to dissenters and prevent all vehemencies of captious dispute all schisms and unnecessary separations and many Wars and Persecutions upon the account of Religion For if the things in which Men differ be not Religion be not Faith and Fundamental If this be true and this truth acknowledg'd All these would want pretence and so Peace and Vnity would possess the spirits of Men. They saw that Religion which was shaken by divisions and rendred suspected of uncertainty through the mixture of uncertain things would stand safe and firm when 't was lay'd only upon the plain infallible undoubted propositions That holiness would thrive when Mens zeal was taken off from talking and disputing against others and directed inwards to the government of themselves and the reformation of their own hearts and lives That Papism which in those times of distraction began to spread even here would drop to the ground if it were believed That the necessary principles of Religion were few and plain and those agreed on For then there would be no need of an Infallible Interpreter and Judge I say They were sensible that all the great Interests of Religion and Mankind might be served by the acknowledgment of this one Reasonable Principle which they saw was the only way to bring us to stability and consistence â—…o Peace and Vnion In Consequence of this Spirit and Doctrine they discours'd the things wherein they differ'd from others with mildness and modesty without anger and damning sentences and afforded their converses to all sorts of good Men though they believ'd them mistaken They never exprest rage in their conversations or discourses against bare errours and mistakes of judgment But for the pride and confidence censoriousness and groundless separations that are the frequent attendants of different opinions These sometimes mov'd them to anger and expression of just resentment because they look'd on them as great Immoralities and very pernicious sins And on the occasion of these spiritual vices they were warmed with zeal against the Sectaries and Bigots for the taking down of whose pride and confidence They thought it necessary to detect the Impostors and to expose their vanities which they did successfully and shew'd That their Divinity consisted most in Phrases and their boasted spirituality in fond affections That their new lights were but freakish fancies and old Heresies revived and the precious Mysteries of their Theology but conceited absurdities and non-sense in a fantastick dress They happily drew the parallel between our Separatists and those antient ones the Pharisees and proved that the same spirit acted the Ataxites that govern'd those Jewish Fanaticks And because their pretences were taking and specious and had caught great numbers of the easie well meaning people of Bensalem Therefore to disabuse them they labour'd much to shew the shortness of their kind of Godliness and the danger of placing all Religion in Praying Hearing Zeal Rapture Mysteries and Opinions Accordingly they declar'd and prov'd That 1. Fluency and Pathetick eloquence in suddain Prayer may proceed and doth many time from excited passion and warm imagination from a peculiar temper and heated melancholly That these are no sign that a man prays by the spirit nor do they argue him to be one jot the better then those that want the faculty or any whit the more accepted of God for it That to pray by the spirit is to pray with Faith Desire and Love and that a Man may pray by the spirit and with a Form 2. That people may delight to hear from other causes then conscience and a desire to be directed in the government of their Lives That hearing is very grateful to some because it feeds their opinions and furnisheth their tongues and inables them to make a great shew of extraordinary Saint-ship They represented that meer animal Men and fond lovers of themselves may be much taken with hearing of the Gracious promises and Glorious priviledges of the Gospel when at the same time they are told they are all theirs and theirs peculiarly and exclusively to the rest of Mankind That pride and vanity and self-love will recommend and indear such preaching That it is most luscious to fond and conceited men to hear how much better and more precious they are then their Neighbours how much dearer to God and more favour'd by him what an interest they have in free distinguishing Grace and how very few have a share in it besides themselves How their enemies are hated of God and how sad a condition they are in who differ from them in practices and opinions To doat on such preaching and admiringly to follow such Preachers They shew'd was but to be in love with flattery and self-deceit That it was no sign of Godliness but an evident argument of pride malice and immoderate selfishness That these are the true causes of the zeal and earnestness of many after Sermons and of the pleasure that they have in hearing though they would perswade others and believe themselves that the love of Religion and sence of duty are the only motives that prevail with them 3. Concerning zeal They taught That zeal in it self is indifferent and made good or bad as it's objects and incentives are That meer education and custom natural conscience and particular complexion do sometimes make Men very zealous about things of Religion That though the fervours of the Ataxites for their Doctrines and ways were not all feigned but real and sincere Yet their zeal was nothing worth being but meer natural passion kindled by a fond delight in their own self chosen practices and opinions That their coldness to the great known necessary duties of Justice Charity Obedience Modesty and Humility was an evident sign that their heat for pretended Orthodox tenents and modes of worship had nothing Divine in it That true zeal begins at home with self-reformation and that where it was imployed altogether about amendments of external Religion and publick Government it was pernicious not only to the World but to a Mans self also 4. And because the heights of zeal ran up sometimes into raptures and exstacies which were look'd on as wonderful appearances of God in the thus transported persons Therefore here also They undeceived the people as I said in the general before by shewing That these alienations may be caused naturally by the power of a strong fancy working upon violent affections That they together may and do oft produce deliquiums of sense That the Imagination working then freely and without contradiction or disturbance from the external senses and being wholly imploy'd about Religious matters may form to it self strange Images of extraordinary apparitions of God and Angels of Voices and Revelations which being forcibly imprest on the fancy may beget a firm belief in the exstaticall person that all these were divine manifestations and discoveries and so he confidently thinks himself a Prophet and an inspired Man and vents all his conceits for Seraphick truths and holy Mysteries And by the vehemency
delivered to the Saints and hereby Heresies are said to be confuted and overthrown So that the disabling and suppressing of Disputes seems to be a weakening rather than any advantage to Religion and the Concernments of it To this I say That by the Faith we are to contend for I conceive the Essentials and certain Articles are meant These we may and we ought to endeavour to defend and promote as there is occasion and we have seen how the Real Philosophy will help our Reasons in that Service But pious Contentions for these are not the disputings of which I am now discoursing those are stiff Contests about uncertain Opinions And such I dare very boldly say are no Contentions for the Faith but the Instruments of the greatest mischiefs to it As for those other Disputes that are used to convince Men of the Truths of the Gospel and the great Articles thereof and for the disproving Infidelity and Heresie they are necessary and Philosophy is an excellent help in such Contests So that those other Objections pleadable from the necessity of proving and trying our Faith and convincing Hereticks From the Example of our Saviour's disputing with the Doctors and the Sadduces and of St. Paul at Athens with the Jews These and such other little Cavils can signifie nothing to the disadvantage of what I have said about the Humour of Disputing in Matters of doubtful and uncertain Opinions against which the Real Philosophy is an Antidote ANd thus I have shewn under five material Heads That the knowledge of Nature and the Works of God promotes the greatest Interests of Religion and by the three last it appears how fundamentally opposite it is to all Schism and Fanaticism which are made up and occasioned by Superstition Enthusiasm and ignorant perverse Disputings So that for Atheists and Sadduces and Fanaticks to detest and inveigh against Philosophy is not at all strange 'T is no more than what may well be expected from Men of that sort Philosophy is their Enemy and it concerns them to disparage and reproach it But for the Sober and Religious to do any thing so unadvised and so prejudicial to Religion is wonderful and deplorable To set these right in their Judgment about Philosophical Inquiry into God's Works is the Principal design of these Papers and in order to the further promoting of it I advance to the last Head of Discourse proposed viz. IV. THat the Ministers and Professors of Religion ought not to discourage but promote the knowledge of Nature and the Works of its Author This is the result of the whole Matter and follows evidently upon it And though it will not infer a necessity of all Mens deep search into Nature yet this it will That no Friend or Servant of Religion should hinder or discountenance such Inquiries And though most private Christians and some publick Ministers have neither leisure nor ability to look into Matters of natural Research and Inquisition yet they ought to think candidly and wish well to the endeavours of those that have and 't is a sin and a folly either in the one or other to censure or discourage those worthy Undertakings So that I cannot without trouble observe how apt some are that pretend much to Religion and some that minister in it to load those that are studious of God's Works with all the studious Names that contempt and spight can suggest The Irreligion of which injurious carriage nothing can excuse but their ignorance And I will rather hope that they neither know what they say nor what they do than believe that they have any direct design against the Glory of their Maker or against any laudable endeavours to promote it I know well what mischief Prejudice will do even upon Minds that otherwise are very honest and intelligent enough And there are many common slanders and some plausible Objections in the Mouths of the Zealous against Philosophy which have begot an ill Opinion of it in well-meaning Men who have never examined things with any depth of Inquiry For the sake of such I shall produce the most considerable Allegations of both sorts and I hope make such returns to them as may be sufficient to satisfie those whose Minds are not barr'd by Obstinacy or Ignorance I speak first of the bold and broad Slanders among which that I. Of Atbeism is one of the most ordinary But certainly 't is one of the most unjust Accusations that Malice and Ignorance could have invented This I need not be industrious to prove here having made it appear that Philosophy is one of the best Weapons in the World to defend Religion against it and my whole Discourse is a confutation of this envious and foolish charge Concerning it I take notice That Philosophical Men are usually dealt with by the Zealous as the greatest Patrons of the Protestant Cause are by the Sects For as the Bishops and other Learned Persons who have most strongly oppugned the Romish Faith have had the ill luck to be accused of Popery themselves in like manner it happens to the humblest and deepest Inquisitors into the Works of God who have the most and fullest Arguments of his Existence have raised impregnable Ramparts with much industry and pious pains against the Atheists and are the only Men that can with success serve Religion against the Godless Rout These Superstitious Ignorance hath always made the loudest out-cry against as if themselves were guilty of that which they have most happily oppugned and defeated And the certain way to be esteemed an Atheist by the fierce and ignorant Devoto's is to study to lay the Foundations of Religion sure and to be able to speak groundedly and to purpose against the desperate Cause of the black Conspirators against Heaven And the greatest Men that have imploy'd their Time and Thoughts this way have been pelted with this Dirt while they have been labouring in the Trenches and indeavouring to secure the Foundations of the Holy Fabrick But besides I observe That narrow angry People take occasion to charge the freer Spirits with Atheism because they move in a larger Circle and have no such fond adherence to some Opinions which they adore and count Sacred And for my own part I confess I have not Superstition enough in my Spirit or Nature to incline me to doat upon all the Principles I judge true or to speak so dogmatically about them as I perceive confident and disputing Men are wont But contenting my self with a firm assent to the few practical Fundamentals of Faith and having fix'd that end of the Compass I desire to preserve my Liberty as to the rest holding the other in such a posture as may be ready to draw those Lines my Judgment informed by the Holy Oracles the Articles of our Church the Apprehensions of wise Antiquity and my particular Reason shall direct me to describe And when I do that 't is for my self and my own satisfaction but am not concern'd to impose my Sentiments
