Such a Faith as this justifies but not as it is a Work or meritorious Action that of its own nature puts us in the Favour of God and makes us truly just But as it is the Condition upon which the Mercy of God is offered to us by Christ Jesus For then we correspond to his design of coming into the World that he might redeem us from all Iniquity Tit. 2.14 that is justify us And purifie unto himself a peculiar people zealous of good works that is sanctify us Upon our bringing our selves therefore under these Qualifications and Conditions we are actually in the Favour of God Our Sins are pardoned and we are entitled to Eternal Life Our Faith and Repentance are not the valuable Considerations for which God pardons and justifies that is done meerly for the Death of Christ which God having out of the Riches of his Grace provided for us and offered to us Justification is upon those accounts said to be free There being nothing on our part which either did or could have procured it But still our Faith which includes our Hope our Love our Repentance and our Obedience is the Condition that makes us capable of receiving the benefits of this Redemption and Free Grace And thus it is clear in what sense we believe that we are justified both freely and yet through Christ and also through Faith as the Condition indispensably necessary on our part In strictness of words we are not justified till the final Sentence is pronounced Till upon our Death we are solemnly acquitted of our Sins and admitted into the Presence of God this being that which is opposite to Condemnation Yet as a Man who is in that state that must end in Condemnation is said to be condemned already Joh. 3.18 and the wrath of God is said to abide upon him tho' he be not yet adjudged to it So on the contrary a Man in that state which must end in the full Enjoyment of God is said now to be justified and to be at peace with God because he not only has the Promises of that state now belonging to him when he does perform the Conditions required in them but is likewise receiving daily Marks of God's Favour the protection of his Providence the Ministry of Angels and the inward Assistances of his Grace and Spirit This is a Doctrine full of comfort for if we did believe that our Justification was founded upon our Inherent Justice or Sanctification as the Consideration on which we receive it we should have just cause of Fear and Dejection since we could not reasonably promise our selves so great a Blessing upon so poor a Consideration but when we know that this is only the Condition of it then when we feel it is sincerely received and believed and carefully observed by us we may conclude that we are justified But we are by no means to think that our certain persuasion of Christ's having died for us in particular or the certainty of our Salvation through him is an Act of saving Faith much less that we are justified by it Many things have been too crudely said upon this Subject which have given the Enemies of the Reformation great Advantages and have furnished them with much matter of Reproach We ought to believe firmly That Christ died for all Penitent and Converted Sinners and when we feel these Characters in our selves we may from thence justly infer That he died for us and that we are of the Number of those who shall be Saved through him But yet if we may fall from this state in which we do now feel our selves we may and must likewise forfeit those hopes and therefore we must work out our Salvation with fear and trembling Our believing that we shall be Saved by Christ is no Act of Divine Faith since every Act of Faith must be founded on some Divine Revelation It is only a Collection and Inference that we may make from this general Proposition That Christ is the propitiation for the Sins of those who do truly repent and believe his Gospel and from those Reflections and Observations that we make on our selves by which we conclude That we do truly both repent and believe ARTICLE XII Of Good Works Albeit that Good Works which are the fruits of Faith and follow after Iustification cannot put away our Sins and endure the severity of God's Iudgment yet are they pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ and do spring out necessarily of a true and lively Faith insomuch that by them a lively Faith may be as evidently known as a Tree discerned by the fruit THat Good works are indispensably necessary to Salvation that without holiness no man shall see the Lord is so fully and frequently exprest in the Gospel that no doubt can be made of it by any who reads it And indeed a greater disparagement to the Christian Religion cannot be imagined than to propose the hopes of God's Mercy and Pardon barely upon Believing without a Life suitable to the Rules it gives us This began early to corrupt the Theories of Religion as it still has but too great an influence upon the Practice of it What St. Iames writ upon this Subject must put an end to all doubting about it and whatever Subtilties some may have set up to separate the consideration of Faith from a holy Life in the point of Iustification yet none among us have denied that it was absolutely necessary to Salvation And so it be owned as necessary it is a nice curiosity to examine whether it is of it self a Condition of Justification or if it is the certain distinction and constant effect of that Faith which justifies These are Speculations of very little consequence as long as the main Point is still maintained That Christ came to bring us to God to change our Natures to mortify the Old man in us and to raise up and restore that Image of God from which we had fallen by Sin And therefore even where the Thread of Men's Speculations of these Matters may be thought too fine and in some Points of them wrong drawn yet so long as this Foundation is preserved that every one who nameth the name of Christ does depart from iniquity 2 Tim. 2.19 so long the Doctrine of Christ is preserved pure in this Capital and Fundamental Point There do arise out of this Article only two Points about which some Debates have been made 1st Whether the Good Works of Holy Men are in themselves so perfect that they can endure the severity of God's Judgment so that there is no mixture of imperfection or Evil in them or not The Council of Trent has decreed That Men by their Good Works have so fully satisfied the Law of God according to the state of this Life that nothing is wanting to them The second Point is Whether these Good Works are of their own nature meritorious of Eternal Life or not The Council of Trent has decreed that
the Word baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you By the first Teaching or making of Disciples that must go before Baptism is to be meant the Convincing the World that Iesus is the Christ the true Messias anointed of God with a fulness of Grace and of the Spirit without measure and sent to be the Saviour and Redeemer of the World And when any were brought to acknowledge this then they were to Baptize them to initiate them to this Religion by obliging them to Renounce all Idolatry and Ungodliness as well as all secular and carnal Lusts and then they led them into the Water and with no other Garments but what might cover Nature they at first laid them down in the Water as a Man is laid in a Grave and then they said those words I baptize or wash thee in the Name of the Father Rom. 6.3 4 5. Son and Holy Ghost Then they raised them up again and clean Garments were put on them From whence came the Phrases of being baptized into Christ's death Col. 2.12 Col. 3.1 10. Rom. 13.14 of being buried with him by baptism into death Of our being risen with Christ and of our putting on the Lord Iesus Christ of putting off the Old Man and putting on the New After Baptism was thus performed the baptized Person was to be farther instructed in all the Specialities of the Christian Religion And in all the Rules of Life that Christ had prescribed This was plainly a different Baptism from St. Iohn's a Profession was made in it not in general of the Belief of a Messias soon to appear but in particular that Iesus was the Messias The Stipulation in St. Iohn's Baptism was Repentance but here it is the Belief of the whole Christian Religion In St. Iohn's Baptism they indeed promised Repentance and he received them into the earnests of the Kingdom of the Messias but it does not appear that St. Iohn either did promise them Remission of Sins or that he had Commission so to do For Repentance and Remission of Sins were not joined together till after the Resurrection of Christ Luke 24.47 that he appointed that Repentance and Remission of Sins should be preached in his Name among all Nations beginning at Ierusalem In the Baptism of Christ I mean that which he appointed after his Resurrection for the Baptism of his Disciples before that time was no doubt the same with St. Iohn's Baptism there was to be an Instruction given in that great Mystery of the Christian Religion concerning the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost which those who had only received St. Iohn's Baptism knew not They did not so much as know that there was a Holy Ghost Acts 19.2 3 4 5. That is they knew nothing of the extraordinary Effusion of the Holy Ghost And it is expresly said that those of St. Iohn's Baptism when St. Paul explained to them the difference between the Baptism of Christ and that of St. Iohn that they were baptized in the Name of the Lord Iesus For St. Iohn in his Baptism had only initiated them to the belief of a Messias but had not said a word of Iesus as being that Messias Joh. 3.3 5 6. So that this must be fixed that these two Baptisms were different the one was a dawning or imperfect beginning to the other as he that administred the one was like the Morning Star before the Sun of Righteousness Our Saviour had this Ordinance that was then imperfect and was to be afterwards compleated when he himself had finished all that he came into the World to do he had I say this visibly in his eye when he spake to Nicodemus and told him that except a man were born again he could not see or discern the Kingdom of God By which he meant that entire change and renovation of a man's mind and of all his powers through which he must pass before he could discern the true Characters of the Dispensation of the Messias for that is the sense in which the Kingdom of God does stand almost universally through the whole Gospel When Nicodemus was amazed at this odd expression and seemed to take it literally our Saviour answered more fully Verily verily I say unto thee except a man be born of water and of the spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God The meaning of which seems to be this that except a man came to be renewed by an ablution like the Baptism which the Iews used that imported the outward profession of a change of Doctrine and of Heart and with that except he were inwardly changed by a secret power called the Spirit that should transform his nature he could not become one of his Disciples or a true Christian which is meant by his entring into the Kingdom of God or the Dispensation of the Messias Upon this Institution and Commission given by Christ we see the Apostles went up and down Preaching and Baptizing And so far were they from considering Baptism only as a carnal Rite or a low Element above which a higher Dispensation of the Spirit was to raise them that when St. Peter saw the Holy Ghost visibly descend upon Cornelius and his Friends he upon that immediately Baptized them and said Acts 10.44 47 48. Can any man forbid or deny water that these should not be baptized which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we Our Saviour has also made Baptism one of the Precepts tho' not one of the Means necessary to Salvation A Mean is that which does so certainly procure a thing that it being had the thing to which it is a certain and necessary Mean is also had and without it the thing cannot be had there being a natural connexion between it and the End Whereas a Precept is an Institution in which there is no such natural efficiency but it is positively commanded so that the neglecting it is a contempt of the Authority that commanded it And therefore in obeying the Precept the value or vertue of the action lies only in the obedience This distinction appears very clearly in what our Saviour has said both of Faith and Baptism Mark 16.16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned Where it appears that Faith is the Mean of Salvation with which it is to be had and not without it since such a believing as makes a man receive the whole Gospel as true and so firmly to depend upon the Promises that are made in it as to observe all the Laws and Rules that are prescribed by it such a Faith as this gives us so sure a title to all the Blessings of this New Covenant that it is impossible that we should continue in this state and not partake of them and it is no less impossible that we should partake of them
AN EXPOSITION OF THE Thirty-nine Articles OF THE CHURCH of ENGLAND Written by GILBERT Bishop of SARVM The Second Edition Corrected LONDON Printed by R. Roberts for RI. CHISWELL at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard MDCC AN EXPOSITION OF THE Thirty-nine Articles TO THE KING SIR THE Title of Defender of the Faith the Noblest of all those which belong to this Imperial Crown that has received a New Lustre by Your MAJESTY's carrying it is that which You have so Gloriously acquired that if Your MAJESTY had not found it among them what You have done must have sâ—cured it to Your Self by the Best of all Claims We should be as much ashamed not to give it to Your MAJESTY as we were to give it to Those who had been fatally led into the Design of Overturning That which has been beyond all the Examples in History preserved and hitherto maintained by Your MAJESTY The Reformation had its greatest Support and Strength from the Crown of England while Two of Your Renowned Ancestors were the Chief Defenders of it in Foreign Parts The Blood of England mixing so happily with Theirs in Your Royal Person seemed to give the World a sure Prognostick of what might be look'd for from so Great a Conjunction Your MAJESTY has outdone all Expectations and has brought Matters to a State far beyond all our Hopes But amidst the Lawrels that adorn You and those Applauses that do every where follow You Suffer me GREAT SIR in all Humility to tell You That Your Work is not yet done nor Your Glory compleat till You have employed that Power which God has put in Your hands and before which nothing has been able hitherto to stand in the supporting and securing This Church in the bearing down Infidelity and Impiety in the healing the Wounds and Breaches that are made among those who do in common profess this Faith but are unhappily disjointed and divided by some Differences that are of less Importance And above all things in the raising the Power and Efficacy of this Religion by a suitable Reformation of our Lives and Manners How much soever mens Hearts are out of the Reach of Human Authority yet their Lives and all outward Appearances are governed by the Example and Influences of their Sovereigns The effectual pursuing of these Designs as it is the greatest of all those Glories of which Mortals are capable so it seems to be the only thing that is now wanting to finish the Brightest and Perfectest Character that will be in History It was in order to the Promoting these Ends that I undertook This Work which I do now most humbly lay before Your MAJESTY with the Profoundest Respect and Submission May God Preserve Your MAJESTY till You have gloriously finished what You have so wonderfully carried on All that You have hitherto set about how small soever the Beginnings and Hopes were has succeeded in Your Hands to the Amazement of the whole World The most desperate Face of Affairs has been able to give You no Stop Your MAJESTY seems Born under an Ascendant of Providence and therefore how low soever all our Hopes are either of raising the Power of Religion or of Vniting those who profess it yet we have often been taught to despair of nothing that is once undertaken by Your MAJESTY This will secure to You the Blessing of the present and of all succeeding Ages and a full Reward in that Glorious and Immortal State that is before You To which That Your MAJESTY may have a Sure though a Late Admittance is the Daily and most Earnest Prayer of May it please Your MAJESTY Your Majesty's most Loyal most Obedient and most Devoted Subject and Servant GI SARUM C. G. THE PREFACE IT has been often reckoned among the things that were wanting That we had not a full and clear Explanation of the Thirty-nine Articles which are the Sum of our Doctrine and the Confession of our Faith The Modesty of some and the Caution of others may have obliged them to let alone an Undertaking that might seem too assuming for any man to venture on without a Command from those who had Authority to give it It has been likewise often suggested That those Articles seemed to be so plain a Transcript of S. Austin's Doctrine in those much disputed Points concerning the Decrees of God and the Efficacy of Grace that they were not expounded by our Divines for that very reason since the far greater Number of them is believed to be now of a different Opinion I should have kept within the same bounds if I had not been first moved to undertake this Work by that Great Prelate who then sate at the Helm And after that determined in it by a Command that was Sacred to Me by Respect as well as by Duty Our Late Primate lived long enough to see the Design finished He read it over with an Exactness that was peculiar to him He imployed some Weeks wholly in perusing it and he correctâ—d it with a Care that descended even to the smallest matters and was such as he thought became the Importance of this Work And when that was done he returned it to me with a Letter and that as it was the last I ever had from him so gave the Whole such a Character that how much soever that might raise its Value with true Judges yet in Decency it must be suppressed by me as being far beyond what any Performance of mine could deserve He gave so favourable an account of it to our Late BLESSED QUEEN that She was pleased to tell me She would find leisure to read it And the last time that I was admitted to the honour of waiting on Her She commanded me to bring it to Her But She was soon after that carried to the Source to the Fountain of Life in whose Light she now sees both Light and Truth So great a Breach as was then made upon all our hopes put a stop upon this as well as upon much greater Designs This Work has lien by me ever since But has been often not only reviewed by my self but by much better Judges The late most Learned Bishop of Worcester read it very carefully He marked every thing in it that he thought needed a review and his Censure was in all points submitted to He expressed himself so well pleased with it to my self and to some others that I do not think it becomes me to repeat what he said of it Both the Most Reverend Archbishops with several of the Bishops and a great many Learned Divines have also read it I must indeed on many accounts own That they may be inclined to favour me too much and to be too partial to me yet they looked upon this Work as a thing of that Importance that I have reason to believe they read it over severely And if some small Corrections may be taken for an Indication that they saw no occasion for greater ones I had this likewise from several
have put our Minds likewise under such a Subordination to some material Motions that out of them peculiar Thoughts should arise in us And though this Union is that which we cannot distinctly conceive yet there is no difficulty in it equal to that of our imagining that Matter can think or move it self We perceive that we our selves and the rest of Mankind have thinking Principles within us so from thence it is easy enough to us to apprehend That there may be other thinking Beings which either have no Bodies at all but act purely as Intellectual Substances or if they have Bodies that they are so subtilised as to be capable of a vast quickness of Motion such in proportion as we perceive to be in our Animal Spirits which in the Minute that our minds command them are raising Motions in the remotest parts of our Bodies Such Bodies may also be so thin as to be invisible to us and as among Men some are Good and some Bad and of the Bad some seem to be determinedly and as to all appearance incurably Bad so there may have been a Time and State of Liberty in which those Spirits were left to their choice whether they would continue in their Innocency or fall from it and such as continued might be for ever fixed in that State or Exalted to higher Degrees in it And such as fell from it might fall irrecoverably into a state of utter Apostacy from God and of Rebellion against him There is nothing in this Theory that is incredible Therefore if the Scriptures have told us any thing concerning it we have no reason to be prejudiced against them upon that account Besides that there are innumerable Histories in many several Countries and Ages of the World of extraordinary Apparitions and other unaccountable Performances that could only have been done by Invisible Powers Many of those are so well attested that it argues a strange pitch of Obstinacy to refuse to believe a Matter of Fact when it is well vouched and when there is nothing in reason to oppose it but an unwillingness to believe Invisible Beings It is true this is an Argument in which a fabulous Humour will go far and in which some are so credulous as to swallow down every thing Therefore all wise men ought to suspend their belief and not to go too fast but when things are so undeniably attested that there is no reason to question the exactness or the credit of the Witnesses it argues a Mind unreasonably prepossessed to reject all such Evidence All those Invisible Beings were created by God and are not to be considered as Emanations or Rays of his Essence which was a gross Conceit of such Philosophers as fancied that the Deity had Parts They are Beings Created by him and are capable of passing through various Scenes in Bodies more or less refined In this Life the State of our Minds receives vast Alterations from the State of our Bodies which ripen gradually And after they are come to their full growth they cannot hold in that condition long but sink down much faster than they grew up some Humours or Diseases discomposing the Brain which is the Seat of the Mind so entirely that it cannot serve it at least so far as to Reflex Acts. So in the next State it is possible that we may at first be in a less perfect condition by reason of this that we may have a less perfect Body to which we may be united between our Death and the General Resurrection and there may be a time in which we may receive a vast Addition and Exaltation in that State by the raising up of our former Bodies and the reuniting us to them which may give us a greater compass and a higher Elevation These things are only proposed as Suppositions that have no Absurdity in them So that if they should happen to be the Parts of a Revealed Religion there is no reason to doubt of it or to reject it on such an Account The Last Branch of this Article is The Assertion of that great Doctrine of the Christian Religion concerning the Trinity or Three Persons in one Divine Essence It is a vain attempt to go about to prove this by Reason For it must be confessed That we should have had no cause to have thought of any such thing if the Scriptures had not Revealed it to us There are indeed Prints of a very Ancient Tradition in the World of Three in the Deity called the Word or the Wisdom and the Spirit or the Love besides the Fountain of both these God This was believed by those from whom the most Ancient Philosophers had their Doctrines The Author of the Book of Wisdom Philo and the Chaldee Paraphrasts have many things that shew that they had received those Traditions from the former Ages but it is not so easy to determine what gave the first rise of them It has been much argued whether this was Revealed in the Old Testament or not some from the Plural Termination of Elohim which is joined to Singular Verbs and from that of the Lord Raining Fire from the Lord upon Sodom Iehovah from Iehovah from the Description of the Wisdom of God in the 8 th of the Proverbs as a person with God from all Eternity and from the mention that is often made of the Spirit as well as the Word of God that came to the Prophets they have I say from all these places and some others concluded that this is contained in the Old Testament Others have doubted of this and have said that the Name Elohim though of a Plural Termination being often joined to a Singular Verb makes it reasonable to think it was a Singular which by somewhat peculiar to that Language might be of a Plural Termination Nor have they thought That since Angels carry the Name of God when they went on special Deputations from him the Angels being called Iehovah could be very confidently urged That Sublime Description of the Wisdom of God in the Proverbs seems not to them to be a full proof in this Matter For the Wisdom there mentioned seems to be the Wisdom of Creation and Providence which is not personal but belongs to the Essence Nor do they think that those places in the Old Testament in which mention is made of the Word or of the Spirit ofGod can settle this Point for these may only signify God's Revealing himself to his Prophets Therefore whatever secret Tradition the Iews might have had among them concerning this from whom perhaps the Greeks might have also had it yet many do not pretend to prove this from passages in the Old Testament alone Though the Expositions given to some of them in the New Testament prove to us who acknowledge it what was the true meaning of those Passages yet take the Old Testament in it self without the New and it must be confessed That it will not be easy to prove this Article from it But there are very
so clear aâ—d so inseparable a Relation to the only True God as its proper Object that it is scarce possible to apprehend how it should be separated from him and given to any other And as this seems evident from the Nature of things so it is not possible to imagine how any thing could have been prohibited in more express and positive and in more frequently-repeated Words and longer Reasonings than the offering of Divine Worship or any part of it to Creatures The chief design of the Mosaical Religion was to banish all Idolatry and Polytheism out of the Minds of the Iews and to possess them with the Idea of One God and of One Object of Worship The Reasons upon which those Prohibitions are founded are universal which are The Unity of God's Essence and his Jealousy in not giving his Honour to another It is not said that they should not worship any as God till they had a Precept or Declaration for it There is no Reserve for any such time but they are plainly forbid to worship any but the Great God Matth. 4.10 because he was One and was Jealous of his Glory The New Testament is writ in the same Strain Christ when tempted of the Devil answered Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God Acts 14.15 Acts 17.29 1 Thes. 1.9 Rev. 19 1â— and him only shalt thou serve The Apostles charged all Idolaters to forsake those Idols and to serve the living God The Angel refused St. Iohn's Worship commanding him to worship God The Christian Faith does in every particular raise the Ideas of God and of Religion to a much grâ—ater Purity and Sublimity than the Mosaical Dispensation had done so it is not to be imagined that in the chief Design of Revealed Religion which was the bringing men from Idolatry to the Worship of One God it should make such a Breach and extend it to a Creature All this seems fully to prove the first Proposition of this Argument That God is the only proper Object of Adoration The next is That Christ is proposed in the New Testament as the Object of Divine Worship I do not in proof of this urge the Instances of those who fell down at Christ's Feet and worshipped him while he was on Earth for it may be well answered to that That a Prophet was worshipped with the civil Respect of falling down before him among the Iews as appears in the History of Elijah and Elisha nor does it appear that those who worshipped Chrisâ— had any apprehension of his being God they only considered him as the Messias or as some eminent Prophet But the mention that St. Luke makes in his Gospel Luke 24.52 of the Disciples worshipping Christ at his Ascension comes more home to this matter All those Salutations in the beginning and conclusion of the Epistles in which Grace Mercy and Peace are wished from God the Father and the Lord Iesus Christ are implied Invocations of him It is also plain that it was to him that St. Paul prayed when he was under the Temptations of the Devil as they are commonly understood 2 Cor. 12.8 9 Phil. 2 10. Heb. 1.5 Rev. 5.8 to the end Every knee must bow to him The Anâ—els of God worship him All the hosts in heaven are represented in St. Iohn's Visions as falling down prostrate before him and worshipping him as they worship the Father He is proposed as the Object of our Faith Hope and Love as the Person whom we are to obey to pray to and to praise so that every Act of Worship both External and Internal is directed to him as to its proper Object But the Instance of all others that is the clearest in this Point is in the last Words of St. Stephen who was the first Martyr and whose Martyrdom is so particularly related by St. Luke He then in his last Minutes saw Christ at the right hand of God and in his last Breath he worshipped him in two short Prayers that are upon the matter the same with those in which our Blessed Saviour worshipped his Father on the Cross Lord Iesus receive my spirit Lord lay not this sin to their charge Acts 7.59.60 From this it seems very evident that if Christ was not the True God and Equal to the Father then this Protomartyr died in two Acts that seem not only Idolatrous but also Blasphemous since he worshipped Christ in the same Acts in which Christ had worshipped his Father It is certain from all this deduction of Particulars That his Human Nature cannot be worshipped therefore there must be another Nature in him to which Divine Worship is due and on the account of which he is to be worshipped It is plain that when this Religion was first published together with these Duties in it as a part of it the Iews though implacably set against it yet never accused it of Idolatry though that Charge of all others had served their purposes the best who intended to blacken and blast it Nothing would have been so well heard and so easily apprehended as a just Prejudice against it as this The Argument would have appeared as strong as it was plain And as the Iews could not be ignorant of the Acts of the Christian Worship when so many fell back to them from it who were offended at other parts of it so they had the Books in which it was contained in their hands Notwithstanding all which we have all possible reason to believe that this Objection against it was never made by any of them in the First Age of Christianity Upon all which I say it is not to be imagined that they could have been silent on this head if a mere Man had been thus proposed among the Christians as the Object of Divine Worship The Silence of the Apostles in not mentioning nor answering this is such a Proof of the Silence of the Iews that it would indeed disparage all their Writings if we could think that while they mentioned and answered the other Prejudices of the Iews which in comparison to this are small and inconsiderable matters they should have passed over this which must have been the greatest and the plausiblest of them all if it was one at all Therefore as the Silence of the Apostles is a clear Proof that the Iews were silent also and did not object this and since their silence could neither flow from their Ignorance nor their undervaluing of this Religion it seems to be certain that the first opening of the Christian Doctrine did not carry any thing in it that could be called the Worshiping of a Creature It follows from hence that the Iews must have understood this part of our Religion in such a manner as agreed with their former Ideas So we must examine these They had this settled among them That God dwelt in the Cloud of Glory and that by virtue of that Inhabitation Divine Worship was paid to God as dwelling in the Cloud that it was
weak and brag continually of the Spirit by which they do pretend that all whatsoever they Preach is suggested to them though manifestly contrary to the Holy Scriptures This whole Article relates to the Antinomians as these last words were added by reason of the Extravagance of some Enthusiasts at that time but that Madness having ceased in Queen Elizabeth's time it seems it was thought that there was no more occasion for those words There are Four heads that do belong to this Article First That the Old Testament is not contrary to the New Secondly That Christ was the Mediator in both Dispensations so that Salvation was offered in both by him Thirdly That the Ceremonial and the Judiciary Precepts in the Law of Moses do not bind Christians Fourthly That the Moral Law does still bind all Christians To the first of these The Manichees of old who fancied that there was a Bad as well as a Good God thought that these Two Great Principles were in a perpetual struggle and they believed the Old Dispensation was under the Bad One which was taken away by the New that is the work of the Good God But they who held such monstrous Tenets must needs reject the whole New Testament or very much corrupt it since there is nothing plainer than that the Prophets of the Old foretold the New with approbation and the Writers of the New prove both their Commission and their Doctrine from Passages of the Old Testament This therefore could not be affirmed without rejecting many of the Books that we own and corrupting the rest So this deserves no more to be considered Upon this occasion it will be no improper Digression to consider what Revelation those under the Mosaical Law or that lived before it had of the Messias This is an Important Matter It is a great Confirmation of the Truth of the Christian Religion as it will furnish us with proper Arguments against the Iews It is certain they have long had and still have an Expectation of a Messias Now the Characters and Predictions concerning this Person must have been fulfilled long ago or the Prophecies will be found to be false and if they do meet and were accomplish'd in our Saviour's Person and if no other Person could ever pretend to this then that which is undertaken to be proved will be fully performed The first Promise to Adam after his Sin speaks of an Enmity between the Seed of the Serpent and the Seed of the Woman Gen. 3.15 It shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel The one might hurt the other in some lesser Instances but the other was to have an entire Victory at last which is plainly signified by the Figures of bruising the Heel and bruising the Head which was to be performed by one who was to bear this Character of being the Woman's Seed The next Promise was made to Abraham In thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed Gen. 12.3 Gen. 22.18 Gen. 26.24 Gen. 28.14 Gen. 49.10 This was lodged in his Seed or Posterity upon his being ready to offer up his Son Isaac That Promise was renewed to Isaac and after him to Iacob When he was dying it was lodged by him in the Tribe of Iudah when he prophesied That the Scepter should not depart from Iudah nor the Law-giver from between his feet till Shiloh should come and the gathering of the people that is of the Gentiles was to be to him It is certain the Ten Tribes were lost in their Captivity whereas the Tribe of Iudah was brought back and continued to be a political Body under their own Laws until a Breach was made upon that by the Romans first reducing them to the Form of a Province and soon after that destroying them utterly So that either that Prediction was not accomplished or the Shiloh the Sent to whom the Gentiles were to be gathered came before they lost their Scepter and Laws Moses told the People of Israel That God was to raise up among them a Prophet like unto him Deut. 18.15 to whom they ought to hearken otherwise God would require it of them The Character of Moses was That he was a Lawgiver and the Author of an entire Body of Instituted Religion so they were to look for such a one Numb 24. â—â— Balaam prophesied darkly of one whom he saw as at a great distance from his own time and he spoke of a Star that should come out of Iacob and a Scepter out of Israel Some Memorial of which was probably preserved among the Arabians In the Book of Psalms there are many things said of David which seem capable of a much Auguster Sense than can be pretended to be answered by any thing that befel himself What is said in the 2 d the 16 th the 22 d the 45 th the 102 d and the 110 th Psalms afford us copious Instances of this Passages in these Psalms must be stretched by Figures that go very high to think they were all fulfilled in David or Solomon But in their Literal and largest Sense they were accomplished in Christ to whom God said Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee In him that was verified Thou wilt not leave my Soul in hell neither wilt thou suffer thy Holy One to see Corruption His hands and his feet were pierced and lots were cast upon his vesture Of him it may be strictly said Thy throne O God is for ever and ever To him that belonged The Lord said unto my Lord Sit thou on my Right-hand till I make thine enemies thy footstool And The Lord sware and will not repent Thou art a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedeck The Prophets gave yet more express Predictions concerning the Messias Isaiah did quiet the Fears of Ahaz and of the House of David by saying The Lord himself shall give you a sign Behold Isa. 8 1â— a Virgin shall conceive and bear a Son It was certainly no Sign for one that was a Virgin to conceive afterwards and bear a Son therefore the Sign or extroardinary thing here promised as a signal Pledge of God's Care of the House of David must lie in this That one still remaining a Virgin should conceive and bear a Son not to insist upon the strict signification of the Word in the Original The same Prophet did also foretell That as this Messiah or the Branch Isa. 11.1 2. should spring from the Stem of Iesse so also he was to be full of the Spirit of the Lord and that the Gentiles should seek to him ver 10. In another place he enumerates many of the Miracles that should be done by him He was to give sight to the Blind make the Deaf to hear and the Lame to walk Isa. 35. â— 6. He does further set forth his Character not that of a Warrior or Conqueror on the contrary He was not to cry nor strive Isa. 42.1 nor break the bruised
all impure Desires being enjoined as indispensably necessary for without holiness no man can see the Lord. And thus every thing relating to this Article is considered and I hope both explained and proved ARTICLE VIII Of the Three Creeds The Three Creeds Nice Creed Athanasius Creed and that which is commonly called the Apostles Creed ought throughly to be received and believed for they may be proved by most certain Warrants of Holy Scripture ALthough no doubt seems to be here made of the Names or Designations given to those Creeds except of that which is ascribed to the Apostles yet none of them are named with any exactness Since the Article of the Procession of the Holy Ghost and all that follows it is not in the Nicene Creed but was used in the Church as a part of it for so it is in Epiphanius In Anchoreto before the Second General Council at Constantinople and it was confirmed and established in that Council Only the Article of the Holy Ghost's proceeding from the Son was afterwards added first in Spain Anno 447. which spread it self over all the West So that the Creed here called the Nice Creed is indeed the Constantinopolitan Creed together with the Addition of Filioque made by the Western Church That which is called Athanasius's Creed is not his neither â—or as it is not among his Works so that great Article of the Christian Religion having been settled at Nice and he and all the rest of the Orthodox referring themselves always to the Creed made by that Council there is no reason to imagine that he would have made a Creed of his own besides that not only the Macedonian but both the Nestorian and the Eutychian Heresies are expresly condemned by this Creed and yet those Authorities never being urged in those Disputes it is clear from thence that no such Creed was then known in the World as indeed it was never heard of before the Eighth Century and then it was given out as the Creed of Athanasius or as a Representation of his Doctrine and so it grew to be received by the Western Church perhaps the more early because it went under so great a Name in Ages that were not Critical enough to judge of what was genuine and what was spurious There is one great difficulty that arises out of several Expressions in this Câ—â—ed in which it is said That whosover will be saved must believe it That the Belief of it is necessary to Salvation and that such as do not hold it pure and undefiled shall without doubt perish everlastingly Where many Explanations of a Mystery hard to be understood are made indispensably necessary to Salvation and it is affirmed That all such as do not so believe must perish everlastingly To this two Answers are made 1. That it is only the Christian Faith in general that is hereby meant and not every Period and Article of this Creed so that all those severe Expressions are thought to import only the necessity of believing the Christian Religion But this seems forced for the words that follow And the Catholick Faith is do so plainly determine the sâ—gnification of that word to the Explanation that comes after that the word Catholick Faith in the first Verse can be no other than the same word as it is defined in the third and following Verses so that this Answer seems not natural 2. The common Answer in which the most Eminent Men of this Church as far as the Memory of all such as I have known could go up have agreed is this That these Condemnatory Expressions are only to be understood to relate to those who having the Means of Instruction offered to them have rejected them and have stifled their own Convictions holding the Truth in Unrighteousness and chusing darkness rather than light Upon such as do thus reject this great Article of the Christian Doctrine concerning One God and Three Persons Father Son and Holy Ghost and that other concerning the Incarnation of Christ by which God and Man were so united as to make one Person together with the other Doctrines that follow these are those Anathâ—maes denounced Not so as if it were hereby meant that every man who does not believe this in every tittle must certainly perish unless he has been furnished with sufficient means of conviction and that he has rejected them and hardned himself against them The Wrath of God is revealed against all sin and the wages of sin is Death So that every Sinner has the Wrath of God abiding on him and is in a state of Damnation yet a sincere Repentance delivers him out of it even though he lives and dies in some sins of Ignorance which though they may make him liable to damnation so that nothing but true Repentance can deliver him from it yet a general Repentance when it is also special for all known sins does certainly deliver a man from the guilt of unknown sins and from the Wrath of God due to them God only knows our hearts the degrees of our knowledge and the measure of our obstinacy and how far our Ignorance is affected or invincible and therefore he will deal with every man according to what he has received So that we may believe that some Doctrines are necessary to Salvation as well as that there are some Commandments necessary for Practice and we may also believe that some Errors as well as some Sins are exclusive of Salvation all which imports no more than that we believe such things are sufficiently revealed and that they are necessary Conditions of Salvation but by this we do not limit the Mercies of God towards those who are under such darkness as not to be able to see through it and to discern and acknowledge these Truths It were indeed to be wished that some express Declaration to this purpose were made by those who have Authority to do it But in the mean while this being the Sense in which the Words of this Creed are universally taken and it agreeing with the Phraseology of the Scripture upon the like occasions this is that which may be rested upon And allowing this large Explanation of these severe words the rest of this Creed imports no more than the Belief of the Doctrine of the Trinity which has been already proved in treating of the former Articles As for the Creed called the Apostles Creed there is good reason for speaking so doubtfully of it as the Article does since it does not appear that any determinate Creed was made by them None of the first Writers agree in delivering their Faith in a certain Form of Words every one of them gives an Abstract of his Faith in Words that differ both from one another and from this Form From thence it is clear that there was no common Form delivered to all the Churches And if there had been any Tradition after the Times of the Council of Nice of such a Creed composed by the Apostles the Arians
had certainly put the chief strength of their Cause on this That they adhered to the Apostles Creed in opposition to the Innovations of the Nicene Fathers There is therefore no reason to believe that this Creed was prepared by the Apostles or that it was of any great Antiquity since Ruffin was the first that published it It is true he published it as the Creed of the Church of Aquileia but that was so late that neither this nor the other Creeds have any Authority upon their own account Great Respect is indeed due to things of such Antiquity and that have been so long in the Church but after all we receive those Creeds not for their own sakes nor for the sake of those who prepared them but for the sake of the Doctrine that is contained in them because we believe that the Doctrine which they declare is contained in the Scriptures and chiefly that which is the main Intent of them which is to assert and profess the Trinity therefore we do receive them tho we must acknowledge that the Creed ascribed to Athanasius as it was none of his so it was never established by any General Council ARTICLE IX Of Original or Birth-Sin Original Sin standeth not in the following of Adam as the Pelagians do vainly talk but it is the fault or corruption of the nature of every man that naturally is engendred of the Offspring of Adam whereby man is very far gone from Original Righteousness and is of his own nature inclined to evil so that the Flesh lusteth always contrary to the Spirit and therefore in every Person born into the World it deserveth God's Wrath and Damnation And this Infection of Nature doth remain yea in them that are regenerated whereby the Lust of the Flesh called in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which some do expound the Wisdom some Sensuality some the Affection some the Desire of the Flesh is not subject to the Law of God And though there is no Condemnation for them that believe and are baptized yet the Apostle doth confess That Concupiscence and Lust hath of it self the nature of Sin AFter the First Principles of the Christian Religion are stated and the Rule of Faith and Life was setled the next thing that was to be done was to declare the special Doctrines of this Religion and that first with relation to all Christians as they are single Individuals for the directing every one of them in order to the working out his own Salvation which is done from this to the Nineteenth Article And then with relation to them as they compose a Society called the Church which is carried on from the Nineteenth to the End In all that has been hitherto explained the whole Church of England has been all along of one mind In this and in some that follow there has been a greater diversity of Opinion but both sides have studied to prove their Tenets to be at least not contrary to the Articles of the Church These different Parties have disputed concerning the Decrees of God and those Assistances which pursuant to his Decrees are afforded to us But because the Foundation of those Decrees and the Necessity of those Assistances are laid in the Sin of Adam and in the Effects it had on Mankind therefore thâ—se Controversies begin on this Head The Pelagians and the Socinians agree in saying That Adam's Sin was Personal That by it as being the first Sin it is said that Sin entred into the World But that as Adam was made mortal â—om 5 1â— and had died whether he had sinned or not so they think the liberty of Human Nature is still entire and that every man is punished for his own sins and not for the sin of another to do otherwise they say seems contrary to Justice not to say Goodness In opposition to this Iudgment is said to have come upon many to condemnation through one either Man or Sin ver 1â— Death is said to have reigned by one and by one man's offence and many are said to be dead through the offence of one All these Passages do intimate that death is the consequence of Adam's Sin and that in him as well as in all others Death was the Wages of Sin so also that we dye upon the account of his Sin We are said to bear the Image of the first Adam as true Christians bear the Image of the second Now we are sure that there is both a derivation of Righteousness 1 Cor 15.49 and a Communication of Inward Holiness transferred to us through Christ So it seems to follow from thence that there is somewhat both transferred to us and conveyed down throughMankind by the first Adam and particularly that by it we are all made subject to Death from which we should have been freed if Adam had continued in his first state and that by virtue of the Tree of Life Gen. 3.22 in which some think there was a natural Virtue to cure all Diseases and relieve against all Accidents while others do ascribe it to a Divine Blessing of which that Tree was only the Symbol or Sacrament through the words said after Adam's sin as the reason of driving him out of Paradise lest he put forth his hand and take of the Tree of Life and eat and live for ever seem to import that there was a Physical Virtue in the Tree that could so fortify and restore Life as to give Immortality These do also think that the Threatning made to Adam That upon his eating the forbidden Fruit he should surely dye is to be taken literally and is to be carried no further than to a Natural Death This Subjection to Death and to the Fear of it brings men under a slavish Bondage many Terrors and other Passions and Miseries that arise out ofit which they think is a great Punishment and that it is a Condemnation and Sentence of Death passed upon the whole Race and by this they are made sinners that is treated as guilty Persons and severely punished This they think is easily enough reconciled with the Notions of Justice and Goodness in God since this is only a Temporary Punishment relating to mens Persons And we see in the common methods of Providence that Children are in this sort often punished for the sins of their Fathers most men that come under a very ill habit of Body transmit the Seeds of Diseases and Pains to their Children They do also think that the Communication of this liableness to death is easily accounted for and they imagine that as the Tree of Life might be a Plant that furnished men with an Universal Medicine so the forbidden Fruit might derive a slow Poyson into Adam's Body that might have exalted and inflamed his Blood very much and might though by a slower operation certainly brought on death at the last Our being thus adjudged to Death and to all the Miseries that accompany Mortality they think may be well called the wrath of
