direction of posterity as it were Theological pandects infinite store of our books might very well lie by and peaceably be buried and after ages reap greater profit with smaller cost and pains But that which was possible in the world united under Justinian in this great division of Kingdoms is peradventure impossible Wherefore having contented my self to shew what a great and irremediable inconvenience this free and uncontroulable ventring upon Theological disputes hath brought upon us I will leave this project as a Speculation and pass from this general Doctrine unto some particulars For this generality and heap of sick persons I must divide into their kindes and give every one his proper Recipe The first in this order of weak persons so to be received cherisht by us is one of whom question may be made whether he may be called weak or no he may seem to be rather dead for no pulse of infused grace beats in him I mean such a one who hath but smal or peradventure no knowledge at all in the mystery of Christ yet is otherwise a man of upright life and conversation such a one as we usually name a moral man Account you of such a one as dead or how you please yet methinks I finde a Recipe for him in my text For this man is even to be woed by us as sometimes one heathen man wisht of another Talis câ—â—m sis utinam noster esses This man may speak unto a Christian as Ruth does unto Booz spread the skirt of thy garment over me for thou art a near kinsman Two parts there are that do compleatly make up a Christian man A true Faith and an honest conversation The first though it seem the worthier and therefore gives unto us the name of Christians yet the second in the end will proove the surer For true profession without honest conversation not only saves not but increases our weight of punishment but a good life without true profession though it bring us not to Heaven yet it lessens the measure of our judgement so that a moral man so called is a Christian by the surer side As our Saviour saith of one in the Gospel that had wisely and discreetly answered him Thou art not far from the kingdom of Heaven So may we say of these men suppose that as yet they be not of yet certainly far from the Kingdom of Heaven they cannot be yea this sincerity of life though sever'd from true profession did seem such a jewel in the eyes of some of the ancient Fathers that their opinion was and so have they in their writings erroneously doubtless yet so have they testified it that God hath in store for such men not only this mitigating mercy of which but now I spake but even saving grace so far forth as to make them possessors of his Kingdom Let it not trouble you that I intitle them to some part of our Christian Faith and therefore without scruple to be received as weak and not to be cast forth as dead Salvianus disputing what Faith is Quid est igitur credulitas vel fides saith he opinor fideliter hominuÌ„ Christo credere id est fideleÌ„ Deo esse hoc est fideliter Dei mandata servare What might this faith be saith he I suppose it is nothing else but faithfully to believe Christ and this is to be faithful unto God which is nothing else but faithfully to keep the commandments of God Not therefore only a bare belief but the fidelity trustiness of Gods servants faithfully accomplishing the will of our Master is required as a part of our Christian Faith Now all those good things which moral men by the light of nature do are a part of Gods will written in their hearts wherefore so far as they were conscientious in performing them if Salvianus his reason be good so far have they title and interest in our Faith And therefore Regulus that famous Roman when he endured infinite torments rather then he would break his Oath may thus far be counted a Martyr and witness for the truth For the Crown of Martyrdom sits not only on the heads of those who have lost their lives rather then they would cease to profess the Name of Christ but on the head of every one that suffers for the testimony of a good conscience and for righteousness sake And here I cannot pass by one very general gross mistaking of our age For in our discourses concerning the notes of a Christian man by what signes we may know a man to be one of the visible company of Christ we have so tied our selves to this outward profession that if we know no other vertue in a man but that he hath cond his Creed by heart let his life be never so profane we think it argument enough for us to account him within the Pale and Circuit of the Church on the contrary side let his life be never so upright if either he little seen in or peradventure quite ignorant of the Mystery of Christ we esteem of him but as dead and those who conceive well of those moral good things as of some tokens giving hope of life we account but as a kinde of Manichees who thought the very earth had life in it I must confess that I have not yet made that proficiency in the Schools of our age as that I could see why the second table and the Acts of it are not as properly the parts of Religion and Christianity as the Acts and observations of the first If I mistake then it is S. James that hath abus'd me for he describing Religion by its proper Acts tells us that True Religion and undefiled before God and the Father is to visit the Fatherless and the widow in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted of the world So that the thing which is an especial refine dialect of the new Christian language signifies nothing but morality and civility that in the language of the holy Ghost imports true Religion Wherefore any difference that the holy Ghost makes notwithstanding the man of vertuous dispositions though ignorant of the mystery of Christ be it Fabricius or Regulus or any ancient heathen man famous for sincerity and uprightness of carriage hath as sure a claim and interest in the Church of Christ as the man deepest skil'd in most certainly believing and openly professing all that is written in the holy books of God if he endevour not to shew his faith by his works The Ancients therefore where they found this kinde of men gladly received them and converst familiarly with them as appears by the friendly entercourse of Epistles of S. Basil with Libanius of Nazianzen and Austen with sundry others and Antiquity hath either left us true or forged us false Epistles betwixt Saint Paul himself and Seneca Now as for the admitting of any of these men to the discussing of the doubts in our Religious mysteries who either know not or peradventure contemn