desired either not to know at all or not in comparison with the plain Doctrines of the Gospel Or if any should take the words in the largest sense then all sorts of Humane Learning and all Arts and Trades are set at nought by the Apostle And if so the meaning can be no more than this That he preferred the Knowledge of Christ before these For 't is ridiculous to think that he absolutely slighted all other Science The Knowledge of Christ is indeed the chiefest and most valuable Wisdom but the Knowledge of the Works of God hath its place also and ought not quite to be excluded and despised Or if Philosophy be to be slighted by this Text all other Knowledge whatsoever must be condemn'd by it But it will be urged 2. That there is a particular Caution given by the Apostle against Philosophy Col. 2. 8. Beware lest any one spoil you through Philosophy To this I have said elsewhere That the Apostle there means either the pretended Knowledge of the Gnosticks the Genealogies of the Jews or the disputing Learning of the Greeks and perhaps he might have a respect to all those sorts of Science falsly so call'd That the Disputing Philosophy of the Greeks is concerned in the Caution will appear very probable if we consider That much of it was built on meer Notion that occasioned division into manifold Sects which managed their Matters by Sophistry and Disputations full of nicity and mazes of Wit and aimed at little but the pride of mysterious talk of things that were not really understood Such a Philosophy the Apostle might justly condemn and all Wise Men do the same because 't is very injurious to Religion Real Knowledge and the Peace of Men. But what is this to that which modestly inquires into the Creatures of God as they are That collects the History of his Works raising Observations from them for the Discovery of Causes and Invention of Arts and Helps for the benefit of Mankind What vanity what prejudice to Religion can be supposed in this Is this think we that Philosophy that Wisdom of this World which the great Apostle censures and condemns He is bold that saith it speaks a thing he knows not and might if he pleased know the contrary Since the Method of Philosophy I vindicate which proceeds by Observation and Experiment to Works and uses of Life was not if at all the way of those Times in which the Apostles liv'd nor did it begin to shew it self in many Ages after and therefore cannot be concerned in St. Paul's Caution to his Colossians nor in his smartness against worldly Wisdom elsewhere for by that we are to understand the Fetches of Policy the Nicities of Wit and Strains of Rhetorick that were then engaged against the progress of the Gospel But what is all this to the Philosophy of God's Works which illustrates the Divine Glory and comments upon his Perfections and promotes the great Design of Christianity which is doing good and in its proper Nature tends to the disposing of Mens Minds to Vertue and Religion But 3. If Philosophy be so excellent an Instrument to Religion it may be askt and the Question will have the force of an Objection why the Disciples and first Preachers of the Gospel were not instructed in it They were plain illiterate Men altogether unacquainted with those Sublimities God chose the foolish things of this World to confound the wise So that it seems he did not shew this kind of Wisdom that respect which according to our Discourse is due unto it I answer That this choice the Divine Wisdom made of the Publishers of the Glad Tydings of Salvation is no more prejudice or discredit to Philosophy than it is to other sorts of Learning and indeed 't is none at all to any For the special Reasons of God's making this Election seem such as these viz. That his Power might more evidently appear in the wonderful propagation of the Religion of Christ Jesus by such seemingly unqualified Instruments That the World might not suspect it to be the contrivance of Wit Subtilty and Art when there was so much plainness and simplicity in its first Promoters And perhaps too it was done in contempt of the vain and pretended knowledge of the Jews and Greeks over which the plainness of the Gospel was made gloriously to triumph To which I add this It might be to shew That God values Simplicity and Integrity above all Natural Perfectious how excellent soever So that there being such special Reasons for the chusing plain Men to set this grand Affair on foot in the World it can be no disparagement to the Knowledge of Nature that it was not begun by Philosophers And to counter-argue this Topick we may consider That The Patriarchs and Holy Men of Ancient Times that were most in the Divine Favour were well instructed in the Knowledge of God's Works and contributed to the good of Men by their useful Discoveries and Inventions Adam was acquainted with the Nature of the Creatures Noah a Planter of Vineyards Abraham as Grotius collects from Ancient History a great Mystes in the Knowledge of the Stars Isaac prosperous in Georgicks Jacob blessed in his Philosophical Stratagem of the speckled Rods. Moses a great Man in all kinds of Natural Knowledge Bezaleel and Aholiab inspired in Architecture Solomon a deep Naturalist and a Composer of a voluminous History of Plants Daniel Hananiah Mishael and Azariab skilled in all Learning and Wisdom Ten times better saith the Text than the Magicians and Astrologers in Nebuchadnezzar's Realm And to accumulate no more Instances the Philosophers of the East made the first Addresses to the Infant Saviour CONCLUSION WE see upon the whole That there is no shadow of Reason why we should discourage or oppose modest Inquiries into the Works of Nature and whatsoever ignorant Zeal may prompt the common sort to me-thinks those of generous Education should not be of so perverse a frame Especially it becomes not any that minister at the Altar to do so great a disservice to Religion as to promote so unjust a Conceit as that of Philosophy's being an Enemy unto it The Philosophers were the Priests among the Egyptians and several other Nations in Ancient Times and there was never more need that the Priests should be Philosophers than in ours For we are liable every day to be called out to make good our Foundations against the Atheist the Sadduce and Enthusiast And 't is the Knowledge of God in his Works that must furnish us with some of the most proper Weapons of Defence Hard Names and damning Sentences the Arrows of bitter words and raging passions will not defeat those Sons of Anak these are not fit Weapons for our Warfare No they must be met by a Reason instructed in the knowledge of Things and fought in their own Quarters and their Arms must be turned upon themselves This may be done and the advantage is all ours We have Steel and
Lordship hath conferr'd on my self but this will be a great duty and business of my Life for such empty expressions as these verbal ones are very unsuitable returns for real and great favours and if ever better acknowledgments are in my power I shall still remember what I owe your Lordship I now most humbly present you with a Collection of some Essays upon subjects of importance The design of them is to lay a foundation for a good habit of thoughts both in Philosophy and Theology They were some of them written several years ago and had trial of the World in divers Editions Now they come abroad together with some things that are new reduced to such an Order as is most agreeable to my present judgment I could have added much upon such fertile and useful Arguments but I am willing to believe I have said enough for the capable and ingenious and I doubt too much for others If your Lordship shall pardon their imperfections and accept of the devotion where-with they are offer'd you it will be the greatest honour and satisfaction to My Lord Your Lordships most humble Most obliged and most intirely devoted Servant JOSEPH GLANVILL The PREFACE I Shall not trouble the Râ—… with much formality or 〈◊〉 of Prefacing but only give a brief account of the following Discourses I know it will be no plâ—…usible excuse for any of their Imperâ—…ctions to alledg that some of them were written when I wâ—… very young since they came abroad again in an Age wherein more maturity of judgment is expected But the truth is I am not grown so much wiser yet as to have alter'd any thing in the main of those conceptions If I had thought it worth the while I might have been more exact in new modelling and could perhaps have given them a turn that would have been more agreeable to some phancies but my Laziness or my Judgment made me think there was no need of that trouble The FIRST Essay against Confidence in Philosophy is quite changed in the way of Writing and in the Order Methought I was somewhat fetter'd and tied in doing it and could not express my self with that case freedom and fulness which possibly I might have commanded amid fresh thoughts Yet 't is so alâ—…'d as to be in a manner new The SECOND of Scepticism and Certainty was written when I was warm in the Consideration of those matters for the satisfaction of a particular Friend what I say was enough for his use though the Subject is capable of much more and I had inlarged on it but that I am loâ—…h to ingage further in Philosophical Arguments I have annext some of the things I said to Mr. White but the main of this Essâ—…y was never extant before The THIRD of Modâ—…rn Improvements was first a Controversie I have here given it another shape As I never begun a Quarrel so I never will continue any when I can fairly let it fall The Discourse was written violently against by one who was wholly unconcern'd The interest be pretended was the defence of his Faculty against a Passage wherein he would have me say That the ancient Physicians could not cure a Câ—…t-finger which I never affirm'd or thought But that Person it now so well known that I need say no more of him or of that Câ—…est His long studied and triumphant Animadversions have given me no reason or occasion to alter any thing in the Treatise except some few Errors of the Press over which he most â—…d He hath writtâ—… divers things against 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have kept the promise I publickly made and have never read them Besides this Antagonist the learned Dr. Meric Casaubon writ Reflections on this Essay in a Letter to Dr. Peter Du Moâ—…n who it seems had presented it to him They were Printed in â—…e year 1669 and my Answers soon after ready But considerâ—…g that the Doctor allow'd all that which was my main design â—…d only oppos'd his own mistakes and suspicious I thought fit to suppress my Reply and was the rather silent because not willing to appear in a Controversie with a Person of Fame and Learning who had treated me with so much Civility and in a way so different from that of my other Assâ—…ants I have further to advertise concerning this Essay That whereas I mention several Discourses of Mr. Boyl's as intended for the Publick 't is likely that some of them by this may be extant though my privacy and retirement hath not afforded me the notice of their publication The FOURTH Essay of the Usefulness of Philosophy to Theology was Printed under the Title of Philosophia Piaâ—… I was commanded to reprint it by a Person of Honour and great Fame for whose Learning and universal Accomplishments I have high and just venerations This put into my thoughts the design of revising of some of my other Writings and bringing them together into a small Collection which I have here done The FIFTH of the Agreement of Reason and Religion was at first a Visitation Sermon twice Printed before I have now only cast it into the form of a Discourse It contains the substance of many thoughts and anxieties about that important matter in a little compass My chief care was to state and represent the whole affair clearly which I think I have done The subject â—…b been written on by divers since who some of them have perplext the matter again others have added no one thought They have written a great deal I wish I could say to purpose I know this freedom is capable of a wrong interpretation but I am urged to it by a little vexaâ—…on that the prâ—…enders to such a subject should afford me no advantage for the improving my conceptions on it The SIXTH Essay was one of the first written and printed four times already It stands in this place because it 〈◊〉 a pâ—…rticular service Philosophy doth in securing one of the out-works of Religion The Daemon of Tedworth that was annext is ready to be Printed by it self with a further Confirmation of that certainâ—… though much opposâ—…d Relation Since the publishing of these Considerations there hath a thing been put out of the Question of Wiâ—…choraft denying there are Witches upon some of the weakest pretences I have urged and disabled Who ever reads this Essay will see that that Writer was answer'd before he gave himself the trouble to be an Author on that Subject The SEVENTH is entirely new 'T is a description of such a Genius in Theology and Philosophy as I confess I my self like and I believe some others may But I blame no Mans differenâ—… sentiment who allows the liberty of judging that himself takes I have borrowed the countenance and colour of my Lord Bacons story of which I have given the brief contents The Essay is a mixture of an Idaea and a disguised History Reader I have done now But I make thee no promise that I will not write again for I