us such dreadful Apprehensions of his Wrath and of the guilt of Sin we dare not soften these to a degree below the Majesty of the Eternal God and the Dignity of his most Holy Laws But after all we are far from the Conceit of the Stoicks who made all Sins alike We acknowledge that some Sins of Ignorance and Infirmity may consist with a state of Grace which is either quite destroyed or at least much eclipsed and clouded by other Sins that are more heinous in their nature and more deliberately gone about It is in this sense that the word deadly Sin is to be understood in the Article For though in the strictness of Justice every Sin is deadly yet in the Dispensation of the Gospel those Sins are only deadly that do deeply wound the Conscience and that drive away Grace Another Term in the Article needs also to be a little explained the sin against the Holy Ghost concerning which since there is so severe a Sentence pronounced by Christ it is necessary that it be rightly understood and that can only be done by considering the Occasion of those Words as well as the Words themselves Christ wrought such Miracles in the sight of his Enemies that when there was no room left for any other Cavil Matth. 12.24 31. they betook themselves to that that he did not cast out devils but by Belzebub the Prince of Devils And this was the occasion that led our Saviour to speak of the Sin or blasphemy against the Holy Ghost It was their rejecting the clearest Evidence that God could give to prove any thing by The power by which those Miracles were wrought and which was afterwards communicated to the Apostles is called through the whole New Testament the Holy Ghost By which is not to be meant here the Third Person of the Trinity but the wonderful Effusion of those extraordinary Gifts and Powers that were then communicated the Oeconomy and Dispensation of which is said to be derived from that one Spirit This was the utmost Proof that could be given of Truth And when Men set themselves to blaspheme this and to ascribe the Works of Christ to a collusion with the Devil they did thereby so wilfully oppose God and reproach his Power they did so stifle their own Conviction and set themselves against the Conviction of others that nothing could be done further for their Conviction this being the highest degree of Evidence and Proof And this was so high an Indignity to God when he descended so far to satisfy their scruples that it was not to be pardoned as their Impenitence and Incredulity was so obstinate as not to be overcome Upon this Occasion given our Saviour makes a difference between their Blaspheming him and instead of owning him to be the Messias calling him a deceiver a glutton and a wine-bibber of which upon hearing his Doctrine and seeing his Life they were still guilty This was indeed a great Sin but yet there were means left of convincing them of the Truth of his being the great Prophet sent of God And by these they might be so far prevailed on as to repent and believe and so to obtain pardon But when they had those means set before them when they saw plain and uncontested Miracles done before them and when instead of yielding to them that set up such an Opposition to them which might have been as reasonably said of every Miracle that could have been wrought then it was not possible to convince them This is an impious rejecting of the highest Method that God himself uses for proving a thing to us The scorn put upon it as it flows from a Nature so depraved that it cannot be wrought on so it is a sin not to be pardoned All things of extream severity in a Doctrine that is so full of Grace and Mercy as the Gospel is ought to be restrained as much as may be From thence we infer That those dreadful words of our Saviour's ought to be restrained to the subject to which they are applied and ought not to be carried further Since Miracles have ceased no Man is any more capable of this Sin These Terms being thus explained the Question in the Article is now to be explained There are words in St. Iohn's Epistle and elsewhere that seem to import that men born of God that is to say Baptized or Regenerated Christians sin not Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not 1 Joh. 3.6 9.5.18 whosoever sinneth hath not seen him neither known him whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin for his seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin for he is born of God This is again repeated in the end of that Epistle together with these words He that is begotten of God keepeth himself and that wicked one toucheth him not As these words seem to import that a true Christian sins not so in the Epistle to the Hebrews it is said to be Impossible to renew again by Repentance those who fall away Heb. 6.4.5.6 after they had been once enlightened and had tasted of the heavenly gift had been made partakers of the Holy Ghost and had tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come Upon these Expressions and some others though not quite of their force it was that in the Primitive Church some that â—ell after Baptism were cast out of the Communion of the Church and though they were not cut off from all hopes of the Mercy of God yet they were never restored to the Peace of the Church This was done in Tertullian's time if what he says on this Subject is not to be reckoned as a piece of his Montanism But soon after there were great Contests upon this Head while the Novatians withdrew from the Communion of the Church and believed it was defiled by the receiving of Apostates into it Though that was not done so easily as some proposed but after a long separation and a severe course of Penance Upon this followed all those Penitentiary Canons concerning the several Measures and Degrees of Penance and that not only for Acts of Apostacy from the Christian Religion but for all other crying Sins According to what has been already said upon the former Articles it has appeared that the Sanctification of Regenerated Men is not so pâ—rfected in this Life but that there is still a mixture of Defects and Imperfections left in them And the state of the New Covenant is a continuance of Repentance and Remission of Sins for as oft as one sins if he repents truly of it and forsakes his Sins there is a standing Offer of the Pardon of all Sins And therefore Christ has taught us to pray daily Forgive us our sins If there were but one general Pardon offered in Baptism this would signify little to those who feel their Infirmities and the Sins that do so easily beset them so apt to return upon them It was no wonder if the entertaining this
other Church has them equally with her or beyond her If all these must be discussed before we can settle this Question Which is the true Infallible Church A Man must stay long e're he can come to a point in it Therefore there can be no other way taken here but to examine first What makes a particular Church And then since the Catholick Church is an united Body of all particular Churches when the true Notion of a particular Church is fixed it will be easy from that to form a Notion of the Catholick Church It would seem reasonable by the Method of all Creeds in particular of that called the Apostles Creed that we ought first to settle our Faith as to the great Points of the Christian Religion and from thence go to settle the Notion of a true Church And that we ought not to begin with the Notion of a Church and from thence go to the Doctrine The Doctrine of Christianity must be first stated and from this we are to take our measures of all Churches and that chiefly with respect to that Doctrine which every Christian is bound to believe Here a distinction is to be made between those Capital and Fundamental Articles without which a Man cannot be esteemed a true Christian nor a Church a true Church And other Truths which being delivered in Scripture all Men are indeed obliged to believe them yet they are not of that nature that the Ignorance of them or an Error in them can exclude from Salvation To make this sensible It is a Proposition of another sort That Christ died for Sinners than this That he died at the Third or at the Sixth Hour And yet if the Second Proposition is expresly revealed in Scripture we are bound to believe it Since God has said it though it is not of the same nature with the other Here a Controversie does naturally arise that wise People are unwilling to meddle with What Articles are Fundamental and what are not The defining of Fundamental Articles seems on the one hand to deny Salvation to such as do not receive them all which Men are not willing to do And on the other hand it may seem a leaving Men at liberty as to all other particulars that are not reckoned up among the Fundamentals But after all the Covenant of Grace the Terms of Salvation and the Grounds on which we expect it seem to be things of another nature than all other truths which though revealed are not of themselves the Means or Conditions of Salvation Wheresoever true Baptism is there it seems the Essentials of this Covenant are preserved For if we look on Baptism as a Foederal admission into Christianity there can be no Baptism where the Essence of Christianity is not preserved As far then as we believe that any Society has preserved that so far we are bound to receive her Baptism and no further For unless we consider Baptism as a sort of a Charm that such words joined with a washing with Water make one a Christian which seems to be expresly contrary to what St. Peter says of it 1 Pet. â— 21 That it is not the washing away the filth of the flesh but the answer of a good Conscience towards God that saves us We must conclude That Baptism is a Foederal thing in which after that the Sponsions are made the Seal of Regeneration is added From hence it will follow That all who have a true Baptism that makes Men Believers and Christians must also have the true Faith as to the Essentials of Christianity The Fundamentals of Christirnity seems to be all that is necessary to make Baptism True and Valid And upon this a distinction is to be made that will discover and destroy a Sophism that is often used on this occasion A True Church is in one sense a Society that preserves the Essentials and Fundamentals of Christianity In another sense it stands for a Society all whose Doctrines are true that has corrupted no part of this Religion nor mixed any Errors with it A true Man is one who has a Soul and a Body that are the Essential Constituents of a Man Whereas in another sense a Man of Sincerity and Candor is called a true Man Truth in the one Sense imports the Essential Constitution and in the other it imports only a Quality that is accidental to it So when we acknowledge that any Society is a true Church we ought to be supposed to mean no other than that the Covenant of Grace in its Essential Constituent parts is preserved entire in that Body and not that it is true in all its Doctrines and Decisions The Second thing to be considered in a Church is their Association together in the use of the Sacraments For these are given by Christ to the Society as the Rites and Badges of that Body That which makes particular Men Believers is their receiving the Fundamentals of Christianity so that which constitutes the Body of the Church is the Profession of that Faith and the use of those Sacraments which are the Rites and Distinctions of those who profess it In this likewise a distinction is to be made between what is Essential to a Sacrament and what is the exact observance of it according to the Institution Additions to the Sacraments do not annul them though they corrupt them with that adulterate mixture Therefore where the Sponsions are made and washing with Water is used with the words of Christ there we own that there is a true Baptism Though there may be a large Addition of other Rites which we reject as Superstitious though we do not pretend that they null the Baptism But if any part of the Institution is cut off there we do not own the Sacrament to be true Because it being an Institution of Christ's it can no more be esteemed a true Sacrament than as it retains all that which by the Institution appears to be the main and essential parts of the Action Upon this account it is That since Christ appointed Bread and Wine fo his other Sacrament and that he not only blessed both but distributed both with words appropriated to each kind we do not esteem that to be a true Sacrament in which either the one or the other of these kinds is w ithdrawn But in the next place there may be many things necessary in the way of Precept and Order both with relation to the Sacraments and to the other publick Acts of Worship in which tho' Additions or Defects are Erroneous and Faulty yet they do not annul the Sacraments We think none ought to Baptize but Men dedicated to the Service of God and Ordained according to that Constitution that was settled in the Church by the Apostles and yet Baptism by Laicks or by Women such as is most commonly practiced in the Roman Church is not esteemed null by us nor is it repeated Because we make a difference between what is Essential to a Sacrament and what is
The justest abatement that we can offer for thisCorruption which is too manifest to be either denied or justified is this They were then engaged with the Heathens and were much set on bringing them over to the Christian Religion In order to that it was very natural for them to think of all methods possible to accommodate Christianity to their taste It was perhaps observed how far the Apostles complied with the Iews that they might gain them St. Paul had said that to the Iews he became a Iew and to them that were without law 1 Cor. 9.19 20. that is the Gentiles as one without law that by all means he might gain some They might think that if the Iews who had abused the light of a Revealed Religion who had rejected and crucified the Messias and persecuted his Followers and had in all respects corrupted both their Doctrine and their Morals were waited on and complied with in the observance of that very Law which was abrogated by the Death of Christ but was still insisted on by them as of perpetual Obligation and yet that after the Apostles had made a solemn decision in the matter they continued to conform themselves to that Law all this might be applied with some advantages to this matter The Gentiles had nothing but the Light of Nature to Govern them they might seem willing to become Christians but they still despised the nakedness and simplicity of that Religion And it is reasonable enough to think that the Emperors and other great Men might in a Political view considering the vast strength of Heathenism press the Bishops of those times to use all imaginable ways to adorn Christianity with such an exteriorForm ofWorship as might be most acceptable to them and might most probably bring them over to it The Christians had long felt the weight of Persecution from them and were no doubt much frighted with the danger of a Relapse in Iulian's time It is natural to all Men to desire to be safe and to weaken the numbers of their implacable Enemies In that state of things we do plainly see they began to comply in lesser Matters For whereas in the First Ages the Christians were often reproached with this that they had no Temples Altars Sacrifices nor Priests they changed their dialect in all those Points so we have reason to believe that this was carried further The Vulgar are more easily wrought upon in greater Points of Speculation than in some small Ritual Matters Because they do not understand the one and so are not much concerned about it But the other is more sensible and lies within their compass We find some in Palestine kept Images in their Houses as Eusebius tells us others began in Spain to light Candles by Day-light and to paint the Walls of their Churches And though these things were condemned by the Council of Elliberis yet we see by what St. Ierom has cited out of Vigilantius that the Spirit of Superstition did work strongly among them We hear of none that writ against those abuses besides Vigilantius yet Ierom tells us that many Bishops were of the same Mind with him with whom he is so angry as to doubt whether they deserved to be called Bishops Most of these abuses had also specious beginnings and went on insensibly Where they made greater steps we find an opposition to them Epipli Heres 79 Epiphanius is very severe upon the Collyridians for their Worshipping the Blessed Virgin And though they did it by Offering up a Cake to her yet if any will read all that he says against that Superstition they will clearly see that no Prayers were then Offered up to her by the Orthodox And that he rejects the thought of it with Indignation But the respect paid the Martyrs and the opinion that they were still hovering about their Tombs might make the calling to them for their Prayers seem to be like one Mans desiring the Prayers of other Good Men and when a thing of this kind is once begun it naturally goes on Of all this we see a particular Account in a Discourse writ on purpose on this Argument of curing the Affections and Inclinations of the Greeks by Theodoret Theod. de cur Gr. affect l. 8. de Martyr who may be justly reckoned among the greatest Men of Antiquity and in it he insists upon this particular of proposing to them the Saints and Martyrs instead of their Gods And there is no doubt to be made but that they found the effects of this compliance many Heathens were every day coming over to the Christian Religion And it might then perhaps be intended to lay all those aside when the Heathens were once brought over To all which this must be added that the good Men of that time had not the Spirit of Prophesy and could not foresee what Progress this might make and to what an Excess it might grow they had nothing of that kind in their View So that between Charity and Policy between a desire to bring over Multitudes to their Faith and an Inclination to secure themselves it is not at all to be wondred at by any who considers all the Circumstances of those Ages that these Corruptions should have got into the Church and much less having once got in they should have gone on so fast and be carried so far Thus I have offered all the Considerations that arise from the State of Things at that time to shew how far we do still preserve the Respect due to the Fathers of those Ages even when we confess that they were Men and that something of human Nature appeared in this Piece of their Conduct This can be made no Argument for later Ages who having no Heathens among them are under no Temptations to comply with any of the Parts of Heathenism to gain them And now that the abuse of these Matters is become so scandalous and has spread it self so far how much soever we may excuse those Ages in which we discern the first beginnings and as it were the small Heads of that which has since overflow'd Christendom Yet we can by no means bear even with those beginnings which have had such dismal Effects and therefore we have reduced the Worship of God to the Simplicity of the Scripture Times and of the First Three Centuries And for the Fourth we reverence it so much on other Accounts that for the Sake of these we are unwilling to Reflect too much on this Another Consideration urged for the Invocation of Saints is that they seeing God we have reason to believe that they see in him if not all things yet at least all the Concerns of the Church of which they are still Parts and they being in a most perfect State of Charity they must certainly love the Souls of their Brethren here below So that if Saints on Earth whose Charity is not yet perfect do pray for one another here on Earth they in that State of Perfection do certainly
pray most fervently for them And as we here on Earth do desire the Prayers of others it may be as reasonable and much more useful to have recourse to their Prayers who are both in a higher State of Favour with God and have a more exalted Charity By which their Intercessions will be both more earnest and more prevalent They think also that this Honour paid the Saints is an Honour done to God who is glorified in them And since he is the acknowledged Fountain of all they think that all the Worship offered to them ends and terminates in God They think as Princes are come at by the means of those that are in Favour with them so we ought to come to God by the Intercession of the Saints That all our Prayers to them are to be understood to amount to no more than a desire to them to interceed for us and finally that the Offering of Sacrifice is an Act of Worship that can indeed be made only to God but that all other Acts of Devotion and Respect may be given to the Saints And the sublimest Degrees of them may be offered to the Blessed Virgin as the Mother of Christ in a peculiar rank by her self For they range the order of Worship into Latria that is due only to God Hyperdulia that belongs to the Blessed Virgin and Dulia that belongs to the other Saints It were easy to retort all this by putting it into the Mouth of a Heathen and shewing how well it would fit all those Parts of Worship that they offered to Demons or Intelligent Spirits and to Deified Men among them This is obvious enough to such as have read what the first Apologists for Christianity have writ upon those Heads But to take this to pieces we have no reason to believe that the Saints see all the Concerns of the Church God can make them perfectly happy without this and if we think the seeing them is a necessary Ingredient of perfect Happiness we must from thence conclude that they do also see the whole Chain of Providence Otherwise they may seem to be in some suspence which according to our Notions is not consistent with perfect Happiness For if they see the Persecutions of the Church and the Miseries of Christians without seeing on to the end in what all that will issue this seems to be a stop to their entire joy And if they see the final Issue and know what God is to do then we cannot imagine that they can interceed against it or indeed for it To us who know not the hidden Counsels of God Prayer is necessary and commanded But it seems inconsistent with a State in which all these Events are known This which they lay for the Foundation of Prayers to Saints is a thing concerning which God has revealed nothing to us and in which we can have no certainty God has commanded us to pray for one another to join our Prayers together and we have clear Warrants for desiring the Intercession of others It is a high Act of Charity and a great Instance of the mutual Love that ought to be among Christians It is a part of the Communion of the Saints And as they do certainly know that those whose assistance they desire understand their Wants when they signify them to them so they are sure that God has commanded this mutual Praying one for another It is a strange thing therefore to argue from what God has commanded and which may have many good Effects and can have no bad one to that which he has not commanded on the contrary against which there are many plain Intimations in Scripture and which may have many bad Effects and we are not sure that it can have any one that is good Beside that the Solemnity of Devotion and Prayer is a thing very different from our desiring the Prayers of such as are alive The one is as visibly an Act of religious Worship as the other is not God has called himself a jealous God that will not give his Glory to another Isâ— 42.8 And through the whole Scripture Prayer is represented as a main Part of the Service due to him and as that in which he takes the most Pleasure It is a Sacrifice and is so called Psal. 141.2 Hos. 14.2 And every other Sacrifice can only be accepted of God as it is accompanied with the internal Acts of Prayers and Praises which are the spiritual Sacrifices with which God is well pleased The only thing which the Church of Rome reserves to God proves to be the Sacrifice of the Mass Psal. 65.2 Which as shall appear upon another Article is a Sacrifice that they have invented but which is no where commanded by God So that if this is well made out there will be nothing reserved to God to be the act of their Latria Though it is not to be forgotten that even the Virgin and the Saints have a share in that Sacrifice The excusing this from the Addresses made to Princes by those that are in Favour with them is as bad as the thing it self it gives us a low Idea of God and of Christ and of that Goodness and Mercy that is so often declared to be Infinite as if he were to be addressed to by those about him and might not be come to without an Interposition Whereas the Scriptures speak always of God as a hearer of Prayer and as ready to accept of and answer the Prayers of his People To seek to other Assistances looks as if the Mercies of God were not Infinite or the Intercessions of Christ were not of infinite Efficacy This is a Corrupting of the main Design of the Gospel which is to draw our Affections wholly to God to free us from all low Notions of him and from every thing that may incline us to Idolatry or Superstition Thus I have gone through all the Heads contained in this Article It seemed necessary to explain these with a due Copiousness they being not only Points of Speculation in which Errors are not always so dangerous but practical Things which enter into the Worship of God and that run through it And certainly it is the Will of God that we should preserve it pure from being corrupted with Heathenish or Idolatrous Practices It seems to be the chief End of Revealed Religion to deliver the World from Idolatry A great Part of the Mosaical Law did consist of Rites of which we can give no other account that is so like to be true as that they were Fences and Hedges that were intended to keep that Nation in the greatest Opposition and at the utmost distance possible from Idolatry we cannot therefore think that in the Christian Religion in which we are carried to higher Notions of God and to a more spiritual way of Worshipping him that there should be such an approach to some of the worst Pieces of Gentilism that it seems to be outdone by Christians in some of its most
Opus operatum it is conveyed to the Souls of those to whom they are applied unless they themselves put a Bar in the way of it by some mortal Sin In consequence of this they reckon that by the Sacraments given to a Man in his Agonies though he is very near past all Sense and so cannot joyn any lively Acts of his Mind with the Sacraments yet he is justified not to mention the common practice of giving Extreme Unction in the last Agony when no appearance of any Sense is left This we reckon a Doctrine that is not only without all Foundation in Scripture but that tends to destroy all Religion and to make Men live on securely in Sin trusting to this that the Sacraments may be given them when they die The Conditions of the New Covenant are Repentance Faith and Obedience and we look on this as the corrupting the Vitals of this Religion when any such means are proposed by which the main Design of the Gospel is quite overthrown The business of a Character is an unintelligible Notion We acknowledge Baptism is not to be repeated but that is not by virtue of a Character imprinted in it but because it being a Dedication of the Person to God in the Christian Religion what is once so done is to be understood to continue still in that State till such a Person falls into an open Apostacy In case of the Repentance of such a Person we finding that the Primitive Church did reconcile but not rebaptize Apostates do imitate that their Practice but not because of this late and unexplicable Notion of a Character We look on all Sacramental Actions as acceptable to God only with regard to the Temper and the inward Acts of the Person to whom they are applied and cannot consider them as Medicines or Charms which work by a Virtue of their own whether the Person to whom they are applied co-operates with them or not Baptism is said by St. Peter to save us not as it is an Action that washes us Not the putting away the filth of the flesh 1 Pet. 3.21 but the answer of a good conscience towards God And therefore Baptism without this Profession is no Baptism but seems to be used as a Charm unless it is said that this Answer or Profession is implied whensoever Baptism is desired When a Person of Age desires Baptism he must make those Answers and Sponsions otherwise he is not truly Baptized and though his outward making of them being all that can fall under Human Cognizance he who does that must be held to be truly baptized and all the outward Priviledges of a baptized Person must belong to him yet as to the effect of Baptism on the Soul of him that is baptized without doubt that depends upon the sincerity of the Professions and Vows made by him The Wills of Infants are by the Law of Nature and Nations in their Parents and are transferred by them to their Sureties the Sponsions that are made on their behalf are considered as made by themselves but there the outward Act is sufficient for the inward Acts of one Person cannot be supposed necessary to give the Sacrament its Virtue in another 1 Cor. 10 1â— In the Eucharist by our shewing forth our Lord's Death till he comes we are admitted to the Communion of his Body and Blood To a share in Partnership with other Christians in the Effects and Merits of his Death But the unworthy Receiver is guilty of his Body and Blood and brings thereby down Judgments upon himself so that to fancy a Virtue in Sacraments that works on the Person to whom they are applied without any inward Acts accompanying it and upon his being only Passive is a Doctrine of which we find nothing in the Scriptures which teach us that every thing we do is only accepted of God with regard to the Disposition of Mind that he knows us to be in when we go about it Our Prayers and Sacrifices are so far from being accepted of God that they are Abomination to him if they come from wicked and defiled Hearts The making Men believe that Sacraments may be effectual to them when they are next to a State of Passivity not capable of any sensible thoughts of their own is a sure way to raise the Credit of the Clergy and of the Sacrament but at the same time it will most certainly dispose Men to live in Sin hoping that a few Rites which may be easily procured at their Death will clear all at last And thus we reject not without great Zeal against the fatal Effects of this Error all that is said of the Opus operatum the very doing of the Sacrament we think it looks liker the Incantations of Heathenism than the Purity and Simplicity of the Christian Religion But the other Extream that we likewise avoid is that of sinking the Sacraments so low as to be meer Rites and Ceremonies St. Peter says Baptism saves us St. Paul calls it The laver of Regeneration to which he joyns the renewing of the Holy Ghost Tit. 3.5 Mark 16.16 John 3.3 5. Our Saviour saith He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved and except ye are born again of Water and of the Spirit ye cannot enter into the Kingdom of God These Words have a Sense and Signification that rises far above a meer Ceremony done to keep up Order and to maintain a settled Form The Phrase Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ is above the Nature of an Anniversary or Memorial Feast This Opinion we think is very unsuitable to those high Expressions and we do not doubt but that Christ who instituted those Sacraments does still accompany them with a particular Presence in them and a Blessing upon them so that we coming to them with Minds well prepared with pure Affections and holy Resolutions do certainly receive in and with them particular largesses of the Favour and Bounty of God They are not bare and naked Remembrances and Tokens but are actuated and animated by a Divine Blessing that attends upon them This is what we believe on this Head and these are the Grounds upon which we found it A Sacrament is an Institution of Christ in which some material thing is sanctified by the use of some Form or Words in and by which federal Acts of this Religion do pass on both sides on ours by Stipulations Professions or Vows and on God's by his secret Assistances by these we are also united to the Body of Christ which is the Church It must be Instituted by Christ for though Ritual Matters that are only the Expressions of our Duty may be appointed by the Church yet federal Acts to which a conveyance of Divine Grace is tied can only be instituted by him who is the Author and Mediator of this New Covenant and who lays down the Rules or Conditions of it and derives the Blessings of it by what Methods and in what Channels he thinks fit
treats of Marriage to the mutual relation that is between Christ and his Church from that state of Life and says There is a great Mystery here the Vulgar has Translated the word Mystery by Sacrament So though the words immediately following seem to turn the matter another way but I speak concerning Christ and the Church yet from the promiscuous use of those two words and because Sacraments were called the Mysteries of the Christian Religion the Translator it seems thought that all Mysteries might be called Sacraments But it is so very hard here to find Matter Form a Minister and a Sacramental Effect that though Pope Eugenius in that famous Decree of his is very punctual in assigning these when he explains the other Sacraments yet he wisely passed them all over when he came to this and only makes a true consent necessary to the making the Sacrament We do not deny Marriage to be an Ordinance of God but we think that as it was at first made in the state of Innocence so it is still founded on the Law of Nature and though the Gospel gives Rules concerning the Duties belonging to this state of Life as it does concerning the Duties of Parents and Children which is another Relation founded on the same Law of Nature yet we cannot call it a Sacrament for we find neither Matter Form Institution nor Federal Acts nor Effects assigned to it in the Gospel to make us esteem it a Sacrament The Matter assigned by the Roman Doctors is the inward Consent by which both Parties do mutually give themselves to one another the Form they make to be the Words or Signs by which this is expressed Now it seems a strange thing to make the secret Thoughts of Men the Matter Upon the whole Doctrine of the Church of Rome concerning the Sacraments as it is explained by the Schoolmen I have followed the Account given by Honoratus Fabri in his Summula Theologica who is dead within these Ten Years I knew him at Rome Anno 1685. He was a true Philosopher beyond the Liberties allowed by his Order and studied to reduce their School-Divinity to as clear Ideas as it was capable of So that in following him I have given the best and not the worst Face of their Doctrine His Book was Printed at Lions Anno 1669. and their Words the Form of a Sacrament all Mutual Compacts being as much Sacraments as this there being no visible material things applied to the Parties who receive them which is necessary to the being of a Sacrament It is also a very absurd Opinion which may have very fatal Consequences and raise very afflicting Scruples if any should imagine that the Inward Consent is the Matter of this Sacrament here is a Foundation laid down for voiding every Marriage The Parties may and often do Marry against their Wills and though they profess an outward Consent they do inwardly Repine against what they are doing If after this they grow to like their Marriage Scruples must arise since they know they have not the Sacrament because it is a Doctrine in that Church that as Intention is necessary in every Sacrament so here that goes further the Intention being the only Matter of this Sacrament so that without it there is no Marriage and yet since they cannot be married again to compleat or rather to make the Marriage such Persons does live only in a State of Concubinate On the other hand here is a Foundation laid down for breaking Marriages as often as the Parties or either of them will solemnly Swear that they gave no Inward Consent which is often practised at Rome All Contracts are sacred things but of them all Marriage is the most Sacred since so much depends upon it Mens Words confirmed by Oaths and other solemn Acts must either be binding according to the plain and acknowledged Sense of them or all the Security and Confidence of Mankind is destroyed No Man can be safe if this principle is once admitted that a Man is not bound by his Promises and Oaths unless his Inward Consent went along with them and if such a fraudulent thing may be applied to Marriages in which so many Persons are concerned and upon which the Order of the World does so much depend it may be very justly applied to all other Contracts whatsoever so that they may be voided at pleasure A Man's Words and Oaths bind him by the Eternal Laws of Fidelity and Truth and it is a just prejudice against any Religion whatsoever if it should teach a Doctrine in which by the secret reserves of not giving an Inward Consent the Faith which is solemnly given may be broken Here such a Door is opened to Perfidy and Treachery that the World can be no longer safe while it is allowed hereby lewd and vitious Persons may intangle others and in the mean while order their own Thoughts so that they shall be all the while free Next to Matter and Form we must see for the Institution of this Sacrament The Church of Rome think that is strong here though they feel it to be hardly defensible in the other Points that relate to it They think that though Marriage as it is a Mutual Contract subsists upon the Law of Nature yet a Divine Virtue is put in it by the Gospel expressed in these Words This is a great Mystery or Sacrament so the explaining these Words determines this Controversy The chief Point in dispute at that time was Whether the Gentiles were to be received to equal Priviledges with the Iews in the dispensation of the Messias The Iews do not to this day deny but that the Gentiles may be admitted to it but still they think that they are to be considered as a distinct Body and in a lower Order the chief Dignity being to be reserved to the Seed of Abraham Now St. Paul had in that Epistle as well as in his other Epistles asserted that all were equal in Christ That he had taken away the middle wall of partition that he had abolished the Ground of the Enmity Eph. 2.15 16 20 21. which was the Mosaical Law called the Law of Commandments contained in Ordinances that he might make both Jew and Gentile one new Man one entire Body of a Church He being the chief corner Stone in whom the whole building was fitly framed together And so became a holy habitation to God Thus he made use of the Figure of a Body and of a Temple to illustrate this Matter and to shew how all Christians were to make up but one Body and one Church So when he came to speak of the Rules belonging to the several States of Human Life he takes occasion to explain the Duties of the married State by comparing that to the Relation that the Church has to Christ And when he had said that the married Couple make but one Body and one Flesh which declares that according to the first Institution every Man was to have but
the Ancients as the only Viaticum of Christians in their last Passage With them we give that and no more Thus it appears upon what Reason we reject those Five Sacraments though we allow both of Confirmation and Orders as Holy Functions derived to us down from the Apostles and because there is a visible Action in these though in strictness that cannot be called a Sacrament yet so the thing be rightly understood we will not dispute about the Extent of a Word that is not used in Scripture Marriage is in no respect to be called a Sacrament of the Christian Religion tho' it being a State of such Importance to Mankind we hold it very proper both for the Solemnity of it and for Imploring the Blessing of God upon it that it be done with Prayers and other Acts of Religious Worship But a great difference is to be made between a pious Custom begun and continued by publick Authority and a Sacrament appointed by Christ. We acknowledge true Repentance to be One of the great Conditions of the New Covenant but we see nothing of the Nature of a Sacrament in it And for Extreme Unction we do not pretend to have the Gift of Healing among us and therefore we will not deceive the World by an Office that shall offer at that which we acknowledge we cannot do Nor will we make a Sacrament for the Good of the Soul out of that which is mentioned in Scripture only as a Rite that accompanied the curing the Diseases of the Body The last Part of this Article concerning the Use of the Sacraments consists of Two Parts the First is Negative that they are not ordained to be gazed on or to be carried about but to be used And this is so Express in the Scripture that little Question can be made about it The Institution of Baptism is go preach and baptize And the Institution of the Eucharist is take eat and drink ye all of it Which Words being set down before those in which the Consecrating them is believed to be made This is my body And this is my blood and the Consecratory Words being delivered as the Reason of the Command take eat and drink nothing can be more clearly exprest than this that the Eucharist is consecrated only that it may be used that it may be eat and drunk The Second Part of this Period is that the Effect of the Sacraments comes only upon the Worthy receiving of them of this so much was already said upon the first Paragraph of this Article that it is not necessary to add any more here The pretending that Sacraments have their Effect any other way is the bringing in the Doctrine and Practice of Charms into the Christian Religion And it tends to dissolve all Obligations to Piety and Devotion to a Holiness of Life or a Purity of Temper When the being in a Passive and perhaps Insensible State while the Sacraments are applied is thought a Disposition sufficient to give them their Vertue Sacraments are federal Acts and those visible Actions are intended to quicken us so that in the use of them we may raise our inward Acts to the highest Degrees possible but not to supply their Defects or Imperfections Our Opinion in this Point represents them as means to raise our Minds and to kindle our Devotion whereas the Doctrine of the Church of Rome represents them as so many Charms which may heighten indeed the Authority of him that Administers them but do extinguish and deaden all true Piety when such helps are offered by which the worst Men living and dying in a bad State may by a few faint Acts and perhaps by none at all of their own be well enough taken care of and secured But as we have not so learned Christ so neither dare we corrupt his Doctrine in its most vital and essential Parts ARTICLE XXVI Of the Unworthiness of the Ministers which hinder not the Effect of the Sacraments Altho in the Uisible Church the Evil be ever mingled with the Good and sometime the Evil have chief Authority in the Ministration of the Word and Sacraments yet for as much as they do not the same in their own Name but in Christ's and do Minister by his Commission and Authority we may use their Ministry both in hearing the Word of God and in receiving the Sacraments Neither is the Effect of Christ's Ordinance taken away by their Wickedness Nor the Grace of God's Gifts diminished from such as by Faith and rightly do receive the Sacraments ministred unto them which be Effectual because of Christ's Institution and Promise although they be ministred by Evil Men. Nevertheless it appertaineth to the Discipline of the Church that enquiry be made of Evil Ministers and that they be accused by those that have knowledge of their Offences and finally being found Guilty by just Iudgment to be deposed THE occasion that was given to this Article was the heat of some in the beginnings of the Reformation who being much offended at the publick Scandal which was given by the enormous Vices that were without any Disguise practised by the Roman Clergy of all Ranks did from thence revive the conceit of the Donatists who thought that not only Heresy and Schism did invalidate Sacred Functions but that personal Sins did also make them void It cannot be denied but that there are many Passages in St. Cyprian that look this Way and which seem to make the Sacraments depend as much on the good State that he was in who administred them as the Answer of their other Prayers did In the Progress of the Controversy with the Donatists they carried this Matter very far and considered the Effect of the Sacraments as the Answer of Prayers So since the Prayers of a wicked Man are Abomination to God they thought the Vertue of these Actions depended wholly on him that officiated Against this St. Augustin set himself very zealously He answered all that was brought from Cyprian in such a manner that by it he has set us a Pattern how we ought to separate the just Respect that we pay the Fathers from an Implicite receiving of all their Notions If this Conceit were allowed of it must go to the secret Thoughts and inward State in which he is who officiates for if the Sacraments are to be considered only as Prayers offered up by him then a Man can never be sure that he receives them Since it is impossible to see into the Hearts or know the Secrets of Men. Sacraments therefore are to be considered as the publick Acts of the Church and though the Effect of them as to him that receives them depends upon his Temper his Preparation and Application yet it cannot be imagined that the Vertue of those federal Acts to which Christians are admitted in them the Validity of them or the Blessings that follow them can depend on the secret State or Temper of him that Officiates Even in the case of publick Scandals though
necessary and so efficacious and yet all this is made to depend on that which can neither be known nor prevented The last Paragraph of this Article is so clear that it needs no explanation and is so evident that it wants no proof 1 Sam. 3.11 Eli was severely threatned for suffering his Sons to go on in their Vices when by their means the Sacrifice of God was abhorred God himself struck Nadab and Abihu dead when they offered strange Fire at his Altar and upon that these words were uttered I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me Levit. 10.3 and before all the People will I be glorified Timothy was required to receive an accusation of an Elder when regularly tendered to him 1 Tim. 5.1 19 20.6 c. 3 4 5. and to rebuke before all those that sinned and he was charged to withdraw himself from those teachers who consented not to wholsome words and that made a gain of godliness A main part of the Discipline of the Primitive Church lay heaviest on the Clergy and such of them as either Apostatized or fell into scandalous Sins even upon their Repentance were indeed received into the Peace of the Church but they were appointed to Communicate among the Laity and were never after that admitted to the Body of the Clergy or to have a share in their Priviledges Certainly there is nothing more incumbent on the whole Body of the Church than that all possible care be taken to discover the bad practices that may be among the Clergy which will ever raise strong prejudices not only against their Persons but even against their Profession and against that Religion which they seem to advance with their Mouths while in their Works and by their Lives they detract from it and seem to deny its Authority But after all our Zeal must go along with Justice and Discretion Fame may be a just ground to enquire upon but a Sentence cannot be founded on it The Laity must discover what they know that so these who have Authority may be able to cut off those that trouble the Church Gal. 5.12 Discretion will require that things which cannot be proved ought rather to be covered than exposed when nothing but clamour can follow upon it In sum this is a part of the Government of the Church for which God will reckon severely with those who from partial regards or other feeble or carnal Considerations are defective in that which is so great a part of their Duty and in which the Honour of God and of Religion and the Good of Souls as well as the Order and Unity of the Church are so highly concerned ARTICLE XXVII Of Baptism Baptism is not only a Sign of Profession and Mark of difference whereby Christian Men are discerned from others that be not Christened but it is also a Sign of Regeneration or New Birth whereby as by an Instrument they that receive Baptism rightly are Grrafted into the Church The Promises of the Forgiveness of Sin of our Adoption to be the Sons of God by the Holy Ghost are visibly Signed and Sealed Faith is confirmed and Grace increased by virtue of Prayer to God The Baptism of Young Children is in any wise to be retained in the Church as most agreeable with the Institution of Christ. WHEN St. Iohn Baptist began first to Baptize we do plainly see by the first Chapter of St. Iohn's Gospel that the Iews were not surprised at the Novelty of the Rite for they sent to ask who he was and when he said he was not the Messias nor Elias nor that Prophet they asked Why Baptizest thou then Which shews not only that they had clear Notions of Baptism John 1.25 but in particular that they thought that if he had been the Messias or Elias or that Prophet he might then have Baptized St. Paul does also say that the Iews were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea which seems to relate to some Opinion the Iews had 1 Cor. 10.2 that by that Cloud and their passing through the Sea they were purified from the Egyptian Defilements and made meet to become Moses's Disciples Yet in the Old Testament we find no clear Warrants for a practice that had then got among the Iews which is still taught by them that they were to receive a Proselyte if a Male by Baptism Circumcision and Sacrifice and if a Female only by Baptism and Sacrifice Thus they reckoned that when any came over from Heathenism to their Religion they were to use a Washing to denote their Purifying themselves from the uncleanness of their former Idolatry and their entring into a Holy Religion And as they do still teach that when the Messias comes they are all bound to set themselves to repent of their former sins so it seems they then thought or at least it would have been no strange thing to them if the Messias had received such as came to him by Baptism St. Iohn by Baptizing those who came to him took them obliged to enter upon a course of Repentance and he declared to them the near approach of the Messias and that the Kingdom of God was at hand and it is very probable that those who were Baptized by Christ that is by his Apostles for though it is expresly said that he Baptized none yet what he did by his Disciples he might in a more general sense be said to have done himself that these I say were Baptized upon the same Sponsions and with the same Declarations and with no other for the Dispensation of the Messias was not yet opened nor was it then fully declared that he was the Messias howsoever this was a preparatory Initiation of such as were fitted for the coming of the Messias by it they owned their expectations of him as then near at hand and they professed their Repentance of their Sins and their purposes of doing what should be enjoined them by him Water was a very proper Emblem to signify the passing from a Course of Defilement to a greater degree of Purity both in Doctrine and Practice Our Saviour in his state of Humiliation as he was subject to the Mosaical Law so he thought fit to fulfil all the Obligations that lay upon the other Iews which by a Phrase used among them he expresses thus to fulfil all righteousness For tho' our Saviour had no sins to Confess yet that not being known he might come to Profess his Belief of the Dispensation of the Messias that was then to appear But how well soever the Iews might have been accustomed to this Rite and how proper a Preparation soever it might be to the Manifestation of the Messias yet the Institution of Baptism as it is a federal Act of the Christian Religion must be taken from the Commission that our Saviour gave to his Disciples Matth. 28.19 to go preach and make disciples to him in all Nations for that is the strict signification of