and consent unto and confess the truth of them Which way of manifesting his will unto many other gracious priviledges which it had above that which in after ages came in place of it had this added that it brought with it unto the man to whom it was made a preservation against all doubt and hesitancy a full assurance both who the author was and how far his intent and meaning reacht We that are their ofspring ought as St. Chrysostome tell us so to have demeand our selves that it might have been with us as it was with them that we might have had no need of writing no other teacher but the spirit no other books but our hearts no other means to have been taught the things of God Nisi inspirationis divinae internam suaviorémque doctrinam ubi sine sonis sermonum sine elementis literarum eo dulciùs quo secretiùs veritas loquitur as saith Fulgentius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Isidorus Pelusiota for it is a great argument of our shame and imperfection that the holy things are written in books For as God in anger tells the Jews that he himself would not go before them asâ—â— hitherto he had done to conduct them into the promised land but would leave his Angel with them as his deputy so hath he dealt with us the unhappy posterity degenerated from the antient purity of our forefathers When himself refused to speak unto our hearts because of the hardness of them he then began to put his laws in writing Which thing for a long time amongst his own people seems not to have brought with it any sensible inconvenience For amongst all those acts of the Jews which God in his book hath registred for our instruction there is not one concerning any pretended ambiguitie or obscurity of the Text and Letter of their Law which might draw them into faction and schisme the Devil belike having other sufficient advantages on which he wrought But ever since the Gospel was committed to writing what age what monument of the Churches acts is not full of debate and strife concerning the force and meaning of those writings which the holy Ghost hath left us to be the law and rule of faith St. Paul one of the first penmen of the Holy Ghost who in Paradise heard words which it was not lawful for man to utter hath left us words in writing which it is not safe for any man to be too busie to interpret No sooner had he laid down his pen almost ere the ink was dry were there found Syllabarum aucupes such as St. Ambrose spake of qui nescire aliquid erubescunt per occasionem obscuritatis tendunt laqueos deceptionis who thought there could be no greater disparagement unto them then to seem to be ignorant of any thing and under pretence of interpreting obscure places laid gins to entrap the uncautelous who taking advantage of the obscurity of St. Pauls text made the letter of the Gospel of life and peace the most-forcible instrument of mortal quarrel and contention The growth of which the Holy Ghost by the Ministery of St. Peter hath endeavoured to cut up in the bud and to strangle in the womb in this short admonition which but now hath sounded in your eares Which the unlearned c. In which words for our more orderly proceeding we will consider First the sin it self that is here reprehended wresting of Scripture where we will briefly consider what it is and what causes and motioners it findes in our corrupt understandings Secondly the persons guilty of this offence discipher'd unto us in two Epithets unlearned unstable Last of all the danger in the last words unto their own damnation And first of the sin it self together with some of the special causes of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They wrest They deal with Scripture as Chimicks deal with natural bodies torturing them to extract that out of them which God and nature never put in them Scripture is a rule which will not fit it self to the obliquity of our conceits but our perverse and crooked discourse must fit it self to the straightness of that rule A learned writer in the age of our fathers commenting upon Scripture spake most truly when he said that his Comments gave no light unto the text the text gave light unto his Comments Other expositions may give rules and directions for understanding their authors but Scripture gives rules to exposition it self and interprets the interpreter Wherefore when we made in Scripture non pro sententia divinarum Scripturarum as St. Austine speaks sed pro nostra ita dimicantes ut tan velimus Scripturarum esse quae nostra est When we strive to give unto it and not to receive from it the sense when we factiously contend to fasten our conceits upon God and like the Harlot in the book of Kings take our dead and putrified fancies and lay them in the bosome of Scripture as of a mother then are we guilty of this great sin of wresting of Scripture The nature of which will the better appear if we consider a little some of those motioners which drive us upon it One very potent and strong mean is the exceeding affection and love unto our own opinions and conceits For grown we are unro extremities on both hands we cannot with patience either admit of other mens opinions or endure that our own should be withstood As it was in the Lacedaemonian army almost all were Captains so in these disputes all will be leaders and we take our selves to be much discountenanced if others think not as we do So that the complaint which one makes concerning the dissention of Physicians about the diseases of our bodies is true likewise in these disputes which concern the cure of our souls hincillae circa aegros miserae sententiarum concertationes nullo idem censente ne videatur accessio alterius From hence have sprong those miserable contentions about the distemper of our souls singularity alone and that we will not seem to stand as cyphers to make up the summe of other mens opinions being cause enough to make us disagree A fault anciently amongst the Christians so apparant that it needed not an Apostolical spirit to discover it the very heathen themselves to our shame and confusion have justly judiciously and sharply taxt us for it Ammianus Marcellinus passing his censure upon Constantius the Emperour Christianam religionem absolutam simplicem saith he and they are words very well worth your marking Christianam religionem absolutam simplicem anili superstitione confudit In qua scrutanda perplexiùs quà m componenda gratiùs excitavit dissidia pluriâ—â—a quae progressa fusiùs aluit concertatione verborum dum ritum omnem ad suum trahere conatur arbitrium The Christian religion a religion of great simplicity and perfection he troubled with dotage and superstition For going about rather perplexedly to search the