from the Corruptions of Time and Interest The Charge of Books was very great Forgeries frequent and Mistakes of Transcribers numerous They were quickly swept away out of those few Libraries in which they were by Fire and Violence or spoiled by Dust and Rottenness And in the absence of this Art 't was easie enough for one Aristotle to destroy the most considerable Remains of the Ancients that the power of his great Scholar put into his hands which 't is credibly reported of him that he did to procure more fame for his own Performances as also to conceal his thefts and injurious dealings with those venerable Sages whom he seems to take a great delight to contradict and expose as I have elsewhere proved But now by this excellent Invention the Knowledge that is lodged in Books is put beyond the danger of such Corruptions Forgeries or any fatal inconvenience We communicate upon easie terms at the remotest distance converse with the Wise Men that went before us and securely convey down our Conceptions to the Ages that shall follow So that by this means Knowledge is advantagiously spread and improved especially since the Assistance Modern Ingenuity hath brought us in that other admirable Invention 2. The Compass How defective the Art of Navigation was in elder Times when they sailed by the observation of the Stars is easie to be imagin'd For in dark weather when their Pleiades Helice and Cynosura were hidden from them by the intervening Clouds the Mariner was at a loss for his Guide and exposed to the casual conduct of the Winds and Tides For which reason the Ancients feldom or never durst venture into the Ocean but steer'd along within sight of the safer Shore So that the Commerce and Communications of those Days were very narrow Their famed Travels in comparison were but domestick and a whole World was to them unknown But it hath been the happy priviledge of later Days to find the way to apply the wonderful Vertues of the Loadstone to Navigation and by the direction of the Compass we securely commit our selves to the immense Ocean and find our path in the vastest Wilderness of Waters So that Commerce and Traffique is infinitely improved the other half of the Globe disclosed and that on this side the great Sea better understood The Religions Laws Customs and all the Rarities and Varieties of Art and Nature which any the most distant Clime knows and enjoys are laid open and made common and thereby the History of Nature is wonderfully inlarged and Knowledge is both propagated and improved Who it was that first discovered this excellent Mystery is not certainly known But one Flavius Goia of Amalphis in the Kingdom of Naples is said to be the Author and to have found this incomparable Rarity about 300 years ago 'T is pity that one of the greatest Benefactors to Mankind that ever was should lie hid in so neglected an obscurity when the great Troublers of the World who have vex'd it by the Wars of the Hand and of the Brain have so dear and so precious a Memory For my part I think there is more acknowledgment due to the name of this obscure Fellow that hath scarce any left than to a thousand Alexanders and Caesars or to ten times the number of Aristotle's and Aquinas's And he really did more for the increase of Knowledge and advantage of the World by this one Experiment than the numerous subtile Disputers that have lived ever since the erection of the School of Wrangling And methinks it may not be improper for me here to take notice of that other great German Invention that useth to be mentioned in the Company viz. That of Gun-powder and Artilery which hath done its Service also for the help and propagation of Knowledge as you will perceive when you shall consider that by the assistance of these terrible Engines of Death the great Western Indies were presently subdued which likely had not been so easily effected by the ancient and ordinary Methods of War 'T was this Thunder and Lightning and the invisible Instruments of Ruine that destroyed the Courage of those numerous and hardy People took away the hearts of the strongest Resisters and made them an easiy Prey to the Conquering Invaders And now by the gaining that mighty Continent and the numerous fruitful â—…sles beyond the Atlantick we have obtained a larger Field of Nature and have thereby an advantage for more Phaenomena and more helps both for Knowledge and for Life which 't is very like that future Ages will make better use of to such Purposes than those hitherto have done and that Science also may at last travel into those Parts and inrich Peru with a more precious Treasure than that of its Golden Mines is not improbable And so these Engines of Destruction in a sense too are Instruments of Knowledge Of the first Author of this Experiment we know no more but that he was a German Monk who lighted on it by chance when he was making some Chymical Tryals with Nitre near about the time of the Invention of the Compass but his Name and other Circumstances are lost Now whoever considers with the Noble Virulam how much the state of things in the World hath been altered and advanced by these THREE EXPERIMENTS alone will conceive great hopes of Modern Experimental Attempts from which greater Matters may be looked for than those which were the Inventions of Single Endeavourers or the Results of Chance And of all the Combinations of Men that ever met for the Improvement of Science there were never any whose Designs were better laid whose Abilities were more promising or whose Constitution was more judiciously or advantageously formed than the ROYAL SOCIETY This Noble Institution was the THIRD Advantage I mentioned that the Modern World hath for the Communication and Increase of Knowledge And here I find I am happily prevented and need not say much about it For the HISTORY of their Constitution and Performances that is abroad gives so full and so accurate an Account of them and their Designs that perhaps it may be superfluous to do more in This than to recommend that excellent Discourse to the perusal of those that would be informed about those Matters which I do with some more than ordinary zeal and concernment both because the Subject is one of the most weighty and considerable that ever afforded Matter to a Philosophical Pen and because it is writ in a way of so judicious a gravity and so prudent and modest an expression with so much clearness of sense and such a natural fluency of genuine Eloquence that I know it will both profit and entertain the Ingenious And I say further That the Style of that Book hath all the Properties that can recommend any thing to an ingenious relish For 't is manly and yet plain natural and yet not careless The Epithets are genuine the Words proper and familiar the Periods smooth and of middle proportion It is
highly pleased with those Engagements I found as much diversion in them as in my dearest Recreations But after I had spent some years in those Notional Studies perhaps with as good success as some others I began to think CVI BONO and to consider what these things would signifie in the World of Action and Business I say I thought but I could find no encouragement to proceed from the Answer my thoughts made me I ask'd my self what Accounts I could give of the Works of God by my Philosophy more than those that have none and found that I could amaze and astonish Ignorance with Distinctions and Words of Art but not satisfie ingenious Inquiry by any considerable and material Resolutions I consider'd I had got nothing all this while but a certain readiness in talking and that about things which I could not use abroad without being Pedantick and ridiculous I perceived that that Philosophy aimed at no more than the instructing Men in Notion and Dispute That its Design was mean and its Principles at the best uncertain and precarious That they did not agree among themselves nor at all with Nature I examined the best Records I could meet with about the Author of those current Hypotheses but could not be assured that Aristotle was he I saw many Reasons to believe that most of the Books that bear his Name are none of his and those that are most strongly presumed to be so are mightily altered and corrupted by Time Ignorance Carelesness and Design I perceived that the Commentators and late Disputers had exceedingly disguised and changed the Sense of those very Writings and made up a Philosophy that was quite another thing from that which those Books contain So that by these means I was by degrees taken off from the implicit Veneration I had for that Learning upon the account of the great Name of Aristotle which it bore And thus the great impediment was removed and the prejudice of Education overcome when I thought further That useful Knowledge was to be look'd for in God's great Book the Vniverse and among those generous Men that had convers'd with real Nature undisguised with Art and Notion And still I saw more of the justice of the excellent Poet's Censure of those Notional Philosophers when he saith They stand Lock'd up together hand in hand Every one leads as he is led The same bare Path they tread And dance like Fairies a phantastick Round But neither change their Motion nor their Ground From this Philosophy therefore and these Men I diverted my Eyes and Hopes and fixt them upon those Methods that I have recommended which I am sure are liable to none of those Imputations And here I think fit to add a Caution which I have given in another Discourse and do it once more to prevent a dangerous misunderstanding viz. And it is That I have said nothing of this to discourage young Academians from applying themselves to those first Studies which are in use in the Vniversities Their Statutes require Exercises in that way of Learning and so much knowledge of it as inables for those Duties is very fit Nor do I deny but that those Speculations raise quicken and whet the Vnderstanding and on that account may not be altogether unprofitable with respect to the more useful Inquisitious provided it keep it self from being nice airy and addicted too much to general Notions But this is the danger and the greatest part run upon the Rock The hazard of which might in great measure be avoided if the Mathematicks and Natural History were mingled with these other Studies which would indeed be excellent Preparatives and Dispositions to future Improvements And I add further That the young Philosophers must take care of looking on their Systematick Notious as the bounds and perfections of Knowledge nor make account to fix eternally upon those Theories as establish'd and infallible Certainties But consider them in the modest sense of Hypotheses and as things they are to take in their passage to others that are more valuable and important I say The Peri-patetick Studies thus temper'd will not I suppose be disal-lowed by those who are for the Practical Methods and so the Vniversity-Establishments can receive no prejudice from the Spirit that dislikes a perpetual acquiescence in the Philosophy of the present Schools The USEFULNESS OF Real Philosophy TO RELIGION Essay IV. Essay IV. THE USEFULNESS OF Real Philosophy TO RELIGION IT is the perverse Opinion of hasty inconsiderate Men that the study of Nature is prejudicial to the Interests of Religion And some who are more zealous than they are wise endeavour to render the Naturalist suspected of holding secret correspondence with the Atheist which things if really they were so 't were fit that the Writings of Philosophers should be sent after the Books of curious Arts that were voted to Destruction by Apostolick Authority and Zeal and then were they all laid together in a fired heap and one Drop from my Finger would quench the Flames I would not let fall that Drop But 't is to be hoped there is no such guilt or danger in the case we may suppose rather that those unkind surmisals concerning natural Wisdom are the effects of superstitious Ignorance yea I doubt they are some of the Reliques of that Barbarism that made Magick of Mathematicks and Heresie of Greek and Hebrew And now were this gross conceit about the Knowledge of Nature only the fear and fancy of the meer vulgar it were to be pardon'd easily and lightly to be consider'd but the worst is the infection of the weak jealousie hath spread it self among some of those whose Lips should preserve Knowledge and there are I doubt divers of the Instructers of the People who should endeavour to deliver them from the vain Images of Fancy that foment those fears in their own Imaginations and theirs For the sake of such and those others who are capable of Conviction I shall endeavour to justific sober Inquisitions into God's Works and to shew that they are not only innocent but very useful in most of the Affairs wherein Religion is concerned This I shall do for more clearness of proof by a gradual motion of Discourse from things that are plain and acknowledg'd which I shall touch briefly to the main Matter I would enforce In this order I. That God is to be praised for his Works II. That his Works are to be studied by those that would praise him for them III. That the study of Nature and God's Works is very serviceable to Religion IV. That the Ministers and Professors of Religion ought not to discourage but promote the knowledge of Nature and the Works of its Author THe FIRST contains two things viz. That God is to be praised and particularly for his Works The former is the constant Voice of Scripture and Universal Nature He is worthy to be praised saith the Kingly Prophet 2 Sam. 22. 4. Greatly to be praised saith the same Royal Saint 1