whether formally or substantially or some other way Some Schoolmen thought that the Matter of Bread was destroyed but that the Form remained to be the Form of Christ's Body that was the Matter of it Others thought that the Matter of the Elements remained and that the Form only was destroyed But that to which many inclined was the Assumption of the Elements into an Union with the Body of Christ or a hypostatical Union of the eternal Word to them by which they became as truly a Body to Christ as that which he has in Heaven Yet it was not the same but a different Body Stephen Bishop of Autun was the First that fell on the Word of Transubstantiation Amalric in the beginning of the Thirteenth Century denied in express Words the corporal Presence De Sacram Altaris c. 13. He was condemned in the Fourth Council of the Lateran as an Heretick and his Body was ordered to be taken up and burnt And in opposition to him Transubstantiation was decreed Yet the Schoolmen continued to offer different Explanations of this for a great while after that But in conclusion all agreed to explain it as was formerly set forth It appears by the crude Way in which it was at first explained that it was a Novelty And that Men did not know how to mould and frame it but at last it was licked into shape the whole Philosophy being cast into such a Mould as agreed with it And therefore in the present Age in which that Philosophy has lost its Credit great Pains are taken to suppress the New and freer Way of Philosophy as that which cannot be so easily subdued to support this Doctrine as the Old one was And the Arts that those who go into the New Philosophy take to reconcile their Scheme to this Doctrine shew that there is nothing that subtile and unsincere Men will not venture on For since they make Extension to be of the Essence of Matter and think that Accidents are only the Modes of Matter which have no proper being of themselves it is evident that a Body cannot be without its Extension and that Accidents cannot subsist without their Subject so that this can be in no sort reconciled to Transubstantiation And therefore they would willingly avoid this special Manner of the Presence and only in General assert that Christ is corporally Present But the Decrees of the Lateran and Trent Councils make it evident that Transubstantiation is now a Doctrine that is bound upon them by the Authority of the Church and of Tradition And that they are as much bound to believe it as to believe the corporal Presence it self Thus the going off from the Simplicity in which Christ did deliver the Sacrament and in which the Church at first received it into some sublime Expressions about it led Men once out of the way and they still went farther and farther from it Pious and Rhetorical Figures pursued far by Men of heated Imaginations and of inflamed Affections were followed with Explanations invented by colder and more designing Men afterwards and so it increased till it grew by degrees to that which at last it settled on But after all if the Doctrine of the Corporal Presence had rested only in a Speculation tho' we should have judged those who held it to be very bad Philosophers and no good Criticks yet we could have endured it if it had rested there and had not gone on to be a matter of practice by the Adoration and Processions with every thing else of that kind which followed upon it for this corrupted the Worship The Lutherans believe a Consubstantiation and that both Christ's Body and Blood and the Substance of the Elements are together in the Sacrament That some explain by an Vbiquity which they think is communicated to the Human Nature of Christ by which his Body is every where as well as in the Sacrament Whereas others of them think that since the words of Christ must needs be true in a literal sense his Body and Blood is therefore in the Sacrament but in with and under the Bread and Wine All this we think is ill grounded and is neither agreeable to the words of the Institution nor to the nature of things A great deal of that which was formerly set forth in defence of our Doctrine falls likewise upon this The Vbiquity communicated to the Humane Nature as it seems a thing in it self impossible so it gives no more to the Sacrament than to every thing else Christ's Body may be said to be in every thing or rather every thing may be said to be his Body and Blood as well as the Elements in the Sacrament The impossibility of a Bodies being without extension or in more places at once lies against this as well as against Transubstantiation But yet after all this is only a Point of Speculation nothing follows upon it in practice no Adoration is offered to the Elements and therefore we judge that Speculative Opinions may be born with when they neither fall upon the Fundamentals of Christianity to give us false Ideas of the Essential parts of our Religion nor affect our practice and chiefly when the Worship of God is maintained in its Purity for which we see God has expressed so particular a concern giving it the Word which of all others raises in us the most sensible and the strongest Ideas calling it Iealousie that we reckon we ought to watch over this with much caution We can very well bear with some Opinions that we think ill grounded as long as they are only matters of Opinion and have no Influence neither on Mens Morals nor their Worship We still hold Communion with Bodies of Men that as we judge think wrong but yet do both live well and maintain the Purity of the Worship of God We know the great design of Religion is to govern Men's Lives and to give them right Ideas of God and of the Ways of Worshipping him All Opinions that do not break in upon these are things in which great forbearance is to be used large Allowances are to be made for Mens Notions in all other things and therefore we think that neither Consubstantiation nor Transubstantiation how ill grounded soever we take both to be ought to dissolve the Union and Communion of Churches But it is quite another thing if under either of these Opinions an Adoration of the Elements is taught and practised This we believe is plain Idolatry when an Insensible piece of Matter such as Bread and Wine has Divine Honours paid it when it is believed to be God when it is called God and is in all respects Worshipped with the same Adoration that is offered up to Almighty God This we think is gross Idolatry Many Writers of the Church of Rome have acknowledged that if Transubstantiation is not true their Worship is a strain of Idolatry beyond any that is practised among the most depraved of all the Heathens The only excuse that
express in this matter as is possible The whole Constitution of their Worship and Discipline shews it Their Worship concluded always with the Eucharist Such as were not capabl e of it as the Catechumens and those who were doing Publick Penance for their Sins assisted at the more general parts of the Worship and so much of it was called their Mass because they were dismissed at the Conclusion of it When that was done then the Faithful staid and did partake of the Eucharist and at the conclusion of it they were likewise dismissed from whence it came to be called the Mass of the Faithful The great Rigor of Penance was thought to consist chiefly in this That such Penitents might not stay with the Faithful to communicate And though this seems to be a Practice begun in the Third Century yet both from Iustin Martyr and Tertullian it is evident that all the Faithful did constantly communicate There is a Canon among those which go under the name of the Apostles Can. 9. Aâ—ost against such as came and assisted in the other parts of the Service and did not partake of the Eucharist The same thing was decreed by the Council of Antioch Con. Antioch Can. 2. Const. Apost l. 8. cap. 11. Hom. 3. in Ep. ad Eph Lib. 2. And it appears by the Constitutions That a Deacon was appointed to see that no man should go out and a Subdeacon was to see that no Woman should go out during the Oblation The Fathers do frequently allude to the Word Communion to shew that the Sacrament was to be common to all It is true in St. Chrysostom's time the Zeal that the Christians of the former Ages had to communicate often began to slacken so that they had thin Communions and few Communicants against which that Father raises himself with his Pathetick Eloquence in words which do shew that he had no Notion of Solitary Masses or of the Lawfulness of them And it is very evident that the Neglect of the Sacrament in those who came not to it and the Prophanation of it by those who came unworthily both which grew very scandalous at that time set that Holy and Zealous Bishop to many Eloquent and Sublime Strains concerning it which cannot be understood without making those Abatements that are dâ—e to a copious and Asiatick stile when much inflamed by Devotion In the succeeding Ages we find great Care was taken to suffer none that did not communicate to stay in the Church and to see the Mysteries There is a Rubrick for this in the Office mentioned by Gregory the Great Dialog Conc. Mogunt Can. 43. The Writers of the Ninth Century go on in the same Strain It was decreed by the Council of Mentz in the end of Charles the Great 's Reign That no Priest should say Mass alone for how could he say The Lord be with you or Lift up your hearts if there was no other Person there besides himself This shews that the practice of Soâ—itary Masses was then begun but that it was disliked Walafridus Strabus says That to a lawful Mass it was necessary that there should be a Priest Walaf Strab. de rebus Eccles c. 22. together with one to answer one to offer and one to communicate And the Author of Micrologus who is believed to have writ about the End of the Eleventh Century does condemn Solitary Communions as contrary both to the Practice of the Antients and to the several parts of the Office So that till the Twelfth Century it was never allowed of in the Roman Church as to this day it is not practised in any other Communion But then with the Doctrine of Purgatory and Transubstantiation mixt together the saying of Masses for other Persons whether alive or dead grew to be considered as a very meritorious thing and of great Efficacy Thereupon great Endowments were made and it became a Trade Masses were sold and a small Piece of Money became their Price So that a prophane sort of Simony was set up and the holiest of all the Institutions of the Christian Religion was exposed to Sale Therefore we in cutting off all this and in bringing the Sacrament to be according to its first Institution a Communion have followed the Words of our Saviour and the constant Practice of the whole Church for the first Ten Centuries So far all the Articles that relate to this Sacrament have been considered The variety of the Matter and the Important Controversies that have arisen out of it has made it necessary to enlarge with some Copiousness upon the several Branches of it Next to the Infallibility of the Church this is the dearest piece of the Doctrine of the Church of Rome and is that in which both Priests and People are better instructed than in any other Point whatsoever and therefore this ought to be studied on our side with a Care proportioned to the Importance of it That so we may govern both our selves and our People aright in a matter of such Consequence avoiding with great Caution the Extremes on both hands both of excessive Superstition on the one hand and of Prophane Neglect on the other For the nature of Man is so moulded that it is not easy to avoid the one without falling into the other We are now visibly under the Extreme of Neglect and therefore we ought to study by all means possible to inspire our People with a just Respect for this Holy Institution and to animate them to desire earnestly to partake often of it and in order to that to prepare themselves seriously to set about it with the Reverence and Devotion and with those Holy Purposes and Solemn Vows that ought to accompany it ARTICLE XXXII Of the Marriage of Priests Bishops Priests and Deacons are not commanded by God's Law either to vow the Estate of Single Life or to abstain from Marriage Therefore it is lawful for them as well as for all Christian Men to Marry at their own discretion as they shall judg the same to serve better to Godliness THE first Period of this Article to the word Therefore was all that was published in King Edward's time They were content to lay down the Assertion and left the Inference to be made as a Consequence that did naturally arise out of it There was not any one Point that was more severely examined at the time of the Reformation than this For as the irregular Practices and dissolute Lives of both Seculars and Regulars had very much prejudiced the World against the Celibate of the Roman Clergy which was considered as the occasion of all those Disorders so on the other hand the Marriage of the Clergy and also of those of both Sexes who had taken Vows gave great Offence They were represented as Persons that could not master their Appetites but that indulged themselves in Carnal Pleasures and Interests Thus as the Scandals of the Unmarried Clergy had alienated the World much from them so the
Sin was like Armour of Proof by which they were invulnerable and by consequence capable of undertaking any thing that might be committed to them But this may well recommend such a Rule to a Crafty and Designing Body of Men in which it is not to be denied that there is a deep and refined Policy yet we have not so learned Christ nor to handle the Word of God or the Authority that he has trusted to us deceitfully As for the Consequences of such Laws Inconveniences are on both hands As long as men are corrupt themselves so long they will abuse all the Liberties of Human Nature If not only common Lewdness in all the kinds of it but even brutal and unnatural Lusts have been the visible Consequences of the strict Law of Celibate and if this appears so evident in History that it cannot be denied we think it better to trust Human Nature with the lawful use of that in which God has not restrained it than to venture on that which has given occasion to Abominations that cannot be mentioned without horror As for the Temptation to Covetousness we think it is neither so great nor so unavoidable upon the one hand as those monstrous ones are on the other It is more reasonable to expect Divine Assistances to preserve men from Temptations when they are using those Liberties which God has left free to them than when by pretending to a Purity greater than that which he has commanded they throw themselves into many Snares It is also very evident that Covetousness is an effect of Mens Tempers rather than of their Marriage since the Instances of a ravenous Covetousness and of a restless Ambition in behalf of mens Kindred and Families hath appeared as often and as scandalously among the Vnmarried as among the Married Clergy From these general Considerations concerning the Power that the Church has to make either a Perpetual or an Universal Law in a thing of this kind I shall in the next place consider in short What the Church has done in this matter In the first Ages of Christianity Basilides and Saturninus and after them both Montanus and Novatus and the Sect of the Encratites condemned Marriage as a state of Libertinism that was unbecoming the Purity required of Christians Against those we find the Fathers asserted the Lawfulness of Marriage to all Christians without making a difference between the Clergy and the Laity It is true the appearances that were in Montanus and his Followers seem to have engaged the Christians of that Age to strain beyond them in those things that gave them their Reputation Many of Tertullian's Writings that Criticks do now see were writ after he was a Montanist which seems not to have been observed in that Age carry the matter of Celibate so high that it is no wonder if considering the Reputation that he had a Bias was given by these to the following Ages in favour of Celibate Yet it seemed to give great and just Prejudices against the Christian Religion if such as had come into the Service of the Church should have forsaken their Wives It is visible how much Scandal this might have given and what matter of Reproach it would have furnished their Enemies with if they could have charged them with this That men to get rid of their Wives and of the Care of their Families went into Orders that so under a pretence of a higher degree of Sanctity they might abandon their Families Therefore great care was taken to prevent this They were so far from requiring Priests to forsake their Wives that such as did it upon their entring into Orders were severely condemned by the Canons that go under the name of the Apostles They were also condemned by the Council of Gangra in the Fourth Century and by that of Trullo in the Seventh Age. There are some Instances brought of Bishops and Priests who are supposed to have married after they were ordained but as there are only few of those so perhaps they are not well proved It must be acknowledged that the general practice was that men once in Orders did not marry But many Bishops in the best Ages lived still with their Wives So did the Fathers both of Gregory Nazianzen and of St. Basil. And among the Works of Hilary of Poictiers there is a Letter writ by him in his Exile to his Daughter Abra in which he refers her to her Mothers Instruction in those things which she by reason of her Age did not then understand which shews that she was then very young and so was probably born after he was a Bishop Some proposed in the Council of Nice Socr. Hist. Eccl. lib. 1. c. 12. That the Clergy should depart from their Wives but Paphnutius though himself unmarried opposed this as the laying an unreasonably heavy Yoke upon them Heliodorus a Bishop the Author of the first of those Love-Fables that are now known by the name of Romances being upon that account accused of too much Levity did in order to the clearing himself of that Imputation move that Clergy-men should be obliged to live from their Wives Which the Historian says they were not tied to before for till then Bishops lived with their Wives So that in those days the living in a married state was not thought unbecoming the Purity of the Sacred Functions A single Marriage was never objected in bar to a mans being made Bishop or Priest They did not indeed admit a man to Orders that had been twice married but even for this there was a distinction If a man had been once married before his Baptism and was once married after his Baptism that was reckoned only a single Marriage for what had been done when in Heathenism went for nothing And Ierome speaking of Bishops who had been twice married but by this Nicety were reckoned to be the Husbands of one Wife says The number of those of this sort in that time could not be reckoned and that more such Bishops might be found than were at the Council of Arimini Canons grew to be frequently made against the Marriage of those in Holy Orders but these were positive Laws made chiefly in the Roman and African Synods and since those Canons were so often renewed we may from thence conclude that they were not well kept When Synesius was ordained Priest he tells in an Epistle of his That he declared openly that he would not live secretly with his Wife as some did but that he would dwell publickly with her and wished that he might have many Children by her In the Eastern Church the Priests are usually married before they are ordained and continue afterwards to live with their Wives and to have Children by them without either Censure or Trouble In the Western Church we find mention made both in the Gallican and Spanish Synods of the Wives both of Bishops and Priests and they are called Episcopae and Presbyterae In the Saxon times the Clergy in most of
the Bishops against one another The Emperors called General Councils by their Summons they sate in them and confirmed their Decrees This was the constant Practice of the Roman Emperors both in the East and in the West When the Church came to fall under many lesser Sovereignties those Princes continued still to make Laws to name Bishops to give Investitures into Benefices to call Synods and to do every thing that appeared necessary to them for the good Government of the Church in their Dominions When Charles the Great was restoring those things that had fallen under much disorder in a course of some ignorant and barbarous Ages and was reviving both Learning and good Government he published many Capitulars a great part of them relating to Ecclesiastical matters nor was any exception taken to that in those Ages The Synods that were then held were for the greatest part mixt Assemblies in which the Temporalty and the Spiritualty sate together and judged and decreed of all matters in common And it is certain that such was the Sanhedrim among the Iews in our Saviour's time it was the Supreme Court both for Spirituals and Temporals In England our Princes began early and continued long to maintain this part of their Authority The Letters that are pretended to have passed between King Lucius and Pope Eleutherius are very probably Forgeries but they are antient ones and did for many Ages pass for true Now a Forgery is generally calculated to the Sense of the Age in which it is made In the Pope's Letter the King is called God's Vicar in his Kingdoms and it is said to belong to his Office to bring his Subjects to the holy Church and to maintain protect and govern them in it Both Saxon and Danish Kings made a great many Laws about Ecclesiastical matters and after the Conquest when the Nation grew into a more united Body and came to a more settled Constitution many Laws were made concerning these matters particularly in opposition to those Practices that favoured the Authority that the Popes were then assuming such as Appeals to Rome or Bishops going out of the Kingdom without the King's leave King Alfred's Laws were a sort of a Text for a great while they contain many Laws about Sacred matters The exempting of Monasteries from Episcopal Jurisdiction was granted by some of our Kings at first William the Conqueror to perpetuate the Memory of his Victory over Harold and to endear himself to the Clergy founded an Abbey in the Field where the Battel was fought called Battel-Abbey And in the Charter of the Foundation in imitation of what former Kings had done in their Endowments this Clause was put It shall be also free and quiet for ever from all subjection to Bishops or the dominion of any other Persons This is an Act that does as immediately relate to the Authority of the Church as any one that we can imagine The Constitutions of Clarendon were asserted by both King and Parliament and by the whole Body of the Clergy as the Antient Customs of the Kingdom These relate to the Clergy and were submitted to by them all Becket himself not excepted though he quickly went off from it It is true the Papacy got generally the better of the Temporal Authority in a course of several Ages but at last the Popes living long at Avignon together with the great Schism that followed upon their return to Rome did very much sink in their Credit and that stopped the Progress they had made before that time which had probably subdued all if it had not been for those Accidents Then the Councils began to take heart and resolved to assert the Freedom of the Church from the Papal Tyranny Pragmatick Sanctions were made in several Nations to assert their Liberty That in France was made with great Solemnity In these the Bishops did not only assert their own Jurisdiction independent in a great measure of the Papacy but they likewise carried it so far as to make themselves Independent on the Civil Authority particularly in the point of Elections This disposed Princes generally to enter into Agreements with the Popes by which the matter was so transacted that the Popes and they made a division between them of all the Rights and Pretensions of the Church Princes yielded a great deal to the Popes to be protected by them in that which they got to be reserved to themselves Great Restraints were laid both on the Clergy and likewise on the See of Rome by the Appeals that were brought into the Secular Courts from the Ordinary Judgments of the Ecclesiastical Courts or from the Bulls or Powers that Legates brought with them A distinction was found that seemed to save the Ecclesiastical Authority at the same time that the Secular Court was made the Judg of it The Appeal did lye upon a pretence that the Ecclesiastical Judg had committed some Abuse in the way of proceeding or in his Sentence So the Appeal was from that Abuse and the Secular Court was to examine the matter according to the Rules and Laws of the Church and not according to the Principles or Rules of any other Law But upon that they did either confirm or reverse the Sentence And even those Princes that acknowledg the Papal Authority have found out distinctions to put such Stops to it as they please and so to make it an Engine to govern their People by as far as they think fit to give way to it and to damn such Bulls or void such Powers as they are afraid of Thus it is evident That both according to Scripture and the Practice of all Ages and Countries the Princes of Christendom have an Authority over their Subjects in matters Ecclesiastical The reason of things makes also for this for if any Rank of men are exempted from their Jurisdiction they must thereby cease to be Subjects And if any sort of Causes Spiritual ones in particular were put out of their Authority it were an easy thing to reduce almost every thing to such a relation to Spirituals that if this Principle were once received their Authority would be very precaâ—ious and feeble Nothing could give Princes stronger and juster Prejudices against the Christian Religion than if they saw that the effect of their receiving it must be the withdrawing so great a part of their Subjects from their Authority and the putting as many Checks upon it as those that had the Management of this Religion should think fit to restrain it by In a word all mankind must be under one Obedience and one Authority It remains that the Measures and the Extent of this Power be right stated It is certain First That this Power does not depend upon the Prince's Religion Whether he is a Christian or not or whether he is of â— true or false Religion or is a good or a bad man By the same Tenure that he holds his Sovereignty he holds this likewise Artaxerâ—â—◠〈◊〉 it as well as either
Violence of Wicked men We owe to Human Society and to the Safety and Order of the World our Endeavours to put a stop to the Wickedness of Men which a good man may do with great inward Tenderness to the Souls of those whom he prosecutes It is highly probable that as nothing besides such a Method could stop the Progress of Injustice and Wickedness so nothing is so likely a Mean to bring the Criminal to repent of his sins and to fit him to dye as a Christian as to condemn him to dye for his Crimes If any thing can awaken his Conscience and strike Terror in him that will do it Therefore as Capital Punishments are necessary to Human Society so they are often real Blessings to those on whom they fall And it may be affirmed very positively That a man who can harden himself against the Terrors of Death when they come upon him so solemnly so slowly and so certainly he being in full Health and well able to reflect on the Consequences of it is not like to be wrought on by a longer continuance of Life or by the Methods of a Natural Death It is not possible to fix Rules to which Capital Punishments ought to be proportioned It is certain that in a full Equality Life only can be set against Life But there may be many other Crimes that must end in the Ruin of Society and in the Dissolution of all Order and all the Commerce that ought to be among men if they go unpunished In this all Princes and States must judge according to the real Exigencies and Necessities that appear to them Nor can any general Rules be made save only this That since Man was made after the Image of God and that the Life of Man is precious and when once extinguished it ceases for evermore therefore all due Care and Tenderness ought to be had in preserving it and since the End of Government is the Preservation of Mankind therefore the Lives of Men ought not to be too lightly taken except as it appears to be necessary for the Preservation and Safety of the Society Under the Gospel as well as under the Law the Magistrate is the Minister of God and has the Sword put in his hand which he beareth not in vain Rom. 13.4 for he is appointed to be a revenger to execute wrath on him that doth evil The natural signification of his carrying the Sword is That he has an Authority for punishing Capitally since it is upon those occasions only that he can be said to use the Sword as a Revenger Nor can Christian Charity oblige a man whom the Law has made to be the Avenger of Blood or of other Crimes to refuse to comply with that obligation which is laid upon him by the Constitution under which he is born He can only forgive that of which he is the Master but the other is a Debt which he owes the Society and his private forgiving of the wrong done himself does not reach to that other obligation which is not in his own power to give away The last Paragraph in this Article is concerning the Lawfulness of Wars Some have thought all Wars to be contrary to Christian Charity to be inhuman and barbarous and that therefore men ought according to the Rule set us by our Saviour Not to resist evil But when one Injury is done not only to bear it Matth. 5.39 but to shew a readiness rather to receive new ones turning the other cheek to him that smites us on the one going two miles with him that shall compel us to go one with him And giving our Cloak to him that shall take away our Coat 40. It seems just that by a parity of reason Societies should be under the same Obligations to bear from other Societies that single Persons are under to other single Persons This must be acknowledged to be a very great difficulty for as on the one hand the words of our Saviour seem to be very express and full so on the other hand if they are to be understood literally they must cast the World loose and expose it to the Injustice justice and Insolence of wicked persons who would not fail to take advantages from such a compliance and submission Therefore these words must be considered first as addressed to private persons then as relating to smaller Injuries which can more easily be born and finally as Phrases and Forms of Speech that are not to be carried to the utmost extent but to be construed with that softning that is to be allowed to the use of a Phrase So that the meaning of that Section of our Saviours Sermon is to be taken thus That private Persons ought to be so far from pursuing Injuries to the equal Retaliation of an eye for an eye or a tooth for a tooth that they ought in many cases to bear Injuries without either resisting them or making returns of evil for evil shewing a Patience to bear even repeated Injuries when the matter is small and the wrong tolerable Under all this secret conditions are to be understood such as when by such our Patience we may hope to overcome evil with good or at least to shew to the World the Power that Religion has over us to check and subdue our Resentments In this case certainly we ought to sacrifice our just Rights either of defence or of seeking reparation to the Honour of Religion and to the gaining of men by such an Heroical Instance of Virtue But it cannot be supposed that our Saviour meant that good men should deliver themselves up to be a Prey to be devoured by bad men or to oblige his Followers to renounce their Claims to the Protection and Reparations of Law and Justice In this St. Paul gives us a clear Commentary on our Saviour's words He reproves the Corinthians for going to Law with one another and that before unbelievers 1 Cor. 6.6 7. when it was so great a Scandal to the Christian Religion in its first Infancy He says Why do not ye take wrong why do not ye suffer your selves to be defrauded Yet he does not deny but that they might claim their Rights and seek for redress therefore he proposes their doing it by Arbitration among themselves and only urges the Scandal of suing before Heathen Magistrates so that his Reproof did not fall on their suing one another but on the scandalous manner of doing it Therefore men are not bound up by the Gospel from seeking Relief before a Christian Judge and by consequence those words of our Saviour's are not to be urged in the utmost extent of which they are capable If private persons may seek Reparation of one another they may also seek Reparations of the Wrongs that are done by those who are under another Obedience and every Prince owes a Protection to his People in such cases for he beareth not the Sword in vain He is their Avenger He may demand Reparation by
Saviour's words Ibid. The discourse Joh. 6. explained 312 It can only be understood spiritually 313 Bold Figures much used in the East Ibid. A plain thing needs no great proof 314 Of unworthy Receivers and the effect of that sin 315 Of the effects of worthy receiving Ibid. Of Foederal Symbols 316 Of the Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ Ibid. Of the like Phrases in Scripture 317 Of our Sense of the Phrase Real Presence Ib. Transubstantiation explained 318 Of the words of Consecration 319 Of the Consequences of Transubstantiation Ibid. The grounds upon which it was believed 320 This is contrary to the Testimony of all our Faculties both Sense and Reason Ibid. We can be sure of nothing if our Senses do deceive us 321 The Objection from believing Mysteries answered 322 The end of all Miracles considered Ibid. Our Doctrine of a Mystical Presence is confessed by those of the Church of Rome 323 St. Austin's Rule about Figures Ibid. Presumptions concerning the belief of the Ancients in this matter 324 They had not that Philosophy which this Doctrine has forced on the Church of Rome 325 This was not objected by Heathens 326 No Heresies or Disputes arose upon this as they did on all other Points 327 Many new Rituals unknown to them have sprung out of this Doctrine Ibid. In particular the adoring the Sacrament 328 Prayers in the Masses of the Saints inconsistent with it Ibid. They believed the Elements were Bread and Wine after Consecration Ibid. Many Authorities brought for this 329 Eutychians said Christ's Humanity was swallowed of his Divinity 330 The Fathers argue against this from the Doctrine of the Eucharist Ibid. The Force of that Argument explained 331 The Fathers say our Bodies are nourished by the Sacrament Ibid. They call it the Type Sign and Figure of the Body and Blood of Christ 332 The Prayer of Consecration calls it so 333 That compared with the Prayer in the Missal Ibid. The progress of the Doctrine of the Corporal Presence 334 Reflection on the Ages in which it grew 335 The occasion on which it was advanced in the Eastern Church 336 Paschase Radbert taught it first 337 But many wrote against him Ibid. Afterwards Berengarius opposed it 338 The Schoolmen descanted on it Ibid. Philosophy was corrupted to support it 339 Concerning Consubstantiation Ibid. It is an Opinion that may be born with 340 The Adoration of the Eucharist is Idolatry Ibid. The Plea against that considered Ibid. Christ is not to be worshipped though present 341 Concerning reserving the Sacrament Ibid. Concerning the Elevation of it 342 ARTICLE XXIX 343 THE wicked do not receive Christ Ibid. The Doctrine of the Fathers in this Point Ibid. More particularly St. Austin's 344 ARTICLE XXX 345 THE Chalice was given to all Ibid. Not to the Disciples as Priests Ibid. The breaking of Bread explained 346 Sacraments must be given according to the Institution Ibid. Nâ— Arguments from ill consequences to be admitted unless in cases of necessity 347 Concomitance a new Notion Ibid. Vniversal practice for giving the Chalice Ibid. The case of the Agrarii 348 The first beginning of taking away the Cup Ibid. The Decree of the Council of Constance 349 ARTICLE XXXI 350 THE term Sacrifice of a large signification Ibid. The Primitive Christians denied that they had any Sacrifices Ibid. The Eucharist has no virtue but as it is a Communion 351 Strictly speaking there is only one Priest and one Sacrifice in the Christian Religion 352 The Fathers did not think the Eucharist was a Propitiatory Sacrifice 353 But call it a Sacrafice in a larger sense Ibid. Mâ—sses without a Communion not known then 354 None might be at Mass who did not communicate Ibid. The Importance of the Controversies concerning the Eucharist 355 ARTICLE XXXII 356 NO Divine Law against a Married Clergy Ibid. Neither in the Old or New Testament but the contrary 357 The Church has not Power to make a perpetual Law against it Ibid. The ill consequences of such a Law 358 No such Law in the first Ages Ibid. When the Laws for the Celibate began 359 The practice of the Church not uniform in it Ibid. The progress of these Laws in England 360 The good and the bad of Celibate balanced Ibid. It is not lawful to make Vows in this matter 361 Nor do they bind when made Ibid. Oaths ill made are worse to be kept 362 ARTICLE XXXIII 363 A Temper to be observed in Church Discipline Ibid. The necessity of keeping it up Ibid. Extremes in this to be avoided 364 Concerning the delivering any to Satan Ibid. The Importance of an Anathemea 365 Of the effect of Church-Censures Ibid. What it is when they are wrong applied 366 The causless jealousy of Church-Power Ibid. How the Laity was once taken into the exercise of it 367 The Pastors of the Church have Authority Ibid. Defects in this no just cause of Separation 368 All these brought in by Popery Ibid. A Correction of them intended at the Reformation 369 ARTICLE XXXIV 370 THE Obligation to obey Canons and Laws Ibid. The great Sin of Schism and Disobedience 371 The true Notion of Scandal Ibid. The fear of giving Scandal no warrant to break established Laws 372 Human Laws are not unalterable Ibid. The Respect due to Ancient Canons 373 The Corruptions of the Canon Law Ibid. Great Varieties in Rituals Ibid. Every Church is a compleat Body 374 ARTICLE XXXV 375 THE occasion of compiling the Homilies Ibid. We are not bound to every thing in them Ibid. But only to the Doctrine 376 This illustrated in the Charge of Idolatry Ib. What is meant by their being necessary for those times Ibid. ARTICLE XXXVI 377 THE occasion of this Article Ibid. An Explanation of the words Receive ye the Holy Ghost 378 ARTICLE XXXVII 379 QVeen Elizabeth's Injunction concerning the Supremacy Ibid. The Popes Vniversal Iurisdiction not warranted by any of the Laws of Christ 380 Nor acknowledged in the first Ages 381 Begun on the occasion of the Arian Controversy Ibid. Contested in many places 382 The Progress that it made Ibid. The Patriarchal Authority founded on the division of the Roman Empire sunk with it 383 The Power exercised by the Kings of Judah in Religious Matters Ibid. That is founded on Scriptures 384 Practised in all Ages Ibid. And particularly in England 385 Methods used by Popish Princes to keep the Ecclesiastical Authority under the Civil Ibid. The Temporal Power is over all persons 386 And in all causes Ibid. The Importance of the Term Head 387 The Necâ—ssity of Capital Punishments Ibid. The measure of these 388 The Lawfulness of War Ibid. Our Saviour's words explained Ibid. In what cases War is juâ—t 389 Warranted by the Laws of God 390 How a Subject may serve in an unlawful War Ibid. ARTICLE XXXVIII 391 COncerning Property and Charity Ibid. The Proportion of Charity to the Poor 392 ARTICLE XXXIX 393 THE Lawfulness of Oaths proved Ibid. From Natural Religion and
the Scriptures Ibid. The Form of Swearing among the Jews 394 Our Saviour's words and St. James's against all Swearing explained 395 When Oaths may be lawfully taken 396 The End of the Table of the Contents AN EXPOSITION OF THE XXXIX ARTICLES OF THE Church of England TITLE Articles whereupon it was agreed by the Archbishops and Byshops of both Provinces and the whole Cleargie in the Convocation holden at London in the yeare of our Lorde GOD 1562. according to the computation of the Church of Englande for the avoiding of the diversities of opinions and for the stablishing of consent touching true Religion Put forth by the Queens authoritie The INTRODUCTION THE Title of these Articles leads me to consider 1. The Time the Occasion and the Design of Compiling them 2 dly The Authority that is stampt upon them both by Church and State and the Obligation that lies upon all of our Communion to Assent to them and more particularly the Importance of the Subscription to which the Clergy are obliged As to the 1 st It may seem somewhat strange to see such a Collection of Tenets made the Standard of the Doctrine of a Church that is deservedly valued by reason of her Moderation This seems to be a departing from the Simplicity of the First Ages which yet we pretend to set up for a Pattern In those times the owning the Belief of the Creeds then received was thought sufficient And when some Heresies had occasioned great Enlargements to be made in the Creeds the Third General Council thought fit to set a Bar against all further Additions and yet all those Creeds one of which goes far beyond the Ephesine Standard make but One Article of the Thirty nine of which this Book consists Many of these do also relate to subtile and abstruse Points in which it is not easy to form a clear Judgment and much less can it be convenient to Impose so great a Collection of Tenets upon a whole Church to Excommunicate such as affirm any of them to be erroneous and to reject those from the Service of the Church who cannot Assent to every one of them The Negative Articles of No Infallibility No Supremacy in the Pope No Transubstantiation No Purgatory and the like give yet a further Colour to Exceptions since it may seem that it was enough not to have mentioned these which implied a tacit rejecting of them It may therefore appear to be too rigorous to require a positive condemning of those Points for a very high degree of Certainty is required to affirm a Negative Proposition In order to the explaining this matter it is to be confessed that in the beginnings of Christianity the Declaration that was required even of a Bishop's Faith was conceived in very general Terms There was a Form setled very early in most Churches This St. Paul in one place calls The Form of Doctrine that was delivered in another place The Form of Sound Words Rom. 6.17 1 Tim. 4.6 6 3. 2 Tim. 1.13 which those who were fixed by the Apostles in particular Churches had received from them These words of his do import a Standard or fixed Formulary by which all Doctrines were to be examined Some have inferred from them that the Apostles delivered that Creed which goes under their Name every where in the same Form of Words But there is great reason to doubt of this since the first Apologists for Christianity when they deliver a short Abstract of the Christian Faith do all vary from one another both as to the Order and as to the Words themselves which they would not have done if the Churches had all received one setled Form from the Apostles They would all have used the same Words and neither more nor less It is more probable That in every Church there was a Form setled which was delivered to it by some Apostle or Companion of the Apostles with some Variation of which at this distance of time considering how defective the History of the First Ages of Christianity is it is not possible nor very necessary for us to be able to give a clear Account For Instance In the whole Extent or Neighbourhood of the Roman Empire it was at first of great Use to have this in every Christian's mouth That our Saviour suffered under Pontius Pilate because this fixed the Time and carried in it an Appeal to Records and Evidences that might then have been searched for But if this Religion went at first far to the Eastward beyond all Commerce with the Romans there is not that reason to think that this should have been a part of the shortest Form of this Doctrine it being enough that it was related in the Gospel These Forms of the several Churches were preserved with that Sacred Respect that was due to them This was esteemed the Depositum or Trust of a Church which was chiefly committed to the keeping of the Bishop In the First Ages in which the Bishops or Clergy of the several Churches could not meet together in Synods to examine the Doctrine of every new Bishop the Method upon which the Circumstances of those Ages put them was this The New Bishop sent round him and chiefly to the Bishops of the more Eminent Sees the Profession of his Faith according to the Form that was fixed in his Church And when the Neighbouring Bishops were satisfied in this they held Communion with him and not only owned him for a Bishop but maintained such a Commerce with him as the state of that Time did admit of But as some Heresies sprung up there were Enlargements made in several Churches for the condemning those and for excluding such as held them from their Communion The Council of Nice examined many of those Creeds and out of them they put their Creed in a fuller Form The Addition made by the Council of Constantinople was put into the Creeds of some particular Churches several Years before that Council met So that though it received its Authority from that Council yet those Fathers rather confirmed an Article which they found in the Creeds of some Churches than made a New one It had been an unvaluable Blessing if the Christian Religion had been kept in its first Simplicity The Council of Ephesus took care that the Creed by which men profess their Christianity should receive no new Additions but be fixed according to the Constantinoplitan Standard yet they made Decrees in Points of Faith and the following Councils went on in their steps adding still new Decrees with Anathematisms against the contrary Doctrines and declaring the Asserters of them to be under an Anathema that is under a very heavy Curse of being totally excluded from their Communion and even from the Communion of Jesus Christ. And whereas the New Bishops had formerly only declared their Faith they were then required besides that to declare That they received such Councils and rejected such Doctrines together with such as favoured them who were sometimes meâ—tioned by
Name This increased daily We have a full Account of the special Declaration that a Bishop was obliged to make in the First Canon of that which passeth for the Fourth Council of Carthage But while by reason of new Emergencies this was swelling to a vast Bulk General and more Implicit Formularies came to be used the Bishops declaring that they received and would observe all the Decrees and Traditions of Holy Coâ—â—cils and Fathers And the Papacy coming afterwards to carry every thing before it a Formal Oath that had many loose and indefinite words in it which were very large and comprehensive was added to all the Declarations that had been formerly established The Enlargements of Creeds were at first occasioned by the Prevarications of Hereticks who having put Senses favouring their Opinions on the simpler Terms in which the First Creeds were proposed it was thought necessary to use more express words This was absolutely necessary as to some Points for they being obliged to shew that the Christian Religion did not bring in that Idolatry which it condemned in Heathens it was also necessary to state this matter so that it should appear that they worshipped no Creature but that the Person to whom all agreed to pay Divine Adoration was truly God And it being found that an Equivocation was used in all other words except that of the same Substance they judged it necessary to fix on it besides some other words that they at first brought in but which were afterwards made more doubtful by the Glosses that were put on them At all times it is very necessary to free the Christian Religion from the Imputation of Idolatry but this was never so necessary as when Christianity was engaged in such a Struggle with Paganism And since the main Article then in dispute with the Heathens was Idolatry and the Lawfulness of worshipping any besides the Great and Eternal God it was of the last Importance to the Christian Cause to take care that the Heathens might have no reason to believe that they worshipped a Creature There was therefore just reason given to secure this main Point and to put an end to Equivocation by establishing a Term which by the Confession of all Parties did not admit of any It had been a great Blessing to the Church if a Stop had been put here and that those nice Descantings that were afterwards so much pursued had been more effectually discouraged than they were But men ever were and ever will be men Factions were formed and Interests were set up Hereticks had shewed so much Dissimulation when they were low and so much Cruelty when they prevailed that it was thought necessary to secure the Church from the Disturbances that they might give them And thus it grew to be a Rule to enlarge the Doctrines and Decisions of the Church So that in stating the Doctrines of this Church so copiously our Reformers followed a Method that had been used in a course of many Ages There were besides this common Practice two particular Circumstances in that time that made this seem to be the more necessary One was That at the breaking out of that Light there sprang up with it many impious and extravagant Sects which broke out into most violent Excesses This was no extraordinary thing for we find the like happened upon the first spreading of the Gospel many detestable Sects grew up with it which tended not a little to the defaming of Christianity and the obstructing its Progress I shall not examine what Influence Evil Spirits might have both in the one and the other Bâ—t one visible occasion of it was That by the first Preaching of the Gospel as also upon the opening the Reformation an Enquiry into the Matters of Religion being then the Subject of mens Studies and Discourses many men of warm and ill-govern'd Imaginations presuming on their own Talents and being desirous to signalize themselves and to have a Name in the World went beyond their Depth in Sâ—udy without the necesâ—ary degrees of Knowledge and the yet more necessary dispositions of Mind for arriving at a right understanding of Divine Matters This happening soon after that the Reformation was first set on foot those whose Corruptions were struck at by it and who both hated and persecuted it on that account did not fail to lay hold of and to improve the Advantage which these Seâ—ts gave them They said That the Sectaries had only spoke out what the rest thought and at last they held to this That all Sects were the Natural Consequences of the Reformation and of shaking off the Doctrine of the Infallibility of the Church To stop those Calumnies the Protestants in Germany prepared that Confession of their Faith which they offered to the Diet as Ausburg and which carries its name And after their Example all the other Churches which separated from the Roman Communion published the Confessions of their Faith both to declare their Doctrine for the Instruction of their own Members and for covering them from the Slanders of their Adversaries Another reason that the first Reformers had for their descending into so many Particulars and for all these Negatives that are in their Confessions was this They had smarted long under the Tyranny of Popery and so they had reason to secure themselves from it and from all those who were leavened with it Those here in England had seen how many had complied with every Alteration both in King Henry and King Edward's Reign who not only declared themselves to have been all the while Papists but became bloody Persecutors in Q. Mary's Days Therefore it was necessary to keep all such out of their Body that they might not secretly undermine and betray it Now since the Church of Rome owns all that is positive in our Doctrine there could be no Discrimination made but by condemning the most important of those additions that they have brought into the Christian Religion in express words It is true that in Matters of Fact or in Theories of Nature it is not safe to affirm a Negative because it is seldom possible to prove it yet the Fundamental Article upon which the whole Reformation and this our Church depends is this That the whole Doctrines of the Christian Religion are contained in the Scripture and that therefore we are to admit no Article as a part of it till it is proved from Scripture This being laid down and well made out it is not at all unreasonable to affirm a Negative upon an Examination of all those places of Scripture that are brought for any Doctrine and that seem to favour it if these are found not at all to support it but to bear a different and sometimes a contrary sense to that which is offered to be proved by them So there is no weight in this cavil which yet may look plausible to such as cannot distinguish common Matters from Points of Faith This may serve in general to justify the largeness and the
