4. it cannot be suppos'd impossible or improbable he should do so now 8. BUT to leave generals and to speak to the case of that Church which magisterially prohibits Scripture to the vulgar she manifestly stands liable to that charge of our Savior Luk. 11. 52. Ye have taken away
or to read therein is subjected to severe penalties 2. FOR the vindication of the truth of God and to put to shame those unhappy Innovators who amidst great pretences to antiquity and veneration to the Scriptures prevaricat from both I think it may not be amiss to shew plainly the mind of the primitive Church herein and that in as few words as the matter will admit 3. FIRST I premise that Ireneus and Tertullian having to do with Heretics who boasted themselves to be emendators of the Apostles and wiser then they despising their autority rejecting several parts of the Scripture and obtruding other writings in their steed have had recourse unto Tradition with a seeming preference of it unto Scripture Their adversaries having no common principle besides the owning the name of Christians it was impossible to convince them but by a recourse to such a medium which they would allow But these Fathers being to set down and establish their Faith are most express in resolving it into Scripture and when they recommend Tradition ever mean such as is also Apostolical 4. IRENEUS in the second Book 47. c. tells us that the Scriptures are perfect as dictated by the word of God and his spirit And the same Father begins his third Book in this manner The disposition of our salvation is no otherwise known by us then by those by whom the Gospel was brought to us which indeed they first preach'd but afterward deliver'd it to us in the Scripture to be the foundation and pillar of our Faith Nor may we imagin that they began to preach to others before they themselves had perfect knowledg as som are bold to say boasting themselves to be emendators of the Apostles For after our Lords Resurrection they were indued with the power of the holy Spirit from on high and having perfect knowledg went forth to the ends of the earth preaching the glad tidings of salvation and celestial praise unto men Each and all of whom had the Gospel of God So Saint Matthew wrote the Gospel to the Hebrews in their tongue Saint Peter and Saint Paul preach'd at Rome and there founded a Church Mark the Disciple and interpreter of Peter deliver'd in writing what he had preach'd and Luke the follower of Paul set down in his Book the Gospel he had deliver'd Afterward Saint John at Ephesus in Asia publish'd his Gospel c. In his fourth Book c. 66. he directs all the Heretics with whom he deals to read diligently the Gospel deliver'd by the Apostles and also read diligently the Prophets assuring they shall there find every action every doctrin and every suffering of our Lord declared by them 5. THUS Tertullian in his Book of Prescriptions c. 6. It is not lawful for us to introduce any thing of our own will nor make any choice upon our arbitrement We have the Apostles of our Lord for our Authors who themselves took up nothing on their own will or choice but faithfully imparted to the Nations the discipline which they had receiv'd from Christ. So that if an Angel from heaven should teach another doctrin he were to be accurst And. c. 25. 'T is madness saies he of the Heretics when they confess that the Apostles were ignorant of nothing nor taught things different to think that they did not revele all things to all which he enforces in the following chapter In his Book against Hermogenes c. 23. he discourses thus I adore the plenitude of the Scripture which discovers to me the Creator and what was created Also in the Gospel I find the Word was the Arbiter and Agent in the Creation That all things were made of preexistent matter I never read Let Hermogenes and his journy-men shew that it is written If it be not written let him fear the woe which belongs to them thad add or detract And in the 39. ch of his Prescript We feed our faith raise our hope and establish our reliance with the sacred Words 6. IN like manner Hippolytus in the Homily against Noetus declares that we acknowledg only from Scripture that there is one God And whereas secular Philosophy is not to be had but from the reading of the doctrin of the Philosophers so whosoever of us will preserve piety towards God he cannot otherwise learn it then from the holy Scripture Accordingly Origen in the fifth Homily on Leviticus saies in the Scripture every word appertaining to God is to be sought and discust and the knowledg of all things is to be receiv'd 7. WHAT Saint Cyprian's opinion was in this point we learn at large from his Epistle to Pompey For when Tradition was objected to him he answers Whence is this Tradition is it from the autority of our Lord and his Gospel or comes it from the commands of the Apostles in their Epistles Almighty God declares that what is written should be obei'd and practic'd The Book of the Law saies he in Joshua shall not depart from thy mouth but thou