in which way those must conceive him that acknowledge nothing but Body in the World which certainly is a very great dis-interest to his Glory and suggests very unbecoming thoughts of him And by the due setling the Notion of a Spirit the conceit of the Soul 's Traduction is overthrown which either ariseth from direct Sadducism or a defect in Philosophy Hereby our Immortality is undermined and dangerously exposed But due Philosophical Disquisition will set us right in the Theory For the former of the Errors mention'd viz. the Aâ—…hropomorphite Doctrines that make God himself a corporeal Substance Those cannot be disproved but by the Use and Application of the Principles of Philosophy Since let us bring what Arguments we can from the Scriptures which speak of the Perfection Infinity Immensity Wisdom and other Attributes of God These no doubt will be granted but the Query will be Whether all may not belong to a material Being a question which Philosophy resolves and there is no other way to search deep into this Matter but by those Aids So likewise as to the Traduction of the Soul The Arguments from Scripture against it are very general yea many expressions we find there seem at first sight to look that way And therefore this other help Philosophy must be used here also and by the distinct representation which it gives of the Nature of Sprit and Matter and of the Operations that appertain to each this Error is effectually confuted which it cannot be by any other proceeding Thus Philosophy befriends us against Sadducism in the first Branch of it as it explodes the being of Spirits 2. The other is the denyal of the Immortality of our Souls The establishment of this likewise the Students of Philosophy and God's Works have attempted in all Ages and they have prov'd it by the Philosophical considerations of the nature of Sense the quickness of Imagination the spirituality of the Vnderstanding the freedom of the Will from these they infer that the Soul is immaterial and from thence that it is immortal which Arguments are some of the most demonstrative and cogent that the meer reasons of Men can use but cannot be manag'd nor understood but by those that are instructed in Philosophy and Nature I confess there are other Demonstrations of our Immortality for the plain Understandings that cannot reach those Heights The Scripture gives clear evidence and that of the Resurrection of the Holy Jesus is palpable But yet the Philosophical Proofs are of great use and serve for the conviction of the Infidel to whom the other inducements are nothing and the deeper knowledge of things is necessary to defend this great Article of Religion against such Men since they alledge a sort of Arguments to prove the Soul to be mortal that cannot be consuted but by a reason instructed in the Observations of Nature For the Modern Sadduce pretends that all things we do are performed by meer Matter and Motion and consequently that there is no such thing as an immaterial Being so that when our Bodies are dissolv'd the whole Man is destroyed and lost for ever which dismal conclusion is true and certain if there be nothing in us but Matter and the results of Motion and those that converse but little with Nature understand little what may be done by these and so cannot be so well assured that the Elevations Mixtures and Combinations of them cannot be at last improv'd so far as to make a sensible reasoning Being nor are they well able to disprove one that affirms that they are actually advanc'd to that height whereas he that hath much inquired into the Works of God and Nature gains a clear sight of what Matter can perform and gets more and stronger Arguments to convince him that its Modifications and Changes cannot amount to perception and sense since in all its Varieties and highest Exaltations he finds no Specimens of such Powers And though I confess that all Mechanick Inquirers make not this use of their Inquisitions and Discoveries yet that is not the fault of the Method but of the Men and those that have gone furthest in that way have receded most from the Sadducean Doctrines Among such I suppose I may be allowed to reckon the Noble Renatus Des-Cartes And his Metaphysicks and Notions of Immaterial Beings are removed to the greatest distance from all Corporeal Affections which I mention not to declare or signifie my adherence to those Principles but for an Instance to shew that acquaintance with Matter and the knowledge of its Operations removes the Mind far off from the belief of those high Effects which some ascribe to Corporeal Motions and from all suppositions of the Soul 's being bodily and material Thus Philosophy is an excellent Antidote against Sadducism in both the Main Branches of it But then I must confess also that the Philosophy of the late Peripatetick Writers doth rather assist than overthrow this dangerous Infidelity I mean in what it teacheth concerning Substantial Forms which I fear tends to the disabling all Philosophical Evidence of the Immortality of Humane Souls For these Peripateticks make their Forms a kind of medium between Body and Spirit viz. Beings that are educed as they speak out of Matter and are so dependent on it that they perish utterly or return into the bosom of the Matter as some cant when they cease to inform it But yet they allow not that those Forms are material in their essential Constitution and Nature This is the Peripatetick account of substantial Forms and such they assign to all Bodies and teach That the noblest sort of them are sensitive and perceptive which are the Souls of Brutes If this be so that Beings which are not Spirits but corruptible dependants upon Matter may be endowed with Animadversion and Sense what Arguments have we then to shew that they may not have Reason also which is but an Improvement and higher degree of simple Perception 'T is as hard to be apprehended how any of the results of Matter should perceive as how they should join their Perceptions into Reasonings and the same Propositions that prove the possibility of one prove both so that those who affirm that Beasts also have their degrees of true Reason speak very consonantly to those Principles And if such material corruptible Forms as the Peripateticks describe are sufficient for all the Actions and Perceptions of Beasts I know not which way to go about to demonstrate that a more elevated sort of them may not suffice for the reasonings of Men. To urge the Topicks of Proof I mention'd from Notions Compositions Deductions and the like which are alledged to prove our Souls Immaterial I say to plead these will signifie nothing but this That Humane Souls are no portions of Matter nor corporeal in their formal Essence But how will they evince that they are not educed from it that they depend not on Matter and shall not perish when their respective Bodies are dissolved Certainly
all those Arguments that are brought for our Immortality are in this way clearly disabled For all that we can say will prove but this That the Soul is no Body or part of Matter but this will amount to no evidence if there are a middle kind of Essences that are not corporeal and yet mortal So that when I say Philosophy serves Religion against Sadducism I would not be understood to mean the Peripatetick Hypotheseis but that Philosophy which is grounded upon acquaintance with real Nature This by leaving this whole unintelligible sort of Beings out of its Accounts as things for which there is no shadow of ground from Reason or Nature but good evidence of their non-existence from both disappoints the Sadduce of the advantage he hath from this needless and precarious Principle And by distributing Substance into Body and Spirit without the admission of middle Natures the Real Philosophy gives demonstrative force to those Arguments for our Immortality that prove our Souls are not Bodies and so Sadducism is ruined by it These things I have thought fit to advertise not out of design to censure any particular way of Philosophy but for the security of my Discourse And though I have made a little bold with the Peripateticks here yet the great Name of Aristotle to which they pretend is not concerned for I am convinc'd that he taught no such Doctrine of substantial Forms as his later Sectators and Interpreters have imputed to Him who indeed have depraved and corrupted his sense almost in the whole Body of his Principles and have presented the World with their own Fancies instead of the genuine Opinions of that Philosopher But I proceed III. THe Real Philosophy that inquires into God's Works assists Religion against Superstition another of its fatal Enemies That I may prove this it must be premised That Superstition consists either in bestowing Religious Valuation and Esteem on things in which there is no good or fearing those in which there is no hurt So that this Folly expresseth it self one while in doting upon Opinions as Fundamentals of Faith and Idoliziug the little Models of Fancy for Divine Institutions And then it runs away afraid of harmless indifferent Appointments and looks pale upon the appearance of any usual Effect of Nature It tells ominous Stories of every Meteor of the Night and makes sad Interpretations of each unwonted Accident All which are the Products of Ignorance and a narrow Mind which defeat the Design of Religion that would make us of a free manly and generous Spirit and indeed represent Christianity as if it were a fond sneaking weak and peevish thing that emasculates Mens Understandings making them amorous of toys and keeping them under the servility of childish fears so that hereby it is exposed to the distrust of larger Minds and to the scorn of Atheists These and many more are the mischiefs of Superstition as we have sadly seen and felt Now against this evil Spirit and its Influences the Real Experimental Philosophy is one of the best Securities in the World For by a generous and open Inquiry in the great Field of Nature Mens minds are enlarged and taken off from all fond adherences to their private Sentiments They are taught by it That Certainty is not in many things and that the most valuable Knowledge is the practical By which means they will find themselves disposed to more indifferency towards those petty Notions in which they were before apt to place a great deal of Religion and to reckon that all that will signifie lies in the few certain operative Principles of the Gospel and a Life suitable to such a Faith not in doting upon Questions and Speculations that engender strife and thus the Modern Experimental Philosophy of God's Works is a Remedy against the notional Superstition as I may call it which hath been and is so fatal to Religion and the peace of Mankind Besides which by making the Soul great this Knowledge delivers it from fondness on small Circumstances and imaginary Models and from little scrupulosities about things indifferent which usually work disquiet in narrow and contracted Spirits And I have known divers whom Philosophy and not Disputes hath cured of this Malady This we may observe that those Remedies are the best and most effectual that alter the