Sacraments  MS. the Injunctions also lately set forth  Pr. the Injunctions also set forth  MS. and serve in the Wars  Pr. and serve in lawful Wars Art 38. MS. every man oughteth of such things  Pr. every man ought of such things Art 39. Edw. 6. qui sequuntur non sunt in MS. WE Th' archbishops and Bishops of either Province of this Realm of England lawfully gathered together in this Provincial Synod holden at London with Continuations and Prorogations of the same do receive profess and acknowledge the xxxviii Articles before written in xix Pages going before to contain true and sound doctrine and do approve and ratify the same by the subscription of our hands the xi â—h day of May in the year of our Lord 1571. and in the year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lady Elizabeth by the Grace of God of England France and Ireland Queen Defender of the Faith c. the thirteenth Matthue Cantuar. Rob. Winton Jo. Heref. Richarde Ely Nic. Wigorn. Jo. Sarisburien Edm. Roffen N. Bangor Ri. Cicestren Thom. Lincoln Willhelmus Exon. From these Diversities a great difficulty will naturally arise about this whole Matter The Manuscripts of Corpus Christi are without doubt Originals The hands of the Subscribers are well known they belonged to Archbishop Parker and were left by him to that College and they are Signed with a particular care for at the end of them there is not only a Sum of the number of the Pages but of the Lines in every Page And though this was the Work only of the Convocation of the Province of Canterbury yet the Archbishop of York with the Bishops of Duresme and Chester Subscribed them likewise and they were also Subscribed by the whole Lower House But we are not sure that the like care was used in the Convocation Anno 1571. for the Articles are only Subscribed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and Ten Bishops of his Province nor does the Subscription of the Lower House appear These Articles were first Printed in the Year 1563. conform to the present Impressions which are still in use among us So the Alterations were then made while the thing was fresh and well known therefore no Fraud nor Artifice is to be suspected since some Objections would have been then made especially by the great Party of the Complying Papists who then continued in the Church They would not have failed to have made much use of this and to have taken great advantages from it if there had been any occasion or colour for it and yet nothing of this kind was then done One Alteration of more Importance was made in the Year 1571. Those words of the 20 th Article The Church hath power to Decree Rites or Ceremonies and Authority in Controversies of Faith were left out both in the Manuscripts and in the Printed Editions but were afterwards restored according to the Articles Printed Anno 1563. I cannot find out in what Year they were again put in the Printed Copies They appear in two several Impressions in Queen Elizabeth's Time which are in my hands It passes commonly that it was done by Archbishop Laud and his Enemies laid this upon him among other things That he had corrupted the Doctrine of this Church by this addition but he cleared himself of that as well he might and in a Speech in the Star-Chamber appealed to the Original and affirmed these words were in it The true account of this difficulty is this When the Articles were first setled they were Subscribed by Both Houses upon Paper but that being done they were afterward Ingrossed in Parchment and made up in Form to remain as Records Now in all such Bodies many Alterations are often made after a minute or first Draught is agreed on before the matter is brought to full Perfection so these Alterations as most of them are small and inconsiderable were made between the time that they were first Subscribed and the last Voting of them But the Original Records which if extant would have cleared the whole matter having been burnt in the Fire of London it is not possible to Appeal to them yet what has been proposed may serve I hope fully to clear the difficulty I now go to consider the Articles themselves ARTICLE I. Of Faith in the Holy Trinity There is but one living and true God everlasting without bodie parts or passions of infinite power wisdom and goodness the maker and preserver of all things both visible and invisible and in the unity of this godhead there be three persons of one substance power and eternity the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost THE Natural Order of Things required That the First of all Articles in Religion should be concerning the Being and Attributes of God For all other Doctrines arise out of this But the Title appropriates this to the Holy Trinity because that is the only part of the Article which peculiarly belongs to the Christian Religion since the rest is Founded on the Principles of Natural Religion There are Six Heads to be Treated of in order to the full opening of all that is contained in this Article 1. That there is a God 2. That there is but One God 3. Negatively That this God hath neither Body Parts nor Passions 4. Positively That he is of Infinite Power Wisdom and Goodness 5. That he at first Created and does still Preserve all things not only what is Material and Visible but also what is Spiritual and Invisible 6. The Trinity is here Asserted These being all Points of the highest consequence it is very necessary to state them as clearly and to prove them as fully as may be The First is That there is a God This is a Proposition which in all Ages has been so universally received and believed some very few Instances being only assigned of such as either have denied or doubted of it that the very consent of so many Ages and Nations of such different Tempers and Languages so vastly remote from one another has been long esteemed a good Argument to prove that either there is somewhat in the Nature of Man that by a secret sort of Instinct does dictate this to him or that all Mankind has descended from one common Stock and that this belief has passed down from the first Man to all his Posterity If the more Polite Nations had only received this some might suggest that wise men had introduced it as a mean to govern human Society and to keep it in order Or if only the more barbarous had received this it might be thought to be the effeâ—t of their Fear and their Ignorance but since all Sorts as well as all Ages of men have received it this alone goes a great way to assure us of the Being of a God To this Two things are Objected 1 st That some Nations such as Sâ—ldania Formosa and some in America have been discovered in these last Ages that seem to acknowledge no
of the Scriptures depends The Second Proposition in the Article is That there is but one God As to this the common Argument by which it is proved is the order of the World from whence it is inferred That there cannot be more Gods than one since where there are more than one there must happen diversity and confusion This is by some thought to be no good reason for if there are more Gods that is more Beings infinitely perfect they will always think the same thing and be knit together with an intire love It is true in things of a Moral Nature this must so happen For Beings infinitely perfect must ever agree But in Physical things capable of no Morality as in creating the World sooner or later and the different Systems of Beings with a thousand other things that have no Moral Goodness in them different Beings infinitely perfect might have different Thoughts So this Argument seems still of great force to prove the Unity of the Deity The other Argument from Reason to prove the Unity of God is from the Notion of a Being infinitely perfect For a Superiority over all other Beings comes so naturally into the Idea of infinite Perfection that we cannot separate it from it A Being therefore that has not all other Beings inferior and subordinate to it cannot be infinitely perfect whence it is evident That there is but one God But besides all this the Unity of God seems to be so frequently and so plainly asserted in the Scripture that we see it was the chief Design of the whole Old Testament both of Moses and the Prophets to establish it in opposition to the false opinions of the Heathen concerning a diversity of Gods This is often repeated in the most solemn Words as Hear O Israel 6. Deut 4. the Lord our God is one God It is the First of the Ten Commandments Thou shalt have no other Gods but me And all things in Heaven and Earth are often said to be made by this one God Negative words are also often used 44. Isa. 6 8. There is none other God but one besides me there is none else and I know no other the going after other Gods is reckon'd the highest and the most unpardonable act of Idolatry The New Testament goes on in the same strain Christ speaks of the only true God and that he alone ought to be worshipped and served 17. Joh 3 4. Mat. 10. 1 Cor. 8.5 6. all the Apostles do frequently affirm the same thing They make the believing of one God in opposition to the many Gods of the Heathens the chief Article of the Christian Religion and they lay down this as the chief ground of our Obligation to mutual Love and Union among our selves 4. Eph. 4.5 6. That there is one God one Lord one Faith one Baptism Now since we are sure that there is but one Messias and one Doctrine delivered by him it will clearly follow that there must be but one God So the Unity of the Divine Essence is clearly proved both from the Order and Government of the World from the Idea of Infinite Perfection and from those express Declarations that are made concerning it in the Scriptures which last is a full proof to all such as own and submit to them The Third Head in this Article is that which is negatively expressed That God is without Body Parts or Passions In general all these are so plainly contrary to the Ideas of Infinite Perfection and they appear so evidently to be Imperfections that this part of the Article will need little Explanation We do plainly perceive that our Bodies are clogs to our Minds And all the use that even the purest sort of Body in an Estate conceived to be glorified can be of to a Mind is to be an Instrument of local Motion or to be a repository of Ideas for Memory and Imagination But God who is every where and is one pure and simple Act can have no such use for a Body A Mind dwelling in a Body is in many respects superior to it yet in some respects is under it We who feel how an Act of our Mind can so direct the Motions of our Body that a thought sets our Limbs and Joints a-going can from thence conceive how that the whole extent of Matter should receive such Motions as the Acts of the Supreme Mind give it But yet not as a Body united to it or that the Deity either needs such a Body or can receive any trouble from it Thus far the apprehension of the thing is very plainly made out to us Our thoughts put some parts of our Body in a present Motion when the Organization is regular and all the parts are exact and when there is no Obstruction in those Vessels or Passages through which that heat and those Spirits do pass that cause the motion We do in this perceive that a thought does command matter but our Minds are limited to our Bodies and these do not obey them but as they are in an exact disposition and a fitness to be so moved Now these are plain Imperfections but removing them from God we can from hence apprehend that all the Matter in the Universe may be so intirely subject to the Divine Mind that it shall move and be whatsoever and wheresoever he will have it to be This is that which all men do agree in But many of the Philosophers thought that Matter though it was moved and moulded by God at his pleasure yet was not made by him but was self-existent and was a Passive Principle but coexistent to the Deity which they thought was the Active Principle From whence some have thought that the belief of two Gods one good and another bad did spring Though others imagine that the belief of a bad God did arise from the corruption of that Tradition concerning fallen Angels as was before suggested The Philosophers could not apprehend that things could be made out of nothing and therefore they believed that Matter was co-eternal with God But it is as hard to apprehend how a Mind by its Thought should give Motion to Matter as how it should give it Being A Being not made by God is not so easily conceivable to be under the acts of his Mind as that which is made by him This conceit plainly destroys infinite Perfection which cannot be in God if all Beings are not from him and under his Authority besides that successive duration has been already proved inconsistent with Eternity This Opinion of the World 's being a Body to God as the Mind that dwells in it and actuates it is the foundation of Atheism For if it be once thought that God can do nothing without such a Body then as this destroys the Idea of Infinite Perfection so it makes way to this conceit That since Matter is Visible and God Invisible there is no other God but the vast extent of the Universe It is true God has
those Particulars that are mentioned in this Article so it was not possible for any that should have had the wickedness to set about it to have corrupted the New Testament by any Additions or Alterations it being so early spread into so many hands and that in so many different places When all this matter is laid together it appears to have as full an Evidence to support it as any Matter of Fact can possibly have The Narration gave great scope to a variety of Enquiries it raised much Disputing Opposition and Persecution and yet nothing was ever pretended to be proved that could subvert its Credit Great Multitudes received this Doctrine and died for it in the Age in which the Matters of Fact upon which its Credit was built were well attested and in which the Truth or Falshood of them might have been easily known which it is reasonable to believe that all men would carefully examine before they embraced and assented to that which was like to draw on them Sufferings that would probably end in Death Those who did spread this Doctrine as well as those who first received it had no Interest beside that of Trutâ— to engage them to it They could expect neither Wealth nor Greatness from it They were obliged to Travel much and to Labour hard to wrestle through great Difficulties and to endure many Indignities They saw others die on the account of it and had reason to look for the like usage themselves The Doctrine that they preached related either to the Facts concerning the Person of Christ or to the Rules of Life which they delivered These were all pure just and good they tended to settle the World upon the Foundations of Truth and Sincerity and that sublime Pitch of Righteousness of doing as they would be done by they tended to make men Sober and Temperate Chaste and Modest Meek and Humble Merciful and Charitable so that from thence there was no Colour given for suspecting any Fraud or Design in it The Worship of God in this Religion was Pure and Simple free from Cost or Pomp from Theatrical Shews as well as Idolatrous Rites and had in it all possible Characters becoming the Purity of the Supreme Mind When therefore so much concurs to give Credit to a Religion there ought to be evident Proofs brought to the contrary before it can be disbelieved or rejected So many men forsaking the Religion in which they were born and bred which has always a strong Influence even upon the greatest Minds and there being so many particular Prejudices both upon Iews and Gentiles by the Opinions in which they had been bred and the Impressions which had gone deep in them it could be no slight matter that could overcome all that The Iews expected a Conqueror for their Messias who should have raised both the Honour of their Law and their Nation and so were much possessed against one of a mean Appearance and when they saw that their Law was to be superseded and that the Gentiles were to be brought in to equal Privileges with themselves they could not but be deeply prejudiced both against the Person and Doctrine of Christ. The Philosophers despised Divine Inspiration and secret Assistances and had an ill Opinion of Miracles And the Herd among the Gentiles were so accustomed to Pomp and Shew in their Religious Performances that they must have nauseated the Christian Simplicity and the corruption of their Morals must have made them uneasy at a Religion of so much strictness All sorts of men lay under very strong Prejudices against this Religion nor was there any one Article or Branch of it that fâ—attered any of the Interests Appetites Passions or Vanities of Men but all was very much to the contrary They were warned to prepare for Trials and Crosses and in particular for a severe and fiery Trial that was speedily to come upon them There was nothing of the way or manner of Impostors that appeared in the Methods in which the Gospel was propagated When the Apostles saw that some were endeavouring to lessen them and their Authority they took no fawning ways They neither flattered nor spared those Churches that were under their care They charged them home with their faults and asserted their own Character in a strain that shewed they were afraid of no discoveries They appeal'd to the Miracles that they had wrought and to those Gifts and Divine Virtues of which they were not only possessed themselves but which were by their Ministry conferred on others The demonstration of the Spirit or Inspiration that was in them appeared in the power that is 1 Cor. 2.4 in the Miracles which accompanied it and those they wrought openly in the sight of many Witnesses An uncontested Miracle is the fullest Evidence that can be given of a Divine Commission A Miracle is a Work that exceeds all the known Powers of Nature and that carries in it plain Characters of a Power Superior to any Human power We cannot indeed fix the bounds of the Powers of Nature but yet we can plainly apprehend what must be beyond them For Instance We do not know what secret Virtues there may be in Plants and Minerals But we do know that bare words can have no Natural Virtue in them to cure Diseases much less to raise the Dead We know not what force Imagination or Credulity may have in Critical Diseases but we know that a Dead man has no Imagination We know also That Blindness Deafness and an Inveterate Palsey cannot be cured by Conceit Therefore such Miracles as the giving Sight to a Man born Blind Speech to the Deaf and Dumb and Strength to the Paralytick but most of all the giving Life to the Dead and that not only to Persons laid out as Dead but to one that was carried out to be Buried and to another that had been four days Dead and in his Grave all this was done with a bare Word without any sort of External Application This I say as it is clearly above the Force of Imagination so it is beyond the Powers of Nature These things were not done in the dark nor in the presence of a few in whom a particular confidence was put but in full day-light and in the sight of great Numbers Enemies as well as Friends and some of those Enemies were both the most enraged and the most capable of making all possible Exceptions to what was done Such were the Rulers of the Synagogues and the Pharisees in our Saviour's Time And yet they could neither deny the Facts nor pretend that there was any Deceit or Juglary in them We have in this all possible reason to conclude That both the things wâ—re truly done as they are related and that no just Exception was or could be made to them If it is pretended That those wonderful things were done by the Power of an Evil Spirit That does both acknowledge the Truth of the Relation and also its being Supernatural This Answer
Deuteronomy The First Book of Chronicles Ecclesiastes or Preacher Ioshua The Second Book of Chronicles Cantica or Song of Solomon Iudges The First Book of Esdras Four Prophets the greater Ruth The Second Book of Esdras Twelve Prophets the less And the other Books as Hierom saith the Church doth read for Example of Life and Instruction of Manners but yet it doth not apply them to Establish any Doctrine Such are these following The Third Book of Esdras The Fourth Book of Esdras The Book of Tobias The Book of Iudith The rest of the Book of Esther The Book oâ— Wisdom Iesus the Son of Syrach Baruch the Prophet The Song of the Three Children The History of Susanna Of Bel and the Dragon The Prayer of Manasses The First Book of Maccabees The Second Book of Maccabees All the Books of the New Testament as they are commonly received we do receive and account them Canonical IN this Article are Two important Heads and to each of them a proper consequence does belong The First is That the Holy Scriptures do contain all things necessary to Salvation The Negative Consequence that ariseth out of that is That no Article that is not either Read in it or that may not be proved by it is to be required to be believed as an Article of Faith or to be thought necessary to Salvation The Second is The settling the Canon of the Scripture both of Old and New Testament and the consequence that arises out of that is The rejecting the Books commonly called Apocryphal which though they may be Read by the Church for Example of Life and Instruction of Manners yet are no part of the Canon nor is any Doctrine to be Established by them After the main Foundations of Religion in General in the belief of a God or more specially of the Christian Religion in the Doctrine of the Trinity and of the Death Resurrection and Ascension of Christ are laid down The next Point to be settled is What is the Rule of this Faith where is it to be found and with whom is it lodged The Church of Rome and We do both agree that the Scriptures are of Divine Inspiration Those of that Communion acknowledge That every thing which is contained in Scripture is true and comes from God but they add to this That the Books of the New Testament were occasionally written and not with the design of making them the full Rule of Faith but that many things were delivered Orally by the Apostles which if they are faithfully Transmitted to us are to be received by us with the same Submission and Respect that we pay to their Writings And they also believe That these Traditions are conveyed down infallibly to us and that to distinguish betwixt true and false Doctrines and Traditions there must be an infallible Authority lodged by Christ with his Church We on the contrary affirm That the Scriptures are a compleat Rule of Faith and that the whole Christian Religion is contained in them and no where else and although we make great use of Tradition especially that which is most Ancient and nearest the Source to help us to a clear understanding of the Scriptures yet as to Matters of Faith we reject all Oral Tradition as an incompetent mean of conveying down Doctrines to us and we refuse to receive any Doctrine that is not either expresly contained in Scripture or clearly proved from it In order to the opening and proving of this it is to be considered what God's design in first ordering Moses and after him all Inspired Persons to put things in Writing could be it could be no other than to free the World from the Uncertainties and Impostures of Oral Tradition All Mankind being derived from one common Source it seems it was much easier in the first Ages of the World to preserve the Tradition pure than it could possibly be afterwards There were only a few things then to be delivered concerning God as That he was one Spiritual Being That he had Created all things That he alone was to be Worshipped and Served the rest relating to the History of the World and chiefly of the first Man that was made in it There were also great advantages on the side of Oral Tradition the first men were very long-liv'd and they saw their own Families spread extreamly so that they had on their side both the Authority which long Life always has particularly concerning Matters of Fact and the credit that Parents have naturally with their own Children to secure Tradition Two Persons might have conveyed it down from Adam so Abraham Methuselah lived above Three hundred years while Adam was yet alive and Sem was almost an hundred when he died and he lived much above an hundred years in the same time with Abraham according to the Hebrew Here is a great period of Time filled up by Two or Three Persons And yet in that Time the Tradition of those very few things in which Religion was then comprehended was so Universally and Intirely corrupted that it was necessary to correct it by immediate Revelation to Abraham God intending to have a peculiar People to himself out of his Posterity commanded him to forsake his Kindred and Country that he might not be corrupted with an Idolatry that we have reason to believe was then but beginning among them We are sure his Nephew Laban was an Idolater And the danger of mixing with the rest of Mankind was then so great that God ordered a Mark to be made on the Bodies of all descended from him to be the Seal of the Covenant and the Badge and Cognisance of his Posterity By that distinction and by their living in a wandring and unfixed manner they were preserved for some time from Idolatry God intending afterwards to settle them in an Instituted Religion But though the Beginnings of it I mean the Promulgation of the Law on Mount Sinai was one of the most amazing things that ever happened and the fittest to be Orally conveyed down the Law being very short and the Circumstances in the delivery of it most astonishing and though there were many Rites and several Festivities appointed chiefly for the carrying down the Memory of it though there was also in that dispensation the greatest advantage imaginable for securing this Tradition all the main Acts of their Religion being to be performed in one Place and by men of one Tribe and Family as they were also all the Inhabitants of a small Tract of Ground of one Language and by their Constitutions oblig'd to maintain a constant Commerce among themselves They having further a continuance of Signal Characters of God's Miraculous Presence among them such as the Operation of the Water of Jealousy the Plenty of the Sixth Year to supply them all the Sabbatical Year and tilâ— the Harvest of the following Year Together with a Succession of Prophets that followed one another either in a constant course or at least soon after one another but
above all the Presence of God which appeared in the Cloud of Glory and in those Answers that were given by the Urim and Thummim all which must be confessed to be advantages on the side of Tradition vastly beyond any that can be pretended to have been in the Christian Church Yet notwithstanding all these God commanded Moses to write all their Law as the Ten Commandments were by the Immediate Power or Finger of God writ on Tables of Stone When all this is laid together and well considered it will appear That God by a particular Oeconomy intended then to secure Revealed Religion from the doubtfulness and uncertainties of Oral Tradition It is much more reasonable to believe That the Christian Religion which was to be spread to many remote Regions among whom there could be little Communication should have been fixed in its first beginnings by putting it in Writing and not left to the looseness of Reports and Stories We do plainly see That though the methods of knowing and communicating Truth are now furer and better fixed than they have been in most of the Ages which have passed since the beginnings of this Religion yet in every Matter of Fact such additions are daily made as it happens to be Reported and every Point of Doctrine is so variously stated that if Religion had not a more assured bottom than Tradition it could not have that Credit paid to it that it ought to have If we had no greater certainty for Religion than Report we could not believe it very firmly nor venture upon it So in order to the giving this Doctrine such Authority as is necessary for attaining the great ends proposed in it the conveyance of it must be clear and unquestionable otherwise as it would grow to be much mixed with Fable so it would come to be looked on as all a Fable Since then Oral Tradition when it had the utmost Advantages possible of its side failed so much in the conveyance both of Natural Religion and of the Mosaical we see that it cannot be relied on as a certain method of preserving the Truths of Revealed Religion In our Saviour's Time Tradition was set up on many occasions against him but he never submitted to it On the contrary he reproached the Iews with this That they had made the Laws of God of no effect by their Traditions Mat. 15.3 6 9. Joh. 5.39 and he told them That they worshipped God in vain when they taught for Doctrines the Commandments of men In all his Disputes with the Pharisees he appealed to Moses and the Prophets he bade them search the scriptures for in them said he ye think ye have eternal life and they testify of me Ye think is by the Phraseology of that time a word that does not refer to any particular Conceit of theirs but imports That as they thought so in them they had Eternal Life Our Saviour justifies himself and his Doctrine often by words of Scripture but never once by Tradition We see plainly That in our Saviour's Time the Tradition of the Resurrection was so doubtful among the Iews that the Sadducees a formed Party among them did openly deny it The Authority of Tradition had likewise imposed two very mischievous Errors upon the strictest Sect of the Iews that adhered the most firmly to it The one was That they understood the Prophecies concerning the Messias sitting on the Throne of David literally They thought that in imitation of David he was not only to free his own Country from a Foreign Yoke but that he was to subdue as David had done all the Neighbouring Nations This was to them a Stone of Stumbling and a Rock of Offence so their adhering to their Traditions proved their ruin in all Respects The other Error to which the Authority of Tradition led them was their preferring the Rituals of their Religion to the Moral Precepts that it contained This not only corrupted their own Manners while they thought that an Exactness of Performing and a Zeal in Asserting not only the Ritual Precepts that Moses gave their Fathers but those Additions to them which they had from Tradition that were accounted hedges about the Law That this I say might well excuse or atone for the most heinous Violations of the Rules of Justice and Mercy But this had yet another worse effect upon them while it possessed them with such prejudices against our Saviour and his Apostles when they came to see that they set no value on those practices that were recommended by Tradition and that they preferred pure and sublime Morals even to Mosaical Ceremonies themselves and set the Gentiles at liberty from those observances So that the ruin of the Iews their rejecting the Messias and their persecuting his followers arose chiefly from this Principle that had got in among them of believing Tradition and of being guided by it The Apostles in all their Disputes with the Iews make their Appeals constantly to the Scriptures they set a high Character on those of Berea for examining them and comparing the Doctrine that they preached Act. 17.11 with them In the Epistles to the Romans Galatians and Hebrews in which they pursue a thread of Argument with relation to the Prejudices that the Iews had taken up against Christianity they never once argue â—rom Tradition but always from the Scriptures They do not pretend only to disparage Modern Tradition and to set up that which was more Ancient They make no such distinction but hold close to the Scriptures When St. Paul sets out the Advantages that Timothy had by a Religious Education he mentions this That of a Child he had known the holy Scriptures 2 Tim. 3 15 16. which were able to make him wise unto Salvation through Faith which was in Christ Iesus That is the Belief of the Christian Religion was a Key to give him a right understanding of the Old Testament and upon this occasion St. Paul adds All Scripture that is the whole Old Testament is given by Divine Inspiration or as others render the words All the divinely Inspired Scripture is profitable for Doctrine for Reproof for Correction for Instruction in Righteousness that the man of God may be perfect throughly furnished unto all good works The New Testament was writ on the same design with the Old that as St. Luke expresses it We might know the certainty of those things wherein we have been instructed â—uk 1.4 John 20 31. These things were written saith St. Iohn that ye might believe that Iesus is the Christ the Son of God and that believing ye might have life through his Name When St. Peter knew by a special Revelation that he was near his End he writ his Second Epistle 2 Pet. 1 15. that they might have that as a mean of keeping those things always in remembrance after his death Nor do the Apostles give us any hints of their having left any thing with the Church to be conveyed down by
an Oral Tradition which they themselves had not put in writing They do sometimes refer themselves to such things as they had delivered to particular Churches but by Tradition in the Apostles days and for some Ages after it is very clear that they meant only the conveyance of the Faith and not any unwritten Doctrines They reckoned the Faith was a sacred depositum which was committed to them and that was to be preserved pure among them But it were very easy to shew in the continued Succession of all the first Christian Writers That they still Appealed to the Scriptures That they Argued from them That they Condemned all Doctrines that were not contained in them and when at any time they brought human Authorities to justify their Opinions or Expressions they contented themselves with a very few and those very late Authorities So that their design in vouching them seems to be rather to clear themselves from the Imputation of having innovated any thing in the Doctrine or in the ways of expressing it than that they thought those Authorities were necessary to prove them by For in that case they must have taken a great deal more pains than they did to have followed up and proved the Tradition much higher than they went We do also plainly see that such Traditions as were not founded on Scripture were easily corrupted and on that account were laid aside by the succeeding Ages Such were the Opinion of Christ's Reign on Earth for a Thousand years The Saints not seeing God till the Resurrection The necessity of giving Infants the Eucharist The Divine Inspiration of the 70 Interpreters besides some more important Matters which in respect to those Times are not to be too much descanted upon It is also plain That the Gnosticks the Valentinians and other Hereticks began very early to set up a Pretension to a Tradition delivered by the Apostles to some particular persons as a Key for understanding the secret meanings that might be in Scripture in opposition to which both Irenaeus Tertullian and others Iren. I. 3. c. 1 2 3 4 5. Tertul. de presc Cap. 20 21 25 27 28. make use of Two sorts of Arguments The one is the Authority of the Scripture it self by which they confuted their Errors The other is a Point of Fact That there was no such Tradition In asserting this they appeal to those Churches which had been founded by the Apostles and in which a Succession of Bishops had been continued down They say in these we must search for Apostolical Tradition This was not said by them as if they had designed to establish Tradition as an Authority distinct from or equal to the Scriptures But only to shew the falshood of that pretence of the Hereticks and that there was no such Tradition for their Heresies as they gave out When this whole Matter is considered in all its parts such as 1 st That nothing is to be believed as an Article of Faith unless it appears to have been Revealed by God 2 dly That Oral Tradition appâ—ars both from the Nature of Man and the Experience of former Times to be an incompetent conveâ—er of Truth 3 dly That some Books were written for the conveyance of those Matters which have been in all Ages carefully preserved and esteemed sacred 4 thly That the Writers of the First Ages do always Argue from and Appeal to these Books And 5 thly That what they have said without Authority from them has been rejected in succeeding Ages the Truth of this Branch of our Article is fully made out If what is contain'd in theScripture in express words is theObject of our Faith then it will follow That whatsoever may be proved from thence by a just and lawful consequence is also to be believed Men may indeed Err in framing these Consequences and Deductions they may mistake or stretch them too far but though there is much Sophistry in the World yet there is also true Logick and a certain Thread of Reasoning And the sense of every Proposition being the same whether expressed always in the same or in different words then whatsoever appears to be clearly the sense of any place of Scripture is an Object of Faith tho it should be otherwise expressed than as it is in Scripture and every just Inference from it must be as true as the Proposition it self is Therefore it is a vain cavil to ask express words of Scripture for every Article That was the Method of all the Anciâ—nt Hereticks Christ and his Apostles Argued from the words and passages in the Old Testament to prove such things as agreed with the true sense of them and so did all the Fathers and therefore so may we do The great Objection to this is That the Scriptures are dark That the same place is capable of different Senses the Literal and the Mystical And therefore since we cannot understand the true Sense of the Scripture we must not Arguefrom it but seek for an Interpreterofit on whom we may depend All Sects Argue from thence and fancy that they find their Tenets in it And therefore this can be no sure way of finding out sacred Truth since so many do err that follow it In Answer to this it is to be considered That the Old Testament was delivered to the whole Nation of the Iews that Moses was read in the Synagogue in the hearing of the Women and Children that whole Nation was to take their Doctrine and Rules from it All Appeals wâ—re made to the Law and to the Prophets among them And though the Propâ—â—cies of the Old Testament were in their Stile and whole Contexture dark and hard to be understood yet when so great a Question as this Who was the true Messias came to be examined the proofs urged for it were Passages in the Old Testament Now the Question was How these were to be understood No Appeal was here made to Tradition or to Church-Authority but only by the Enemies of our Saviour Whereas he and his Disciples urge these passages in their true sense and in the consequences that arose out of them They did in that Appeal to the rational Faculties of those to whom they spoke The Christian Religion was at first delivered to poor and simple Multitudes who were both illiterate and weak the Epistles which are by much the hardest to be understood of the whole New Testament were Addressed to the whole Churches to all the Faithful or Saints that is to all the Christians in those Churches These were afterwards read in all thâ—ir Assemblies Upon this it may reasonably be asked Were these Writings clear in that Age or were they not If they were not it is unaccountable why they were addressed to the whole Body and how they came to be received and entertained as they were It is the End of Speech and Writing to make things to be understood and it is not supposable That Men Inspired by the Holy Ghost either could not or would
not express themselves so as that they should be clearly understood It is also to be observed That the New Dispensation is opposed to the Old as Light is to Darkness an Open Face to a Veiled and Substance to Shadows Since then the Old Testament was so clear that David both in the 19 th and most copiously in the 119 th Psalm sets out very fully the Light which the Laws of God gave them in that darker State we have much more reason to conclude That the New Dispensation should be much brighter If there was no need of a certain Expounder of Scripture then there is much less now Nor is there any Provision made in the New for a sure Guide No Intimations are given where to find one From all which we may conclude That the Books of the New Testament were clear in those days and might well be understood by those to whom they were at first addressed If they were clear to them they may be likewise clear to us For though we have not a full History of that Time or of the Phrases and Customs and particular Opinions of that Age yet the vast Industry of the succeeding Ages of these two last in particular has made such discoveries besides the other collateral advantages which Learning and a Niceness in Reasoning has given us that we may justly reckon that though some Hints in the Epistles which relate to the particulars of that Time may be so lost that we can at best but make conjectures about them yet upon the whole matter we may well understand all that is necessary to Salvation in the Scripture We may indeed fall into Mistakes as well as into Sins And into Errors of Ignorance as well as into Sins of Ignorance God has dealt with our Understandings as he has dealt with our Wiils He proposes our Duty to us with strong Motives to Obedience he promises us inward Assistances and accepts of our sincere Endeavours And yet this does not hinder many from perishng Eternally and others from falling into great Sins and so running great danger of Eternal Damnation and all this is because God has left our Wills free and does not constrain us to be good He deals with our Understandings in the same manner he has set his Will and the knowledge of Salvation before us in Writings that are framed in a simple and plain Stile in a Language that was then common and is still well understood that were at first designed for common Use They are soon read and it must be confessed that a great part of them is very clear So we have reason to conclude that if a man reads these carefully and with an honest Mind if he prays to God to direct him and follows sincerely what he apprehends to be true and practises diligently those Duties that do unquestionably appear to be bound upon him by them that then he shall find out enough to save his Soul and that such Mistakes as lye still upon him shall either be cleared up to him by some happy Providence or shall be forgiven him by that Infinite Mercy to which his Sincerity and Diligence is well known That bad men should fall into grievous Errors is no more strange than that they should commit heinous Sins And the Errors of good men in which they are neither wilful nor insolent will certainly be forgiven as well as their Sins of Infirmity Therefore all the ill use that is made of the Scripture and all the Errors that are pretended to be proved by it do not weaken its Authority or Clearness This does only shew us the danger of Studying them with a biassed or corrupted mind of reading them too carelesly of being too curious in going farther than as they open matters to us and in being too implicite in adhering to our Education or in Submitting to the Dictates of others So far I have explained the First Branch of this Article The Consequence that arises out of it is so clear that it needs not be proved That therefore nothing ought to be esteemed an Article of Faith but what may be found in it or proved from it If this is our Rule our entire and only Rule then such Doctrines as are not in it ought to be rejected and any Church that adds to the Christian Religion is erroneous for making such Additions and becomes Tyrannical if she imposes them upon all her Members and requires positive Declarations Subscriptions and Oaths concerning them In so doing she forces such as cannot have Communion with her but by affirming what they believe to be false to withdraw from that which cannot be had without departing from the Truth So all the Additions of the Five Sacraments of the Invocation of Angels and Saints of the worshipping of Images Crosses and Relicks of the Corporal Presence in the Eucharist of the Sacrifice offered in it for the dead as well as for the living together with the Adoration offered to it with a great many more are certainly Errors unless they can be proved from Scripture and they are intolerable Errors if as the Scripture is express in opposition to them so they defile the Worship of Christians with Idolatry But they become yet most intolerable if they are imposed upon all that are in that Communion and if Creeds or Oaths in which they are affirmed are required of all in their Communion Here is the main ground of justifying our forming our selves into a distinct Body from the Roman Church and therefore it is well to be considered The further discussing of this will come properly in when other Particulars come to be examined From hence I go to the Second Branch of this Article which gives us the Canon of the Scripture Here I shall begin with the New Testament for though in order the Old Testament is before the New yâ—t the Proof of the one being more distinctly made out by the concurring Testimonies of other Writers than can possibly be pretended for the other and the New giving an Authority to the Old by asserting it so expresly I shall therefore prove first the Canon of the New Testament I will not urge that of the Testimony of the Spirit which many have had recourse to This is only an Argument to him that feels it if it is one at all and therefore it proves nothing to another person besides the utmost that with reason can be made of this is that a good man feeling the very powerful Effects of the Christian Religion on his own Heart in the reforming his Nature and the calming his Conscience together with those Comforts that arise out of it is convinced in general of the Whole of Christianity by the happy Effects that it has upon his own Mind But it does not from this appear how he should know that such Books and such Passages in them should come from a Divine Original or that he should be able to distinguish what is Genuine in them from what is Spurious To come
The Stile and Matter of the Revelation as well as the designation of Divine given to the Author of it gave occasion to many Questions about it Clemens of Rome cites it as a Prophetical Book Clem. in Ep. ad Coâ— Justin cont Tryphon Irenaeus l 5. c. 30. Eus. Hist. l. 4. c. 24 26. l. 5. c. 18. l. 7. c. 27. Iustin Martyr says it was writ by Iohn one of Christ's Twelve Apostles Irenaeus calls it the Revelation of St. Iohn the Disciple of our Lord writ almost in our own Age in the End of Domitian's Reign Melito writ upon it Theophilus of Antioch Hyppolitus Clemens and Dennis of Alexandria Tertullian Cyprian and Origen do cite it And thus the Canon of the New Testamentseems to be fullymade outbythe concurrent Testimony of the several Churches immediately after the Apostolicaltime Here it is to be observed that a great difference is to be made between all this and the Oral Tradition of a Doctrine in which there is nothing fixed or permanent so that the whole is only Report carried about and handed down Whereas here is a Book that was only to be copied out and read publickly and by all Persons between which the difference is so vast that it is as little possible to imagine how the one should continue pure as how the other should come to be corrupted There was never a Book of which we have that reason to be assured that it is genuine that we have here There hapned to be constant Disputes among Christians from the Second Century downward concerning some of the most important Parts of this Doctrine and by both sides these Books were appealed to And though there might be some Variations in Readings and Translations yet no question was made concerning the Canon or the Authenticalness of the Books themselves unless it were by the Manichees who came indeed to be called Christians by a very enlarged way of speaking since it is justly strange how men who said that the Author of the Universe and of the Mosaical Dispensation was an Evil God and who held that there were Two Supreme Gods a Good and an Evil one how such men I say could be called Christians The Authority of those Books is not derived from any Judgment that the Church made concerning them but from this That it was known that they were writ either by men who were themselves the Apostles of Christ or by those who were their Assistants and Companions at whose Order or under whose Direction and Approbation it was known that they were written and published These Books were received and known for such in the very Apostolical Age it self so that many of the Apostolical men such as Ignatius and Polycarp lived long enough to see the Canon generally received and settled The suffering and depressed state of the First Christians was also such that as there is no reason to suspect them of Imposture so it is not at all credible that an Imposture of this kind could have passed upon all the Christian Churches A man in a Corner might have forged the Sibylline Oracles or some other Pieces which were not to be generally used and they might have apâ—â—ared soon after and Crâ—dit might have been given too easily to a Book or Writing of that kind But it cannot be imagined that in an Age in which the belief of this Doctrine brought men under great Troubles and in which Miracles and other extraordinary Gifts were long continued in the Church that I say either False Books could have been so early obtruded on the Church as True or that True Books could have been so vitiated as to lose their Original Purity while they were so universally read and used and that so soon or that the Writers of that very Age and of the next should have been so generally and so grosly imposed upon as to have cited Spurious Writings for True These are things that could not be believed in the Histories or Records of any Nation Though the Value that the Christians set upon these Books and the constant use they made of them reading a parcel of them every Lord's Day make this much less supposable in the Christian Religion than it could be in any other sort of History or Record whatsoever The early spreading of the Christian Religion to so many remote Countries and Provinces the many Copies of these Books that lay in Countries so remote the many Translations of them that were quickly made do all concur to make the Impossibility of any such Imposture the more sensible Thus the Canon of the New Testament is fixed upon clear and sure Grounds From thence without any further Proof we may be convinced of the Canon of the Old Testament Christ does frequently cite Moses and the Prophets he appeals to them and though he charged the Iews of that time chiefly their Teachers and Rulers with many Disorders and Faults yet he never once so much as insinuated that they had corrupted their Law or other Sacred Books which if true had been the greatest of all those Abuses that they had put upon the People Our Saviour cited their Books according to the Translation that was then in Credit and common Use amongst them When one asked him which was the great Commandment he answered How readest thou And he proved the chief things relating to himself his Death and Resurrection from the Prophecies that had gone before which ought to have been fulfilled in him He also cites the Old Testament Luke 24.44 by a Threefold Division of the Law of Moses the Prophets and the Psalms according to the Three Orders of Books into which the Iews had divided it The Psalms which was the first among the Holy Writings being set for that whole Volume St. Paul says That to the Iews were committed the Oracles of God Rom. 3.2 He reckons that among the chief of their Privileges but he never blames them for being unfaithful in this Trust and it is certain that the Iews have not corrupted the chief of those Passages that are urged against them to prove Jesus to have been the Christ. So that the Old Testament at least the Translation of the LXX Interpreters which was in common use and in high esteem among the Iews in our Saviour's time was as to the main faithful and uncorrupted This might be further urged from what St. Paul says concerning those Scriptures which Timothy had learned of a Child these could be no other than the Books of the Old Testament Thus if the Writings of the New Testament are acknowledged to be of Divine Authority the full Testimony that they give to the Books of the Old Testament does sufficiently prove their â—uthority and Genuineness likewise But to carry this matter yet further Moses wrought such Miracles both in Egypt in passing through the Red-Sea and in the Wilderness that if these are acknowledg'd to be true there can be no question made of his being sent of God and authorized by