shalt meditate in it day and night that you may observe and keep all that is written therein So our Lord sending his Apostles commands them to baptize all Nations and teach them to observe all things that he had commanded Again what obstinacy and presumtion is it to prefer human Tradition to divine Command not considering that Gods wrath is kindled as often as his Precepts are dissolv'd and neglected by reason of human Traditions Thus God warns and speaks by Isaiah This people honors me with their lips but their heart is far from me but in vain do they worship me teaching for doctrins the commandments of men Also the Lord in the Gospel checks and reproves saying you reject the Law of God that you may establish your Tradition Of which Precept the Apostle Saint Paul being mindful admonishes and instructs saying If any man teaches otherwise and hearkens not to sound doctrin and the words of our Lord Jesus Christ he is proud knowing nothing From such we must depart And again he adds There is a compendious way for religious and sincere minds both to deposit their errors and find out the truth For if we return to the source and original of divine Tradition human error will cease and the ground of heavenly Mysteries being seen what soever was hid with clouds and darkness will be manifest by the light of truth If a pipe that brought plentiful supplies of water fail on the suddain do not men look to the fountain and thence learn the cause of the defect whether the spring it self be dry or if running freely the water is stopt in its passage that if by interrupted or broken conveiances it was hindred to pass they being repair'd it may again be brought to the City with the same plenty as it flows from the spring And this Gods Priests ought to do at this time obeying the commands of God that if truth have swerv'd or fail'd in any particular we go backward to the source of the Evangelical
of another Book 't is the sense and meaning only that is divinely inspir'd and he that considers only the former may as well entertain himself with a spelling-book 26. WE must therefore keep our minds fixt and attent to what we read 't is a folly and lightness not to do so in human Authors but 't is a sin and danger not to do so in this divine Book We know there can scarce be a greater instance of contemt and disvalue then to hear a man speak and not at all mind what he saies yet this vilest affront do all those put upon God who hear or read his Word and give it no attention Yet I fear the practice is not more impious then it is frequent for there are many that read the Bible who if at the end of each Chapter they should be callâ—d to account I doubt they could produce very slender collections and truly 't is a sad consideration that that sacred Book is read most attentively by those who read it as som preach the Gospel Phil. 1. 15. out of â—â—vy and strife How curiously do men inspect nay ransac and embowel a Text to find a pretence for cavil and objection whilst men who profess to look there for life and salvation read with such a retchless heedlesness as if it could tell them nothing they were concern'd in and to such 't is no wonder if their reading bring no advantage God is not in this sense found of those that seek him not Esai 65. 1. 't is Satans part to serve himself of the bare words and characters of holy Writ for charms and amulets the vertue God has put there consists in the sense and meaning and can never be drawn out by drousy inadverting Readers 27. THIS unattentiveness fore-stalls all possibility of good How shall that convince the understanding or perswade the affections which do's not so much as enter the imagination So that in this case the seed seems more cast away then in any of those instances the parable gives Mat. 13. In those it still fell upon the soil but in this it never reaches that but is scatter'd and dissipated as with a mighty wind by those thoughts which have prepossess'd the mind Let no man therefore take this sacred Book into his hand till he have turn'd out all distracting phancies and have his faculties free and vacant for those better objects which will there present themselves And when he has so dispos'd himself for attention then let him contrive to improve that attention to the best advantage 28. To which purpose it may be very conducive to put it into som order and method As for instance when he reads the doctrinal part of Scripture let him first and principally advert to those plain Texts which contain the necessary points of Faith that he may not owe his Creed only to his education the institution of his Parents or Tutors but may know the true foundation on which it is bottom'd viz. the word of God and may thence be able to justify his Faith and as Saint Peter exhorts be ready to give an answer to every man that asks him a reason of the hope that is in him 1 Pet. 3. 