temper and disposition of the Mind For 't is suitableness to that which makes the way to Mens Judgments and settles them in their Perswasions There are few that hold their Opinions by Arguments and dry Reasonings but by congruity to the Understanding and consequently by relish in the Affections So that seldom any thing cures our intellectual Diseases throughly but what changes these And I dare affirm that the Free Experimental Philosophy will do this to purpose by giving the Mind another Tincture and introducing a sounder Habit which by degrees will repel and cast out all Malignities and settle it in a strong and manly Temperament that will master and put to flight all idle Dotages and effeminate Fears The Truth is This World is a very Bedlam and he that would cure Madmen must not attempt it by Reasoning or indeavour to shew the absurdity of their Conceits but such a course must be taken as may restore the Mind to a right Crasis and that when it is effected will reduce and rectifie the extravagances of the distemper'd Brain which Disputes and Oppositions will but inflame and make worse Thus for instance when frantick Persons are fond of Feathers and mightily taken with the employment of picking Straws 't would signifie very little to represent to them the vanity of the Objects of their Delights and when the Melancholist was afraid to sit down for fear of being broken supposing himself of Glass it had been to little purpose to have declared to him the ridiculousness of his Fears the disposition of the Head was to be alter'd before the particular Phrensie could be cured 'T is too evident how just this is in the application to the present Age Superstitious fondness and fears are a real degree of madness And though I cannot say that Philosophy must be the only Catholick way of Cure for of this the far greatest part of Men is incapable yet this I do affirm that 't is a Remedy for those that are strong enough to take it and the rest must be helped by that which changeth the Genius and this cannot ordinarily be done by any thing that opposeth the particular Fancy However I must say 2. That the sort of Superstition which is yet behind in my account and consists in the causless fear of some Extraordinaries in Accident or Nature is directly cured by that Philosophy which gives fair likely-hoods of their Causes and shews that there is nothing in them supernatural the light of the day drives away Apparitions and vain Images that fancy forms in obscure shades and darkness Thus particularly the Modern Doctrine of Comets which have been always great Bugbears to the guilty
and timorous World hath rescued Philosophers from the trouble of dreadful Presages and the mischievous Consequences that arise from those superstitious Abodings For whatever the casual Coincidencies may be between those Phaenomena and the direful Events that are sometimes observed closely to attend them which as my Lord Bacon truly notes are observ'd when they bit not when they miss I say notwithstanding these the Real Experimental Philosophy makes it appear that they are Heavenly Bodies far above all the Regions of Vapours in which we are not concerned and so they are neither the Signs nor the Causes of our Mischiefs And for the other little things which afford Matter for the Tales about Prodigies and other ominous Appearings the knowledge of Nature by exciting worthy and magnificent conceptions of the God of Nature cures that blasphemous abuse of the adorable Majesty whereby foolish Men attribute every trivial event that may serve their turns against those they hate to his immediate extraordinary interposal For 't is ignorance of God and his Works that disposeth Men to absurd ridiculous Surmises uncharitable Censures seditious Machinations and so to Thoughts that are prejudicial to the Glory of God the Interests of Religion and the security of Government to that Justice and Charity we owe to others and to the happiness that we seek our selves To which I add That this kind of Superstition is a relique of Pagan Ignorance which made Men look on Thunder Eclipses Earthquakes and all the more terrifying Phaenomena of Nature as the immediate Effects of Powers Supernatural and to judge Events by flights of Birds and garbages of Cattel by the accidental occursions of this Creature and the other and almost every casual occurrence But these Particulars have been most ingeniously represented and reproved in a late very elegant Discourse about Prodigies And though I do not acquiesce in the Design of that excellently penn'd Book which is to discredit and take away all kinds of Presages Yet I think it hath done rarely well so far as it discovers the folly and mischiefs of that ignorant and superstitious Spirit that makes every thing a Prodigy With such apprehensions as these the knowledge of Nature fills those Minds that are instructed in it And there is no doubt but that the Antipathy the Real Philosophy bears to all the kinds of Superstition is one cause why zealous Ignorance brands those Researches with the mark of Atheism and Irreligion For superstitious Folly adopts those groundless Trifles which Philosophy contemns and reproves into the Family of Religion and therefore reproacheth the Despisers of them as Enemies to the Faith and Power of Godliness So it fared with some of the bravest Spirits of ancient times who have had black Characters fixt upon their great and worthy Names only for their Oppositions of the foolish Rites and Idolatries of the vulgar Heathen We know the case of Socrates And as to the interest of their Names that of Anaxagoras Theodorus Protagoras and Epicurus was much worse the causless infamy coming down the Stream as far as the last Ages Since then we know who was an Heretick for saying there were Antipodes and a Pope was taken for a Conjurer for being a Mathematician yea those noble Sciences were counted Diabolical and even the Sacred Language could scarce escape the suspicion In later times Galilaeo fell into the Inquisition for the Discoveries of his Telescopes and Campanella could not endeavour to assert and vindicate the freedom of his Mind without losing that of his Person I might come nearer to our own days and knowledge Gothick barharity and the Spirit of the Iuquisition is not quite worn out of the Reformation Though indeed it ordinarily remains but among the scum and dregs of Men And no one is either less Religious or less Wise for being accounted an Atheist by the common Rabble But where-ever the knowledge of Nature and God's Works hath in any degree obtain'd those vile Superstitions have been despised and put to an infamous flight But to take another step IV. THe Real Philosophy and knowledge of God's Works serves Religion against Enthusiasm another dreadful Enemy Now Enthusiasm is a false conceit of Inspiration and all the bold and mistaken Pretensions to the Spirit in our days are of this sort What particularly Religion hath suffer'd from it would be too long to reckon upon this occasion It will be enough to say in an Age that hath so much and such sad experience of it That Enthusiasm hath introduced much phantastry into Religion and made way for all imaginable Follies and even Atheism it self which it hath done two ways 1. By crying up the Excesses and Diseases of Imagination for the greatest height of Godliness And 2. By the disparagrment of sober Reason as an Enemy to the Principles of Faith And Philosophy assists Religion against both these FOR the first in order The real knowledge of Nature detects the dangerous imposture by shewing what strange things may be effected by no diviner a cause than a strong Fancy impregnated by Heated Melancholy For this sometimes warms the Brain to a degree that makes it very active and imaginative full of odd Thoughts and unexpected Suggestions so that if the Temper determine the Imagination to Religion it flies at high things at interpretations of dark and Prophetick Scriptures at Predictions of future Events and mysterious Discoveries which the Man expresseth fluently and boldly with a peculiar and pathetick Eloquence which pregnances being not ordinary but much beyond the usual tone and temper of the Enthusiast and he having heard great things of the Spirits immediate Motions and Inspirations cannot well fail of believing himself inspired and of intitling all the excursious of his Fancy to the immediate Actings of the Holy Ghost and those thoughts by the help of natural pride and self-love will work also exceedingly upon the heightned Affections and they upon the Body so far as to cast it sometimes into Raptures Extasies and Deliquiums of Sense in which every Dream is taken for a Prophesie every Image of the Fancy for a Vision and all the glarings of the Imagination for new Lights and Revelations Thus have our Modern Prophets been inspired by Temper and Imagination and not by Design only For we may not think they are all Hypocrites and knowing Impostors No they generally believe themselves and the strength of their highly invigorated Fancies shuts out the sober Light of Reason that should disabuse them as sleep doth that of our External Senses in our Dreams And the silly People that understand not Nature but are apt to take every thing that is vebement to be sacred are easily deceived into the belief of those Pretensions and thus Diseases have been worship'd for Religion This account the Philosophy of Humane Nature gives of that by which the World hath been so miserably abused And when we cast our eyes abroad we may plainly see that those glorious things are no more than what hath been done
by the Extatick Priests of the Heathen Oracles and the Mad-men of all Religions by Sybils Lunaticks Poets Dreamers and transported Persons of all sorts And it may be observ'd daily to what degrees of elevation excess of drinking will heighten the Brain making some witty nimble and eloquent much beyond the ordinary proportion of their Parts and Ingenuity and inclining others to be hugely devour who usually have no great sense of Religion As I knew one who would pray rapturously when he was drunk but at other times was a moping Sot and could scarce speak sense Thus also some kinds of Madness Diseases Accidents Peculiarities of Temper and other natural things that heat the Brain fill Men with high surprizing Conceits about Religion and furnish them with fervid Devotion great readiness of Expression and unexpected applications of Scripture to their crasy Conceits I say the Experimental Philosophy of our Natures informs us that all this is common in alienations and singularities of Mind and Complexion And they were remarkable in the Prophets of the Heathen and the Priest whom Saint Austin knew that would whine himself into an Extasie In the wonderful Discourses of the American Bishop that said he was the Holy Ghost and the canting fluency of the German Enthusiasts some of whose Imaginations were as wild and extravagant of such Instances I might make up a much larger Catalogue if I should descend to our Domestick Lunaticks but their temper is well known and therefore I only add this more That I have often met with a poor Woman in the North whose habitual conceit it was That she was Mother of God and of all things living I was wont to personate a kind of complyance with her Fancy and a modest desire to be further informed about it which gentleness drew from her so many odd fetches of Discourse such applications of Scripture and such wonderful references to Things in which she was never instructed that look'd like gleanings out of Hobbs and Epicurus that I have been much amazed at her talk And yet when I diverted her to any thing else of ordinary Matters she spoke usually with as much sobriety and cold discretion as could well be expected from a Person of her Condition nor did she use to be extravagant in any thing but about that particular Imagination which Instance among many others I might produce very much confirms me in the truth of that Observation of those Philosophers who have given us the best light into the Enthusiastick Temper viz. That there is a sort of madness which takes Men in some particular things when they are sound in others which one Proposition will afford a good account of many of the Phaenomena of Enthusiasm and shews that the Extravagants among us may be really distracted in the Affairs of Religion though their Brains are untouc'd in other Matters Thus a Philosophical use of observation and the knowledge of Humane Nature by it helps us to distinguish between the Effects of the adorable Spirit and those of an hot distemper'd Fancy which is no small advantage for the securing the Purity Honour and all the interests of Religion But 2. there is another mischief of the Enthusiastick Spirit behind and that is its bringing Reason into disgrace and denying the use thereof in the Affairs of Faith and Religion This is an evil that is the cause of many more for it hath brought into the World all kinds of Phantastry and Folly and exposed Religion to