many were made sinners As these words are positive and of great importance in themselves so all this is much the stronger by the opposition in which every one of them is put to the Effects and Benefits of Christ's Death particularly to our Justification through him in which there is an Imputation of the Merits and Effects of his Death that are thereby transferred to us so that that the whole Effect of this Discourse is taken away if the Imputation of Adam's Sin is denied And this Explication does certainly quadrate more entirely to the words of the Article as it is known that this was the Tenet of those who prepared the Articles it having been the generally-received Opinion from S. Austin's days downward But to many other Divines this seems a harsh and unconceivable Opinion it seems repugnant to the Justice and Goodness of God to reckon Men guily of a Sin which they never committed and to punish them in their Souls Eternally for that which was no Act of theirs And though we easily enough conceive how God in the Riches of his Grace may transfer Merit and Blessings from one Person to many this being only an Oeconomy of Mercy where all is free and such a method is taken as may best declare the Goodness of God But in the Imputation of Sin and Guilt which are Matters of strict Justice it is quite otherwise Upon that Head God is pleased often to Appeal to Men of the Justice of all his ways And therefore no such Doctrine ought to be admitted that carries in it an Idea of Cruelty Jer. 31.29 Ezek. 18.20 beyond what the blackest Tyrants have ever invented Besides that in the Scripture such a method as the punishing Children for their Fathers Sins is often disclaimed and it is positively affirmed that every man that sins is punished Now though in Articles relating to the Nature of God they acknowledge it is highly reasonable to believe That there may be Mysteries which exceed our Capacity yet in Moral Matters in God's foederal dealings with us it seems unreasonable and contrary to the Nature of God to believe that there may be a Mystery contrary to the clearest Notions of Justice and Goodness such as the condemning Mankind for the Sin of one Man in which the rest had no share and as contrary to our Ideas of God and upon that to set up another Mystery that shall take away the Truth and Fidelity of the promises of God Justice and Goodness being as inseparable from his Nature as Truth and Fidelity can be supposed to be This seems to expose the Christian Religion to the Scoffs of its Enemies and to Objections that are much sooner made than answered And since the foundation of this is a supposed Covenant with Adam as the Representative Head of Mankind it is strange that a thing of that great consequence should not have been more plainly Reported in the History of the Creation But that men should be put to fetch out the knowledge of so great and so extraordinary a thing only by some remote Consequences It is no small prejudice against this Opinion That it was so long before it first appeared in the Latin Church that it was never received in the Greek and that even the Western Church though perhaps for some Ignorant Ages it received it as it did every thing else very implicity yet has been very much divided both about this and many other Opinions related to it or a rising out of it As for those words of St. Paul's that are its chief if not its only Foundation they say many things upon them First it is a single Proof Now when we have not a variety of places proving any point in which one gives Light and leads us to a sure Exposition of another we cannot be so sure of the meaning of any one place as to raise a Theory or found a Doctrine upon it They say further That S. Paul seems to argue from that Opinion of our having sinned in Adam to prove that we are justified by Christ. Now it is a piece of Natural Logick not to prove a thing by another unless that other is more clear of it self or at least more clear by its being already received and believed This cannot be said to be more clear of it self for it is certainly less credible or conceivable than the Reconciliation by Christ. Nor was this clear from any special Revelation made of it in the Old Testament Therefore there is good reason to believe that it was then a Doctrine received among the Iews as there are odd things of this kind to be found among the Cabbalists as if all the Souls of all Mankind had been in Adam's Body Now when an Argument is brought in Scripture to prove another thing by though we are bound to acknowledge the Conclusion yet we are not always sure of the Premises for they are often founded upon received Opinions So that it is not certain that S. Paul meant to offer this Doctrine to our belief as true but only that he intended by it to prove our being reconciled to God through the Death of Christ and the Medium by which he proved it might be for ought that appears from the words themselves only an Opinion held true among those to whom he writes For he only supposes it but says nothing to prove it Which it might be expected he would have done if the Iews had made any doubt of it But further they say that when Comparisons or Oppositions such as this are made in Scripture we are not always to carry them on to an exact Equality We are required not only to be holy as God is holy but to be perfect as he is perfect 1 Pet. 1.15 16. Mat. 5.48 Where by the as is not to be meant a true Equality but some sort Resemblance and Conformity Therefore those who believe that there is nothing imputed to Adam's Posterity on the account of his Sin but this Temporary punishment of their being made liable to Death and to all those Miseries that the fear of it with our other concerns about it bring us under say that this is enough to justify the comparison that is there stated And that those who will carry it on to be an exact parallel make a stretch beyond the Phraseology of the Scripture and the use of Parables and of the many comparisons that go only to one or more points but ought not to be stretched to every thing These are the things that other great Divines among us have opposed to this Opinion As to its Consonancy to the Article those who oppose it do not deny but that it comes up fully to the highest sense that the words of the Article can Import Nor do they doubt but that those who prepared the Articles being of that Opinion themselves might perhaps have had that sense of the words in their Thoughts But they add That we are only bound to sign the Articles in a
Conceit brought in a Superstitious Error in Practice among the Ancient Christians of delaying Baptism till Death as hoping that all Sins were then certainly pardoned A much more dangerous Error than even the Fatal One of trusting to a Death-bed Repentance For Baptism might have been more easily compassed and there was more offered in the way of Argument for building upon it than has been offered at for a Death-bed Repentance St. Peter's Denial his Repentance and his being restored to his Apostolical Dignity seem to be Recorded partly on this account to encourage us even after the most heinous Offences to return to God and never to reckon our Condition desperate were our Sins ever so many but as we find our Hearts hardened in them into an obstinate Impenitency Our Saviour has made our pardoning the offences that others commit against us the measure upon which we may expect pardon from God and he being asked What limits he set to the number of the faults that we were bound to pardon by the Day if Seven was not enough he carried it up to seventy times seven a vast number far beyond the number of offences that any Man will in all probability commit against another in a Day But if they should grow up to all that vast number of 490 yet if our Brother still turns again and repents Luk. 17.4 we are still bound to forgive Now since this is joined with what he declared that if we pardoned our Brother his offences our heavenly Father would also forgive us Matt. 18.35 then we may depend upon this That according to the sincerity of our Repentance our sins are always forgiven us And if this is the Nature of the New Covenant then the Church which is a Society formed upon it must proportion the Rules both of her Communion and Censure to those set in the Gospel A heinous Sin must give us a deeper sorrow and higer degrees of Repentance Scandals must also be taken off and forgiven when the offending Persons have repaired the offence that was given by them with suitable degrees of sorrow St. Paul in the beginnings of Christianity in which it being yet tender and not well known to the World was more apt to be both blemished and corrupted did yet order the Corinthians to receive back into their Communion the Incestuous Person 1 Cor. 5.5 whom by his own Directions they had delivered to Satan they had excommunicated him 2 Cor. 2.7 and by way of reverse to the Gifts of the Holy Ghost poured out upon all Christians he was possessed or haunted with an evil Spirit And yet as St. Paul declares that he forgave him so he orders them to forgive him likewise and he gives a reason for this Conduct from the common principles of pity and humanity lest he should be swallowed up by overmuch sorrow What is in that place mentioned only in a particular instance is extended to a general rule in the Epistle to the Galatians If any one is overtaken in a fault Gal. 6.1 ye which are spiritual restore such a one in the Spirit of meekness considering thy self lest thou also be tempted Where both the supposition that is made and the reason that is given do plainly insinuate that all Men are subject to their several infirmities So that every Man may be overtaken in faults 2 Tim 4.2 Tit. 1.13 1 Joh. 5.16 The charge given to Timothy and Titus to rebuke and exhort does suppose that Christians and even Bishops and Deacons were subject to faults that might deserve correction In that passage cited out of S. Iohn's Epistle as mention is made of a sin unto death for which they were not to pray so mention is made both there and in S. Iames's Epistle of sins for which they were to pray Jam. 5.15 16. and which upon their Prayers were to be forgiven All which places do not only express this to be the tenor of the New Covenant That the sins of Regenerated Persons were to be pardoned in it but they are also clear precedents and rules for the Churches to follow them in their Discipline And therefore those words in S. Iohn that a man born of God doth not and cannot sin must be understood in a larger sense of their not living in the practice of known sins of their not allowing themselves in that course of Life nor going on deliberately with it By the sin unto death is meat the same thing with that Apostacy mentioned in the 6th of the Hebrews Among the Iews some sins were punished by a total excision or cutting off Heb. 6.6 and this probably gave the rise to that designation of a sin unto death The words in the Epistle to the Hebrews do plainly import those who being not only Baptized but having also received a share of the Extraordinary Effusion of the Holy Ghost had totally renounced the Christian Religion and apostatized from the Faith which was a Crucifying of Christ anew Such Apostates to Judaism were thereby involved in the crime and guilt of the crucifying of Christ and the putting him to open shame Now Persons so Apostatizing could not be renewed again by Repentance it not being possible to do any thing toward their conviction that had not been already done and they hardning themselves against all that was offer'd for their conviction were arrived at such a degree of wickedness that it was impossible to work upon them there was nothing left to be tried that had not been already tried and proved to be ineffectual Yet it is to be observed that it was an unjustifiable piece of rigor to apply these words to all such as had fallen in a time of trial and persecution for as they had not those miraculous means of conviction which must be acknowledged to be the strongest the sensiblest and the most easily apprehended of all Arguments so that they could not sin so heinously as those had done who after what they had seen and felt revolted from the Faith Great difference is also to be made between a deliberate sin that a Man goes into upon choice and in which he continues and a Sin that the fears of death and the infirmities of Human Nature betray him into and out of which he quickly recovers himself and for which he mourns bitterly There was no reason to apply what is said in the New Testament against the wicked Apostates of that time to those who were overcome in the Persecution The latter sinned grievously yet it was not in the same kind nor are they in any sort to be compar'd to the former All affectations of excessive severity look like Pharisaical Hypocrisy whereas the Spirit of Christ which is made up of Humility and Charity will make us look so severely to our selves that on that very account we will be gentle even to the failings of others Yet on the other hand the Church ought to endeavour to conform her self so far to her Head and to his
Scriptures in ascribing all good things to God and in charging us to offer up the Honour of all to him seems very expresly to favour this Doctrine Since if all our good is from God and is particularly owing to his Grace then Good Men have somewhat from God that Bad Men have not for which they ought to Praise him The Stile of all the Prayers that are used or directed to be used in the Scripture is for a Grace that opens our Eyes that turns our Hearts that makes us to go that leads us not into Temptation but delivers us from Evil. All these Phrases do plainly Import that we desire more than a Power or Capacity to Act such as is given to all Men and such as after we have received it may be still ineffectual to us For to pray for such Assistances as are always given to all Men and are such that the whole good of them shall wholly depend upon our selves would sound very odly whereas we pray for somewhat that is special and that we hope shall be effectual We do not and cannot pray earnestly for that which we know all Men as well as we our selves have at all times Humility and Earnestness in Prayer seem to be among the chief means of working in us the Image of Christ and of deriving to us all the Blessings of Heaven That Doctrine which blasts both which swells us up with an Opinion that all comes from our selves and that we receive nothing from God but what is given in common with us to all the World is certainly contrary both to the Spirit and to the Design of the Gospel To this they addO bservations from Providence The World was for many Ages delivered up to Idolatry and since the Christian Religion has appeared we see vast Tracts of Countries which have continued ever since in Idolatry Others are fallen under Mahometanism And the State of Christendom is in the Eastern Parts of it under so much Ignorance and the greatest Part of the West is under so much Corruption that we must confess the far greatest part of Mankind has been in 〈◊〉 Ages left destitute of the Means of Grace so that the Promulgating the Goâ—pel to some Nations and the denying it to others must be ascribed to the Unsearchable Ways of God that are past finding out If he thus leaves whole Nations in such Darkness and Corruption and freely chuses others to Communicate the knowledge of himself to them then we need not wonder if he should hold the same method with Individuals that he doth with whole Bodies For the Rejecting of whole Nations by the lump for so many Ages is much more unaccountable than the Selecting of a few and the leaving others in that State of Ignorance and Brutality And whatever may be said of his extending Mercy to some few of those who have made a good use of that dim Light which they had yet it cannot be denied but their Condition is more deplorable and the Condition of the others is much more hopeful so that great Numbers of Men are Born in such Circumstances that it is morally impossible that they should not perish in them whereas others are more happily Situated and Enlightned This Argument taken from common Observation becomes much stronger when we consider what the Apostle says Rom. 9 11. particularly in the Epistles to the Romans and the Ephesians even according to the Exposition of those of the other side For if God loved Iacob so as to chuse his Posterity to be his People and rejected or hated Esau and his Posterity and if that was according to the purpose and design of his Election if by the same purpose the Gentiles were to be grafted upon that Stock from which the Iews were then to be cut off and if the Counsel or Purpose of God had appeared in particular to those of Ephesus though the most corrupted both in Magick Idolatry and Immorality of any in the East then it is plain that the applying the means of Grace arises meerly from a great Design that was long hid in God which did then break out It is reasonable to believe That there is a proportion between the Application of the Means and the Decree it self concerning the End The one is resolved into the Unsearchable Riches of God's Grace and declared to be Free and Absolute God's chusing the Nation of the Iews in such a distinction beyond all other Nations is by Moses and the Prophets frequently said not to be on their account or on the account of any thing that God saw in them but meerly from the Goodness of God to them From all this it seems say they as reasonable to believe that the other is likewise free according to those words of our Saviour's I thank thee O Father Lord of Heaven and Earth because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes The reason of which is given in the following words Matth. 1. 25.26 Ibid. 21 22 22. Even so Father for it seemed good in thy sight What goes before of Tyre and Sydon and the Land of Sodom that would have made a better use of his preaching than the Towns of Galilee had done among whom he lived confirms this That the means of Grace are not bestowed on those of whom it was foreseen that they would have made a good use of them or denied to those who as was foreseen would have made an ill use of them The contrary of this being plainly asserted in those words of our Saviour's It is further observable That he seems not to be speaking here of different Nations but of the different sorts of Men of the same Nation The more Learned of the Iews the Wise and Prudent rejected him while the simpler but better sort the babes received him So that the difference between Individual Persons seems here to be resolved into the good pleasure of God It is further urged that since those of the other side confess that God by his Prescience foresaw what Circumstances might be happy and what Assistances might prove efficacious to Bad Men then his not putting them in those Circumstances but giving them such Assistances only which how effectual soever might be to others he saw would have no efficacy on them and his putting them in Circumstances and giving them Assistances which he foresaw they would abuse if it may seem to clear the Justice of God yet it cannot clear his Infinite Holiness and Goodness which must evâ—r carry him according to our Notions of these Perfections to do all that may be done and that in the most effectual way to rescue others from misery to make them truly good and to put them in a way be happy Since therefore this is not always done according to the other Opinion it is plain that there is an unsearchable depth in the ways of God which we are not able to fathom Therefore it must be concluded That since
all are not actually good and so put in a way to be saved that God did not intend that it should be so for who hath resisted his will The Counsel of the Lord standeth fast and the Thoughts of his heart to all Generations It is true Rom. 9.10 Ps. 33.12 His Laws are his Will in one respect He requires all to obey them He approves them and he obliges all Men to keep them All the Expressions of his desires that all Men should bâ— saved are to be explained of the Will of Revelation commonly called the Sign of his Will When it is said What more could have been done Isa. 5.4 that is to be understood of outward Means and Blessings But still God has a secret Will of his good pleasure in which he designs all things and this can neaver be frustrated From this they do also conclude That though Christ's Death was to be offered to all Christians yet that Intentionally and Actually he only died for those whom the Father had chosen and given to him to be saved by him They cannot think that Christ could have died in vain which St. Paul speaks of as a vast Absurdity Now since if he had died for all Gal. 2.21 he should have died in vain with relation to the far greater part of Mankind who are not to be saved by him they from thence conclude That all those for whom he died are certainly saved by him Perhaps with relation to some subaltern Blessings which are through him Communicated if not to all Mankind yet to all Christians he may be said to have died for all But as to Eternal Salvation they believe his Design went no further than the secret Purpose and Election of God and this they think is implied in these words John 17.9.10 all that are given me of my Father Thine they were and thou gavest them me He also limits his Intercession to those only I pray not for the world but for those that thou hast given me for they are thine and all thine are mine and mine are thine They believe that he also limited to them the extent of his Death and of that Sacrifice which he offered in it It is true the Christian Religion being to be distinguished from the Iewish in this main Point that whereas the Iewish was restrained to Abraham's Posterity and confined within oneRace and Nation the Christian was to be preached to every Creature Universal words are used concerning the Death of Christ But as the words Mark 16.15 preaching to every Creature and to all the World are not to be understood in the utmost extent for then they have never been verified since the Gospel has never yet for ought that appears to us been preached to every Nation under Heaven but are only to be explained generally of a Commission not limited to one or more Nations none being excluded from it The Apostles were to execute it in going from City to City as they should be inwardly moved to it by the Holy Ghost So they think that those large words that are applied to the Death of Christ are to be understood in the same qualified manner that no Nation or sort of Men are excluded from it and that some of all kinds and sorts shall be saved by him And this is to be carried no further without an Imputation on the Justice of God For if he has received a sufficient Oblation and Satisfaction for the Sins of the whole World it is not reconcileable to Justice that all should not be saved by it or should not at least have the Offer and Promulgation of it made them that so a trial may be made whether they will accept of it or not The Grace of God is set forth in Scripture by such Figures and Expressions as do plainly intimate itâ— efficacy and that it does not depend upon us to use it Eph. 2.10 2 Cor. 5.17 Phil. 2.13 Ps. 110.3 Jerem. 31.33 34. Ezek. 36.26 27. Rom. 9.21 or not to use it at pleasure It it said to be a Creation we are created unto good works and we become new Creatures It is called a Regeneration or a New Birth it is called a Quickning and a Resurrection as our former state is compared to a feebleness a blindness and a death God is said to work in us both to will and to do His people shall be willing in the day of his power He will write his Laws in their hearts and make them to walk in them Mankind is compared to a Mass of Clay in the hands of the Potter who of the same lump makes at his pleasure Vessels of honour or of dishonour These passages this last in particular do insinuate an Absolute and a Conquering power in Grace and that the love of God constrains us as S. Paul speaks expresly All outward coaction is contrary to the nature of liberty and all those inward Impressions that drove on the Prophets so that they had not the free use of their Faculties but felt themselves carried they knew not how are inconsistent with it yet when a Man feels that his Faculties go in their method and that he assents or chuses from a thread of inward Conviction and Ratiocination he still acts freely that is by an Internal Principle of Reason and Thought A Man acts as much according to his Faculties when he assents to a Truth as when he chuses what he is to do And if his Mind were so enlightned that he saw as clearly the good of Moral Things as he percieves Speculative Truths so that he felt himself as little able to resist the one as the other he would be no less a free and a rational Creature than if he were left to a more unlimited Range Nay the more evidently that he saw the true good of things and the more that he were determined by it he should then act more suitably to his Faculties and to the Excellence of his Nature For though the Saints in Heaven being made perfect in Glory are no more capable of further Rewards yet it cannot be denied but they act with a more accomplished Liberty because they see all things in a true Light according to that in thy light we shall see light Psal. 26.9 And therefore they conclude that such an overcoming degree of Grace by which a Man is made willing through the Illumination of his Understanding and not by any blind or violent Impulse is no way contrary to the true Notion of Liberty After all they think That if a Debate falls to be between the Sovereignty of God his Acts and his Purposes and the freedom of Man's will it is modest and decent rather to make the abatement on Man's part than on God's but they think there is no need of this They infer That besides the outward Enlightening of a Man by Knowledge there is an inward Enlightening of the Mind and a secret forcible conviction stampt on it otherwise what can be meant
Decree is either Presumption or Despair since a Man upon that bottom reckons That which way soever the Decree is made it must certainly be accomplished They also argue That because we must receive the Promises of God as conditional we must also believe the Decree to be conditional for Absolute Decrees exclude conditional Promises An Offer cannot be supposed to be made in earnest by him that has excluded the greatest number of Men from it by an antecedent Act of his own And if we must only follow the revealed Will of God we ought not to suppose that there is an Antecedent and Positive Will of God that has decreed our doing the contrary to what he has commanded Thus the one side argues That the Article as it lies in the plain meaning of those who conceived it does very expresly establish their Doctrine And the other argues from those Cautions that are added to it That it ought to be understood so as that it may agree with these Cautions And both sides find in the Article it self such grounds that they reckon they do not renounce their Opinions by subscribing it The Remonstrant side have this further to add That the Universal Extent of the Death of Christ seems to be very plainly affirmed in the most solemn part of all the Offices of the Church For in the Office of Communion and in the Prayer of Consecration we own That Christ by the one Oblation of himself once offered made there a full perfect and sufficient Sacrifice Oblation and Satisfaction for the Sins of the whole World Though the others say That by full perfect and sufficient is not to be understood that Christ's Death was intended to be a compleat Sacrifice and Satisfaction for the whole World but that in its own Value it was capable of being such This is thought too great a stretch put upon the words And there are yet more express words in our Church-Catechism to this purpose which is to be considered as the most solemn Declaration of the sense of the Church since that is the Doctrine in which she instructs all her Children And in that part of it which seems to be most important as being the short Summary of the Apostles Creed it is said God the Son who hath redeemed me and all Mankind Where all must stand in the same Extent of Universality as in the precedent and in the following words The Father who made me and all the World the Holy Ghost who sanctifieth me and all the Elect People of God which being to be understood severely and without exception this must also be taken in the same strictness There is another Argument brought from the Office of Baptism to prove that men may fall from a state of Grace and Regeneration for in the whole Office more particularly in the Thanksgiving after the Baptism it is affirmed That the Person baptized is Regenerated by God's Holy Spirit and is received for his own Child by Adoption Now since it is certain that many who are baptized fall from that state of Grace this seems to import That some of the Regenerate may fall away Which tho' it agree well with St. Austin's Doctrine yet it does not agree with the Calvinists Opinions Thus I have examined this matter in as short a compass as was possible and yet I do not know that I have forgot any important part of the whole Controversy though it is large and has many Branches I have kept as far as I can perceive that Indifference which I proposed to my self in the prosecuting of this matter and have not on this occasion declared my own Opinion though I have not avoided the doing it upon other occasions Since the Church has not been peremptory but that a Latitude has been left to different Opinions I thought it became me to make this Explanation of the Article such And therefore I have not endeavoured to possess the Reader with that which is my own sense in this matter but have laid the Force of the Arguments as well as the Weight of the Difficulties of both Sides before him with all the Advantages that I had found in the Books either of the one or of the other Persuasion And I leave the Choice as free to my Reader as the Church has done ARTICLE XVIII Of obtaining Eternal Salvation only by the Name of Christ. They also are to be accursed that presume to say That every man shall be saved by the Law or Sect which he professeth so that he be diligent to frame his Life according to that Law and the Light of Nature For Holy Scripture doth set out unto us only the Name of Iesus Christ whereby men must be saved THE Impiety that is condemned in this Article was first taug htby some of the Heathen Oraters and Philosophers in the Fourth Century who in their Addresses to the Christian Emperors for the Tolerance of Paganism started this Thought that how lively soever it may seem when well set off in a piece of Eloquence will not bear a severe Argument That God is more honoured by the Varieties and different Methods of worshipping and serving him than if all should fall into the same way That this diversity has a Beauty in it and a suitableness to the Infinite Perfections of God and it does not look so like a mutual agreement or concert as when all Men worship him one way But this is rather a Flash of Wit than true Reasoning The Alcoran has carried this matter further to the asserting That all Men in all Religions are equally acceptable to God if they serve him faithfully in them The infusing this into the World that has a shew of Mercy in it made Men more easy to receive their Law and they took care by their extream Severity to fix them in it when they were once engaged for though they use no Force to make Men Musselmans yet they punish with all extremity every thing that looks like Apostacy from it if it is once received The Doctrine of Leviathan that makes Law to be Religion and Religion to be Law that is that obliges Subjects to believe that Religion to be true or at least to follow that which is enacted by the Laws of their Countrey must be built either on this foundation That there is no such thing as Revealed Religion but that it is only a Political Contrivance or that all Religions are equally acceptable to God Others having observ'd that it was a very small part of Mankind that had the advantages of the Christian Religion have thought it too cruel to damn in their thoughts all those who have not heard of it and yet have lived morally and virtuously according to their Light and Education And some to make themselves and others easy in accommodating their Religion to their secular Interests to excuse their changing and to quiet their Consciences have set up this Notion that seems to have a largeness both of good Nature and Charity in
it looks plausiable and is calculated to take in the greatest Numbers They therefore suppose that God in his Infinite Goodness will accept equally the Services that all his Creratures offer to him according to the best of their skill and strength In opposition to all which they are here condemned who think that every Man shall be saved by the Law or Sect which he professeth Where a great difference is to be observed between the words saved by the Law and saved in the Law the one is condemned but not the other To be saved by a Law or Sect signifies That by the virtue of that Law or Sect such Men who follow it may be saved Whereas to be saved in a Law or Sect imports only That God may extend his Compassions to Men that are engaged in false Religions The former is only condemned by this Article which affirms nothing concerning the other In sum if we have fully proved that the Christian Religion was delivered to the World in the Name of God and was attested by Miracles so that we believe it's Truth we must believe every part and tittle of it and by consequence those Passages which denounce the Wrath and Judgments of God against Impenitent Sinners and that promise Mercy and Salvation only upon the account of Christ and his Death Rom. 10.9 10. Mark 8.38 We must believe with our hearts and confess it with our mouths We must not be ashamed of Christ or of his words lest he should be ashamed of us when he comes in the glory of his Father with his holy Angels This I say being a part of the Gospel must be as true as the Gospel it self is and these Rules must bind all those to whom they are proposed whether they are enacted by Law or not For if we are assured that they are a part of the Law of the King of Kings we are bound to believe and obey them whether Human Laws do favour them or not it being an evident thing that no subordinate Authority can derogate from that which is superior to it So if the Laws of God are clearly revealed and certainly conveyed down to us we are bound by them and no Human Law can dissolve this Obligation If God has declared his Will to us it can never be supposed to be free to us to chuse whether we will obey it or not and serve him under that or under another Form of Religion at our pleasure and choice We are limited by what God has declared to us and we must not fancy our selves to be at liberty after he has revealed his Will to us As to such to whom the Christian Religion is revealed there no question can be made for it is certain they are under an indispensable Obligation to obey and follow that which is so graciously revealed to them They are bound to follow it according to what they are in their Consciences persuaded is its true sense and meaning And if for any Secular Interest they chuse to comply with that which they are convinced is an Important Error and is condemned in the Scripture they do plainly shew that they prefer Lands Houses and Life to the Authority of God in whose Will when revealed to them they are bound to acquiesce The only difficulty remaining is concerning those who never heard of this Religion Whether or How can they be saved St. Paul having divided the World into Iews and Gentiles called by him those who were in the Law and who were without Law he says Those who sinned without Law Rom. 2.12 14 15. that is out of the Mosaical Dispensation shall be judged without Law that is upon another foot For he adds when the Gentiles which have not the Law do by nature things contained in the Law That is the Moral parts of it these having not the Law are a Law unto themselves that is their Consciences are to them instead of a Written Law which shew the work of the Law written in their hearts their conscience also bearing witness and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another This implies that there are either Seeds of Knowledg and Virtue laid in the Nature of Man or that such Notions pass among them as are carried down by Tradition The same S. Paul says How can they call on him in whom they have not believed And how can they believe in him of whom they have not heard Rom. 1â— 14 and how can they hear without a Preacher Which seems plainly to intimate that Men cannot be bound to believe and by consequence cannot be punished for not believing unless the Gospel is preached to them St. Peter said to Cornelius Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons Acâ—â— 1â— â—4 35. but in every nation he that feareth God and worketh righteousness is accepted of him Those places seem to import that those who make the best use they can of that small measure of Light that is given them shall be judged according to it and that God will not require more of them than he has given them This also agrees so well with â—he Ideas which we have both of Justice and Goodness that this Opinion wants not special colours to make it look well But on the other hand the Pardon of Sin and the Favourof God are so positively limited to the believing in Christ Jesus and it is so expresly said That there is no salvation in any other Acts 4.12 and that there is none other name or Authority under Heaven given among Men whereby we must be saved that the distinction which can only be made in this matter is this That it is only on the Account and in the Consideration of the Death of Christ that Sin is pardoned and men are saved This is the only Sacrifice in the sight of God so that whosoever are received into mercy have it through Christ as the Channel and Conveyance of it But it is not so plainly said that no Man can be saved unless he has an explicit Knowledge of this together with a belief in it Few in the Old Dispensation could have that Infants and Innocents or Ideots have it not and yet it were a bold thing to say that they may not be saved by it So it does not appear to be clearly Revealed That none shall be saved by the Death of Christ unless they do explicitely both know it and believe in it Since it is certain That God may pardon Sin only upon that score without obliging all Men to believe in it especially when it is not Revealed to them And here another distinction is to be made which will clear this whole matter and all the difficulties that arise out of it A great difference is to be made between a Foederal certainty of Salvation secured by the Promises of God and of this New Covenant in Christ Jesus and the extent to which the Goodness and Mercy of God may go None are in
requisite in the regular way of using it None can deny this among us but those who will question the whole Christianity of the Roman Church where the Midwives do generally Baptize But if this Invalidates the Baptism then we must question all that is done among them Persons so Baptized if their Baptism is void are neither truly Ordained nor capable of any other act of Church-Communion Therefore mens being in Orders or their being duly Ordained is not necessary to the Essence of the Sacrament of Baptism but only to the regularity of Administring it And so the want of it does not void it but does only prove such Men to be under some Defects and Disorder in their Constitution Thus I have laid down those distinctions that will guide us in the right understanding of this Article If we believe that any Society retains the Fundamentals of Christianity we do from that conclude it to be a true Church to have a true Baptism and the Members of it to be capable of Salvation But we are not upon that bound to Associate our selves to their Communion For if they have the Addition of false Doctrines or any unlawful parts of Worship among them we are not bound to join in that which we are persuaded is Error Idolatry or Superstition If the Sacraments that Christ has appointed are observed and ministred by any Church as to the main of them according to his Institution we are to own those for valid Actions But we are not for that bound to join in Communion with them if they have Adulterated these with many Mixtures and Additions Thus a plain difference is made between our owning that a Church may retain the Fundamentals of Christianity a true Baptism and true Orders which are a consequent upon the former and our joining with that Church in such acts as we think are so far vitiated that they become unlawful to us to do them Pursuant to this we do neither repeat the Baptism nor the Ordinations of the Church of Rome We acknowledge that our Fore-fathers were both Eaptized and Ordained in that Communion And we derive our present Christianity or Baptism and our Orders from thence yet we think that there were so many unlawful Actions even in those Rituals besides the other corruptions of their Worship that we cannot join in such any more The being Baptized in a Church does not tie a Man to every thing in that Church it only ties him to the Covenant of Grace The Stipulations which are made in Baptism as well as in Ordination do only bind a Man to the Christian Faith or to the faithful dispensing of that Gospel and of those Sacraments of which he is made a Minister So he who being convinced of the Errors and Corruptions of a Church departs from them and goes on in the Purity of the Christian Religion does pursue the true effect both of his Baptism and of his Ordination Vows For these are to be considered as ties upon him only to God and Christ and not to adhere to the other Dictates of that body in which he had his Birth Baptism and Ordination The great Objection against all this is That it sets up a private Judgment it gives particular persons a right of judging Churches Whereas the Natural Order is That private persons ought to be Subject and Obedient to the Church This must needs feed Pride and Curiosity it must break all Order and cast all things loose if every single Man according to his Reading and Presumption will judge of Churches and Communions On this Head it is very easy to Employ a great deal of popular Eloquence to decry private mens examining of Scriptures and forming their judgments of things out of them and not submitting all to the judgment of the Church But how absurd soever this may seem all Parties do acknowledg that it must be done Those of the Church of Rome do teach That a Man born in the Greek Church or among us is bound to lay down his Error and his Communion too and to come over to them and yet they allow our Baptism as well as they do the Ordinations of the Greek Church Thus they allow private Men to judge and that in so great a Point as what Church and what Communion ought to be chosen or forsaken And it is certain That to judge of Churches and Communions is a thing of that Intricacy that if private judgment is allowed here there is no reason to deny it its full scope as to all other Matters God has given us rational Faculties to guide and direct us And we must make the most of these that we can We must judge with our own Reasons as well as see with our own Eyes Neither can we or ought we to resign up our Understandings to any others unless we are convinced that God has Imposed this upon us by his making them infallible so that we are secured from Error if we follow them All this we must examine and be well assured of it otherwise it will be a very rash unmanly and base thing in us to muffle up our own Understandings and to deliver our Reason and Faith over to others blindfold Reason is God's Image in us and as the Use and Application of our Reason as well as of the Freedom of our Wills are the highest Excellencies of the Rational Nature so they must be always claimed and ought never to be parted with by us but upon clear and certain Authorities in the Name of God putting us implicitly under the Dictates of others We may abuse the Use of our Reason as well as the Liberty of our Will and may be damn'd for the one as well as the other But when we set our selves to make the best use we can of the freedom of our Wills we may and do upon that expect secret affistances We have both the like promises Direction to the like Prayers and Reason to expect the same Illumination to make us see know and comprehend the Truths of Religion that we have to expect that our Powers shall be inwardly Strengthened to love and obey them Psal. 119.18 35. David prayes that God may open his Eyes as well as that he may make him to go in his ways The Promises in the Prophets concerning the Gospel-Dispensation carry in them the being Taught of God as well as the being made to walk in his ways Ephes. 1 18.3.17 and the enlightening the mind and the eys of the mind to know is prayed for by St. Paul as well as that Christ might dwell in their hearts Since then there is an Assistance of the Divine Grace given to fortify the Understanding as well as to enable the Will it follows that our Understanding is to be imployed by us in order to the finding out of the Truth as well as our Will in order to the obeying of it And though this may have very ill consequences it does not follow from thence that it is
not true No consequences can be worse than the Corruption that is in the World and the Damnation that follows upon sin and yet God permits it because he has made us free Creatures Nor can any reason be given why we should be less free in the use of our understanding than we are in the use of our Will or why God should make it to be less possible for us to fall into Errors than it is to commit Sins The Wrath of God is as much denounced against Men that hold the Truth in unrighteousness as against other Sins Rom. 1.18 24 26. 2 Thes. 2.11 and it is reckoned among the heaviest of Curses to be given up to strong delusions to believe a lye Upon all these reasons therefore it seems clear that our Understandings are left free to us as well as our Wills and if we observe the Stile and Method of the Scriptures we shall find in them all over a constant Appeal to a Man's Reason and to his Intellectual Faculties If the mere dictates of the Church or of Infallible Men had been the resolution or foundation of Faith there had been no need of such a long Thread of Reasoning and Discourse as both our Saviour used while on Earth and as the Apostles used in their Writings We see the way of Authority is not taken but Explanations are offered Proofs and Illustrations are brought to convince the Mind which shews that God in the clearest Manifestation of his Will would deal with us as with reasonable Creatures who are not to believe but upon Persuasion and are to use our Reasons in order to the attaining that Persuasion And therefore upon the whole matter we ought not to believe Doctrines to be true because the Church teaches them but we ought to search the Scriptures and then according as we find the Doctrine of any Church to be true in the Fundamentals we ought to believe her to be a true Church and if besides this the whole Extent of the Doctrine and Worship together not only with the essential parts of the Sacraments but the whole Administration of them and the other Rituals of any Church are pure and true then we ought to account such a Church true in the largest Extent of the word true and by consequence we ought to hold Communion with it Another question may arise out of the first words of this Article concerning the Visibility of this Church Whether it must be always Visible According to the distinction hitherto made use of the resolution of this will be soon made There seem to be Promises in the Scriptures of a perpetual Duration of the Christian Church I will be with you always Matth. 28.20 Matth. 16.18 even to the end of the world And the gates of Hell shall not prevail against the Church The Iewish Religion had a Period perfixed in which it was to come to an end but the Prophecies that are among the Prophets concerning the new Dispensation seem to import not only its Continuance but its being continued still Visible in the World But as the Iewish Dispensation was long continued after they had fallen generally into some very gross Errors so the Christian Church may be Visible still though not Infallible God may preserve the Succession of a true Church as to the Essentials and Fundamentals of Faith in the World even though this Society should fall into Error So a Visible Society of Christians in a true Church as to the Essentials of our Faith is not controverted by us We do only deny the Infallibility of this true Church And therefore we are not afraid of that Question Where was your Church before Henry the Eighth We Answer It was where it is now here in England and in the other Kingdoms of the World only it was then corrupted and it is now pure There is therefore no sort of Inconvenience in owning the constant Visibility of a constant Succession and Church of true Christians true as to the Essentials of the Covenant of Grace though not true in all their Doctrines This seems to be a part of the Glory of the Messias and of his Kingdom That he shall be still visibly worshipped in the World by a Body of Men called by his Name But when Visibility is thus separated from Infallibility and it is made out that a Church may be a true Church though she has a large Allay of Errors and Corruptions mixed in her Constitution and Decisions there will be no manner of Inconvenience in owning a constant Visibility even at the same time that we charge the most eminent part of this Visible Body with many Errors and with much Corruption So far has the first part of this Article been treated of From it we pass to the second which affirms That as the other Patriarchal and Apostolical Churches such as Ierusalem Alexandria and Antioch have erred so the Church of Rome has likewise erred and that not only in their living and manner of Ceremonies but also in matters of Faith It is not questioned but that the other Patriarchal Churches have erred both that where our Saviour himself first taught and which was governed by two of the Apostles successively and those which were founded by St. Peter in Person or by Proxy as Church History represents Alexandria and Antioch to have been Those of the Church of Rome by whom they are at this day condemned both of Heresy and Schism do not dispute this Nor do they dispute that many of their Popes have led bad and flagitious Lives They deny not that the Canons Ceremonies and Government of the Church are very much changed by the Influence and the Authority of their Popes But the whole question turns upon this Whether the See of Rome has erred in matter of Faith or not In this those of that Communion are divided Some by the Church or See of Rome mean the Popes personally so they maintain That they never have and never can fall into Error Whereas others by the See of Rome mean that whole Body that holds Communion with Rome which they say cannot be tainted with Error and these separate this from the Personal Infallibility of Popes for if a Pope should err they think that a General Council has Authority to proceed against him and to deprive him And thus though he should err the See might be kept free from Error I shall upon this Article only consider the first Opinion reserving the Consideration of the second to the Article concerning General Councils As to the Popes their being subject to Error that must be confessed unless it can be proved that by a clear and express Privilege granted them by God they are excepted out of the common condition of Human Nature It is further highly probable that there is no such Privilege since the Church continued for many Ages before it was so much as pretended to and that in a time when that See was not only claiming all the Rights that