controversies then gravely to compose them he raised great stirs and by disputing spread them far and wide whilst he went about to make himself sole Lord and commander of the whole profession Now that it may appear wherefore I have noted this it is no hard thing for a man that hath wit and is strongly possest of an opinion and resolute to maintain it to finde some places of Scripture which by good handling will be woed to cast a favourable countenance upon it Pythagoras Schollers having been bred up in the doctrine of numbers when afterward they diverted upon the studies of nature fancied unto themselves somewhat in natural bodies like unto numbers and thereupon fell into a conceit that numbers were the principles of them So fares it with him that to the reading of Scripture comes forepossest with some opinion As Antipheron Orietes in Aristotle thought that every where he saw his own shape and picture going afore him so in divers parts of Scripture where these men walk they will easily perswade themselves that they see the image of their own conceits It was and is to this day a fashion in the hotter countreys at noon when the sun is in his strength to retire themselves to their Closets or beds if they were at home to cool and shady places if they were abroad to avoid the inconvenience of the heat of it To this the Spouse in the Canticles alluding calls after her beloved as after a shepherd Shew me O thou whom my soul loveth where thou feedest thy flock where thou dost rest at noon The Donatists conceiting unto themselves that the Church was shut up in them alone being urged by the fathers to shew how the Church being universal came on a sudden thus to be confinde to Africk they had presently their Scripture for it for so they found it written in the Canticles Indica quem diligit anima mea ubi pascas ubi cubes in meridie In which text meridies doubtless as they thought was their Southern countrie of Africk where the shepherd of Israel was and no where else to feed his flocks I may not trouble you with instances in this kinde little observation is able to furnish the man of slendrest reading with abundance The texts of Scripture which are especially subject to this abuse are those that are of ambiguous and doubtful meaning For as Thucydides observes of the fat and fertile places of Greece that they were evermore the occasions of stirs and seditions the neighbouring nations every one striving to make it self Lord of them so is it with these places that are so fertile as it were of interpretation and yield a multiplicity of sense they are the Palaestra for good wits to prove masteries in where every one desires to be Lord and absolute A second thing occasioning us to transgress against Scripture and the discreet and sober handling of it is our too quick and speedy entrance upon the practise of interpreting it in our young and green years before that time and experience have ripened us and setled our conceits For that which in all other business and here likewise doth most especially commend us is our cautelous and wary handling it But this is a flower seldome seen in youths garden Aristotle differencing age and youth makes it a property of youth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to suppose they know all things and to be bold in affirming and the heathen Rhetorician could tell us that by this so speedy entring upon action and so timely venting our crude and unconcocted studies quod est ubique perniciosissimum praevenit vires fiducia a thing which in all cases is most pernicious presumption is greater then strength after the manner of those who are lately recovered out of some great sickness in whom appetite is stronger then digestion These are they who take the greatest mysteries of Christian religion to be the fittest arguments to spend themselves upon So Eckius in his Chrysopassus a work of his so termed wherein he discusses the question of predestination in the very entrance of his work tells us that he therefore enterpris'd to handle this argument because forsooth he thought it to be the fittest question in which he might Juveniles calores exercere The ancient Masters of fence amongst the Romans were wont to set up a post and cause their young Schollers to practise upon it and to foin and fight with it as with an adversary Insteed of a post this young fencer hath set himself up one of the deepest mysteries of our profession to practise his freshmanship upon Which quality when once it findes Scripture for his object how great inconvenience it brings with it needs no large discourse to prove St. Jerome a man not too easily brought on to acknowledge the errours of his writings amongst those few things which he doth retract censures nothing so sharply as the mistake of his youth in this kinde In adolescentia provocatus ardore studio Scripturarum allegoricè interpretatus sum Abdiam Prophetam cujus historiam nesciebam He thought it one of the greatest sins of his youth that being carried away through an inconsiderate heat in his studies of Scripture he adventured to interpret Abdias the Prophet allegorically when as yet he knew not the historical meaning Old men saith our best natural master by reason of the experience of their often mistakes are hardly brought constantly to affirm any thing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they will always cauteâ—â—ously interline their speeches with it may bees and peradventures and other such particles of wariness and circumspection This old mens modesty of all other things best fits us in perusing those hard and obscure texts of holy Scripture Out of which conceit it is that we see St. Austine in his books de Genesi ad literam to have written only by way of questions and interrogations after the manner of Aristotle in his Problemes that he might not for so he gives his reason by being over positive prejudice others and peradventure truer interpretations that every one might choose according to his likeing ubi quid intelligere non potest Scripturae Dei det honorem sibi timorem and where his understanding cannot attain unto the sense of it let him give that honour and reverence which is due unto the Scripture and carry himself with that aw and respect which befits him Wherefore not without especial providence it is that the Holy Ghost by St. Paul giving precepts to Timothy concerning the quality of those who were to be admitted to the distributing of Gods holy word expresly prescribes against a young Scholler least saith he he be puft up For as it hath been noted of men who are lately grown rich that they differ from other rich men only in this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that commonly they have all the faults that rich men have and many more so is it as true in those who have lately attaind to some degree and mediocrity