Contempt and Derision by making Madness and Diseases Sacred It leads Mens Minds into a maze of confused Imaginations and betrays them into Bogs and Precipices deprives them of their Light and their Guide and lays them open to all the Delusions of Satan and their own distemper'd Brains It takes Religion off from its Foundations and leaves the Interest of Eternity in Mens Souls to Chance and the Hits of Imagination teaching those that are deluded to lay the stress of all upon Raptures Heats and Mysterious Notions while they forgetâ—… and scorn the plain Christianity which is an imitation of Christ in Charity Humility Justice and Purity in the exercise of all Vertue and command of our selves It renders Men obnoxious to all the Temptations of Atheism and the blackest Infidelity and makes it impossible to convince an Infidel to settle one that doubts or to recover one that is fallen off from the Faith These Evils I am content only to name in this place having represented them more fully in another Discourse and the experience of our own Age may convince us with a little consideration upon it That all those fatal Mischiefs have been tâ—… Effects of the Contempt and Disparagement of Reason But yet though I affirm this I am not so rash or so unjust as to believe or say That this Spirit hath produced all those sâ—…d things in every one that speaks hotly and inconsiderately against Reason I am far from the wildness of such a censure because I know how much imprudent Zeal customary Talk high Pretensions and superstitious Fears may work even upon honest Minds who many times hold bad things in the Principle which they deny in the Practice and so are upright in their Wills while they are very much confused and mistaken in their Vnderstandings This I account to be the case of multitudes of pious People in reference to Reason They have heard hot-headed indiscreet Men declaim against it and many of them whose Opinions will not bear the Light have an interest to do so Their Pretensions were plausible and their Zeal great their Talk loud and their Affirmations bold and the honest well-meaning Folks are caught in their Affections and these lead bad Principles into their Minds which are neither disposed nor able to examine So they believe and speak after their Teachers and say That Reason is a low dull thing ignorant of the Spirit and an Enemy to Faith and Religion while in this they have no clear thoughts nor yet any evil meaning But let these Fancies swim a-top in their Imaginations and upon occasions they run out at the Tongues end though they are not always improved to those deadly Practices For Charity and Caution I have said this but yet nothing hinders but that all the forecited Evils are justly said to be the Tendencies and in too many Instances have been and are the Effects of this Spirit And now I doubt not but 't will be granted readily by all considering Men that whatever assists Religion against this destructive Enemy doth it most important service and this the Free and Real Philosophy doth in a very eminent degree In order to the proof of this we may consider what I intimated just now viz. That Men are led into and kept in this Fancy of the Enmity of Reason to Religion chiefly by two things 1. By an implicit assent to the Systemes and Distates of those who first instructed them And 2. By defect in clearness of Thoughts and the ability to
upon others nor do I care to endeavour the change of their Minds though I judge them mistaken as long as Vertue the Interests of Religion the Peace of the World and their own are not prejudiced by their Errors By this modest indifference I secure Charity for all the diversities of Belief and equally offer my Frienship and Converses to the several Sects and Perswasions that stick to the plain Principles of the Gospel and a Vertuous Life overlooking their particular fondnesses and follies This is the temper of my Genius and this some warm People who have more Heat than Light are apt to call Scepticism and cold Neutrality But that it deserves better Names I have made appear in some other Papers True it is That the Men of the meer Epicurean sort have left God and Providence out of their Accounts But other Philosophers have shewn what Fools they are for doing so and how absurd their pretended Philosophy is in supposing things to have been made and ordered by the casual hits of Atoms in a mighty Void And though their general Doctrine of Matter and Motion be exceeding ancient and very accountable when we suppose Matter was at first created by Almighty Power and its Motions ordered and directed by Omniscient Wisdom Yet the supposal that they are independent and eternal is very precarious and unreasonable And that all the regular Motions in Nature should be from blind tumultuous jumblings intermixtures is the most unphilosophical Fansie and ridiculous Dotage in the World So that there is no reason to accuse Philosophy of a Fault which Philosophy sufficiently shames and reproves and yet I doubt too many have entertain'd great prejudice against it upon this score and 't is a particular brand upon some of the modern Men that they have revived the Philosophy of Epicurus which they think to be in its whole extent Atheistical and Irreligious To which I say that the Opinion of the World 's being made by a fortuitous concurrence of Atoms is impious and vile And this those of Epicurus his Elder School taught Whereas the late Restorers of the Corpuscularian Hypothesis hate and despise the wicked and absurd Doctrine But thus far they think the Atomical Philosophy reasonable viz. as it teacheth That the Operations of Nature are performed by subtile streams of minute Bodies and not by I know not what imaginary Qualities and Forms They think That the various Motions and Figures of the parts of Matter are enough for all the Phaenomena and all the varieties which with relation to our Senses we call such and such Qualities But then they suppose and teach That God created Matter and is the supreme Orderer of its Motions by which all those Diversities are made And hereby Piety and the Faith of Providence is secured This as far as we know any thing of elder Times was the ancient Philosophy of the World and it doth not in the least interfere with any Principle of Religion Thus far I dare say I may undertake for most of the Corpuscularian Philosophers of our times excepting those of M. Hobbes his way And therefore I cannot but wonder at a late Reverend Author who seems to conclude those Modern Philosophers under the name and notion of such Somatists as are for meer Matter and Motion and exclude immaterial Beings whereas those Learned Men though they own Matter and Motion as the material and formal causes of the Phenomena They do yet acknowledge God's Efficiency and Government of all Things with as much seriousness and contend for it with as much zeal as any Philosophers or Divines whatsoever And 't is very hard that any number of Men should be exposed to the suspicion of being Atheists for denying the Peripatetick Qualities and Forms and there is nothing else overthrown by the Corpuscularian Doctrines as they are managed by those Philosophers So that methinks that Reverend Person hath not dealt so fairly with the great Names of Des-Cartes and Gassendus where he mentions them promiscuously with the meer Epicurean and Hobbian Somatists without any note to distinguish them from those Sadduces For both those celebrated Men have laboured much in asserting the Grand Articles of Religion against the Infidel and Atheist But 2. 't is alledg'd by some Philosophy disposeth Men to despise the Scriptures or at least to neglect the study of them and therefore is to be flighted and exploded among Christians To this I say That Philosophy is the knowledge of God's Works and there is nothing in God's Works that is contrary to his Word How then should the study of the one incline Men to despise the other Certainly had there been any such impious tendency in searching into God's Works to the lessening of our value of the Scriptures The Scripture it self would never have recommended it so much unto us Yea this is so far from being true that on the contrary the knowledge of God's Works tends in its proper nature to dispose Men to love and veneration of the Scriptures For by familiarity with Nature we are made sensible of the Power Wisdom and Goodness of God fresh Instances of which we shall find in all things And 't is one great design of the Scripture to promote the Glory of these Attributes How then can he that is much affected with them chuse but love and esteem those Holy Records which so gloriously illustrate the Perfections he admires Besides by inquiry into God's Works we discover continually how little we can comprehend of his Ways and Menagements and he that is sensible of this will find himself more inclined to reverence the declarations of his Word though they are beyond his reach and though he cannot fathom those Mysteries he is required to believe Such a disposition is necessary for the securing our Reverence to the Divine Oracles and Philosophy promotes it much So that though 't is like enough there may be those that pretend to Philosophy who have less veneration and respect for the Scripture than they ought yet that impious disesteem of those sacred Writings is no effect of their Philosophy but of their corrupt and evil Inclinations And to remove the scandal brought upon Natural Wisdom by those Pretenders it may be observed that none are more earnest or more frequent in the proof and recommendation of the Authority of Scripture than those of Philosophical Inclination and Genius who by 〈◊〉 â—…mblick Capacity and Profession have the best opportunities to give testimony to the Honour of that Divine Book But to justifie the imputation of the disservice Philosophy doth Religion and the Scriptures it may by some be pleaded That Philosophy viz. that which is called the new teacheth Doctrines that are coutrary to the Word of God or at least such as we have no ground from Scripture to believe For instance That the Earth moves and That the Moon is of a Terrestrial Nature and capable of Inhabitants which Opinions are presumed to be impious and Antiscriptural In return to this
I say 1. In the general 'T is very true that Philosophy teacheth many things which are not revealed in Scripture for this was not intended to instruct Men in the Affairs of Nature but its Design is to direct Mankind and even those of the plainest Understandings in Life and Manners to propose to us the way of Happiness and the Principles that are necessary to guide us in it with the several Motives and Incouragements that are proper to excite our Endeavours and to bear them up against all Difficulties and Temptations This I say was the chief Design of that Divine Book and therefore 't is accommodated in the main to the most ordinary capacities and speaks after our manner suitably to sense and vulgar Conception Thus we find that the Clouds are called Heaven the Moon one of the greater Lights and the Stars mentioned as less considerable and the Stars also Gen. 1. We read of the going down of the Sun and of the ends of the Earth and of the Heavens and divers other such Expressions are in the Scriptures which plainly shew That they do not concern themselves to rectifie the Mistakes of the Vulgar in Philosophical Theories but comply with their Infirmities and speak according as they understand So that 2. No Tenent in Philosophy ought to be condemned and exploded because there may be some occasional Sayings in the Divine Oracles which seem not to comport with it And therefore the Problems mentioned concerning the Motion of the Earth and Terrestrial Nature of the Moon ought to be left to the Disquisitions of Philosophy The Word of God determines nothing about them for those Expressions concerning the running of the Sun and its standing still may very well be interpreted as spoken by way of accommodation to Sense and common apprehension as 't is certain that those of its going down and running from one end of the Heavens to the other and numerous resembling Sayings are so to be understood And when 't is else-where said That the Foundations of the Earth are so fixt that it cannot be moved at any time or to that purpose 'T is supposed by Learned Men that nothing else is meant but this That the Earth cannot be moved from its Centre which is no prejudice to the Opinion of its being moved upon it For the other Hypothesis of the Moon 's being a kind of Earth the Scripture hath said nothing of it on either hand nor can its silence be argumentative here since we know That all Mankind believes many things of which there is no mention there As that there are such places as China and America That the Magnet attracts Iron and directs to the North and that the Sea hath the motion of Flux and Reflux with ten thousand such other things discovered by Experience of which there is not the least hint in the Sacred Volume And are not these