15. For want of this it is that Religion sits so loose upon men that every wind of doctrin blows them into distinct and various forms till at last their Christianity it self vapors away and disappears 29. BUT let men be careful thus to secure the foundation and then 't will be commendable in them who are capable of it to aspire to higher degrees of speculation yet even in these it will be their safest course chiefly to pursue such as have the most immediat influence on practice and be more industrious to make observations of that sort then curious and critical remarks or bold conjectures upon those mysteries on which God has spread a veil 30. BUT besides a mans own particular collections it will be prudence in him to advantage himself of those of others and to consult the learned'st and best expositors and that not only upon a present emergency when he is to dispute a point as most do but in the constant course of this reading wherein he will most sedatly and dispassionatly judg of the notions they offer 31. AS to the choice of the portions of Scripture to be read in course tho I shall not condemn that of reading the whole Bible in order yet 't is apparent that som parts of it as that of the Levitical Law are not so aptly accommodated to our present state as others are and consequently not so edificatory to us and therefore I cannot see why any man should oblige himself to an equal frequency in reading them And to this our Church seems to give her suffrage by excluding such out of her public Lessons And if we govern our privat reading by her mesures it will well express our deference to her judgment who has selected som parts of Scripture not that she would keep her children in ignorance of any but because they tend most immediatly to practice 32. NEITHER will the daily reading the Scripture in the rubricks order hinder any man from acquainting himself with the rest For he may take in the other parts as supernumeraries to his constant task and read them as his leisure and inclination shall promt So that all the hurt that can accrue to him by this method is the being invited to read somtimes extraordinary proportions 33. IF it be objected that to those who daily hear the Church Service 't will be a kind of tautology first to read those Lessons in privat which soon after they shall hear read publicly I answer that whatever men may please to call it 't will really be an advantage For he that shall read a chapter by himself with due consideration and consulting of good Paraphrasts will have div'd so far into the sense of it that he will much better comprehend it when he hears it read as on the other side the hearing it read so immediatly after will serve to confirm and rivet the sense in his mind The one is as the conning the other the repeating the Lesson which every Schole-boy can tell us is best don at the nearest distance to each other But I shall not contend for this or any particular method let the Scripture be read in proportion to every mans leisure and capacity and read with attention and we need not be scrupulous about circumstances when the main duty is secur'd 34. BUT as in the doctrinal so in the preceptive part there is a caution to be us'd in our attention For we are to distinguish between those temporary precepts that were adapted to particular times and occasions and such as are of perpetual obligation He that do's not this may bring himself under the Jewish Law or believe a necessity of selling all and giving it to the poor because 't was Christs command to the rich man Mat. 19. or incur other
considerable mischiefs 35. THUS frequently commands are put in comprehensive indefinite words but concern only the Generality to whom the Law is written and not those who are entrusted with the vindication of their contemt Accordingly 'tis said thou shalt not kill Mark 10. 19. which concerns the private person but extends not to the Magistrate in the execution of his office who is a revenger appointed by God and hears not the sword in vain Rom. 13. 4. So the injunction not to swear at all Mat. 5. 34 refers to the common transactions of life but not those solemn occasions where an oath is to give glory to God and is the end of all strife Heb. 9. 16. Yet these mistakes at this day prevail with Anabaptists and Quakers and bottom their denial of the Magistrates power to protect his Subjects by war and to determin differences in Peace by the oath of witnesses in judicial proceedings 36. THERE is another distinction we are to attend to and that is between absolute and primary commands and secundary ones the former we are to set a special remark upon as those upon whose observance or violation our eternal life or death inseparably depends And therefore our first and most solicitous care must be concerning them I mention this not to divert any from aspiring to the highest degrees of perfection but to reprove that preposterous course many take who lay the greatest weight upon those things on which God laies the least and have more zeal for oblique intimations then for express downright commands nay think by the one to commute for the contemt of the other For example fasting is recommended to us in Scripture but in a far lower key then moral duties rather as an expedient and help to vertue then as properly a vertue it self And yet we may see men scrupulous in that who startle not at injustice and oppression that clamorous sin that cries to heaven who pretend to mortify their appetites by denying it its proper food or being luxurious in one sort of it and yet glut their avarice eat up the poor and devour widows houses Mat. 23. 