ought to maintain the Unity of the Body and the Decency and Order that is necessary for Peace and mutual Edification Therefore since there is not any one thing that Christ has enjoined more solemnly and more frequently than Love and Charity Union and Agreement amongst his Disciples since we are also required to assemble our selves together Heb 10.25 to constitute our selves in a Body both for worshipping God jointly and for maintaining of Order and Love among the Society of Christians we ought to acquiesce in such Rules as have been agreed on by common Consent and which are recommended to us by long Practice and that are established by those who have the lawful Authority over us Nor can we assign any other Bounds to our Submission in this Case than those that the Gospel has limited We must obey God rather than Man Acts 5.29 Matth. 22.21 and we must in the first place render to God the things that are God's and then give to Caesar the things that are Caesar's So that if either Church or State have power to make Rules and Laws in such matters they must have this Extent given them That till they break in upon the Laws of God and the Gospel we must be bound to obey them A Mean cannot be put here either they have no Power at all or they have a Power that must go to every thing that is not forbid by any Law of God This is the only measure that can be given in this matter But a great difference is here to be made between those Rules that both Church and State ought to set to themselves in their enacting of such matters and the Measures of the Obedience of Subjects The only question in the point of Obedience must be Lawful or Unlawful For Expedient or Inexpedient ought never to be brought into question as to the point of Obedience since no Inexpediency whatsoever can balance the breaking of Order and the dissolving the Constitution and Society This is a Consideration that arises out of a Man's apprehensions of the fitness or usefulness of things in which though he might be in the right as to the antecedent fitness of them and yet even there he may be in the wrong and in common modesty every Man ought to think that it is more likely that he should be in the wrong than the Governors and Rulers of the Society yet I say allowing all this it is certain that Order and Obedience are both in their own nature and in their Consequences to be preferred to all the particular considerations of Expediency or Inexpediency Yet still those in whose Hands the making of those Rules is put ought to carry their Thoughts much further They ought to consider well the Genius of the Christian Religion and therefore they are to avoid every thing that may lead to Idolatry or feed Superstition every thing that is apt to be abused to give false Ideas of God or to make the World think that such Instituted Practices may balance the Violation of the Laws of God They ought not to overcharge the Worship of God with too great a Number of them The Rites ought to be grave simple and naturally expressive of that which is intended by them Vain Pomp and indecent Levity ought to be guarded against and next to the Honour of God and Religion the Peace and Edification of the Society ought to be chiefly considered Due regard ought to be had to what Men can bear and what may be most suitable to the present State of the whole and finally a great Respect is due to Ancient and Established Practices Antiquity does generally beget Veneration and the very changing of what has been long in use does naturally startle many and discompose a great part of the Body So all Changes unless the Expediency of making them is upon other Accounts very visible labour under a great prejudice with the more staid Sort of Men for this very Reason because they are Changes But in this matter no certain or Mathematical Rules can be given Every one of these that has been named is capable of that Variety by the diversity of Times and other Circumstances that since Prudence and Discretion must Rule the use that is to be made of them that must be left to the Conscience and Prudence of every Person who may be concerned in the Management of this Authority He must Act as he will Answer it to God and to the Church for he must be at liberty in applying those general Rules to particular Times and Cases And a Temper must be observed We must avoid a sullen adhering to things because they were once settled as if Points of Honour were to be maintained here and that it look'd like a reproaching a Constitution or the Wisdom of a former Age to alter what they did since it is certain that what was wisely ordered in one Time may be as wisely chang'd in another As on the other hand all Men ought to avoid the Imputations of a desultory Levity as if they loved Changes for Changes sake This might give occasion to our Adversaries to triumph over us and might also fill the Minds of the weaker among our selves with Apprehensions and Scruples The next particular Asserted in this Article is That the Church hath Authority in Matters of Faith Here a Distinction is to be made between an Authority that is absolute and founded on Infallibility and an Authority of Order The former is very formally disclaimed by our Church but the second may be well maintained tho' we Assert no Unerring Authority Every single Man has a Right to search the Scriptures and to take his Faith from them yet it is certain that he may be mistaken in it It is therefore a much surer way for Numbers of Men to Meet together and to Examine such Differences as happen to arise To consider the Arguments of all Hands with the Importance of such Passages of Scripture as are brought into the Controversy and thus to enquire into the whole Matter in which as it is very natural to think that a great Company of Men should see further than a less Number so there is all Reason to expect a good Issue of such Deliberations if Men proceed in them with due Sincerity and Diligence If Pride Faction and Interest do not sway their Councils and if they seek for Truth more than for Victory But what abuses soever may have crept since into the publick Consultations of the Clergy the Apostles at first met and consulted together upon that Controversy which was then moved concerning the Imposing the Mosaical Law upon the Gentiles They ordered the Pastors of the Church to be able to convince Gainsayers Titus 1.9 3.10 and not to reject a Man as an Heretick till after a first and a second Admonition The most likely method both to find out the Truth and to bring such as are in Error over to it is to consult of these Matters in
For so great and so important a Matter as this is must be supposed to be either expresly declared in the Scriptures or not at all The Article affirming That some General Councils have erred must be understood of Councils that pass for such and that may be called General Councils much better than many others that go by that Name For that at Arimini was both very Numerous and was drawn out of many different Provinces As to the strict Notion of a General Council there is great Reason to believe that there was never any Assembly to which it will be found to agree And for the Four General Councils which this Church declares she receives they are received only because we are persuaded from the Scriptures that their Decisions were made according to them That the Son is truly God of the same Substance with the Father That the Holy Ghost is also truly God That the Divine Nature was truly united to the Human in Christ and that in One Person That both Natures remain distinct and that the Human Nature was not swallowed up of the Divine These Truths we find in the Scriptures and therefore we believe them We reverence those Councils for the sake of their Doctrine but do not believe the Doctrine for the Authority of the Councils There appeared too much of Human Frailty in some of their other Proceedings to give us such an Implicite Submission to them as to believe things only because they so Decided them ARTICLE XXII Of Purgatory The Romish Doctrine concerning Purgatory Pardons Worshipping and Adoration as well of Images as of Relicks and also Invocation of Saints is a fond thing vainly invented and grounded upon no warrant of Scripture but rather repugnant to the Word of God THERE are two small Variations in this Article from that published in King Edward's Reign What is here called the Romish Doctrine is there called the Doctrine of School-men The plain reason of this is that these Errors were not so fully espoused by the Body of the Roman Church when those Articles were first published so that some Writers that softened matters threw them upon the School-men and therefore the Article was cautiously worded in laying them there But before these that we have now were published the Decree and Canons concerning the Mass had passed at Trent in which most of the Heads of this Article are either affirmed or supposed though the formal Decree concerning them was made some Months after these Articles were published This will serve to justifie that diversity The second difference is only the leaving out a severe word Perniciously repugnant to the Word of God was put at first but perniciously being considered to be only a hard word they judged very right in the Second Edition of them that it was enough to say repugnant to the Word of God There are in this Article five Particulars that are all Ingredients in the Doctrine and Worship of the Church of Rome Purgatory Pardons the Worship of Images and of Relicks and the Invocation of Saints that are rejected not only as ill grounded brought in and maintained without good warrants from the Scripture but as contrary to it The first of these is Purgatory concerning which the Doctrine of the Church of Rome is that every Man is liable both to Temporal and to Eternal Punishment for his Sins that God upon the Account of the Death and Intercession of Christ does indeed pardon Sin as to its Eternal Punishment but the Sinner is still liable to Temporal Punishment which he must expiate by Acts of Pennance and Sorrow in this World together with such other Sufferings as God shall think fit to lay upon him but if he does not expiate these in this Life there is a State of Suffering and Misery in the next World where the Soul is to bear the Temporal punishment of its Sins which may continue longer or shorter till the Day of Judgment And in order to the shortening this the Prayers and Supererogations of Men here on Earth or the Intercession of the Saints in Heaven but above all things the Sacrifice of the Mass are of great Efficacy This is the Doctrine of the Church of Rome asserted in the Councils of Florence and Trent What has been taught among them concerning the Nature and the Degrees of those Torments though supported by many pretended Apparitions and Revelations is not to be imputed to the whole Body and is indeed only the Doctrine of Schoolmen though it is generally preached and infused into the Consciences of the People Therefore I shall only examine that which is the established Doctrine of the whole Roman Church And first as to the Foundation of it that Sins are only pardoned as to their Eternal Punishment to those who being justified by faith have peace with God through our Lord Iesus Christ. Rom. 5.1 There is not a colour for it in the Scriptures Remission of Sins is in general that with which the Preaching of the Gospel ought always to begin and this is so often repeated without any such reserve that it is a high assuming upon God and his Attributes of Goodness and Mercy to limit these when he has not limited them but has expresly said that this is a main part of the New Covenant Jer. 31.34 Heb. 8.12 that he will remember our sins and iniquities no more Now it seems to be a Maxim not only of the Law of Nations but of Nature that all offers of Pardon are to be understood in the full extent of the Words without any secret Reserves or Limitations unless they are plainly expressed An Indemnity being offered by a Prince to persuade his Subjects to return to their Obedience in the fullest Words possible without any reserves made in it it would be lookt on as a very perfidious thing if when the Subjects come in upon it trusting to it they should be told that they were to be secured by it against Capital Punishments but that as to all Inferior Punishments they were still at Mercy We do not dispute whether God if he had thought fit so to do might not have made this distinction nor do we deny that the Grace of the Gospel had been infinitely valuable if it had offered us only the Pardon of Sin with relation to its Eternal Punishment and had left the Temporal Punishment on us to be expiated by our selves but then we say this ought to have been expressed The Distinction ought to have been made between Temporal and Eternal and we ought not to have been drawn into a Covenant with God by words that do plainly import an intire Pardon and Oblivion upon which there lay a limited Sense that was not to be told the World till it was once well engaged in the Christian Religion Upon these Reasons it is that we conclude that this Doctrine not being contained in the Scriptures is not only without any warrant in them but that it is contrary to those full offers of
executing the many trifling performances to which Indulgences are granted has brought in among them such a Prostitution of Holy Things that either it must be said that those are publick Cheats and that they were so from the beginning or that their Vertue is now exhausted though the Bulls that grant them are perpetual Or else a Man may on very easy Terms presâ—rve himself and redeem his Friends out of Purgatory If the saying a Prayer before a priviledged Altar or the Visiting some Churches in the time of Jubilee with those slight Devotions that are then enjoined have such efficacy in them it is scarce possible for any Man to be in danger of Purgatory The Third Head rejected in this Article is the Worshipping of Images Here those of the Church of Rome complain much of the Charge of Idolatry that our Church has laid upon them so fully and so severely in the Homilies Some among our selves have also thought that we must either Renounce that Charge or that we must deny the Possibility of salvation in that Church and in Consequence to that conclude that neither the Baptism nor the Orders of that Church are valid For since Idolaters are excluded from the Kingdom of Heaven they argue That if there can be no Salvation where Idolatry is committed by the whole Body of a Church then that can be no Church and in it there is no Salvation But here we are to consider before we enter upon the Specialties of this Matter that Idolatry is a general Word which comprehends maâ—y several Sorts and Ranks of Sins under it As Lying is capable of many Degrees from an officious Lye to the swearing falsly against the Life of an innocent Man in Judgment The one is the lowest and the other is the highest Act of that kind But all are Lying And yet it would appear an unreasonable Thing to urge every thing that is said of any Act in General and which belongs to the higest Acts of it as if all the Inferior Degrees did necessarily involve the Guilt of the highest There is another distinction to be made between Actions as they signify either of themselves or by the publick Constructions that are put on them by those who Authorise them and those same Actions as they may be privately intended by particular Persons We in our weighing of Things are only to consider what Actions signify of their own Nature or by Publick Authority and according to that we must Form our Judgments about them and in particular in the Point of Idolatry but as for the secret Thoughts or Intentions of Men we must leave these to the Judgment of God who only knows them and who being infinitely Gracious slow to Anger and ready to Forgive will we do not doubt make all the Abatements in the weighing Men's Actions that there is Reason for But we ought not to enter into that Matter we ought neither to aggravate nor to mollify Things too much We are to judge of Things as they are in themselves and to leave the Case of Mens Intentions and secret Notions to that God who is to Judge them As for the Business of Images we know that the Heathens had them of several Sorts Some they believed were real Resemblances of those Deities that they Worshipped Those Divinities had been Men and the Statues made for them resembled them Other Images they believed had a Divine Vertue affixed to them perhaps from the Stars which were believed to be Gods and it was thought that the Influences of their Aspects and Positions were by secret Charms called down and fastened to some Figures Other Images were considered as Emblems and Representations of their Deities So that they only gave them occasion to represent them to their Thoughts These Images thus of different Sorts were all Worshipped some more some less They kneeled before them they prayed to them and made many Oblations to them they set Lights before them and burnt Incense to them they set them in their Temples Market-places and High-ways and they had them in their Houses They set them off with much Pomp and had many Processions to their Honour But in all this though it is like the Vulgar among them might have gross Thoughts of those Images yet the Philosophers not only after the Christian Religion had obliged them to consider well of that Matter and to express themselves cautiously about it but even while they were in the peaceable Possession of the World did believe that the Deity was not in the Image but was only represented by it That the Deity was Worshipped in the Image so that the Honour done the Image did belong to the Deity it self Here then were two false Opinions The one was concerning those Deities themselves the other was concerning this way of Worshipping them and both were blamed Not only the Worshipping a false God but the Worshipping that God by an Image If Idolatry had only consisted in the acknowledging a false God and if the Worshipping the true God in an Image had not been Idolatry then all the Fault of the Heathenish Idolatries should have consisted in this that they Worshipped a false God but their Worshipping Images should not of it self have been an additional Fault But in opposition to this what can we think of those full and copious Words in which God did not only forbid the having of false Gods but the making of a graven Image Deut. 4.12 15 23. or the likeness of any thing in heaven in earth or under the earth The bowing down to it and the worshipping it are also forbid Where besides the copiousness of these Words we are to consider that Moses in the rehearsal of that Law in Deuteronomy does over and over again add and insist on this that they saw no manner of similitude when God spoke of them lest they should corrupt themselves and make to them a graven Image an enumeration is made of many different likenesses and after that comes another species of Idolatry their worshipping the host of heaven and therefore Moses charges them in that Chapter again and again to take heed Verse 23. Deut. 12.30 Levit. 26.1 Deut. 16â— 22. to take good heed to themselves lest they should forget the covenant of the Lord their God and make them a graven Image And he lays the same charge a third time upon them in the same Chapter A special Law is also given against the most Innocent of all the Images that could be made They were required not only not to have Idols nor graven Images but not to rear up a standing image or pillar nor to set up any image of stone or any carved stone such were the Baitulia the least tempting or ensnaring of all Idols They were not to bow down before it and the reason given is For I am the Lord your God The importance of those Laws will appear clearer if they are compared with the practice of those times and particularly in those symbolical
could they offer at it in a plain contradiction to such Principles as are consistent with the Christian Religion if the Doctrine of the Roman Church is true Here then we have not only the Scripture but Tradition fully of our side Some pretended Christians it is true did very early Worship Images but those were the Gnosticks held in detestation by all the Orthodox Irenaeus Epiphanius and St. Austin tell us Iren. l. 1. c. 24. Epiph. Haeres 27. August de Haeres cap. 7. that they Worshipped the Images of Christ together with Pythagoras Plato and Aristotle Nor are they only blamed for Worshipping the Images of Christ together with these of the Philosophers but they are particularly blamed for having several sorts of Images and Worshipping these as the Heathens did and that among these there was an Image of Christ which they pretended to have had from Pilate Besides these Corrupters of Christianity there were no others among the Christians of the first Ages that Worshipped Images This was so well known to the Heathens that they bring this among other things as a reproach against the Christians that they had no Images Which the first Apologists are so far from denying that they answered them That it was impossible for him who knew God to Worship Images But as human Nature is inclined to visible Objects of Worship so it seems some began to Paint the Walls of their Churches with Pictures or at least moved for it In the beginning of the Fourth Century this was condemned by the Council of Eliberis Can. 36. It pleases us to have no Pictures in Churches lest that which is Worshipped should be Painted upon the Walls Towards the end of that Century we have an account given us by Epiphanius Epiph. ep ad Joan. Hieros of his Indignation occasioned by a Picture that he saw upon a Veil at Anablatha He did not much consider whose Picture it was whether a Picture of Christ or of some Saint he positively affirms it was against the Authority of the Scriptures and the Christian Religion and therefore he tore it but supplied that Church with another Veil It seems private Persons had Statues of Christ and the Apostles Euseb. Hist. Eccl. l. 7. c. 18. Aug. in Psal. 113. de Moribus Eccl. Cath. c. 34. which Eusebius censures where he reports it as a remnant of Heathenism It is plain enough from some passages in St. Austin that he knew of no Images in Churches in the beginning of the Fifth Century It is true they began to be brought before that time into some of the Churches of Pontus and Cappadocia which was done very probably to draw the Heathens by this piece of conformity to them to like the Christian Worship the better For that humour began to work and appeared in many Instances of other kinds as well as in this It was not possible that People could see Pictures in their Churches long without paying some marks of respect to them which grew in a little time to the downright worship of them A famous instance we have of this in the Sixth Century Serenus Bishop of Marseilles finding that he could not restrain his People from the Worship of Images broke them in pieces upon which Pope Gregory writ to him blaming him indeed for breaking the Images Greg. Epist. l. 9. Ep. 9. but commending him for not allowing them to be worshipped This he prosecutes in a variety of very plain Expressions It is one thing to worship an Image and another thing to learn by it what is to be worshipped He says they were set up not to be worshipped but to instruct the Ignorant and cites our Saviour's Words Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve to prove that it was not lawful to worship the work of mens hands We see by a fragment cited in the Second Nicene Council that both Iews and Gentiles took advantages from the Worship of Images to reproach the Christians soon after that time The Iews were scandalized at their Worshipping Images as being expresly against the Command of God The Gentiles had also by it great advantages of turning back upon the Christians all that had been written against their Images in the former Ages At last in the beginning of the Eighth Century the famous Controversy about the having or breaking of Images grew hot The Churches of Italy were so set on the worshipping of them This is owned by all the Historians of that Age Anastasius Zonaras Câ—drenus Glycâ—s Theophanes Sigebert Otho Pris. Urspergensis Sigonius Rubens and Ciaâ—â—nius that Pope Gregory the Second gives this for the reason of their Rebelling against the Emperor because of his opposition to Images And here in little more than an Hundred Years the See of Rome changed its Doctrine Pope Gregory the Second being as positive for the worshipping them as the first of that Name had been against it Violent Contentions arose upon this Head The breakers of Images were charged with Iudaism Samaritanism and Manicheism and the worshippers of them were charged with Gentilism and Idolatry One General Council at Constantinople consisting of about Three hundred and thirty eight Bishops condemned the Worshipping them as Idolatrous but another at Nice of Three hundred and fifty Bishops though others say they were only Three hundred asserted the Worship of them Yet as soon as this was known in the West how active soever the See of Rome was for establishing their Worship a Council of about Three hundred Bishops met at Francfort under Charles the Great which condemned the Nicene Council together with the Worship of Images The Gallican Church insisted long upon this matter Books were published in the Name of Charles the Great against them A Council held at Paris under his Son did also condemn Image-worship as contrary to the Honour that is due to God only and to the Commands that he has given us in Scripture The Nicene Council was rejected here in England as our Historians tell us because it asserted the Adoration of Images which the Church of God abhors Agobard Bishop of Lions and Claud of Turin writ against it the former writ with great vehemence The Learned Men of that Communion do now acknowledge that what he writ was according to the sense of the Gallican Church in that Age And even Ionas of Orleans who studied to moderate the matter and to reconcile the Gallican Bishops to the See of Rome yet does himself declare against the Worship of Images We are not concerned to examine how it came that all this vigorous opposition to Image-worship went off so soon It is enough to us that it was once made so resolutely let those who think it so incredible a thing that Churches should depart from the received Traditions answer this as they can As for the Methods then used and the Arguments that were then brought to infuse this Doctrine into the World Acta Con. Nic. 2. Action 4 5 6
not only in the point of Redemption which is not denied by those of the Church of Rome but even in the point of Intercession for when St. Paul is treating concerning the Prayers and Supplications that are to be offered for all Men he concludes that Direction in these Words For there is one God and one Mediator between God and Man 1 Tim. 2. the Man Christ Iesus We think the silence of the New Testament might be a sufficient Argument for this But these Words go farther and imply a Prohibition to address our Prayers to God by any other Mediator All the Directions that are given us of trusting in God and praying to him are upon the matter Prohibitions of trusting to any other or of calling on any other Invocation and Faith are joyned together How shall they call on him in whom they have not believed Rom. 10.14 So that we ought only to pray to God and to Christ according to those words Ye believe in God believe ye also in me John 14.1 We do also know that it was a part of Heathenish Idolatry to Invocate either Demons or departed Men whom they considered as good Beings subordinate to the Divine Essence and imployed by God in the Government of the World and they had almost the same Speculations about them that have been since introduced into the Church concerning Angels and Saints In the condemning all Idolatry no reserve is made in Scripture for this as being faulty only because it was applied wrong or that it might be set right when directed better On the contrary when some Men under the pretence of Humility and of Will-worship Col. 2.18 did according to the Platonick Notions offer to bring in the Worship of Angels into the Church of Colosse pretending as is probable that those Spirits who were imployed by God in the Ministry of the Gospel ought in gratitude for that Service and out of respect to their Dignity to be worshipped St. Paul condemns all this without any reserves made for lower degrees of Worship he charges the Christians to beware of that vain Philosophy Verse 8 9 10. and not to be deceived by those shews of Humility or the Speculations of Men who pretended to explain that which they did not know as intruding into things which they had not seen vainly puffed up by their fleshly Mind If any degrees of invocating Saints or Angels had been consistent with the Christian Religion this was the proper place of declaring them But the condemning that matter so absolutely looks as a very express Prohibition of all sort of Worship to Angels And when St. Iohn fell down to Worship the Angel that had made him such glorious Discoveries upon two several Occasions The Answer he had was See thou do it not Rev. 19.10 Rev. 22.9 worship God I am thy fellow servant It is probable enough that St. Iohn might imagine that the Angel who had made such Discoveries to him was Iesus Christ but the Answer plainly shews that no sort of Worship ought to be offered to Angels nor to any but God The reason given excludes all sort of Worship for that cannot be among Fellow-Servants As Angels are thus forbid to be worshipped so no mention is made of worshipping or invocating anySaints that had died for theFaith such as St. Stephen and St. Iames. In the Epistle to the Hebrews Heb. 13.7 they are required to Remember them which had the rule over them and to follow their faith but not a word of praying to them So that if either the Silence of the Scriptures on this Head or if plain Declarations to the contrary could decide this Matter the Controversy would be soon at an end Christ is always proposed to us as the only Person by whom we come unto God And when St. Paul speaks against the worshipping of Angels he sets Christ out in his Glory in Opposition to it For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily and ye are compleat in him which is the Head of all Principality and Power Col. 2.9 10. pursuing that reason in a great many particulars From the Scriptures if we go to the first Ages of Christianity we find nothing that favours this but a great deal to the contrary Irenaeus disclaims the Invocation of Angels The memorable Passage of the Church of Smirna formerly cited is a full Proof of their Sense in this matter Clemens Alexandrinus and Tertullian do often mention the Worship that was given to God only Clem. Protrep Tertul. Apol. c. 17. by Prayer and so far were they at that time from praying to Saints that they prayed for them as was formerly explained They thought they were not yet in the Presence of God so they could not pray to them as long as that Opinion continued That Form of praying for them is in the Apostolical Constitutions In all that Collection which seems to be a Work of the Fourth or Fifth Century there is not a word that intimates their Praying to Saints In the Council of Laodicea there is an express Condemnation of those who invocated Angels Con. Laod. c. 35. Just. Mart. Apol. 2. Iren. l. 2. c. 35. Orig. Con. Cels. l. 8. Tert. de Orat. c. 1. Athanas. cont Arian Orat. 1 3 4. Greg. Nazianz. Orat. 40. Greg. Niss in Basil. cont Eunap Basil. Hom. 27. cont Eunom l. 4. Epiph. Haeres 64 69 78 79. Theod. de Haer. Fabul l. 5. c. 3. Chrysost. de Trinit this is called a Secret Idolatry and a forsaking of our Lord Iesus Christ. The first Apologists for Christianity do arraign the Worship of Demons and of such as had once lived on Earth in a Stile that shewed they did not apprehend that the Argument could be turned against them for their worshipping either Angels or departed Saints When the Arian Controversy arose the Invocation of Christ is urged by Athanasius Basil Cyril and other Fathers as an evident Argument that he was neither made nor created since they did not pray to Angels or any other Creatures from whence they concluded that Christ was God These are convincing Proofs of the Doctrine of the Three first and of a good part of the Fourth Century It is true as was confessed upon the former Head they began with Martyrs in the end of the Fourth Century They fancied they heard those that called to them and upon that it was no wonder if they invocated them and so private Prayers to them began But as appears both by the Constitutions and several of the Writers of that time the Publick Offices were yet preserved pure St. Austin says plainly The Gentiles built Temples raised Altars ordained Priests and offered Sacrifices to their Gods Aug. con Serm. Ar. c. 29. con Max. l. 13. c. 4. Aug. de Civ Dei l. 22. c. 10. l. 8. c. 27. but we do not erect Temples to our Martyrs as if they were Gods but Memories as to dead Men whose Spirits live with
Time or rather for the sake of such a Time only to have setled those Functions in the Church and that the Aposâ—les should have ordained Elders in every Church Those extraordinary Gifts that were then Acts 14.23 without any authoritative Settlement might hâ—ve served in that Time to have procured to Men so qualified all due Regards We have therefore much better Reason to Conclude that this was setled at that Time chiefly with respect to the following Ages which as they were to fall off from that Zeal and Purity that did then reign among them so they would need Rule and Government to maintain the Unity of the Church and the Order of sacred Things And for that Reason chiefly we may conclude that the Apostles setled Order and Government in the Church not so much for the Age in which they themselves lived as once to establish and give credit to Constitutions that they foresaw would be yet more necessâ—ry to the succeeding Ages This is confirmed by that which is in the Epistle to the Hebrews both concerning those who had ruled over them and those who were then their Guides Heb. 13.7 17. 1 Pet. 5.2 3. St. Peter gave directions to the Elders of the Churches to whom he writ how they ought both to feed and govern the flock and his charging them not to do it out of Covetousness or with Ambition insinuates that either some were beginning to do so or that in a Spirit of Prophecy he foresaw that some might fall under such Corruptions This is hint enough to teach us that though such things should happen they could furnish no Argument against the Function Abuses ought to be corrected but upon that pretence the Function ought not to be taken away If from the Scriptures we go to the first Writings of Christians we find that the main subject of St. Clemens and St. Ignatius Epistles is to keep the Churches in order and union in subjection to their Pastors and in the due subordination of all the Members of the Body one to another After the first Age the thing grows too clear to need any further proof The Argument for this from the standing Rules of Order of Decency of the Authority in which the Holy things ought to be maintained and the care that must be taken to repress Vanity and Insolence and all the extravagancies of light and ungoverned Fancies is very clear For if every Man may assume Authority to Preach and Perform Holy Functions it is certain Religion must fall into disorder and under contempt Hot-headed Men of warm Fancies and voluble Tongues with very little knowledge and discretion would be apt to thrust themselves on to the Teaching and Governing others if they themselves were under no Government This would soon make the publick Service of God to be loathed and break and dissolve the whole Body A few Men of livelier Thoughts that begin to set on foot such ways might for some time maintain a little credit yet so many others would follow in at that breach which they had once made on publick Order that it could not be possible to keep the Society of Christians under any method if this were once allowed And therefore those who in their heart hate the Christian Religion and desire to see it fall under a more general contempt know well what they do when they encourage all those Enthusiasts that destroy order hoping by the credit which their outward appearances may give them to compass that which the others know themselves to be too obnoxious to hope that they can ever have credit enough to persuade the World to Whereas those poor deluded Men do not see what Properties the others make of them The Morals of Infidels shew that they hate all Religions equally or with this difference that the stricter any are they must hate them the more the root of their quarrel being at all Religion and Virtue And it is certain as it is that which those who drive it on see well and therefore they drive it on that if once the publick Order and the National Constitution of a Church is dissolved the strength and power as well as the order and beauty of all Religion will soon go after it For humanly speaking it cannot subsist without it I come in the next place to consider the Second Part of this Article which is the Definition here given of those that are lawfully Called and Sent This is put in very general words far from that Magisterial stiffness in which some have taken upon them to dictate in this matter The Article does not resolve this into any particular Constitution but leaves the matter open and at large for such accidents as had happened and such as might still happen They who drew it had the state of the severalChurches before their Eyes that had been differently reformed and although thâ—ir own had been less forced to go out of the beaten path than any other yet they knew that all things among themselves had not gone according to those Rules that ought to be sacred in Regular times Necessity has no Law and is a Law to it self This is the difference between those things that are the means of Salvation and the Precepts that are only necessary because they are Commanded Those things which are the means such as Faith Repentance and new Obedience are indispensable they oblige all Men and at all times alike because they have a natural influence on us to make us fit and capable Subjects of the Mercy of God But such things as are necessary only by virtue of a Command of God and not by virtue of any real Efficiency which they have to reform our Natures do indeed oblige us to seek for them and to use all our endeavours to have them But as they of themselves are not necessary in the same order with the first so much less are all those methods necessary in which we may come at the regular use of them This distinction shall be more fully enlarged on when the Sacraments are Treated of But to the matter in hand That which is simply necessary as a mean to preserve the Order and Union of the Body of Christians and to maintain the Reverence due to holy things is that no Man enter upon any part of the holy Ministry without he be Chosen and Called to it by such as have an Authority so to do that I say is fixed by the Article But Men are left more at liberty as to their Thoughts concerning the subject of this lawful Authority That which we believe to be Lawful Authority is that Rule which the Body of the Pastors or Bishops and Clergy of a Church shall settle being met in a Body under the due Respect to the Powers that God shall set over them Rules thus made being in nothing contrary to the Word of God and duly executed by the particular Persons to whom that care belongs are certainly the Lawful Authority Those are the Pastors
Voice Stand up and bless the Lord your God for ever and ever which shews that all did understand the Service When the Syriac Tongue became more familiar to them the Iews had their Prayers in Syriac and they did read the Law in their Synagogues in Greek when that Language was more familiar to them when they read the Law in Greek we have reason to believe that they prayed likewise in it In the New Testament we see the Gift of Tongues was granted to enable the Apostles and others to go every where preaching the Gospel and performing Holy Functions in such a Language as might be understood The World was amaz'd when every Man heard them speak in his own Language One of the general Rules given by St. Paul with relation to the Worship of God is Let every thing be done to Edification Since then the speaking either to God in the Name of the People or to the People in the Name of God in an unknown Tongue can edify no Person then by this Rule it is to be understood to be forbidden When some who had the Gift of Tongues did indiscreetly shew it in the Church of Corinth St. Paul was so offended at that and thought it would appear to the World so undecent as well as unfruitful that he bestows a whole Chapter upon it and tho' a great part of the Discourse is against the pretending to teach the People in an unknown Tongue which yet is not near so bad as the reading the Word of God to them in a Tongue not understood by them it being much more important that the People should understand the words of the living God than the Expositions of Men yet there are many Passages in that Chapter that belong to Prayer The reason of the thing is common to both since unless the words were understood they who uttered them spoke only to the Air and how should it be known what was spoken For if the meaning of the Voice was not known they would be Barbarians to one another As to Prayer he says If I pray in an unknown tongue 1 Cor. 14.14 my spirit that is the Inspiration or Gift that is in me prayeth but my understanding that is my rational Powers is unfruitful Verse 15. and therefore he concludes that he will both Pray and give Thanks with the Spirit and with the understanding also he will do it in such a manner that the Inspiration with which he was acted and his rational Powers should joyn together The reason given for this seems evident enough to determine the whole matter Else when thou shalt bless with the Spirit Verse 16. how shall he that occupieth the room of the unlearned say Amen at thy giving of thanks seeing he understandeth not what thou sayest For thou verily givest thanks well but the other is not edified In which Words it is plain that the People even the most unlearned among them were to joyn in the Prayers and Praises and to testify that by saying Amen at the conclusion of them And in order to their doing this as became reasonable Creatures it was necessary that they should understand what that was which they were to confirm by their Amen It is also evident that St. Paul judged that the People ought to be edified by all that was said in the Church and so he says a little after this Let all things be done to edifying After such plain Authorities from Scripture supporting that which seems to be founded on the Light of Nature Verse 26. we need go no farther to prove that which is mainly designed by this Article The Custom of the Primitive Church is no less clear in this Point As the Christian Religion was spread to different Nations so they all worshipped God in their own Tongue The Syriac the Greek and the Latin were indeed of that extent that we have no particular History of any Churches that lay beyond the compass of those Languages but there was the same reason for putting the Worship of God in other Languages that there was for these That which is drawn from the Three Languages in which the Title on our Saviour's Cross was written is too trifling a thing to deserve an Answer As if a humour of Pilate's were to be considered as a Prophetical Warrant what he did being only designed to make that Title to be understood by all who were then at Ierusalem There are very large Passages both in Origen and St. Basil which mention every Tongues praising of God Cont Celsum l. 8. p. 402. Ep. 63. ad Neoces and that the Gospel being spread to many Nations he was in every Nation praised in the Language of that Nation This continued so long to be the practice even of the Latin Church that in the Ninth Century when the Slavons were converted it was considered at Rome by Pope Iohn VIII in what Language they should be allowed to Worship God Johan 8. Ep. 247. Concil Tom. 9. And as is pretended a Voice was heard Let every Tongue confess to God upon which that Pope writ both to the Prince and to the Bishop of the Slavons allowing them to have their Publick Service in their own Tongue But in the other Parts of the Western Church the Latin Tongue continued to be so universally understood by almost all sorts of People till the Tenth or Eleventh Century that there was no occasion for changing it and by that time the Clergy were affecting to keep the People in Ignorance and in a blind dependance upon themselves and so were willing to make them think that the whole business of reconciling the People to God lay upon them and that they were to do it for them A great part of the Service of the Mass was said so low that even they who understood some Latin could not be the better for it in an Age in which there was no printing and so few Copies were to be had of the Publick Offices The Scriptures were likewise kept from the People and the Service of God was filled with many Rites in all which the Clergy seemed to design to make the People believe that these were sacred Charms of which they only had the Secret So that all the Edification which was to be had in the Publick Worship was turned to Pomp and Shew for the Diversion and Entertainment of the Spectators In defence of this Worship in an unknown Tongue the main Argument that is brought is the Authority and Infallibility of the Church which has appointed it and since she ought to be supposed not to have erred therefore this must be believed to be lawful We are not much moved with this especially with the Authority of the later Ages Con. Trid. Câ—â—p 8. Sâ—ll 22. so the other Arguments must be considered which indeed can scarce be called Arguments The Modern Tongues change so fast that they say if the Worship were in them it must either be often changed or
increasing Numbers of the Christians made that both in France in the Councils of Orange and in Spain in the Council of Toledo the same Rule was laid down that the Greeks had begun In Spain some Priests did consecrate the Chrism but that was severely forbid in one of the Councils of Toledo Yet at Rome the ancient Custom was observed of appropriating the whole business of Confirmation to the Bishop Greg. Ep. l. 3. Ep. 9. even in Gregory the Great 's time Therefore he reproved the Clergy of Sardinia because among them the Priests did Confirm and he appointed it to be reserved to the Bishop But when he understood that some of them were offended at this he writ to the Bishop of Carali that tho' his former Order was made according to the ancient Practice of the Church of Rome yet he consented that for the future the Priests might Confirm in the Bishops absence But Pope Nicholas in the IX Century pressed this with more rigor For the Bulgarians being then converted to the Christian Religion and their Priests having both Baptized and Confirmed the new Converts Pope Nicholas sent Bishops among them with Orders to Confirm even those who had already been Confirmed by Priests Upon which the contest being then on foot between Rome and Constantinople Photius got it to be decreed in a Synod at Constantinople That theChrism being hallowed by a Bishop it might be administred by Presbyters And Photius affirmed that a Presbyter might do this as well as Baptize or Offer at the Altar But Pope Nicholas with the confidence that was often assumed by that See upon as bad grounds did affirm that this had never been allowed of And upon this many of the Latins did in the Progress of their Disputes with the Greeks say that they had no Confirmation This has been more enlarged on than was necessary by the designed shortness of this Work because all those of â—he Roman Communion among us have now no Confirmation In decr Con. Florent unless a Bishop happens to come amongst them And therefore it is now a commonDoctrine among them that tho' Confirmation is a Sacrament yet it is not necessary About this there were fierce Disputes among them about Sixty years ago whether it was necessary for them to have a Bishop here to Confirm according to the ancient Custom or not The Jesuites who had no mind to be under any Authority but their own opposed it for the Bishop being by Pope Eugenius declared to be the ordinary Minister of it from thence it was inferred that a Bishop was not simply necessary This was much censured by some of the Gallican Church If Confirmation were considered only as an Ecclesiastical Rite we could not dispute the power of the Church about it but we cannot allow that a Sacrament should be thus within the power of the Church or that a new Function of Consecrating Oil without applying it distinct from Confirmation and yet necessary to the very essence of it could have been set up by the power of the Church for if Sacraments are federal conveyances of Grace they must be continued according to their first Institution The Grace of God being only tied to the Actions with which it is promised We go next to the Second of the Sacraments here rejected which is Penance that is reckoned the Fourth in order among them Penance or Penitence is formed from the Latin Translation of a Greek word that signifies a change or renovation of Mind which Christ has made a necessary condition of the New Covenant It consists in several acts all which when joined together and producing this real change we become then true Penitents and have a right to the Remission of Sins which is in the New Testament often joined with Repentance and is its certain consequent The first act of this Repentance is Confession to God before whom we must humble our selves and confess our Sins to him upon which we believe that he is faithful and true to his Promises and just to forgive us our sins and if we have wronged others 1 John 1.9 or have given publick offence to the Body or Church to which we belong we ought to confess our faults to them likewise and as a mean to quiet Mens Consciences James 5.16 to direct them to compleat their Repentance and to make them more humble and ashamed of their Sins we advise them to use secret Confession to their Priest or to any other Minister of God's Word leaving this matter wholly to their discretion When these acts of sorrow have had their due effect in reforming the natures and lives of Sinners then their Sins are forgiven them In order to which we do teach them to Pray much to give Alms according to their Capacity and to fast as often as their Health and Circumstances will admit of and most indispensably to restore or repair as they find they have sinned against others And as we teach them thus to look back on what is past with a deep and hearty sorrow and a profound shame so we charge them to look chiefly forward not thinking that any acts with relation to what is past can as it were by an account or compensation free us from the guilt of our former Sins unless we amend our Lives and change our Tempers for the future The great design of Repentance being to make us like God Pure and Holy as he is Upon such a Repentance sincerely begun and honestly pursued we do in general as the Heralds of God's Mercy and the Ministers of his Gospel pronounce to our People daily the offers that are made us of Mercy and Pardon by Christ Jesus This we do in our daily Service and in a more peculiar manner before we go to the Holy Communion We do also as we are a Body that may be offended with the sins of others forgive the Scandals committed against the Church and that such as we think die in a state of Repentance may die in the full Peace of the Church we join both Absolutions in one in the last Office likewise praying to our Saviour that he would forgive them and then we as the Officers of the Church authorised for that end do forgive all the Offences and Scandals committed by them against the whole Body This is our Doctrine concerning Repentance in all which we find no Characters of a Sacrament no more than there is in Prayer or Devotion Here is no Matter no application of that Matter by a peculiar Form no Institution and no peculiar federal acts The Scene here is the Mind the acts are Internal the effect is such also and therefore we do not reckon it a Sacrament not finding in it any of the Characters of a Sacrament The matter that is assigned in the Church of Rome are the acts of the Penitent his Confession by his Mouth to the Priest the Contrition of his Heart and the satisfaction of his Work in doing the enjoined