to be believed till they can be proved from Scripture This is ridiculously to abuse the Holy Oracles and to extend them beyond their proper Business and Design To argue against this Supposal as some do by Queries What Men are in that other Earth Whether fallen and how saved is very childish and absurd He that holds the Opinion may confess his ignorance in all these things without any prejudice to his Hypothesis of the Moon 's being habitable or the supposal of its being actually inhabited For that may be though no living Man can tell the Nature and Condition of those Creatures But for my part I assert neither of these Paradoxes only I have thought fit to speak thus briefly about them that they may be left to the freedom of Philosophical Inquiry for the Scripture is not concerned in such Queries And yet besides this which might suffice to vindicate the Neoterick Philosophy from the charge of being injurious to the Scripture in such Instances I add 3. The Free Experimental Philosophy which I recommend doth not affirm either of those so much dreaded Propositions For neither of them hath sufficient evidence to warrant peremptory and dogmatical Assertions And therefore though perhaps some of those Philosophers may think they have great degrees of probability and are fit for Philosophical Consideration Yet there are none that I know who look on them as Certainties and positive Truths 'T is contrary to the Genius of their way to dogmatize for things of so great an uncertainty or to be confident against them where there wants full proof to assure the Negative But whether the one be true or the other Religion and the Scriptures are not at all concerned Thus briefly of the Slanders that are affixt upon Philosophy viz. of its Tendency to Atheism and disparagement of the Scriptures The other lesser ones are answered in the discussion of these BUT besides the foul and slanderous Imputations fastned on Philosophy there are some vulgar plausibilities pretended the chief of which I shall now recite and answer 'T is said 1. There is too much curiosity in those Inquiries and St. Paul desired to know nothing but Christ and him crucified To which I answer That what is blameable curiosity in things not worth our pains or forbidden our scrutiny is Duty and laudable endeavour in Matters that are weighty and permitted to our search So that no ill can justly be fastned upon Philosophical Inquisitions into Nature on this account till it be first proved That a diligent observance of God's Goodness and Wisdom in his Works in order to the using them to his Glory and the benefit of the World is either prohibited or impertinent There is indeed such a depth in Nature that it is never like to be throughly fathomed and such a darkness upon some of God's Works that they will not in this World be found out to Perfection But however we are not kept off by any expressness of Prohibition Nature is no Holy Mount that ought not to be touched yea we are commanded To search after Wisdom and particularly after this when we are so frequently called upon to celebrate our Creator for his Works and are encouraged by the success of many that have gone before For many shall go to and fro and Science shall be increased So that our Iniquiries into Nature are not forbidden and he that saith they are frivolous and of no use when the Art of the Omniscient is the Object and his Glory and the good of Men the end asperseth both the Creator and the Creature and contradicts his duty to both As for the latter clause of the Objection which urgeth that Speech of St. Paul of his desiring to know nothing but Christ and him crucified 1 Cor. 2. 2. I return to it That he that shall duely consider the Discourse of the Apostle in the verse before and those that succeed will perceive That in this expression he only slights the affected Eloquence of the Orators and Rhetoricians He spoke in plainness and simplicity and not in those inticing words of Man's Wisdom which he
Brass for our Defence and they have little else than Twigs and Bull-rushes for the Assault we have Light and firm Ground and they are lost in Smoak and Mists They tread among Bogs and dangerous Fens and reel near the Rocks and Steeps And shall we despise our Advantages and forsake them Shall we relinquish our Ground and our Light and muffle our selves up in darkness Shall we give our Enemies the Weapons and all the odds and so endeavour to insure their Triumphs over us This is soâ—…tishly to betray Religion and our selves If this Discourse chance to meet with any that are guilty of these dangerous Follies it will I hope convince them That they have no reason to be afraid of Philosophy or to despise its Aids in the Concerns of Religion And for those who never yet thought of this part of Religion to glorifie God for his Works I wish it may awaken them to more attentive consideration of the wisdom and goodness that is in them and so excite their pious acclamations And to encourage them to it I shall adventure to add That it seems very probable that much of the Matter of those Hallelujah's and triumphant Songs that shall be the joyful entertainment of the Blessed will be taken from the wonders of God's Works and who knows but the contemplation of these and God in them shall make up a good part of the imployment of those glorified Spirits who will then have inconceivable advantages for the searching into those Effects of Divine Wisdom and Power beyond what are possible for us Mortals to attain And those Discoveries which for ever they shall make in that immense Treasure of Art the Vniverse must needs fill their Souls every moment with pleasant astonishment and inflame their hearts with the ardours of the highest Love and Devotion which will breathe forth in everlasting Thanksgivings And thus the study of God's Works joyned with those pious Sentiments they deserve is a kind of anticipation of Heaven And next after the contemplations of his Word and the wonders of his Mercy discovered in our Redemption it is one of the best and noblest Imployments the most becoming a reasonable Creature and such a one as is taught by the most reasonable and excellent Religion in the World THE AGREEMENT OF Reason and Religion Essay V. Essay V. THE AGREEMENT OF Reason and Religion THere is not any thing that I know which hath done more mischief to Religion than the disparaging of Reason under pretence of respect and favour to it For hereby the very Foundations of Christian Faith have been undermin'd and the World prepared for Atheism And if Reason must not be heard the Being of a God and the Authority of Scripture can neither be proved nor defended and so our Faith drops to the Ground like an House that hath no Foundation By the same way those sickly Conceits and Enthusiastick Dreams and unsound Doctrines that have poyson'd our Air and infatuated the Minds of Men and expos'd Religion to the scorn of Infidels and divided the Church and disturbed the Peace of Mankind and involv'd all the Nation in so much Blood and so many Ruines I say hereby all these fatal Follies that have been the oceasions of so many Mischiefs have been propagated and promoted On which accounts I think I may affirm with some confidence That here is the Spring-Head of most of the Watters of Bitterness and Strife And here the Fountain of the Great Deeps of Atheism and Fanaticism that are broken up upon us So that there cannot be a more seasonable Service done either to Reason or Religion than to endeavour the stopping up this Source of Mischiefs by representing the Friendship and fair Agreement that is between them For hereby Religion will be rescued from the impious accusation of its being groundless and imaginary And Reason also defended against the unjust Charge of its being prophane and irreligious This we have heard often from indiscreet and hot Men For having entertain'd vain and unreasonable Doctrines which they had made an Interest and the Badges of a Party and perceiving that their Darling Opinions could not stand if Reason their Enemy were not discredited They set up loud cries against it as the grand Adversary of Free Grace and Faith and zealously endeavour'd to run it down under the misapplyed names of Vain Philosophy Carnal Reasoning and the Wisdom of this World and what have been the Effects of this proceeding we have seen and felt So that in my Judgment it is the great duty of all sober and reasonable Men to rise up as they can against this Spirit of Folly and Infatuation And something I shall attempt now by shewing That Reason is very serviceable to Religion and Religion very friendly to Reason In order to which I must 1. State what I mean by Religion and what by Reason For there is nothing in any Matter of Enquiry or Debate that can be discover'd or determin'd till the Terms of the Question are explain'd and the Notions settled The want of this hath been the occasion of a great part of those Confusions we find in Disputes and particularly most of the Clamours that have been raised against Reason in the Affairs of Religion have sprung from it For while ungrounded Opinions and unreasonable Practises are often call'd Religion on the one hand and vain Imaginations and false Consequences are as frequently stiled Reason on the other 'T is no wonder that such a Religion disclaims the use of Reason or that such Reason is opposite to Religion Therefore in order to my shewing the Agreement between True Religion and the Genuine Reason I shall with all the clearness that I can represent the just meaning of the one and of the other For Religion first It is taken either strictly for the Worship of God or in a more comprehensive sense for the sum of those Duties we owe to Him And this takes in the other and agrees with the Notation of the Name which imports Binding and implies Duty Now all Duty is comprised under these two viz. Worship and Vertue Worship comprehends all Duties that immediately relate to God as the Object of them Vertue all those that respect our Neighbour and our Selves So that Religion primarily and mainly consists in Worship and Vertue But Duty cannot be performed without Knowledge and some Principles there must be to direct the Practice and those that discover the Duties and guide Men in the performance of them are call'd Principles of Religion These are of two sorts Some 1. Fundamental and Essential Others 2. Accessory and Assisting Fundamental is a Metaphor taken from the Foundation of a Building upon which the Fabrick is erected and without which it cannot stand So that Fundamental Principles are such as are presupposed to the Duties of Religion one or more and such as are absolutely necessary to the doing of them of this sort I shall mention three viz. 1. The Being of God and the perfections of
his Nature The belief of these is necessary to all the parts of Religion He that comes unto God in any way of Worship or Address must know that he is and in some measure what Namely he must know and own the commonly acknowledg'd Attributes of his Being 2. A second necessary Principle is The Providenee of God viz. the Knowledge That he made us and not we our selves that he preserves us and daily provides for us the good things we enjoy This is necessary to the Duties of Prayer Praise and Adoration And if there be no Providence Prayer and Thanksgiving and other Acts of Worship are in vain 3. A third Fundamental is Moral Good and Evil. Without this there can be no confession of Sin no respect to Charity Humility Justice Purity or the rest that we call Vertues These will be confes'd to be Fundamentals of Religion And I shall not dispute how many more may be admitted into the number These we are sure are such in the strictest sense for all Religion supposeth and stands upon them And they have been acknowledg'd by Mankind in all Ages and Places of the World But besides these there are other Principles of Religion which are not in the same degree of absolute necessity with the former but yet are highly serviceable by way of incouragement and assistance I reckon four viz. 1 That God will pardon us if we repent 2. That he will assist us if we endeavour 3. That he will accept of Services that are imperfect if they are sincere 4. That he will righteously reward and punish in another World These contain the Matter and Substance of the Gospel more clearly and explicitly reveal'd to the Christian Church but in some measure owned also by the Gentiles So that I may reckon that the Principles I have mention'd are the sum of the Religion of Mankind I mean as to the Doctrinal Part of it and the Duties recited before are the Substance of the Practical which primarily and most essentially is Religion And Christianity takes in all these Duties and all these Principles advancing the Duties to higher degrees of Excellency and Perfection incouraging them by new Motives and Assistances and superadding two other Instances Baptism and the Lord's Supper And for the Principles it confirms those of Natural Religion it explains them