learning which the world teaches it were almost a miracle to finde a man constant to his own tenents For not to doubt in things in which we are conversant is either by reason of excellency and serenity of understanding throughly apprehending the main principles on which all things are grounded together with the discrying of the several passages from them unto particular conclusions and the diverticles and blind by-paths which Sophistry and deceit are wont to tread and such a man can nature never yield or else it is through a senseless stupidity like unto that in the common sort of men who conversing among the creatures and beholding the course of heaven and the heavenly host yet never attend them neither ever sinks it into their heads to marvel or question these things so full of doubt and difficulty Even such a one is he that learns Theology in the School of nature if he seem to participate of any setledness or composedness of conscience Either it never comes into his head to doubt of any of those things with which the world hath inured him or if it doth it is to no great purpose he may smother and strangle he can never resolve his doubt The reason of which is this It lies not in the worlds power to give in this case a text of sufficient authority to compose and fix the thoughts of a soul that is dispos'd to doubt But this great inconvenience which held the world in uncertainty by the providence of God is prevented in the Church For unto it is left a certain undoubted and sufficient authority able to exalt every valley and lay low every hill to smooth all rubs and make our way so open and passable that little enquiry serves So that as it were a wonder in the school of nature to finde one setled and resolved so might it seem a marvel that in the Church any man is unstable unresolved Yet notwithstanding even here is the unstable man found too and to his charge the Apostle lays this sin of wresting of Scripture For since that it is confest at all hands that the sense and meaning of Scripture is the rule and ground of our Christian tenents whensoever we alter them we must needs give a new sense unto the word of God So that the man that is unstable in his religion can never be free from violating of Scripture The especial cause of this levity and flitting disposition in the common and ordinary sort of men is their disability to discern of the strength of such reasons as may be framed against them For which cause they usually start and many times falls away upon every objection that is made In which too sudden entertainment of objections they resemble the state of those who are lately recovered out of some long sickness qui et si reliquias effugerint suspicionibus tamen inquietantur omnem câ—â—lorem corporis sui calumniantur Who never more wrong themselves then by suspecting every alteration of their temper and being affrighted at every little passion of heat as if it were an ague-fit To bring these men therefore unto an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and to purchase them a setledness of minde that temper that St. Austine doth require in him that reads his book tales meorum Scriptorem velim judices qui responsionem non semper desiderent quum his quae leguntur audierint aliquid contradici the same temper must be found in every reader of Scripture he must not be at a stand and require an answer to every objection that is made against them For as the Philosopher tells us that mad and fantastical men are very apprehensive of all outward accidents because their soul is inwardly empty and unfurnished of any thing of worth which might hold the inward attention of their mindes so when we are so easily dord and amated with every Sophisme it is a certain argument of great defect of inward furniture and worth which should as it were ballance the minde and keep it upright against all outward occurrents whatsoever And be it that many times the means to open such doubts be not at hand yet as S. Austine sometime spake unto his Scholler Licentius concerning such advice and counsel as he had given him Nolo te causas rationesque rimari quae etiamsi reddi possint sidei tamen qua mihi credis non eas debeo so much more must we thus resolve of those lessons which God teacheth us the reasons and grounds of them though they might be given yet it fits not that credit and trust which we owe him once to search into or call in question And so I come to the third general part the danger of wresting of Scripture in the last words unto their own damnation The reward of every sin is death As the worm eats out the heart of the plant that bred it so whatsoever is done amiss naturally works no other end but destruction of him that doth it As this is true in general so is it as true that when the Scripture doth precisely note out unto us some sin and threatens death unto it it is commonly an argument that there is more then ordinary that there is some especial sin which shall draw with it some especial punishment This sin of wresting of Scripture in the eye of some of the ancients seemed so ougly that they have ranged it in the same rank with the sin against the holy Ghost And therefore have they pronounced it a sin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 greater then can be pardoned For the most part of other sins are sins of infirmity or simplicity but this is a sin of wit and strength The man that doth it doth it with a high hand he knows and sees and resolves upon it Again Scripture is the voice of God and it is confest by all that the sense is Scripture rather then the words It cannot therefore be avoided but he that wilfully strives to fasten some sense of his own upon it other then the very nature of the place will bear must needs take upon him the Person of God and become a new inditer of Scripture and all that applaud and give consent unto any such in effect cry the same that the people did to Herod the voice of God and not of man If he then that abases the Princes coin deserves to die what is his desert that instead of the tried silver of Gods word stamps the name and Character of God upon Nehushtan upon base brazen stuff of his own Thirdly No Scripture is of private interpretation saith the Apostle There can therefore be but two certain and infallible interpreters of Scripture either it self or the holy Ghost the Author of it It self doth then expound it self when the words and circumstances do sound unto us the prime and natural and principal sense But when the place is obscure involved and intricate or when there is contained some secret and hidden mystery beyond