they may make the holy things to be loathed by the aversion that will naturally follow upon them yet after all though that aversion may go too far we must still distinguish between the things that the Ministers of the Church do as they are publick Officers and what they do as they are private Christians Their Prayers and every thing else that they do as they are private Christians have their effect only according to the state and temper that they are in when they offer them up to God but their publick Functions are the appointments of Christ in which they Officiate they can neither make them the better nor the worse by any thing that they join to them And if miraculous Vertues may be in Bad Men so that in the great Day some of those to whom Christ shall say I never knew you depart from me ye that work iniquity Mat. 7.22 may yet say to him Lord Lord have we not prophesied in thy name and in thy name have cast out devils and in thy name done many wonderful works then certainly this may be concluded much more concerning those standing Functions and Appointments that are to continue in the Church Nor can any difference be made in this matter between publick Scandals and secret Sins for if the former make void the Sacraments the latter must do so too The only reason that can be pretended for the one will also fall upon the other for if the vertue of the Sacraments is thought to be derived upon them as an Answer of Prayer then since the Prayers of Hypocrites are as little effectual as the Prayers of those who are openly Vicious the Inference is good that if the Sacraments Administred by a scandalous Man are without any effect the Sacraments Administred by a Man that is inwardly Corrupted though that can be only known to God will be also of no effect and therefore this Opinion that was taken up perhaps from an inconsiderate Zeal against the sins and scandals of the Clergy is without all foundation and must needs cast all Men into endless scruples which can never be cured The Church of Rome though they reject this Opinion yet have brought in another very like it which must needs fill the Minds of Men with endless distractions and fears chiefly considering of what necessity and efficacy they make the Sacraments to be They do teach that the Intention of him that gives the Sacrament is necessary to the Essence of it so that without it no Sacrament can be Administred This was expresly affirmed by Pope Eugenius in his Decree and an Anathema past at Trent against those that deny it They do indeed define it to be only an Intention of doing that which the Church intends to do and though the surest way they say is to have an actual Intention yet it is commonly taught among them that a habitual or virtual Intention will serve But they do all agree in this that if a Priest has a secret Intention not to make a Sacrament that in that case no Sacrament is made and this is carried so far Miss Rom. Rubr. de defectu Intent art 1. that in one of the Rubricks of the Missal it is given as a Rule that if a Priest who goes to Consecrate Twelve Hosties should have a general Intention to leave out one of them from being truly Consecrated and should not apply that to any one but let it run loosely through them all that in such case he should not Consecrate any one of the Twelve that loose exception falling upon them all because it is not restrained to any one particular And among the Articles that were condemned by Pope Alexander the Eighth the 7th of December 1690. the 28th runs thus Valet Baptismus collatus a Ministro qui omnem ritum externum formamque Baptisandi observat intus vero in corde suo apud se resolvit non intendo quod facit Ecclesia And thus they make the secret acts of a Priest's mind enter so far into those Divine Appointments that by his Malice Irreligion or Atheism he can make those Sacraments which he visibly Blesses and Administers to be only the outward shews of Sacraments but no real ones We do not pretend that the Sacraments are of the nature of Charms so that if a Man should in a way of open Mockery and Profanation go about them that therefore because Matter and Form are observed they should be true Sacraments But though we make the serious appearances of a Christian action to be necessary to the making it a Sacrament yet we carry this no further to the inward and secret acts of the Priest as if they were essential to the being of it If this is true no Man can have quiet in his Mind It is a Profanation for an Unbaptized Person to receive the Eucharist so if Baptism is not true when a Priest sets his Intention cross to it then a Man in Orders must be in perpetual doubts whether he is not living in a continual state of Sacriledge in Administring the other Sacraments while he is not yet Baptized and if Baptism be so necessary to Salvation that no Man who is not Baptized can hope to be Saved here a perpetual scruple must arise which can never be removed Nor can a Man be sure but that when he thinks he is Worshipping the true Body of Jesus Christ he is committing Idolatry and Worshipping only a piece of Bread for it is no more according to them if the Priest had an Intention against Consecrating it No Orders are given if an Intention lies against them and then he who passes for a Priest is no Priest and all his Consecrations and Absolutions are so many invalid things and a continued course of Sacriledge Now what reason soever Men may have in this case to hope for the pardon of those sins since it is certain that the Ignorance is invincible yet here strange thoughts must arise concerning Christ and his Gospel if in those actions that are made necessary to Salvation it should be in the power of a false Christian or an Atheistical Priest or Bishop to make them all void so that by consequence it should be in his power to damn them for since they are taught to expect Grace and Justification from the Sacraments if these are no true Sacraments which they take for such but only the Shadows and the Phantasms of them then neither Grace nor Justification can follow upon them This may be carried so far as even to evacuate the very being of a Church for a Man not truly Baptized can never be in Orders so that the whole Ordinations of a Church and the Succession of it may be broke by the Impiety of any one Priest This we look on as such a chain of Absurdities that if this Doctrine of Intention were true it alone might serve to destroy the whole credit of the Christian Religion in which the Sacraments are taught to be both so
or the body like the Notion that the Gentiles might have of their Februations or which is more natural considering to whom he writes like the Opinions that the Iews had of their Cleansings after their Legal Impurities from which their Washings and Bathings did absolutely free them The Salvation that we Christians have by Baptism is effected by that Federation into which we enter when upon the Demands that are made of our renouncing the Devil the World and the Flesh and of our believing in Christ and our Repentance towards God we make such Answers from a good Conscience as agree with the end and design of Baptism then by our thus coming into Covenant with God we are saved in Baptism So that the Salvation by Baptism is given by reason of the federal compact that is made in it Now this being made outwardly according to the Rules that are prescribed that must make the Baptism good among Men as to all the outward and visible effects of it But since it is the answer of a good Conscience only that saves then an answer from a bad Conscience from a hypocritical Person who does not inwardly think or purpose according to what he professes outwardly cannot save but does on the contrary aggravate his Damnation Therefore our Article puts the efficacy of Baptism in order to the forgiveness of our sins and to our Adoption and Salvation upon the vertue of Prayer to God that is upon those Vows and other acts of Devotion that accompany them So that when the seriousness of the mind accompanies the regularity of the action then both the outward and inward effects of Baptism are attained by it and we are not only Baptized into one Body but are also saved by Baptism So that upon the whole matter Baptism is a federal admission into Christianity in which on God's part all the Blessings of the Gospel are made over to the Baptized And on the other hand the Person Baptized takes on him by a solemn Profession and Vow to observe and adhere to the whole Christian Religion So it is a very natural distinction to say that the outward effects of Baptism follow it as outwardly performed but that the inward effects of it follow upon the inward acts but this difference is still to be observed between inward acts and outward actions that when the outward action is rightly performed the Church must reckon the Baptism good and never renew it But if one has been wanting in the inward acts those may be afterwards renewed and that want may be made up by Repentance Thus all that the Scriptures have told us concerning Baptism seems to be sufficiently explained There remains only one place that may seem somewhat strange St. Paul says that Christ sent him not to Baptize but to Preach 1 Cor. 1.17 Which some have carried so far as to infer from thence that Preaching is of more value than Baptism But it is to be considered that the Preaching of the Apostles was of the nature of a Promulgation made by Heraulds It was an act of a special Authority by which he in particular was to convert the World from Idolatry and Iudaism to acknowledge Iesus to be the true Messias Acts 8.26 to the end Now when Men by the Preaching of the Apostles and by the Miracles that accompanied it were so wrought on as to believe that Iesus was the Christ Acts 16.31 32 33. then according to the practice of Philip towards the Eunuch of Ethiopia and of St. Paul to his Jayler at Philippi they might immediately Baptize them yet most commonly there was a special Instruction to be used before Persons were Baptized who might in general have some Conviction and yet not be so fully satisfied but that a great deal of more pains was to be taken to carry them on to that full assurance of Faith which was necessary This was a work of much time and was to be managed by the Pastors or Teachers of the several Churches So that the meaning of what St. Paul says was this that he was to publish the Gospel from City to City but could not descend to the particular labour of preparing and instructing of the Persons to be Baptized and to the Baptizing them when so prepared If he had entred upon this Work he could not have made that progress nor have founded those Churches that he did All this is therefore misunderstood when it is applied to such Preaching as is still continued in the Church which does not succeed the Apostolical Preaching that was inspired and infallible but comes in the room of that Instruction and Teaching which was then performed by the Pastors of the Church The last Head in this Article relates to the Baptism of Infants which is spoken of with that moderation that appears very eminently through the whole Articles of our Church on this Head It is only said to be most agreeable with the Institution of Christ and that therefore it is to be in â—ny ways retained in the Church Now to open this it is to be considerâ—d that tho' Baptism and Circumcision do not in every particular come to a Parallel yet they do agree in two things The one is that both were the Rites of admission into their respective Covenants and to the Rights and Privileges that did arise out of them and the other is that in them both there was an Obligation laid on the Persons to the observance of that whole Law to which they were so initiated St. Paul arguing against Circumcision lays this down as an uncontested Maxim That if a Man was Circumcâ—â—â—d he became thereby a debtor to the whole law Parents had by the Iewish Constitution Gal. 5.3 an Authority given them to conclude their Children under that Obligation so that the Soul and Will of the Child was so far put in the power of the Parents that they could bring them under federal Obligations and thereby procure to them a share in federal Blessings And it is probable that from hence it was that when the Iews made Proselytes they considered them as having such Authority over their Children that they Baptized them first and then Circumcised them though Infants Now since Christ took Baptism from them and appointed it to be the federal Admission to his Religion as Circumcision had been in the Mosaical Dispensation it is reasonable to believe that except where he declared a change that he made in it in all other respects it was to go on and to continue as before especially when the Apostles in their first Preaching told the Iews that the Promises were made to them and to their Children Acts 2.39 which the Iews must have understood according to what they were already in possession of that they could initiate their Children into their Religion bring them under the obligations of it and procure to them a share in those Blessings that belonged to it The Law of Nature and Nations puts Children in the Power
of their Parents they are naturally their Guardians and if they are entitled to any thing their Parents have a right to transact about it because of the weakness of the Child and what Contracts soever they make by which the Child does not lose but is a gainer these do certainly bind the Child It is then suitable both to the constitution of Mankind and to the dispensation of the Mosaical Covenant that Parents may dedicate their Children to God and may bring them under the obligations of the Gospel and if they may do that then they certainly procure to them with it or in lieu of it a share in the blessings and promises of the Gospel So that they may offer their Children either themselves or by such others of their Friends to whom for that occasion they transfer that Right which they have to transact for and to bind their Children All this receives a great confirmation from the decision which St. Paul makes upon a case that must have hapâ—â—ned commonly at that time which was when one of the Parties in a Married state Husband or Wife was Converted while the other continued still in the former state of Idolatry or Infidelity Here then a scruple naturally arose Whether a Believer or Christian might still live in a married state with an Infidel Besides the ill usage to which that diversity of Religion might give occasion another difficulty might be made Whether a Person defiled by Idolatry did not communicate that Impurity to the Christian and whether the Children born in such a Marriage were to be reckoned a holy seed according to the Iewish Phrase or an unholy unclean Children that is Heathenish Children who were not to be Dedicated to God nor to be Admitted into Covenant with him For unclean in the Old Testament and Unciâ—cumcised signify sometimes the same thing and so St. Peter said that in the case of Cornelius God had shewed him that he should call no Man common or unclean 1 Cor. 14. in allusion to all which St. Paul determines the case not by an immediate Revelation but by the Inferences that he drew from what had been Revealed to him he does appoint the Christian to live with the Infidel and says that the Christian is so far from being defiled by the Infidel that there is a communication of a Blessing that passes from the Christian to the Infidel the one being the better for the Prayers of the other and sharing in the Blessings bestowed on the other The better part was accepted of God in whom mercy rejoices over judgment there was a communication of a Blessing that the Christian derived to the Infidel which at least went so far that their Children were not unclean that is shut out from being dedicated to God but were holy Now it is to be considered that in the New Testament Christians and Saints or Holy stand all promiscuously The Purity of the Christian Doctrine and the Dedication by which Christians offer up themselves to God makes them Holy In Scripture Holiness stands in a double Sense the one is a true and real Purity by which a Man's Faculties and Actions become Holy the other is a dedicated Holiness when any thing is appropriated to God in which sense it stands most commonly in the Old Testament So Times Places and not only Persons but even Utensils applied to the Service of God are called Holy In the New Testament Christian and Saint are the same thing so the saying that Children are Holy when one of the Parents is a Christian must import this that the Child has also a right to be made Holy or to be made a Christian and by consequence that by the Parents Dedication that Child may be made Holy or a Christian. Upon these Reasons we conclude That though there is no express Precept or Rule given in the New Testament for the Baptism of Infants yet it is most agreeable to the Institution of Christ since he conformed his Institutions to those of the Mosaical Law as far as could consist with his Design and therefore in a thing of this kind in which the just tenderness of the human Nature does dispose Parents to secure to their Children a Title to the Mercies and Blessings of the Gospel there is no reason to think that this being so fully set forth and assured to the Iews in the Old Testament that Christ should not have intended to give Parents the same Comforts and Assurances by his Gospel that they had under the Law of Moses Since nothing is said against it we may conclude from the nature of the two Dispensations and the proportion and gradation that is between them that Children under the New Testament are a holy seed as well as they were under the Old and by consequence that they may be now Baptized as well as they were then Circumcised If this may be done then it is very reasonable to say what is said in the Article concerning it That it ought in any wise to be retained in the Church For the same Humanity that obliges Parents to feed their Children and to take care of them while they are in such a helpless state must dictate that it is much more incumbent on them and is as much more necessary as the Soul is more valuable than the Body for them to do all that in them lies for the Souls of their Children for securing to them a share in the Blessings and Privileges of the Gospel and for Dedicating them early to the Christian Religion The Office for Baptizing Infants is in the same words with that for Persons of Riper Age because Infants being then in the power of their Parents who are of Age are considered as in them and as binding themselves by the Vows that they make in their Name Therefore the Office carries on the supposition of an internal Regeneration and in that helpless state the Infant is offered up and Dedicated to God and provided that when he comes to Age he takes those Vows on himself and lives like a Person so in Covenant with God then he shall find the full effects of Baptism and if he dies in that state of Incapacity he being Dedicated to God is certainly accepted of by him and by being put in the Second Adam all the bad effects of his having descended from the First Adam are quite taken away Matt. 19.13 14. Christ when on Earth encouraged those who brought little Children to him he took them in his arms and laid his hands on them and blessed them and said suffer little children to come unto me and forbid them not for of such is the kingdom of God Whatever these words may signify mystically the literal meaning of them is that little Children may be admitted into the Dispensation of the Messias and by consequence that they may be Baptized ARTICLE XXVIII Of the Lord's Supper The Supper of the Lord is not only a sign of the love that Christians ought to have
Isa. 12.3 ye shall receive a new Doctrine with joy from some select Persons Since then the Figure of eating and drinking was used among the Iews for receiving and imbibing a Doctrine it was no wonder if our Saviour pursued it in a Discourse in which there are several hints given to shew us that it ought to be so understood It is further observable that our Saviour did frequently follow that common way of Instruction among the Eastern Nations by Figures that to us would seem strong and bold These were much used in those Parts to excite the Attention of the Hearers and they are not always to be severely expounded according to the full Extent that the words will bear The Parable of the unjust Judge of the unjust Steward of the ten Virgins of plucking out the right Eye and cutting off the right Hand or Foot and several others might be instanced Our Saviour in these considered the Genius of those to whom he spoke So that these Figures must be restrained only to that Particular for which he meant them and must not be stretched to every thing to which the Words may be carried We find our Saviour compares himself to a great many Things to a Vine a Door and a Way And therefore when the Scope of a Discourse does plainly run in a Figuâ—e we are not to go and descant on every Word of it much less may any pretend to say that some Parts of it are to be understood literally and some Parts figuratively For instance if that Chapter of St. Iohn is to be understood literally then Christ's Flesh and Blood must be the Nourishment of our Bodies so as to be meat indeed and that we shall never hunger any more and never die after we have eat of it If therefore all do confess that those Expressions are to be understood figuratively then we have the same reason to conclude that the whole is a Figure For it is as reasonable for us to make all of it a Figure as it is for them to make those Parts of it a Figure which they cannot conveniently expound in a literal Sense From all which it is abundantly clear that nothing can be drawn from that Discourse of our Saviour's to make it reasonable to believe that the words of the Institution of this Sacrament ought to be literally understood On the contrary our Saviour himself calls the Wine after those Words had been used by him the Fruit of the Vine which is as strict a Form of Speech as can well be imagined to make us understand that the Nature of the Wine was not altered And when St. Paul treats of it in those two Chapters in which all that is left us besides the History of the Institution concerning this Sacrament is to be found he calls it five times Bread and never once the Body of Christ. 1 Cor. 10.16 In one Place he calls it the Communion of the Body as the Cup is the Communion of the Blood of Christ. Which is rather a saying that it is in some sort and after a manner the Body and the Blood of Christ than that it is so strictly speaking If this Sacrament had been that mysterious and unconceivable Thing which it has been since believed to be we cannot imagine but that the Books of the New Testament the Acts of the Apostles and their Epistles should have contained fuller Explanations of it and larger Instructions about it There is enough indeed said in them to support the plain and natural Sense that we give to this Institution and because no more is said and the design of it is plainly declared to be to remember Christ's death and to shew it forth till he come we reckon that by this natural Simplicity in which this Matter is delivered to us we are very much confirmed in that plain and easy Signification which we put upon our Saviour's words Plain things need not be insisted on But if the most sublime and wonderful Thing in the World seems to be delivered in Words that yet are capable of a lower and plainer Sense then unless there is a concurrence of other Circumstances to force us to that higher meaning of them we ought not to go into it for simple Things prove themselves Whereas the more extraordinary that any thing is it requires a fulness and evidence in the Proof proportioned to the uneasiness of conceiving or believing it We do therefore understand our Saviour's Institution thus that as he was to give his body to be broken and his blood to be shed for our Sins so he intended that this his Death and Suffering should be still commemorated by all such as look for remission of sins by it not only in their Thoughts and Devotions but in a visible Representation Which he appointed should be done in Symbols that should be both very plain and simple and yet very expressive of that which he intended should be remembred by them Bread is the plainest Food that the Body of Man can receive and Wine was the common nourishing Liquor of that Countrey So he made choice of these Materials and in them appointed a Representation and Remembrance to be made of his body broken and of his blood shed that is of his Death and Sufferings till his Second coming And he obliged his Followers to repeat this frequently In the doing of it according to his Institution they profess the Belief of his Death for the Remission of their Sins and that they look for his Second coming This does also import that as Bread and Wine are the simplest of bodily Nourishments â—o his Death is that which restores the Souls of those that do believe in him As Bread and Wine convey a vital Nourishment to the Body so the Sacrifice of his Death conveys somewhat to the Soul that is vital that fortifies and exalts it And as Water in Baptism is a natural Emblem of the Purity of the Christian Religion Bread and Wine in the Eucharist are the Emblems of somewhat that is derived to us that raises our Faculties and fortifies all our Powers St. PÃ ul does very plainly tell us that unworthy receivers that did neither examine nor discern themselves nor yet discern the Lord's Body were guilty of the body and blood of the Lord 1 Cor. 11.27 29. and did eat and drink their own damnation That is such as do receive it without truly believing the Christian Religion without a grateful acknowledgment of Christ's Death and Sufferings without feeling that they are walking suitably to this Religion that they profess and without that decency and charity which becomes so Holy an Action but that receive the Bread and Wine only as bare bodily Nourishments without considering that Christ has instituted them to be the Memorials of his Death such Persons are guilty of the Body and Blood of Christ That is they are guilty either of a Prophanation of the Sacrament of his Body and Blood or they do in a manner Crucify
their joining to the Idol Feasts for an Idol was nothing and so that wstich was offered to an Idol could contract no defilement from the Idol it being nothing Now if the meaning of their being partakers with Devils imports only their joining themselves in Acts of Fellowship with Idolaters then the Sin of this would have easily appeared without such a re-inforcing of the Matter For tho' an Idol was nothing yet it was still a great Sin to join in the Acts that were meant to be the Worship of this nothing This was a dishonouring of God and a debasing of Man But St. Paul seems to carry the Argument farther that how true soever it was that the Idol was nothing that is a dead and lifeless thing that had no Vertue nor Operation and that by consequence could derive nothing to the Sacrifice that was offered to it Yet since those Idols were the Instruments by which the Devil kept the World in Subjection to him all such as did partake in their Sacrifices might come under the Effects of that Magick that might be exerted about their Temples or Sacrifices By which the Credit of Idolatry was much kept up And though every Christian had a sure defence against the Powers of Darkness as long as he continued true to his Religion yet if he went out of that Protection into the Empire of the Devil and joined in the Acts that were as a Homage to him he then fell within the reach of the Devil and might justly fear his being brought into a Partnership of those magical Possessions or Temptations that might be suffered to fall upon such Christians as should associate themselves in so detestable a Service In the same Sense it was also said 1 Cor. 10.18 that all the Israelites who did eat of the Sacrifices were partakers of the Altar That is that all of them who joined in the Acts of that Religion such as the Offering their Peace-Offerings for of those of that kind they might only eat all these were partakers of the Altar That is of all the Blessings of their Religion of all the Expiations the Burnt-offerings and Sin-offerings that were offered on the Altar for the sins of the whole Congregation For that as a great Stock went in a common Dividend among such as observed the Precepts of that Law and joined in the Acts of Worship prescribed by it Thus it appears that such as joined in the Acts of Idolatry became partakers of all that Influence that Devils might have over those Sacrifices and all that continued in the Observances of the Mosaical Law had thereby a partnership in the Expiations of the Altar so likewise all Christians who receive this Sacrament worthily have by their so doing a share in that which is represented by it the Death of Christ and the Expiation and other Benefits that follow it This seemed necessary to be fully explained For this Matter how plain soever in it self has been made very dark by the ways in which some have pretended to open it With this I conclude all that belongs to the first Part of the Article and that which was first to be explained of our Doctrine concerning the Sacrament By which we assert a real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ but not of his Body as it is now glorified in Heaven but of his Body as it was broken on the Cross when his blood was shed and separated from it That is his Death with the merit and effects of it are in a visible and federal Act offered in this Sacrament to all worthy Believers By Real we understand True in opposition both to Fiction and Imagination And to those Shadows that were in the Mosaical Dispensation in which the Manna the Rock the brazen Serpent but most eminently the Cloud of Glory were the Types and Shadows of the Messias that was to come With whom came Grace and Truth that is a most wonderful Manifestation of the Mercy or Grace of God and a verifying of the Promises made under the Law In this Sense we acknowledge a real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament Though we are convinced that our first Reformers judged right concerning the use of the Phrase real Presence that it were better to be let fall than to be continued since the Use of it and that Idea which does naturally arise from the common acceptation of it may stick deeper and feed Superstition more than all thoâ—e larger Explanations that are given to it can be able to cure But howsoever in this Sense it is innocent of it self and may be lawfully used though perhaps it were more cautiously done not to use it since advantages have been taken from it to urge it farther than we intend it and since it has been a snare to some I go in the next Place to explain the Doctrine of the Church of Rome concerning this Sacrament Transubstantiation does express it in one Word but that a full Idea may be given of this Part of their Doctrine I shall open it in all its Branches and Consequences The Matter of this Sacrament is not Bread and Wine For they are annihilated when the Sacrament is made They are only the remote Matter out of which it is made But when the Sacrament is made they cease to be And instead of them their outward Appearances or Accidents do only remain Which though they are no Substances yet are supposed to have a Nature and Essence of their own separable from Matter And these Appearances with the Body of Christ under them are the Matter of the Sacrament Now though the Natural and Visible Body of Christ could not be the Sacrament of his Body yet they think his real Body being thus veiled under the Appearances of Bread and Wine may be the Sacrament of his glorified Body Yet it seeming somewhat strange to make a true Body the Sacrament of it self they would willingly put the Sacrament in the Appearances but that would sound very harsh to make Accidents which are not Matter to be the Matter of the Sacrament Therefore since these words This is my Body must be literally understood the Matter must be the true Body of Christ so that Christ's Body is the Sacrament of his Body Christ's Body though now in Heaven is as they think presented in every Place where a true Consecration is made And though it is in Heaven in an extended State as all other Bodies are yet they think that Extension may be separated from Matter as well as the other Appearances or Accidents are believed to be separated from it And whereas our Souls are believed to be so in our Bodies that though the whole Soul is in the whole Body yet all the Soul is believed to be in every Part of it but so that if any Part of the Body is separated from the rest the Soul is not divided being one single Substance but retires back into the rest of the Body They apprehend that Christ's Body is present after
as that it can be no where else at the same time And though we can very easily apprehend that an Insinite Power can both create and annihilate Beings at pleasure yet we cannot apprehend that God does change the Essences of Things and so make them to be contrary to that Nature and sort of Being of which he has made them Another Argument against Transubstantiation is this God has made us capable to know and serve him And in order to that he has put some Sâ—nses in us which are the conveyances of many subtile Motions to our Brains that give us Apprehensions of the Objects which by those Motions are represented to us When those Motions are lively and the Object is in a due distance when we feel that neither our Organs nor our Faculties are under any disorder and when the Impression is clear and strong we are determined by it We cannot help being so When we see the Sun risen and all is bright about us it is not possible for us to think that it is dark Night No authority can impose it on us we are not so far the Masters of our own Thoughts as to force our selves to think it though we would for God has made us of such a Nature that we are determined by such an Evidence and cannot contradict it When an Object is at too great a distance we may mistake a weakness or an ill disposition in our sight may misrepresent it and a false Medium Water a Cloud or a Glass may give it a tincture or cast so that we may see cause to correct our first Apprehensions in some Sensations but when we have duly examined every thing when we have corrected one Sense by another we grow at last to be so sure by the Constitution of that Nature that God has given us that we cannot doubt much less believe in contradiction to the express Evidence of our Senses It is by this Evidence only that God convinces the World of the Authority of those whom he sends to speak in his Name He gives them a Power to work Miracles which is an Appeal to the Senses of Mankind and it is the highest Appeal that can be made for those who stood out against the Conviction of Christ's Miracles had no Cloak for their Sins It is the utmost Conviction that God offers or that Man can pretend to From all which we must infer this That either our Senses in their clearest Apprehensions or rather Representations of Things must be Infallible or we must throw up all Faith and Certainty since it is not possible for us to receive the Evidence that is given us of any thing but by our Senses and since we do naturally acquiesce in that Evidence we must acknowledge that God has so made us that this is his voice in us because it is the voice of those Faculties that he has put in us and is the only way by which we can find out Truth and be led by it And if our Faculties fail us in any one thing so that God should reveal to us any thing that did plainly contradict our Faculties he should thereby give us a right to disbelieve them for ever If they can mistake when they bring any Object to us with the fullest Evidence that they can give we can never depend upon them nor be certain of any thing because they shew it Nay we are not and cannot be bound to believe that nor any other Revelation that God may make to convince us We can only receive a Revelation by hearing or reading by our Ears or our Eyes So if any part of this Revelation destroys the certainty of the Evidence that our Senses our Eyes or our Ears give us it destroys it self for we cannot be bound to believe it upon the Evidence of our Senses if this is a part of it that our Senses are not to be trusted Nor will this matter be healed by saying that certainly we must believe God more than our Senses And therefore if he has revealed any thing to us that is contrary to their Evidence we must as to that paâ—ticular believe God before our Senses But that as to all other things where we have not an express Revelation to the contrary we must still believe our Senses There is a difference to be made between that feeble Evidence that our Senses give us of remote Objects or those loose Inferences that we may make from a slight view of Things and the full Evidence that Sense gives us as when we see and smell to we handle and taste the same Object This is the voice of God to us he has made us so that we are determined by it And as we should not believe a Prophet that wrought ever â—o many Miracles if he should contradict any part of that which God had already revealed so we cannot be bound to believe a Revelation contrary to our Sense because that were to believe God in contradiction to Himself which is impossible to be true For we should believe that Revelation certainly upon an Evidence which it self tells us is not certain and this is a Contradiction We believe our Senses upon this foundation because we reckon there is an Intrinsick certainty in their Evidence we do not believe them as we believe another Man upon a Moral presumption of his Truth and Sincerity but we believe them because such is the nature of the Union of our Souls and Bodies which is the work of God that upon the full Impressions that are made upon the Senses the Soul does necessarily produce or rather feel those Thoughts and Sensations arise with a full Evidence that correspond to the motions of sensible Objects upon the Organs of Sense The Soul has a sagacity to examine these Sensations to correct one Sense by another but when she has used all the means she can and the Evidence is still clear she is perswaded and cannot help being so she naturally takes all this to be true because of the necessary connexion that she feels between such Sensations and her assent to them Now if she should find that she could be mistaken in this even tho' she should know this by a Divine Revelation all the Intrinsick certainty of the Evidence of Sense and that connexion between those Sensations and her assent to them should be hereby dissolved To all this another Objection may be made from the Mysteries of the Christian Religion which contradict our Reasons and yet we are bound to believe them altho' Reason is a faculty much superior to Sense But all this is a mistake we cannot be bound to believe any thing that contradicts our Reasons for the Evidence of Reason as well as that of Sense is the voice of God to us But as great difference is to be made between a feeble Evidence that Sense gives us of an Object that is at a distance from us or that appears to us through a false Medium such as a Concave or a Convex-Glass
doubt of the Testimony of our Senses Another presumptive Proof that the Ancients knew nothing of this Doctrine is that the Heathens and the Iews who charged them and their Doctrine with every thing that they could invent to make both it and them odious and ridiculous could never have passed over this in which both Sense and Reason seemed to be so evidently on their side They reproach the Christians for believing a God that was Born a God of Flesh that was crucified and buried They laughed at their belief of a Judgment to come of endless Flames of a heavenly Paradise and of the Resurrection of the Body Those who writ the first Apologies for the Christian Religion Iustin Martyr Tertullian Origen Arnobius and Minutius Felix have given us a large Account of the Blasphemies both of Iews and Gentiles against the Doctrines of Christianity Cyril of Alexandria has given us Iulian's Objections in his own Words who having been not only initiated into the Christian Religion but having read the Scriptures in the Churches and being a Philosophical and Inquisitive Man must have been well instructed concerning the Doctrine and the Sacraments of this Religion And his Relation to the Emperor Constantine must have made the Christians concerned to take more than ordinary Pains on him When he made Apostacy from the Faith he reproached the Christians with the Doctrine of Baptism and laughed at them for thinking that there was an Ablution and Sanctification in it conceiving it a thing Impossible that Water should wash or cleanse a Soul Yet neither he nor Porphiry nor Celsus before them did charge this Religion with the Absurdities of Transubstantiation It is reasonable to believe that if the Christians of that time had any such Doctrine among them it must have been known Every Christian must have known in what Sense those Words This is is my body and This is my blood were understood among them All the Apostates from Christianity must have known it and must have published it to excuse or hide the shame of their Apostacy Since Apostates are apt to spread Lies of them whom they forsake but not to conceal such Truths as are to their Prejudice Iulian must have known it and if he had known it his Judgment was too True and his Malice to the Christian Religion too Quick to overlook or neglect the Advantages which this part of their Doctrine gave him Nor can this be carried off by saying that the eating of human Flesh and the Thyestean Suppers which were objected to the Christians relate to this When the Fathers answer that they tell the Heathens that it was a downright Calumny and Lie And do not offer any Explanations or Distinctions taken from their Doctrine of the Sacrament to clear them from the mistake and malice of this Calumny The Truth is the execrable Practices of the Gnosticks who were called Christians gave the Rise to those as well as to many other Calumnies But they were not at all founded on the Doctrine of the Eucharist which is never once mentioned as the Occasion of this Accusation Another Presumption from which we conclude that the Ancients knew nothing of this Doctrine is that we find Heresies and Disputes arising concerning all the other Points of Religion There were very few of the Doctrines of the Christian Religion and not any of the Mysteries of the Faith that did not fall under great Objections But there was not any one Heresy raised upon this Head Men were never so meek and tame as easily to believe things when there appeared strong Evidence or at least great Presumptions against them In these last Eight or Nine Centuries since this Doctrine was received there has been a perpetual Opposition made to it even in dark and unlearned Ages In which implicite Faith and blind Obedience have carried a great sway And though the Secular Arm has been employed with great and unrelenting Severities to extirpate all that have opposed it Yet all the while many have stood out against it and have suffered much and long for their rejecting it Now it is not to be imagined that such an opposition should have been made to this Doctrine during the nine hundred Years last past and that for the former eight hundred Years there should have been no Disputes at all concerning it And that while all other things were so much questioned that several Fathers writ and Councils were called to settle the Belief of them yet that for about eight hundred Years this was the single Point that went down so easily that no Treatise was all that while writ to prove it nor Council held to establish it Certainly the Reason of this will appear to be much rather that since there have been Contests upon this Point these last Nine Ages and that there were none the first Eight this Doctrine was not known during those First Ages and that the great Silence about it for so long a time is a very strong Presumption that in all that time this Doctrine was not thought of The last of those Considerations that I shall offer which are of the nature of presumptive Proofs is that there are a great many Rites and other practices that have arisen out of this Doctrine as its natural Consequences which were not thought of for a great many Ages but that have gone on by a perpetual progress and have increased very fruitfully ever since this Doctrine was received Such are the Elevation Adoration and Processions together with the Doctrine of Concomitance and a vast number of Rites and Rubricks the first occasions and beginnings of which are well known These did all arise from this Doctrine it being natural especially in the Ages of Ignorance and Superstition for Men upon the supposition of Christ's being Corporally present to run out into all possible Inventions of Pomp and Magnificence about this Sacrament and it is very reasonable to think that since these things are of so late and so certain a date that the Doctrine upon which they are founded is not much ancienter The great Simplicity of the Primitive Forms not only as they are reported by Iustin Martyr and Tertullian in the Ages of the Poverty and Persecutions of the Church but as they are represented to us in the Fourth and Fifth Century by Cyril of Ierusalem the Constitutions and the pretended Areopagite have nothing of that Air that appears in the latter Ages The Sacrament was then given in both kinds it was put in the hands of the Faithful they reserved some portions of it It was given to Children for many Ages The Laity and even Boys were imployed to carry it to dying Penitents what remained of it was burnt in some places and consumed by the Clergy and by Children in other places the making Cataplasms of it the mixing the Wine with Ink to sign the Condemnation of Hereticks are very clear Presumptions that this Doctrine was not then known But above all their not adoring the Sacrament which
Sacrifice v. 27. first for his own Sins and then for the People for this he did once when he offered up himself He opposes that to the Annual Expiation made by the Iewish High-Priest Christ entred in once to the Holy Place having made Redemption for us by his own Blood And having laid down that general Maxim 9. ch 22. v. 28. that without shedding of Blood there was no Remission he says Christ was offered once to bear the Sins of many He puts a Question to shew that all Sacrifices were now to cease When the Worshippers are once purged then would not Sacrifices cease to be offered 10. ch v. 11. And he ends with this as a full Conclusion to that Part of his Discourse v. 12. Every Priest stands daily ministring and offering oftentimes the same Sacrifices which can never take away Sin But this Man after he had offered up one Sacrifice for Sins for â—ver sat down on the right Hand of God Here are not general Words ambiguous Expressions or remote Hints but a Thread of a full and clear Discourse to shew that in the strict Sense of the Words we have but one Priest and likewise but one Sacrifice under the Gospel Therefore how largely soever those Words of Priest or Sacrifice may have been used yet according to the true Idea of a propitiatory Sacrifice and of a Priest that reconciles Sinners to God they cannot be applyed to any Acts of our Worship or to any Order of Men upon Earth Nor can the Value and Virtue of any instituted Act of Religion be carried by any Inferences or reasonings beyond that which is put in them by the Institution And therefore since the Institution of this Sacrament has nothing in it that gives us this Idea of it we cannot set any such Value upon it and since the reconciling Sinners to God and the pardoning of Sin are free Acts of his Grace it is therefore a high Presumption in any Man to imagin they can do this by an Act of theirs without Powers and Warrants for it from Scripture Nor can this be pretended to without assuming a most Sacrilegious Sort of Power over the Attributes of God Therefore all the Virtue that can be in the Sacrament is that we do therein gratefully commemorate the Sacrifice of Christ's Death and by renewed Acts of Faith present that to God as our Sacrifice in the Memorial of it which he himself has appointed By so doing we renew our Covenant with God and share in the Effects of that Death which he suffered for us All the antient Liturgies have this as a main Part of the Office that being mindful of the Death of Christ or commemorating it they offered up the Gifts This is the Language of Iustin Martyr Irenaeus Tertullian Cyprian and of all the following Writers They do compare this Sacrifice to that of Melchisedec who offered Bread and Wine And though the Text imports only his giving Bread and Wine to Abraham and his Followers yet they applied that generally to the Oblation of Bread and Wine that was made on the Altar But this shews that they did not think of any Sacrifice made by the offering up of Christ. It was the Bread and the Wine only which they thought the Priests of the Christian Religion did offer to God And therefore it is remarkable that when the Fathers answer the Reproach of the Heathens who charged them with Irreligion and Impiety for having no Sacrifices among them they never answer it by saying That they offered up a Sacrifice of inestimable Value to God which must have been the first Answer that could have occurred to a man possessed with the Ideas of the Church of Rome On the contrary Iustin Martyr in his Apology says They had no other Sacrifices but Prayers and Praises Apol. 2. And in his Dialogue with Trypho he confesses That Christians offer to God Oblations according to Malachi's Prophecy when they celebrate the Eucharist Leg. pro Christ. Minut. in Octav. Lib. 8. con Celsum Tert. A. -pol c. 30. Clem. Strom. l. 7. Arnob. lib. 7. in which they commemorate the Lord's Death Both Athenagoras and Minutius Felix justify the Christians for having no other Sacrifices but pure Hearts clean Consciences and a stedfast Faith Origen and Tertullian refute the same Objection in the same manner They set the Prayers of Christians in opposition to all the Sacrifices that were among the Heathens Clemens of Alexandria and Arnobius write in the same strain and they do all make use of one Topick to justify their offering no Sacrifices That God who made all things and to whom all things do belong needs nothing from his Creatures To multiply no more Quotations on this Head Iulian in his time objected the same thing to the Christians which shews that there was then no Idea of a Sacrifice among them otherwise he who knew their Doctrine and Rites had either not denied so positively as he did their having Sacrifices or at least he had shewed how improperly the Eucharist was called one When Cyril of Alexandria towards the middle of the Fifth Century came to answer this Cyr. Al. lib. 10. cont Jul. he insists only upon the inward and spiritual Sacrifices that were offered by Christians which were sutable to a pure and spiritual Essence such as the Divinity was to take pleasure in and therefore he sets that in opposition to the Sacrifices of Beasts Birds and of all other things whatsoever Nor does he so much as mention even in a Hint the Sacrifice of the Eucharist which shews that he did not consider that as a Sacrifice that was propitiatory These things do so plainly set before us the Ideas that the First Ages had of this Sacrament that to one who considers them duly they do not leave so much as a doubt in this matter All that they may say in Homilies or Treatises of Piety concerning the Pure Offering that according to Malachi all Christians offered to God in the Sacrament concerning the Sacrifice and the unbloody Sacrifice of Christians must be understood to relate to the Prayers and Thanksgivings that accompanied it to the Commemoration that was made in it of the Sacrifice offered once upon the Cross and finally to the Oblation of the Bread and Wine which they so often compare both to Abel's Sacrifice and to Melchisedec's offering Bread and Wine It were easy to enlarge further on this Head and from all the Rituals of the Antients to shew that they had none of those Ideas that are now in the Roman Church They had but one Altar in a Church and probably but one in a City They had but one Communion in a day at that Altar So far were they from the many Altars in every Church and the many Masses at every Altar that are now in the Roman Church They did not know what Solitary Masses were without a Communion All the Liturgies and all the Writings of the Antients are as