37. To such as these 't would be good advice to fix their attention on the absolute commands to study moral honesty and the essentials of Christianity to make a good progress there and do what God indispensably requires and then it may be seasonable to think of voluntary oblations but till then they are so far from homage that they are the most reprochful flattery an attemt to bribe God against himself and a sacrilege like that of Dionysius who took away Apollo's golden robe and gave him a stuff one 38. THE second thing requisit in our reading is application this is the proper end of our attention and without this we may be very busy to very little purpose The most laborious attention without it puts us but in the condition of those poor slaves that labor in the mines who with infinit toil dig that ore of which they shall never partake If therefore we will appropriate that rich tresure we must apply and so make it our own 39. LET us then at every period of holy Writ reflect and look on our selves as the persons spoke to When we find Philip giving baptism to the Eunuch upon this condition that he believe with all his heart Act. 8. let us consider that unless we do so our baptism like a thing surreptitiously obtain'd conveis no title to us will avail us nothing 40. WHEN we read our Saviours denunciation to the Jews except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish Lu. 13. 5. we are to look on it as if addrest immediatly to our selves and conclude as great a necessity of our repentance In those black catalogues of crimes which the Apostle mentions 1 Cor. 6. 10. and Gal. 5. 19 20 21. as excluding from the Kingdom of heaven we are to behold our own guilts arraign'd and to resolve that the same crimes will as certainly shut heaven gates against us as those to whom those Epistles were immediatly directed In all the precepts of good life and Christian vertue we are to think our selves as nearly and particularly concern'd as if we had bin Christs Auditors on the Mount So proportionably in all the threats and promises we are either to tremble or hope according as we find our selves adhere to those sins or vertues to which they are affixt 41. THIS close application would render what we read operative and effective which without it will be useless and insignificant We may see an instance of it in David who was not at all convinc'd of his own guilt by Nathans parable tho the most apposite that was imaginable till he roundly appli'd it saying thou art the man 2 Sam. 12. And unless we treat our selves at the same rate the Scripture may fill our heads with high notions nay with many speculative truths which yet amounts to no more then the Devils theology Ja. 2. 19. and will as little advantage us 42. IT now remains that we speak of what we are to do after our reading which may be summ'd up in two words Recollect and practice Our memories are very frail as to things of this nature And therefore we ought to impress them as deep as we can by reflecting on what we have read It is an observation out of the Levitical Law that those beasts only were clean and fit for sacrifice that chew'd the cud Lev. 11. 4. And tho the ceremony were Jewish the moral is Christian and admonishes us how we should revolve and ruminate on spiritual instructions Without this what we hear or read slips insensibly from us and like letters writ in chalk is wipâ—t out by the next succeeding thought but recollection engraves and indents the characters in the mind And he that would duly use it would find other manner of impressions more affective and more lasting then bare reading will leave 43. WE find it thus in all Sciences he that only reads over the rules and laies aside the thoughts of them together with his Book will make but a slow advance whilest he that plods and studies upon them repetes and reinforces them upon his mind soon arrives to an eminency By this it was that David attain'd to that perfection in Gods Law as to out-strip his teachers and understand more then the Ancients Ps. 119. 99 100. because it was his meditation as himself tells us ver 97 99. 44. LET us therefore pursue the same method and when we have read a portion of Scripture let us recollect what observable things we have there met with what exhortations to vertue or determents from vice what promises to obedience or menaces for the contrary what examples of Gods vengeance against such or such sins or what instances of his blessing upon duties If we do this daily we cannot but amass together a great stock of Scripture documents which will be ready for us to produce upon every occasion Satan can assault