time of War when he might lawfully have done it in the fury of the battel Abner would not shed blood but by constraint Xenophon would make us believe that the Souldiers in Cyrus his army were so well disciplin'd that one of them in time of the battel having lift up his arm to strike his enemy hearing the Trumpet begin to sound the retreat let fall his arm and willingly lost his blow because he thought the time of striking was now past So far were these men from thinking it lawful to shed the blood of a Subject in the time of peace that they would not shed the blood of an enemy in time of war except it were in the field J. Cesar was one of the greatest stoutest Captains that ever was in the World he stood the shock of fifty set battels besides all sieges and outroads he took a thousand Cities and walled Towns he overrun three hundred severall countreyes and in his wars were slain well near twelve hundred thousand men besides all those that died in the civil wars which were great numbers yet this man protested of himself and that most truly that he never drew blood but in the field nunquam nisi in acie stantem never slew any man but in a set battel I have been a little the bolder in bringing these instances of heathen men First because the Doctrine of Christ through error is counted an enemy to policie of War and Martial Discipline Secondly because we have found out many distinctions and evasions to elude the precepts of our Blessed Saviour and his Apostles For as it hath been observed of the God-makers I mean the Painters and Statuaries among the heathen they were wont many times to paint their Goddesses like their mistresses and then think them most fair when they were most like what they best loved so is it with many professors of Christian Religion they can temper the precepts of it to their liking and lay upon them glosses and interpretations as it were colours and make it look like what they love Thirdly because it is likely that the examples of these men will most prevail with those to whom I speak as being such to whom above all they affect to be most like Except therefore it be their purpose to hear no other Judgement but only their own unruly and misorderly affections it cannot but move them to see the examples of men guided only by the light of reason of men I say the most famous in all the world for valour and resolution to run so mainly against them To come then unto the question of Duels both by the light of reason and by the practice of men it doth appear that there is no case wherein subjects may privatly seek each others lives There are extant the Laws of the Jews framed by God himself The Laws of the Roman Empire made partly by the Ethnick partly by Christian Princes A great part of the Laws of Sparta and Athens two warlike Common-Wealths especially the former lie dispersed in our books yet amongst them all is there not a Law or Custome that permits this liberty to Subjects The reason of it I conceive is very plain The principal thing next under God by which a Common-Wealth doth stand is the Authority of the Magistrate whose proper end is to compose and end quarrels between man and man upon what occasion soever they grow For were men peaceable were men not injurious one to another there were no use of Government Wherefore to permit men in private to try their own rights or to avenge their own wrongs and so to decline the sentence of the Magistrate is quite to cut off all use of Authority Indeed it hath been sometimes seen that the event of a battel by consent of both armies hath been put upon single combat to avoid further effusion of blood but combats betwixt Subjects for private causes till these later ages of the world was never allowed Yet I must confess the practice of it is very Ancient For Cain the second man in the world was the first Duelist the first that ever challenged the field in the fourth of Genesis the Text saith That Cain spake unto his Brother and when they were in the field he arose and slew him The Septuagint to make the sense more plain do adde another clause and tell us what it was he said unto his Brother 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us go out into the field and when they were in the field he arose and slew him Let us go out into the field it is the very form and proper language of a challenge Many times indeed our Gallants can formalize in other words but evermore the substance and usually the very words are no other but these of Cains Let us go out into the field Abel I perswade my self understood them not as a challenge for had he so done he would have made so much use of his discretion as to have refused it yet can we not chuse but acknowledge a secret Judgement of God in this that the words of Cain should still be so Religiously kept till this day as a Proem and Introduction to that action which doubtless is no other then what Cains was When therefore our Gallants are so ready to challenge the field and to go into the field Let them but remember whose words they use and so accordingly think of their action Again notwithstanding Duels are of so ancient and worshipful a Parentage yet could they never gain so good acceptance as to be permitted much less to be counted lawful in the civil part of the world till barbarisme had overran it About five or six hundred years after Christ at the fall of the Roman Empire aboundance of rude and barbarous people brake in and possest the civiler part of the world who abolishing the ancient Laws of the Empire set up many strange customs in their rooms Amongst the rest for the determining of quarrels that might arise in case of doubtful title or of false accusation or the like they put themselves upon many unusual forms of Tryal as to handle red hot Iron to walk bare foot on burning coals to put their hands and feet in scalding water and many other of the like nature which are reckoned up by Hottoman a French Lawyer For they presumed so far on Gods providence that if the party accused were innocent he might do any of these without any smart or harm In the same cases when by reason of unsufficient and doubtful evidence the Judges could not proceed to sentence as somtimes it falls out and the parties contending would admit of no reasonable composition Their manner was to permit them to trie it out by their swords That so the Conqueror might be thought to be in the right They permitted Isay thus to do For at the best 't was but a permission to prevent farther mischief For to this end sometimes some known abuses are tolerated So God permitted the Jews