delivered Hymenaeus and Alexander unto Satan that they might learn not to blaspheme And he ordered that the incestuous person at Corinth should be delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh that the Spirit might be saved in the day of the Lord Iesus Certainly a Vicious indulgence to Sinners is an encouragement to them to live in Sin whereas when others about them try all methods for their Recovery and Mourn for those Sins in which they do perhaps Glory and do upon that withdraw themselves from all Communication with them both in Spirituals and as much as may be in Temporals likewise this is one of the last means that can be used in order to the reclaiming of them Another Consideration is the Peace and the Honour of the Society S. Paul wished that they were cut off that troubled the Churches Gal. 5.12 Great care ought to be taken that the Name of God and his Doctrine be not blasphemed and to give no occasion to the Enemies of our Faith to reproach us as if we designed to make Parties to promote our own Interests and to turn Religion to a Faction Excusing such as adhere to us in other things though they should break out into the most scandalous Violations of the greatest of all the Commandments of God Such a behaviour towards Excommunicated persons would also have this further good Effect It would give great Authority to that Sentence and fill mens minds with the Awe of it which must be taken off when it is observed that men converse familiarly with those that are under it These Rules are all founded upon the Principles of Societies which as they associate upon some common designs so in order to the pursuing those must have a power to separate themselves from those who depart from them In this Matter there are Extremes of both hands to be avoided Some have thought that because the Apostles have in general declared such persons to be accursed 1 Cor. 16.22 or under an Anathema who preach another Gospel and such as love not the Lord Iesus to be Anathema Maranatha which is generally understood to be a total cutting off never to be admitted till the Lord comes that therefore the Church may still put men under an Anathema for holding such unsound Doctrines as they think make the Gospel to become another in part at least if not in whole and that she may thereupon in imitation of another practice of the Apostles deliver them over unto Satan casting them out of the protection of Christ and abandoning them to the Devil Reckoning that the cutting them off from the Body of Christ is really the exposing them to the Devil who goes about as a Roaring Lion seeking whom he may devour But with what Authority soever the Apostles might upon so great a matter as the changing the Gospel or the not loving the Lord Iesus denounce an Anathema yet the applying this which they used so seldom and upon such great occasions to every Opinion after a Decision is made in it as it has carried on the Notion of the Infallibility of the Church so it has laid a Foundation for much Uncharitableness and many Animosities It has widened Breaches and made them incurable And unless it is certain that the Church which has so decreed cannot err it is a bold assuming of an Authority to which no fallible Body of men can have a Right That delivery unto Satan was visibly an act of a miraculous Power lodged with the Apostles For as they struck some blind or dead so they had an Authority of letting loose Evil Spirits on some to haunt and terrify or to punish and plague them that a desperate Evil might be cured by an extreme Remedy And therefore the Apostles never reckon this among the Standing Functions of the Church Nor do they give any Charge or Directions about it They used it themselves and but seldom It is true that S. Paul being carried by a just zeal against the Scandal which the incestuous person at Corinth had cast upon the Christian Religion did adjudg him to this severe degree of Censure But he judged it and did only order the Corinthians to publish it as coming from him with the power of our Lord Iesus Christ That so the thing might become the more publick and that the effects of it might be the more conspicuous The Primitive Church that being nearest the Fountain did best understand the Nature of Church-Power and the Effects of her Censures thought of nothing in this matter but of denying to suffer Apostates or rather scandalous persons to mix with the rest in the Sacrament or in other parts of Worship They admitted them upon the profession of their Repentance by an imposition of Hands to share in some of the more general parts of the Worship and even in these they stood by themselves and at a distance from the rest And when they had passed through several Degrees in that state of Mourning they were by steps received back again to the Communion of the Church This agrees well with all that was said formerly concerning the Nature and the Ends of Church-Power Which was given for edification and not for destruction 2 Cor. 10.8 This is suitable to the designs of the Gospel both for preserving the Society pure and for reclaiming those who are otherwise like to be carried away by the Devil in his snare This is to admonish Sinners as Brethren and not to use them as Enemies Whereas the other method looks like a power that designs Destruction rather than Edification especially when the Secular Arm is called in and that Princes are required under the Penalties of Deposition and losing their Dominions to extirpate and destroy and that by the cruellest sort of Death all those whom the Church doth so Anathematize We do not deny but that the form of denouncing or declaring Anathemas against Heresies and Hereticks is very Antient. It grew to be a Form expressing horror and was applied to the Dead as well as to the Living It was understood to be a cutting such Persons off from the Communion of the Church if they were still alive they were not admitted to any Act of Worship if they were dead their Names were not to be read at the Altar among those who were then commemorated But as heat about Opinions encreased and some lesser matters grew to be more valued then the weightier things both of Law and Gospel so the adding Anathemas to every point in which men differed from one another grew to be a common practice and swelled up at last to such a pitch that in the Council of Trent a whole Body of Divinity was put into Canons and an Anathema was fastened to every one of them The delivering to Satan was made the common Form of Excommunication an Act of Apostolical Authority being made a Precedent for the standing practice of the Church Great Subtilties were also set on foot concerning the force and
effect of Church-Censures The straining this matter too high has given occasion to extremes on the other hand If a man is condemned as an Heretick for that which is no Heresy but is an Article founded on the Word of God his Conscience is not at all concerned in any such Censure Great Modesty and Decency ought indeed to be shewed by private persons when they dispute against publick Decisions But unless the Church is Infallible none can be bound to implicit Faith or blind Submission Therefore an Anathema ill founded cannot hurt him against whom it is thundred If the Doctrine upon which the Censures and Denunciations of the Church are grounded is true and if it appears so to him that sets himself against it he who thus despises the Pastors of the Church despises Christ In whose Name and by whose Authority they are acting But if he is still under Convictions of his being in the right when he is indeed in the wrong then he is in a state of Ignorance and his Sins are Sins of Ignorance and they will be judged by that God w ho knows the sincerity of all mens Hearts and sees into their secretest Thoughts how â—ar the Ignorance is wilful and affected and how far it is sincere and invincible And as for those Censures that are founded upon the Proofs that are made of certain Facts that are scandalous either the person on whom they are charged knows himself to be really guilty of them or that he is wronged either by the Witnesses or the Pastors and Judges If he is indeed guilty he ought to consider such Censures as the Medicinal Provisions of the Church against Sin He ought to submit to them and to such Rebukes and Admonitions to such publick Confessions and other Acts of Self-Abasement 2 Tim. 2.26 by which he may be recovered out of the snare of the Devil and may repair the publick Scandal that he has brought upon the Profession of Christianity and recover the honour of it which he has blemisht as far as lies in him This is the submitting to those that are over him and the obeying them as those that watch for his soul and that must give an account of it But if on the other hand Heb. 13.17 any such person is run down by Falshood and Calumny he must submit to that Dispensation of God's Providence that has suffered such a load to be laid upon him He must not betray his Integrity he ought to commit his way to God and to bear his burden patiently Such a Censure ought not at all to give him too deep an inward concern For he is sure it is ill founded and therefore it can have no effect upon his Conscience God who knows his Innocence will acquit him though all the World should condemn him He must indeed submit to that separation from the Body of Christians But he is safe in his secret Appeals to God who sees not as man sees but judges righteous Judgment And such a Censure as this cannot be bound in Heaven In the pronouncing the Censures of the Church great care and tenderness ought to be used for men are not to be rashly cut off from the Body of Christ nothing but a wilful Obstinacy in Sin and a deliberate Contempt of the Rules and Orders of the Church can justify this Extremity Scandalous Sinners may be brought under the Medicinal Cure of the Church and the Offender may be denied all the Privileges of Christians till he has repaired the Offence that he has given Here another Extreme has been run into by men who being jealous of the Tyranny of the Church of Rome have thought that the World could not be safe from that unless all Church-Power were destroyed They have thought that the Ecclesiastical Order is a Body of Men bound by their Office to preach the Gospel and to offer the Sacraments to all Christians but that as the Gospel is a Doctrine equally offered to all in which every man must make the particular Application of the Promises the Comforts and the Terrors of it to himself as he will answer it to God so they imagin that the Sacraments are in the same promiscuous manner to be offered to all Persons and that every man is to try and examine himself and so to partake of them but that the Clergy have no Authority to deny them to any Person or to put marks of distinction or of Infamy on men And that therefore the Antient Discipline of the Church did arise out of a mutual Compromise of Christians who in times of Misery and Persecution submitted to such Rules as seemed necessary in that state of things but that now all the Authority that the Church hath is founded only on the Law of the Land and is still subject to it So that what Changes or Alterations are appointed by the Civil Authority must take place in bar to any Laws and Customs of the Church how Antient or how Universal soever they may be In answer to this it is not to be denied but that the degrees and extent of this Authority the methods and the management of it were at first framed by common consent In the times of Persecution the Laity who embraced the Christian Religion were to the Church instead of the Magistrate The whole concerns of Religion were supported and protected by them and this gave them a Natural Right to be consulted with in all the decisions of the Church The Brethren were called to join with the Apostles and Elders in that great Debate concerning the Circumcision of the Gentiles which was settled at Ierusalem and of such Practices we find frequent mention in St. Cyprian's Epistles The more Eminent among the Laity were then naturally the Patrons of the Churches But when the Church came under the Protection of Christian Princes and Magistrates then the Patronage and Protection of it fell to them upon whom the Peace and Order of the World depended Yet though all this is acknowledged we see plainly that in the New Testament there are many general Rules given for the Government and Order of the Church Timothy and Titus were appointed to ordain to admonish and rebuke and that before all The Body of the Christians is required to submit themselves to them and to obey them which is not to be carried to an indefinite and boundless degree but must be limited to that Doctrine which they were to teach and to such things as depended upon it or tended to its Establishment and Propagation From these general Heads we see just grounds to assert such a Power in the Pastors of the Church as is for Edification but not for Destruction and therefore here is a Foundation of Power laid down though it is not to be denied but that in the application of it such Prudence and discretion ought to be used as may make it most likely to attain those Ends for which it is given A general Consent in time of Persecution was necessary
otherwise too indiscreet a Rigor might have pulled down that which ought to have been built up If in a broken state of things a common Consent ought to be much endeavoured and staid for this is much more necessary in a regular and settled time with relation to the Civil Authority under whom the whole Society is put according to its Constitution But it can never be supposed that the Authority of the Pastors of the Church is no other than that of a Lawyer or a Physician to their Clients who are still at their liberty and are in no sort bound to follow their directions In particular Advices with relation to their private Concerns where no general Rules are agreed on an Authority is not pretended to and these may be compared to all other Advices only with this difference That the Pastors of the Church watch over the Souls of their people and must give an account of them But when things are grown into Method and general Rules are settled there the consideration of Edification and Unity and of maintaining Peace and Order are such sacred Obligations on every one that has a true regard to Religion that such as despise all this may be well look'd on as Heathens and Publicans and they are so much worse than they as a secret and well-disguised Traytor is much more dangerous than an open professed Enemy And though these Words of our Saviour of telling the Church may perhaps not be so strictly applicable to this matter in their primary sense Matt. 18.17 as our Saviour first spoke them yet the Nature of things and the Parity of Reason may well lead us to conclude That though those Words did immediately relate to the composing of private differences and of delating intractable persons to the Synagogues yet they may be well extended to all those publick Offences which are injuries to the whole Body and may be now applied to the Christian Church and to the Pastors and Guides of it though they related to the Synagogue when they were first spoken It is therefore highly congruous both to the whole Design of the Christian Religion and to many Passages in the New Testament that there should be Rules set for censuring Offenders that so they may be reclaimed or at least ashamed and that others may fear And as the final Sentence of every Authority whatsoever must be the cutting off from the Body all such as continue in a wilful disobedience to the Laws of the Society so if any who call themselves Christians will live so as to be a Reproach to that which they profess they must be cut off and cast out for if there is any sort of Power in the Church it must terminate in this This is the last and highest act of their Authority it is like Death or Banishment by the Civil Power which are not proceeded to but upon great occasions in which milder Censures will not prevail and where the general good of the Society requires it So casting out being the last Act of Church-Power like a Parent 's disinheriting a Child it ought to be proceeded in with that slowness and upon such considerations as may well justify the Rigor of it A wilful Contempt of Order and Authority carries virtually in it every other Irregularity because it dissolves the Union of the Body and destroys that Respect by which all the other ends of Religion are to be artained and when this is deliberate and fixed there is no other way of proceeding but by cutting off those who are so refractory and who set such an ill Example to others If the Execution of this should happen to fall under great Disorders so that many scandalous Persons are not censured and a promiscuous multitude is suffered to break in upon the most Sacred Performances this cannot justify private Persons who upon that do withdraw from the Communion of the Church For after all that has been said the Divine Peecept is to every man to try and examine himself and not to try and censure others All Order and Government are destroyed if private Persons take upon them to judg and censure others or to separate from any Body because there are Abuses in the use of this Authority Private Confession in the Church of Rome had quite destroyed the Government of the Church and superseded all the Antient Penitentiary Canons and the Tyranny of the Church of Rome had set many Ingenious Men on many subtle Contrivances either to evade the Force of those Canons to which some regard was still preserved or to maintain the Order of the Church in opposition to the Appeals that were made to Rome And while some pretended to subject all things to the Papal Authority others studied to keep up the Antient Rules The Encroachments that the Temporal and Spiritual Courts ware making upon one another occasioned many Disputes which being managed by such subtle men as the Civilians and Canonists were all this brought in a great variety of Cases and Rules into the Courts of the Church So that instead of the first Simplicity which was evident in the Constitution of the Church not only for the first Three Centuries but for a great many more that came afterwards there grew to be so much Practice and so many Subterfuges in the Rules and manner of proceeding of those Courts that the Church has long groaned under it and has wished to see that effected which was designed in the beginnings of the Reformation The Draught of a Reformation of those Courts is still extant that so instead of the Intricacies Delays and other Disorders that have arisen from the Canon Law we might have another short and plain Body of Rules which might be managed as antiently by Bishops with the Assistance of their Clergy But though this is not yet done and that by reason of it the Tares grow up with the Wheat we ought to let them grow together till the great Harvest comes or at least till a proper Harvest may be given the Church by the Providence of God in which the good may be distinguished and separated from the bad without endangering the Ruin of all which must certainly be the effect of Peoples falling indiscreetly to this before the time ARTICLE XXXIV Of the Traditions of the Church It is not necessary that Traditions and Ceremonies be in all places one or utterly like for at all times they have been diverse and may be changed according to the diversity of Countries and mens manners so that nothing be ordained against God's Word Whosoever through his private Iudgment willingly and purposely doth openly break the Traditions and Ceremonies of the Church which be not repugnant to the Word of God and be ordained and approved by common Authority ought to be rebuked openly that others may fear to do the like as one that offendeth against the common Order of the Church and hurteth the Authority of the Magistrate and woundeth the Consciences of weak Brethren Every
particular or National Church hath Authority to ordain change and abolish Ceremonies or Rights of the Church ordained only by mens Authority so that all things be done to edifying THIS Article consists of two Branches The first is That the Church hath Power to appoint such Rites and Ceremonies as are not contrary to the Word of God and that private Persons are bound to conform themselves to their Orders The second is That it is not necessary that the whole Church should meet to determine such maters the Power of doing that being in every National Church which is fully empowr'd to take care of it self and no Rule made in such matters is to be held unalterable but may be changed upon occasion As to the first it hath been already considered when the first words of the Twentieth Article were explained There the Authority of the Church in matters indifferent was stated and proved It remains now only to prove That private Persons are bound to conform themselves to such Ceremonies especially when they are also enacted by the Civil Authority It is to be considered That the Christian Religion was chiefly designed to raise and purify the Nature of man and to make Human Society perfect now Brotherly Love and Charity does this more than any one Virtue whatsoever It raises a man to the Likeness of God it gives him a Divine and Heavenly Temper within himself and creates the tenderest Union and firmest Happiness possible among all the Societies of Men. Our Saviour has so enlarged the Obligation to it as to make it by the Extent he has given it a great and new Commandment by which all the World may be able to know and distinguish his Followers from the rest of Mankind And as all the Apostles insist much upon this in every one of their Epistles not excepting the shortest of them so St. Iohn who writ last of them has dwelt more fully upon it than upon any other Duty whatsoever Our Saviour did particularly intend that his Followers should be associated into one Body and join together in order to their keeping up and inflaming their mutual Love and therefore he delivered his Prayer to them all in the Plural to shew that he intended that they should use it in a Body He appointed Baptism as the way of receiving men into this Body and the Eucharist as a joint Memorial that the Body was to keep up of his Death For this end he appointed Pastors to teach and keep his Followers in a Body And in his last and longest Prayer to the Father he repeats this That they might be one That they might be kept in one Body and made perfect in one in five several Expressions Joh. 17.11 21 22 23. which shews both how necessary a part of his Religion he meant this should be and likewise intimates to us the danger that he foresaw of his Followers departing from it which made him intercede so earnestly for it One Expression that he has of this Union shews how entire and tender he intended that it should be for he prayed that the Union might be such as that between the Father and himself was The Apostles use the Figure of a Body frequently to express this Union than which nothing can be imagined that is more firmly knit together and in which all the parts do more tenderly sympathize with one another Upon all these considerations we may certainly gather That the dissolving this Union the dislocating this Body and the doing any thing that may extinguish the Love and Charity by which Christians are to be made so happy in themselves and so useful to one another and by which the Body of Christians grows much the firmer and stronger and shines more in the World that I say the doing this upon slight grounds must be a Sin of a very high nature Nothing can be a just Reason either to carry men to it or justify them in it but the imposing on them unlawful Terms of Communion for in that case it is certain that we must obey God rather than man that we must seek Truth and Peace together Acts 24.16 and that the rule of keeping a good Conscience in all things is laid thus To do it first towards God and then towards man So that a Schism that is occasioned by any Church's imposing unlawful Terms of Communion lies at their door who impose them and the Guilt is wholly theirs But without such a necessity it is certainly both in its own nature and in its consequences one of the greatest of Sins to create needless Disturbances in a Church and to give occasion to all that alienation of Mind all those rash Censures and unjust Judgments that do arise from such Divisions This receives a very great Aggravation if the Civil Authority has concurred by a Law to enjoyn the Observance of such indifferent things for to all their lawful Commands we owe an Obedience not only for fear but for conscience sake since the Authority of the Magistrate is chiefly to be imployed in such matters Rom. 13.3 As to things that are either commanded or forbidden of God the Magistrate has only the Execution of these in his hands so that in those his Laws are only the Sanctions and Penalties of the Laws of God The Subject-matter of his Authority is about things which are of their own nature indifferent but that may be made fit and proper means for the maintaining of Order Union and Decency in the Society And therefore such Laws as are made by him in those things do certainly bind the Conscience and oblige the Subjects to Obedience Disobedience does also give Scandal to the weak Scandal is a Block or Trap laid in the way of another by which he is made to stumble and fall So this Figure of giving Scandal or the laying a stumbling-block in our Brother's way is applied to our doing of such Actions as may prove the occasions of Sin to others Every man according to the influence that his Example or Authority may have over others who do too easily and implicitely follow him becomes thereby the more capable of giving them Scandal that is of drawing them after him to commit many Sins And since men are under Fetters according to the Persuasions that they have of things he who thinks a thing sinful does sin if he does it as long as he is under that apprehension because he deliberately ventures on that which he thinks offends God even while he doubts of it or makes a distinction between Meats for the word rendered doubts Rom. 14.23 signifies also the making a difference he is damned that is self-condemned as acting against his own sense of things if he does it Another ma n that has larger Thoughts and clearer Ideas may see that there is no sin in an Action about which others may be still in doubt and so upon his own account he may certainly do it But if he has reason to believe that his
doing that may draw others who have not such clear Notions to do it after his Example they being still in doubt as to the Lawfulness of it then he gives Scandal that is he lays a stumbling-block in their way if he does it unless he lies under an Obligation from some of the Laws of God or of the Society to which he belongs to do it In that case he is bound to obey and he must not then consider the Consequences of his Actions of which he is only bound to take care when he is left to himself and is at full liberty to do or not to do as he pleases This explains the Notion of Scandal as it is used in the Epistles For there being several doubts raised at that time concerning the Lawfulness or Obligation of observing the Mosaical Law and concerning the Lawfulness of eating Meats offered to Idols no general Decision was made that went through that matter the Apostles having only decreed that the Mosaical Law was not to be imposed on the Gentiles but not having condemned such as might of their own accord have observed some parts of that Law Scruples arose about this and so here they gave great Caution against the laying a Stumbling-block in the way of their Brethren Ver. 13. But it is visible from this that the fear of giving Scandal does only take place where matters are free and may be done or not done But when Laws are made and an Order is settled the fear of giving Scandal lies all on the side of Obedience For a man of weight and Authority when he does not obey gives Scruples and Jealousies to others who will be apt to collect from his Practice that the thing is unlawful He who does not conform himself to settled Orders gives occasion to others who see and observe him to imitate him in it and thus he lays a Scandal or Stumbling-block in their way and all the sins which they commit through their excessive Respect to him and imitation of him are in a very high degree to be put to his account who gave them such occasion of falling The Second Branch of this Article is against the Unalterableness of Laws made in matters indifferent and it asserts the Right of every National Church to take care of it self That the Laws of any one Age of the Church cannot bind another is very evident from this That all Legislature is still entire in the hands of those who have it The Laws of God do bind all men at all times but the Laws of the Church as well as the Laws of every State are only Provisions made upon the present state of things from the fitness or unfitness that appears to be in them for the great Ends of Religion or for the Good of Mankind All these things are subject to alteration therefore the Power of the Church is in every Age entire and is as great as it was in any one Age since the days in which she was under the Conduct of men immediately Inspired So there can be no unalterable Laws in matters indifferent In this there neither is nor can be any Controversy An obstinate adhering to things only because they are antient when all the ends for which they were at first introduced do cease is the limiting the Church in a point in which she ought still to preserve her Liberty She ought still to pursue those great Rules in all her Orders of doing all things to Edification with Decency and for Peace The only question that can be made in this matter is Whether such general Laws as have been made by greater Bodies by General Councils for instance or by those Synods whose Canons were received into the Body of the Canons of the Catholick Church whether these I say may be altered by National Churches Or whether the Body of Christians is so to be reckoned one Body that all the Parts of it are bound to submit in matters indifferent to the Decrees of the Body in general It is certain that all the Parts of the Catholick Church ought to hold a Communion one with another and mutual Commerce and Correspondence together but this difference is to be observed between the Christian and the Iewish Religion that the one was tied to one Nation and to one place whereas the Christian Religion is universal to be spread to all Nations among People of different Climates and Languages and of different Customs and Tempers and therefore since the Power in indifferent matters is given the Church only in order to Edification every Nation must be the proper Judg of that within it self The Roman Empire though a great Body yet was all under one Government and therefore all the Councils that were held while that Empire stood are to be considered only as National Synods under one Civil Policy The Christians of Persia India or Ethiopia were not subject to the Canons made by them but were at full liberty to make Rules and Canons for themselves And in the Primitive Times we see a vast diversity in their Rules and Rituals They were so far from imposing general Rules on all that they left the Churches at full liberty Even the Council of Nice made very few Rules That of Constantinople and Ephesus made fewer And though the Abuses that were growing in the Fifth Century gave occasion to the Council of Calcedon to make more Canons yet the number of these is but small so that the Tyranny of subjecting particular Churches to Laws that might be inconvenient for them was not then brought into the Church The Corruptions that did afterwards overspread the Church together with the Papal Usurpations and the New Canon Law that the Popes brought in which was totally different from the old one had worn out the remembrance of all the Antient Canons so it is not to be wondred at if they were not much regarded at the Reformation They were quite out of practice and were then scarce known And as for the Subordination of Churches and Sees together with the Privileges and Exemptions of them these did all flow from the Divisions of the Roman Empire into Dioceses and Provinces out of which the Dignity and the Dependances of their Cities did arise But now that the Roman Empire is gone and that all the Laws which they made are at an end with the Authority that made them it is a vain thing to pretend to keep up the Antient Dignities of Sees since the Foundation upon which that was built is sunk and gone Every Empire Kingdom or State is an entire Body within it self The Magistrate has that Authority over all his Subjects that he may keep them all at home and hinder them from entring into any Consultations or Combinations but such as shall be under his Direction He may require the Pastors of the Church under him to consult together about the best methods for carrying on the Ends of Religion but neither he nor they can be bound to stay for
withstood St. Peter to his Face when he thought that he deserved to be blamed and he speaks of his own line and share as being subordinate in it to none And by his saying that he did not stretch himself beyond his own Measure 2 Cor. 10.14 he plainly insinuates that within his own Province he was only accountable to him that had called and sent him This was also the Sense of the Primitive Church That all Bishops were Brethren Collegues and Fellow-Bishops And though the Dignity of that City which was the Head of the Empire and the Opinion of that Church's being founded by St. Peter and St. Paul created a great Respect to the Bishops of that See which was supported and encreased by the eminent Worth as well as the frequent Martyrdoms of their Bishops yet St. Cyprian in his time as he was against the suffering of any Causes to be carried in the way of a Complaint for Redress to Rome so he does in plain words say That all the Apostles were equal in Power De Unit Eccles. and that all Bishops were also equal since the whole Office and Episcopate was one entire thing of which every Bishop had a compleat and equal share It is true he speaks of the Vnity of the Roman Chureh and of the Union of other Churches with it but those words were occasioned by a Schism that Novatian had made then at Rome he being elected in opposition to the Rightful Bishop So that St. Cyprian does not insinuate any thing concerning an Authority of the See of Rome over other Sees but speaks only of their Union under one Bishop and of the other Churches holding a Brotherly Communion with that Bishop Through his whole Epistles he treats the Bishops of Rome as his Equals with the Titles of Brother and Collegue In the first General Council the Authority of the Bishops of the great Sees is stated as equal Conc. Nic. Can. 6. The Bishops of Alexandria and Antioch are declared to have according to Custom the same Authority over the Churches subordinate to them that the Bishops of Rome had over those that lay about that City This Authority is pretended to be derived only from Custom and is considered as under the Limitations and Decisions of a General Council Soon after that the Arian Heresy was so spread over the East that those who adhered to the Nicene Faith were not safe in their numbers Ep. 10. ad Greg. and the Western Churches being free from that Contagion though St. Basil laments that they neither understood their matters nor were much concerned about them but were swelled up with Pride Athanasius and other oppressed Bishops fled to the Bishops of Rome as well as to the other Bishops of the West it being natural for the oppressed to seek Protection wheresoever they can find it And so a sort of Appeals was begun and they were authorized by the Council of Sardica But the ill effects of this Con. Sard. Can. 3 7 Con. Constant Can. 3. if it should become a Precedent were apprehended by the Second General Council in which it was decreed That every Province should be governed by its own Synod and that all Bishops should be at first judged by the Bishops of their own Province and from them an Appeal was allowed to the Bishops of the Diocess whereas by the Canons of Nice no Appeal lay from the Bishops of the Province But though this Canon of Constantinople allows of an Appeal to the Bishops of every such Division of the Roman Empire as was known by the name of Diocess yet there is an express Prohibition of any other or further Appeal which is a plain repealing of the Canon at Sardica And in that same Council it appears upon what the Dignity of the See of Rome was then believed to be founded For Constantinople being made the Seat of the Empire and called New Rome the Bishops of that See had the same Privileges given them that the Bishops of Old Rome had except only the Point of Rank which was preserved to Old Rome because of the Dignity of the City This was also confirmed at Chalcedon in the middle of the Fifth Century Con. Chalced Can. 28. This shews that the Authority and Privileges of the Bishops of Rome were then considered as arising out of the Dignity of that City and that the Order of them was subject to the Authority of a General Council Conc. Afric cap. 101. 1â—5 Epâ—st ad Bonifac. Celâ—st The African Churches in that time knew nothing of any Superiority that the Bishops of Rome had over them They condemned the making of Appeals to them and appointed that such as made them should be excommunicated The Popes who laid that matter much to heart did not pretend to an Universal Jurisdiction as St. Peter's Successors by a Divine Right they only pleaded a Canon of the Council of Nice but the Africans had heard of no such Canon and so they justified their Independence on the See of Rome Great Search was made after this Canon and it was found to be an Imposture So early did the See of Rome aspire to this Universal Authority and did not stick at Forgery in order to the compassing of it In the Sixth Century when the Emperor Mauritius continued a Practice begun by some former Emperors to give the Bishop of Constantinople the Title of Universal Bishop Greg. Ep. Lib. 4. Ep. 32 34 36 38 39. Lib. 6. Ep. 24 28 30 31. Lib. 7. Ep. 70. Pelage and after him Gregory the Great broke out into the most Pathetical Expressions that could be invented against it he compared it to the Pride of Lucifer and said That he who assumed it was the forerunner of Antichrist and as he renounced all Claim to it so he affirmed that none of his Predecessors had ever aspired to such a Power This is the more remarkable because the Saxons being converted to the Christian Religion under this Pope's direction we have reason to believe that this Doctrine was infused into this Church at the first Conversion of the Saxons yet Pope Gregory's Successor made no exceptions to the giving himself that Title against which his Predecessor had declaimed so much But then the Confusions of Italy gave the Popes great Advantages to make all new Invaders and Pretenders enlarge their Privileges since it was a great accession of Strength to any party to have them of their side The Kings of the Lombards began to lye heavy on them but they called in the Kings of a new conquering Family from France who were ready enough to make new Conquests and when the Nomination of the Popes was given to the Kings of that Race it was natural for them to raise the Greatness of one who was to be their Creature so they promoted their Authority which was not a little confirmed by an Impudent Forgery at that time oâ— the Decretal Epistles of the first Popes in
which they were represented as governing the World with an Universal and Unbounded Authority This Book was a little disputed at first but was quickly submitted to and the Popes went on upon that Foundation still enlarging their Pretensions Soon after that was submitted to it quickly appeared that the Pretensions of that See were endless They went on to claim a Power over Princes and their Dominions and that first with relation to Spiritual matters They deposed them if they were either Hereticks themselves or if they favoured Heresy at least so far as not to extirpate it From deposing they went to the disposing of their Dominions to others And at last Boniface the Eighth compleated their Claim for he decreed That it was necessary to every man to be subject to the Pope's Authority And he asserted a direct Dominion over Princes as to their Temporals That they were all subject to him and held their Dominions under him and at his Courtesy As for the Jurisdiction that they claimed over the Spirituality they exercised it with that Rigor with such heavy Taxes and Impositions such Exemptions and Dispensations and such a Violation of all the Antient Canons that as it grew insupportably grievous so the management was grosly scandalous for every thing was openly set to Sale By these Practices they disposed the World to examine the Grounds of that Authority which was managed with so much Tyranny and Corruption It was so ill founded that it could not be defended but by Force and Artifices Thus it appears that there is no Authority at all in the Scripture for this Extent of Jurisdiction that the Popes assumed That it was not thought on in the first Ages That a vigorous Opposition was made to every step of the Progress that it made And that Forgery and Violence was used to bring the World under it So that there is no reason now to submit to it As for the Patriarchal Authority which that See had over a great part of the Roman Empire that was only a Regulation made conform to the Constitution of that Empire So that the Empire being now dissolved into many different Sovereignties the new Princes are under no sort of obligation to have any regard to the Roman Constitution Nor does a Nation 's receiving the Faith by the Ministry of Men sent from any See subject them to that See for then all must be subject to Ierusalem since the Gospel came to all the Churches from thence There was a Decision made in the Third General Council in the case of the Cypriotick Churches which pretended that they had been always compleat Churches within themselves and Independent therefore they stood upon this Privilege Not to be subject to Appeals to any Patriarchal See The Council judged in their favour So since the Britannick Churches were converted long before they had any Commerce with Rome they were originally Independent which could not be lost by any thing that was afterwards done among the Saxons by men sent over from Rome This is enough to prove the First Point That the Bishops of Rome have no Lawful Jurisdiction here among us The Second is That Kings or Queens have an Authority over their Subjects in Matters Ecclesiastical In the Old Testament the Kings of Israel intermeddled in all matters of Religion Samuel acknowledged Saul's Authority and Abimelech though the High-Priest when called before Saul 1 Sam. 15.30.22.14 appeared and answered to some things that were objected to him that related to the Worship of God Samuel said in express words to Saul That he was made the Head of all the Tribes and one of these was the Tribe of Levi. 15.17 David made many Laws about Sacred Matters such as the Orders of the Courses of the Priests and the time of their Attendance at the Publick Service When he died and was informing Solomon of the Extent of his Authority he told him that the Courses of the Priests and all the People were to be wholly at his Commandment Pursuant to which 1 Chron. 23.6.28.21 Solomon did appoint them their Charges in the Service of God and both the Priests and Levites departed not from his Commandment in any matter He turned out Abiathar from the High-Priests Office 2 Chron. 8.14 15. and yet no Complaint was made upon it as if he had assumed an Authority that did not belong to him It is true both David and Solomon were men that were particularly inspired as to some things but it does not appear that they acted in those matters by virtue of any such Inspiration They were Acts of Regal Power and they did them in that Capacity Iehoshaphat Hezekiah and Iosiah gave many Directions and Orders in Sacred Matters 2 Chron. 17.8 9. chap. 19.8 to the End Chap. 26.16 17 18 19. But though the Priest withstood Vzziah when he was going to offer Incense in the Holy Place yet they did not pretend Privilege or make opposition to those Orders that were issued out by their Kings Mordecai appointed the Feast of Purim by virtue of the Authority that King Ahasuerus gave him And both Ezra and Nehemiah by virtue of Commissions from the Kings of Persia made many Reformations and gave many Orders in Sacred Matters Under the New Testament Christ by saying Render to Caesar the things which are Caesars did plainly show that he did not intend that his Religion should in any sort lessen the Temporal Authority The Apostles writ to the Churches to obey Magistrates Rom. 13.6 to submit to them and to pay Taxes They enjoined Obedience whether to the King as supreme or to others that were sent by him Ver. 1. 1 â—et 2.13 Every Soul without exception is charged to be subject to the higher Powers The Magistrate is ordained of God and is his Minister to encourage them that do well and to punish the evil doers If these Passages of Scripture are to be interpreted according to the common consent of the Fathers Churchmen are included within them as well as other Persons There was not indeed great occasion to consider this matter before Constantine's coming to the Empire for till then the Emperors did not consider the Christians otherwise than either as Enemies ot at best as their Subjects at large And therefore though the Christians made an Address to Aurelian in the matter of Samosatenus and obtained a favourable and just Answer to it yet in Constantine's time the Protection that he gave to the Christian Religion led him and his Successors to make many Laws in Ecclesiastical matters concerning the Age the Qualifications and the Duties of the Clergy Many of these are to be found in Theodosius and Iustinian's Code Iustinian added many more in his Novels Appeals were made to the Emperors against the Injustice of Synods They received them and appointed such Bishops to hear and try those Causes as happened to be then about their Courts In the Council of Nice many Complaints were given to the Emperor by
to the Practice of the second Branch of it We see what particular Care God took of the Poor in the Old Dispensation and what variety of Provision was made for them all which must certainly be carried as much higher among Christians as the Laws of Love and Charity are raised to a higher degree in the Gospel Christ represents the Essay that he gives of the Day of Judgment in this Article of Charity and expresses it in the most emphatical words possible as if what is given to the Poor were to be reckoned for as if it had been given personally to Christ himself And in a great variety of other Passages this matter is so oft insisted on that no man can resist it who reads them and acknowledges the Authority of the New Testament It is not possible to fix a determined Quota as was done under the Law in which every Family had their peculiar Allotment which had a certain Charge specified in the Law that was laid upon it But under the Gospel as men may be under greater Inequalities of Fortune than they could have been under the Old Dispensation so that vast variety of mens Circumstances makes that such Proportions as would be intolerable Burdens upon some would be too light and disproportioned to the Wealth of others Those words of our Saviour come pretty near the marking out every mans measure Luk. 21.4 These have of their abundance cast into the offerings of God but she of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had Abundance is Superfluity in the Greek which imports that which is over and above the food that is convenient Prov. 30.8 that which one can well spare and lay aside Now by our Saviour's design it plainly appears that this is a low degree of Charity when men give only out of this though God knows it is far beyond what is done by the greater part of Christians Whereas that which is so peculiarly acceptable to God is when men give out of their Penury that is out of what is necessary to them when they are ready especially upon great and crying occasions even to pinch Nature and straiten themselves within what upon other occasions they may allow themselves that so they may distribute to the necessities of others who are more pinched and are in great extremities By this every man ought to judg himself as knowing that he must give a most particular Account to God of that which God hath reserved to himself and ordered the distribution of it to the Poor out of all that Abundance with which he has bless'd some far beyond others ARTICLE XXXIX Of a Christian Man's Oath As we confess that vain and rash swearing is forbidden Christian men by our Lord Iesus Christ and James his Apostle so we judg that Christian Religion doth not prohibit but that a man may swear when the Magistrate requireth in a Cause of Faith and Charity so it be done according to the Prophets teaching in Iustice Iudgment and Truth AN Oath is an Appeal to God either upon a Testimony that is given or a Promise that is made confirming the Truth of the one and the Fidelity of the other It is an Appeal to God who knows all things and will judg all men So it is an Act that acknowledges both his Omniscience and his being the Governor of this World who will judg all at the Last Day according to their deeds and must be supposed to have a more immediate regard to such Acts in which men made him a Party An Appeal truly made is a committing the matter to God A false one is an Act of open defiance which must either suppose a denial of his knowing all things or a belief that he has forsaken the Earth and has no regard to the Actions of Mortals or finally it is a bold venturing on the Justice and Wrath of God for the serving some present end or the gaining of some present advantage And which of these soever gives a man that brutal Confidence of adventuring on a false Oath we must conclude it to be a very crying Sin which must be expiated with a very severe Repentance or will bring down verry terrible Judgments on those who are guilty of it Thus if we consider the matter upon the Principles of Natural Religion an Oath is an Act of Worship and Homage done to God and is a very powerful mean for preserving the Justice and Order of the World All Decisions in Justice must be founded upon evidence two must be believed rather than one therefore the more Terror that is struck into the minds of men either when they give their Testimony or when they bind themselves by Promises and the deeper that this goes it will both oblige them to the greater Caution in what they say and to the greater Strictness in what they promise Since therefore Truth and Fidelity are so necessary to the Security and Commerce of the World and since an Appeal to God is the greatest Mean that can be thought on to bind men to an exactness and strictness in every thing with which that Appeal is joined therefore the use of an Oath is fully justified upon the Principles of Natural Religion This has spread it self so universally through the World and began so early that it may well be reckoned a Branch of the Law and Light of Nature We find this was practised by the Patriarchs Abimelech reckoned that he was safe if he could persuade Abraham to swear to him by God Gen. 21.23.26.28.31.53 That he would not deal falsly with him and Abraham consented so to swear Either the same Abimelech or another of that Name desired that an Oath might be between Isaac and him and they sware one to another Iacob did also swear to Laban Thus we find the Patriarchs practising this before the Mosaical Law Under that Law we find many Covenants sealed by an Oath and that was a Sacred Bond as appears from the Story of the Gibeonites There was also a special Constitution in the Iewish Religion by which one in Authority might put others under an Oath and adjure them either to do somewhat or to declare some Truth The Law was That when any Soul i. e. man sinned Lev. 5.1 and heard the voice of swearing Adjuration and was a witness whether he hath seen it or known it if he do not utter it then he shall bear his Iniquity that is he shall be guilty of Perjury So the Form then was the Judg or the Parent did adjure all persons to declare their knowledg of any particular They charged this upon them with an Oath or Curse and all persons were then bound by that Oath to tell the truth So Micah came and confessed Judg. 17.2 upon his Mother's Adjuration That he had the Eleven hundred Shekels for which he heard her put all under a Curse and upon that she blessed him 1 Sam. 14.24 28 44. Saul when he was pursuing