so there is a double satisfaction to be made one unto God another to our Neighbour for this second satisfaction between man and man many Heathen common-wealths have been very sufficiently furnished with store of excellent laws But of an attonement over and above to be made to God they scarce seem to have had any thought and indeed to speak truth to what purpose had it been to trouble their heads about it It is impossible that it should ever fall within the conceit of any reasonable creature to pronounce what satisfaction was to be made for offence committed against God He is of infinite majesty holding no proportion no correspondence with any created being What recompence then can he receive from the hands of dust and ashes Ten thousand worlds were we able to give them all could not make satisfaction for any part of the smallest offence we have committed against him when therefore the inventions of men were thus at a stand when all discourse all reason were posed it pleased God in mercy to open his pleasure in his word and to accept of true and unfeigned repentance as the only means to wash away the guilt of sin against his majesty A thing in the eye of flesh and blood altogether ridiculous And therefore Julian that accursed Apostata scorning Constantine the Emperour for betaking himself to the Christian religion in contempt and derision of Baptisme and Repentance thus speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Hoe whosoever is a corrupter and a defiler of women whosoever is a man-slayer whosoever is an impure and unclean person let him from henceforth be secure and care for nothing I will shew him a little water in which if he do but dip himself he shall be forthwith clean yea though he desperately run again into the same crimes I will give him this gift if he but knock his breast and strike his forehead which are the gestures of the penitent he shall without any more adoe become as pure as glass 'T is true indeed in spight of unbelieving miscreants it hath pleased God through the foolishness of Baptisme and Repentance to save those that are his The water of baptisme and the tears of true repentance creatures of themselves weak and contemptible yet through the wonderful operation of the grace of God annext unto them are able were our sins as red as twice-died scarlet to make them as white as snow The sentence of God denounced unto Adam What day thou eatest of the Tree thou shall die certainly was absolute and irrevocable neither could any repentance of Adams totally have reverst it Yet Abulensis cries out O quam foelix humanum genus c. O how happy should mankinde have been if Adam after his fall had used the benefit of Repentance and in time acknowledged his sin unto God Yea he goes further and seems to intimate that it had been of force almost to restore us unto our primitive purity For this way his words seem to look when he saith Quod si seipsum accusasset nos omnes ab accusatione judicio liberasset If he had accused himself doubtless he had freed us all from accusation and curse Whatsoever his meaning was thus much without danger we may think that if our first Parents had not so strangly shuffled their fault from the one to the other the man to the woman the woman to the serpent but had freely acknowledged it and humbly begged pardon for it God whose mercies were then as many and as ready as now they are would if not altogether have revok't yet doubtless much have qualified and mitigated the sentence of the curse If Adam had used more ingenuity in confessing God would have used less rigour in punishing Out of all this I draw this one lesson for your instruction Whosoever he be that thinks himself quit of some sins into which either through weakness or carelessnes he hath fallen let him not presently flatter himself as if for this his book of debt unto God were cancel'd as if he were in state of grace and new birth but let him examine his own conscience and Impartially sist all the manner of his reclaim He may peradventure finde that upon some moral respect he hath broken off the practice of his sin he may finde that he hath satisfied his neighbour contented the Law done many acts by which he hath purchast reconciliation with the world But if he finde not this passage of Repentance and hearty sorrow twixt God and his own soul let him know that God is yet unsatisfied that he is yet in his sin his sin is yet unrepented of and therefore still remains THus from the necessity of registring Peters Repentance I come to the words wherein it is registred And he went out c. In these words we will consider four things First the person He He went forth or and going forth he wept Secondly the preparative to the Repentance He went forth Thirdly the Repentance it self comprised in the word wept Fourthly the extent and measure and compass of this Repentance in the last word bitterly I. He The way of mans life is a slippery way no man whilst he is in it hath the priviledge of not sliding just and unjust thus far are of like condition both fall But here they differ the just man riseth again Not the eminency of Peters person not his great understanding in the mystery of Christ not his resolution in our Saviours quarrel not the love and respect his Master bare him kept him from falling But Peter being fallen provides himself to rise and therefore in the second place he went forth saith my Text Peter was now in the High-priests Court a place very unfit for one in Peters case Princes Courts are no place for Repentance To wear soft raiment to fair deliciously every day this is Courtiers guise But 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the shirt of hair the tear of Repentance this is the habit of the penitent But wherefore went Peter out Did he as our Saviour observes of the Scribes and Pharisees go out into the wilderness to see to gaze and look about him No His eyes now must do him other service He went out as Joseph did from the face of his Brethren to seek a place to weep Maldonat the Jesuite thinks it would have been a more goodly thing and far more beseeming Peters resolution if in the place he had offended in the same he had repented if before those he had made a constant confession of Christ before whom he had denyed him But be the reasons what they will which moved Peter to go forth we will not prescribe unto the Saints a form of Repentance we will cease therefore to dispute what Peter should have done and rather gather lessons for our selves out of what he did fourthly and last of all as Peters fault was great so he contends that his Repentance may be as serious The tears therefore he sheds are not slight and perfunctory
Scribe had by some means or other suffered a copie of the reason for their opinion to be brought aforehand to those of Breme who openly in the Synod house in scripto refuted them which thing is feared will cause some choler And this was all that this day was done concerning this question and so both the questions yet depend The Synod did the sooner end because they were at eleven a clock to go to the Funeral of Henricus ab Hell who died lately as I think I told your Honour The Solemnity was no more but this Some of the chief of the Town together with the whole Synod went to the House where he died accompanied him to the Church laid him in his Grave and went home again almost in as little space as I have told it you The Dutchess of Tremullio was at this Session and as I hear spake very well of the Synod commending it both for Piety and good Order The Remonstrants are now every day expected We understand that they are already met together at Leyden Mr. Praeses came this day to my Lord Bishop and under Benedicite told him that it was thought the Remonstrants would become Suiters to the Secular Deputies for some greater respect in the Synod then it is likely otherwise they should have and that for this they would use the English as Mediators Then that they would call in question the right of his Presidentship as being made only by the Provincials without any respect had unto the Forreigners To this my Lord Bishop replyed that for the first since they were Members of the Synod they would not do any thing clancularily without the Consent and Privity of the whole Company To the second he answered that hitherto they had acknowledged him for their Praeses and so they would continue to do notwithstanding any objection might be fancyed so that of them he might secure himself And this is all hath hapned since Friday Morning at what time I addrest my last Letters unto your Honour and for this time commending your Lordship to Gods good Protection I humbly take my leave Dort Decemb. 2. 1618. Stylo novo Your Honours Chaplain and Bounden in all Duty Jo. Hales Right Honourable and my very good Lord MY Letters conteining the acts of our Synod upon Friday and Saterday I dispatched this morning unto your Honour by a Soldier whom I knew not and he delivered them to a Skipper whom he knew not and whether or no they came to your Lordships hands I am uncertain There are to come with them Letters from my Lord Bishop to your Honour Upon Monday the third of Decemb. the Deputies being met they prosecuted the two questions before left undecided First of the Baptizing of children born of Ethnick parents secondly of means considerable how to breed up those who are to enter the Ministry In the first concerning the adulti the Synod agreed that if they made profession of the Christian Faith they might be baptized etiam invitis parentibus Their reason was because that after children came to be of years in case of Religion they depended not from the power of their parents but might make their own market All the difficulty was of infants and children not yet of discretion to make their choice The English the Professors those of Hassia those of Breme of Zeland of Freesland thought it necessary they should be baptized if they were rightfully adopted into Christian Families and that their parents had altogether resigned them into the hands of the Christians They grounded themselves upon the examples of Abraham circumcising all that were of his Family of Paul baptizing whole housholds of the primitive Church recorded in S. Austin who shews that anciently children that were exposititii were wont to be taken up by the Christians and baptized Now such were the children of Ethnick parents for it was never esteem'd lawful for Christians to expose their children All the rest were peremptory that they were not to be baptiz'd till they came to be of years of Discretion to make profession of the Faith The North Hollanders themselves whose business it was and who moved the Synod in it were expresly against it whether they were bought given taken in war or howsoever Their reasons were because they are immundi because they are extra foedus of which Baptisme is a signe because Adoption could entitle them only to terrene not to an Heavenly inheritance c. So that if plurality of voices carry it the negative part prevails The Praeses requir'd some time to compare the opinions together and so for that time forbare to pronounce sentence And because the examples of Abraham and Paul were much stood upon by those who held the affirmative he proposed these two things to be considered of First whether it were likely that in Abrahams Family when he put circumcision in act there were any Infants whose Parents died uncircumcised Secondly whether it were likely that in the Families baptized by Paul there were any Infants whose Parents died unbaptized and so he past away to the second Question concerning the manner of training up those who were to enter the Ministry In my last Letters to your Honour I related at large the advice given in this point by the Zelanders and South Hollanders It was now proposed to the Synod whether they did approve their counsel or except against it Some thought it was unlawful for men not in Orders to preach publickly or baptize for the South Hollanders in their advice had determined they should others thought it unmeet that they should be present in the Consistories and meetings of Deacons or that they should read the Scriptures publickly in the Church which was the joint advice of the Zelanders and South Hollanders Lastly it was doubted whether the Synod could make any Decree in this Question because of the several customs in several Provinces which it lay not in the power of the Synod to prejudice So that instead of deciding this one doubt the Praeses proposed five more to be considered of 1. Whether men not in Orders might make publike Sermous 2. Whether they might baptize 3. Whether it were fit they should come into the Consistories 4. Whether they should read the Scriptures publikely 5. Whether the Synod could make a Decree in this business for the reason above mentioned or only give advice The Synod had begun to speak to the two first and it was the general opinion that they might not baptize In the point of preaching they differ'd Some thought absolutely it might be permitted them others on the contrary thought no some took a middle course thinking they might preach privately before a select Auditory who were to be their Judges how sufficient they were for that end some that they may do it openly so that it were understood they did it not cum potestate solvendi ligandi But when part of the Synod had spoken their mindes because the time was much pass'd they
they saw further into the Cause then their Brethren they might have leave to exhibit their minde in writing to the Synod Provided First that they had leave of the Synod so to do Secondly that they did not seek any frivolous delayes Thirdly that they promis'd to submit themselves to the Decree of the Synod and last of all that the Church Censures respectively pass'd on Grevinchovius and Goulartius be not prejudiced but stand still in their full force and vertue This Decree was consented unto by the whole Synod Here the Praeses admonisht those of Utrecht to provide themselves and resolve what they would do whether they would profess themselves parties for the Remonstrants or keep their places and sit as Judges if they would express as parties then must they cease to be accounted part of the Synod and be accounted as Episcopius and the rest that were cited They requir'd that time might be given them to deliberate The Praeses eagerly urged them to give their resolute answer They replyed it was a greater matter then might so soon be dispatch't So far they went that at length they fell on some warm words For when two of the Remonstrants Deputies by chance spake both at once the Praeses admonisht them to speak modestiùs ornatiùs For men here speak one by one and not by pairs But here the Secular Deputies strook in and thought fit they should have time of respite till the morrow yet so that in the mean time the Synod should proceed Then were the Remonstrants call'd in and the Decree of the States concerning Grevinchovius and Goulartius read unto them Episcopius standing up requir'd that a little time might be granted to them to speak and forthwith uttered an Oration acrem sanè animosam and about which by reason of some particulars in it there will grow some stirre The effect of the Oration was this THat Religion was the chiefest note of a man and we were more distinguished by it from other Creatures then by our Reason That their apparence before the Synod was ut illam etiam Spartam ornarent that they might endeavour something for the preservation of the Purity of Religion That Religion was nothing else but a right Conceit and Worship of God That the Conceits concerning God are of two sorts some absolutely necessary which were the grounds of all true Worship in these to erre might finally endanger a man Some not absolutely necessary and in these sometimes without great danger men might mistake That they defcryed many conceits passing in our Churches which could not stand with the Goodness and Justice of God with the use of the Sacramenâ—â—s with the Duties of Christian men These had given occasion to the Adversaries abroad to accuse our Churches and lay upon them many strange imputations That therefore their endeavour had been none other but to remove these imputations and to provide as much as in them lay that the Conceits of some few might not pass for the general Doctrine of our Churches But this their endeavour had hitherunto had but ill success And as in a diseased body many times when Physick is administred the humours which before were quiet are now stirred and hence the body proves more distempered so their endeavours to cure the Church had caused greater disorder yet in this had they not offended For they labour'd to none other end but that the Church might not be traduced by reason of the private conceâ—â—s of some of her Ministers That in this behalf the world had been exceedingly incensed against them but this Envy they esteemed their Gloriam Palmarium That for this they did not mean to forsake their Cause and were it so that they should lose the day yet would they joy in it and think it glory enough magnis ausis excedisse That this their stirring was not de lana capâ—â—ina of small frivolous and worthless matters of mere quiâ—â—ks of Wit as many of the common sort were perswaded that out of this conceit it was that they had been so exceedingly roughly dealt withall yea they might say soevitum fuisse against them as against unnecessary Innovavators in the Church First matters were handled against them clancularâ—â—ly and by stealth after this they brake out into open but false accusations and after this into wrath into scoffing and bitterness till at length effractis moderationis repagulis every one came with open mouth against them tanquam in publici odii victimas Here followed a grave and serious invocation of Christ as a witness to the truth of what they said True indeed it was that in their Books many things were to be found amisse For a very hard matter they thought it for mindes exasperated semper rectum clavem tenere That for the setling of these things there could but three courses be thought of either a National Synod or a mutual Tolleration of each others Opinions or the Cession and Resignation of their Calling and place in the Church To quit them of their calling and to fly this were a note of the Hireling as for a Synod which they much desired remorabantur qui minime debebant and it was pretended that the condition of the Times would not suffer it There remains only a mutual Tolleration of the possibility of which alone they had hope And for this end they did exceedingly approve of the Decreeof the States of Holland and West-fryzeland which they thought confirmed by the examples of Beza's dealing with some of their own dealing with the Lutherans of the Advice of the King of Great Brittain But all this was labour lost for there was a buzze and jealousie spread in the heads of men that under this larve this whifling Suit of Tolleration there lay personated more dangerous designes that behinde this tanquam post siparium there lay intents of opening a way to the Profession of all the ancient Heresies and that the Remonstrants could pro tempore Conscientiaesuae imperare quod volunt upon this began mens minds to be alienated from them which thing at length brake forth into Schism and open Separation Now began their books to be more narrowly inquir'd into every line every phrase every word and tittle to be stretcht to the uttermost to prove them Hereticks Witness that late work intituled Specimen Controversiarum Belgicarum whose Authors credit and good dealing had already in part appeared and hereafter farther would appear That all Fundamental points of Divinity they had preserved untouched For they knew that there were many things of which it is not lawful to dispute and they abhorr'd from that conceit of many men who would believe nothing but what they were able to give a Reason of That what they questioned was only such a matter which for a long time had been without danger both pro and contra disputed of They thought it sufficient if the chief points of Religion remain unshaken That there had been always sundry Opinions even amongst the Fathers