further and discovers some few new ones And all these both of the former and the latter sort are contain'd in the Creed Here are all the Fundamentals of Religion and the main Assisting Principles also And though our Church require our assent to more Propositions yet those are only Articles of Communion not Doctrines absolutely necessary to Salvation And if we go beyond the Creed for the Essentials of Faith who can tell where we shall stop The sum is Religion primarily is Duty And Duty is All that which God hath commanded to be done by his Word or our Reasons and we have the substance of these in the Commandments Religion also in a secondary sense consists in some Principles relating to the Worship of God and of his Son in the ways of devout and vertuous living and these are comprised in that Summary of Belief called the Apostles Creed This I take to be Religion and this Religion I shall prove to be reasonable But I cannot undertake for all the Opinions some Men are pleased to call Orthodox nor for all those that by many private Persons and some Churches are accounted essential Articles of Faith and Salvation Thus I have stated what I mean by Religion The OTHER thing to be determined and fixt is the proper Notion of Reason For this we may consider that Reason is sometimes taken for Reason in the Faculty which is the Vnderstanding and at other times for Reason in the Object which consists in those Principles and Conclusions by which the Understanding is informed This latter is meant in the Dispute concerning the Agreement or Disagreement of Reason and Religion And Reason in this sense is the same with natural Truth which I said is made up of Principles and Conclusions By the Principles of Reason we are not to understand the Grounds of any Man's Philosophy nor the Critical Rules of Syllogism but those imbred Fundamental Notices that God hath implanted in our Souls such as arise not from external Objects nor particular Humours or Imaginations but are immediately lodged in our Minds independent upon other Principles or Deductions commanding a sudden assent and acknowledged by all sober Mankind Of this sort are these That God is a Being of all Perfection That nothing hath no Attributes That a Thing cannot be and not be That the Whole is greater than any of its Parts These and such-like are unto Vs what Instincts are to other Creatures And these I call the Principles of Reason The Conclusions are those other Notices that are inferred rightly from these and by their help from the Observations of Sense And the remotest of them that can be conceived if it be duly inferred from the Principles of Reason or rightly circumstantiated Sense is as well to be reckoned a Part and Branch of Reason as the more immediate Conclusions that are Principles in respect of those distant Truths And thus I have given an account also of the proper Notion and Nature of Reason I AM to shew next 2. That Religion is reasonable and this implies two things viz. That Reason is a Friend to Religion and that Religion is so to Reason I begin with the FIRST and here I might easily shew the great congruity that there is between that Light and those Laws that God hath placed in our Souls and the Duties of Religion that by the expressness of his written Word he requires from us and demonstrate that Reason teacheth All those excepting only the two Positives Baptism and the Holy Eucharist But there is not so much need of turning my Discourse that way and therefore I shall confine it to the Principles of Religion which are called Faith and prove that Reason exceedingly befriends these It doth this I. By proving some of those Principles And II. By defending all For the clearing both let us consider That the Principles of Religion are of two sorts Either 1. Such as are presupposed to Faith or such as 2. are formal Articles of it Of the first are The Being of a God and the Authority of the Scripture And of the second such as are expresly declared by Divine Testimony as the Attributes of God the Incarnation of his Son and such like I. For the former they are proved by Reason and by Reason only The others we shall consider after 1. That the Being of a God the Foundation of all is proved by Reason the Apostle acknowledgeth when he saith That what was to be known of God was manifest and to the Heathen Rom. 1. 19. and he adds vers 20. That the invisible Things from the Creation of the World are clearly seen being understood by the Things that are
made And the Royal Psalmist speaks to the like purpose Psal. 19. The Heavens declare the Glory of God and the Firmament sheweth his handy-Works And again Psal. 148. 3. Praise him Sun and Moon praise him ye Stars and Light which intimates that these Works of his afford Matter to our Reasons for Religious Acknowledgments And Reason proves the Existence of God srom the beauty and order and ends and usefulness of the Creatures for these are demonstrative Arguments of the Being of a wise and omnipotent Mind that hath framed all things so regularly and exactly and that Mind is God This Article then Reason proves which was the first Branch of the Particular and I add that it is Reason only that can do it which was the other For there are but three things from whence the Existence of any Being can be concluded viz. Sense Revelation or Reason Sense hath no more to do here but to present Matter for our Reasons to work on and Revelation supposeth the Being of a God and cannot prove it for we can have no security that the Revelation is true till we are assured it is from God or from some commissioned by him The knowledge of his Being therefore must precede our Faith in Revelation and so cannot be deduced from it So that only Reason is left to assure us here And thus Reason lays the very Corner Stone of Religion The next to this is the other Principle mentioned viz. 2. The Divine Authority of Scripture This also is to be proved by Reason and only by it The great Argument for the truth of Scripture is the Testimony of the Spirit in the Miracles wrought by Christ and his Apostles Our Saviour himself useth this Argument to gain credit to his Doctrines Believe me for the Work 's sake The Works that I do bear testimony of me and if I had not done among them the Works that no other Man did they had had no sin John 15. 24. And the Apostles continually urge that great Miracle the Resurrection of Christ from the dead for the conviction both of the Jews and Gentiles That he was the Son of God and his Doctrines true Now Miracles are an Argument to our Reasons and we reason from them thus Miracles are God's Seal and they are wrought by his Power and he is true and good and would not lend these to Impostors to cheat and abuse Mankind Therefore whoever works real Miracles for the confirmation of any Doctrine it is to be believed that he is taught of God and commissioned to teach us And that Christ and his Apostles did those things which are recorded of them is Matter of Testimony and Reason clears the validity of this by the aggregation of multitudes of Circumstances which shew That the first Relators could not be deceived themselves and would not deceive us nor indeed could in the main Matters if they had designed it And the certainty of the conveyance of those things to us is evinced also by numerous convictive Reasons So that the matter of Fact is secure and that such Doctrines were taught as are ascribed to those Divine Persons and those Persons inspired that penned them are proved the same way And so it follows from the whole that the Gospel is the Word of God and the Old Testament is confirmed by that Thus Reason proves the Divine Authority of Scripture and those other Arguments that use to be produced for it from its Stile and its influence upon the Souls of Men from the excellency of its Design and the Providence of God in preserving it are of the same sort though not of the same strength Reason then proves the Scriptures and this only for that they are from God is not known immediately by Sense and there is no distinct Revelation that is certain and infallible to assure us of it and so Reason only remains to demonstrate the Article These two great Truths The Existence of God and Authority of Scripture are the first in our Religion and they are Conclusions of Reason as well as Foundations of Faith And thus briefly of those Principles of Religion that are presupposed unto it we have seen how Reason serves for the Demonstration of them II. I COME now to the other sort of Principles viz. those that are formally so They are of two sorts â—…t and pure The mixt are those that are discovered by Reason and declared by Revelation also and so are Principles both of Reason and Faith Of this kind are the Attributes of God Moral good and evil and the immortality of Humane Souls The Principles of pure Faith are such as are known only by Divine Testimony as the Miraculous Conception the Incarnation and the Trinity The first sort Reason proves as well as Scripture this I shew briefly in the Instances mention'd 1. That the Divine Attributes are revealed in the Holy Oracles is very clear and as plain it is that they are deduced from Reason For 't is a general Principle through the World That God is a Being absolutely perfect And hence Reason concludes all the particular Attributes of his Nature since Wisdom Goodness Power and the rest are Perfections and imply nothing of imperfection or defect and therefore ought to be ascribed to the infinitely perfect Being 2. That there is moral Good and Evil is discoverable by Reason as well as Scripture For these are Reason's Maxims That every Thing is made for an end and every Thing is directed to its end by certain Rules These Rules in Creatures of understanding and choice are Laws and the transgressing these is Vice and Sin 3. The Immortality of our Souls is plain in Scripture and Reason proves it by shewing the spirituality of our Natures and that it doth from the nature of Sense and our perception of Spiritual Beings of Vniversals and of Logical Metaphysical and Mathematical Notions From our compounding Propositions and drawing Conclusions from them From the vastness and quickness of our Imaginations and liberty of our Wills all which are beyond the Powers of Matter and therefore argue a Being that is Spiritual and consequently immortal which Inference the Philosophy of Spirits proves Also the Moral Arguments of Reason from the goodness of God and his Justice in distributing Rewards and Punishments the nature of Vertue and tendencies of Religious Appetites conclude I think very hopefully That there is a Life after this Thus in short of the Principles I called mixt which Reason demonstrates BUT for the others viz. 2. Those of pure Revelation Reason cannot prove them immediately nor is it to be expected that it should For they are Matters of Testimony and we are no more to look for immediate proof from Reason of those things than we are to expect that abstracted Reason should demonstrate That there is such a place as China or that there was such a Man as Julius Caesar All that it can do here is to assert and make good the credibility and truth of the Testimonies
deduce some Corollaries that may be of use for the better understanding of the whole Matter 1. Reason is certain and infallible This follows from the state I gave of the Nature and Notion of Reason in the beginning It consists in First Principles and the Conclusions that are raised from them and the Observations of Sense Now first Principles are certain or nothing can be so for every possible Conclusion must be drawn from those or by their help and every Article of Faith supposeth them And for the Propositions that arise from those certain Principles they are certain likewise For nothing can follow from Truth but Truth in the longest Series of Deduction If Error creep in there is ill consequence in the case And the sort of Conclusions that arise from the Observations of Sense if the Sense be rightly circumstantiated and the Inference rightly made are certain also For if our Senses in all their due Circumstances deceive us All is a delusion and we are sure of nothing But we know that first Principles are certain and that our Senses do not deceive us because God that bestowed them upon us is True and Good and we are as much assured that whatever we duly conclude from either of them is certain because whatever is drawn from any Principle was virtually contained in it 2. I infer That Reason is in a sense the Word of God viz. That which he hath written upon our Minds and Hearts as Scripture is that which is written in a Book The former is the Word whereby he hath spoken to all Mankind the latter is that whereby he hath declared his Will to the Church and his peculiar People Reason is that Candle of the Lord of which Solomon speaks Prov. 20. 27. That Light whereby Christ hath enlightned every one that cometh into the World John 1. 9. And that Law whereby the Consciences of the Heathen either accuse or excuse one another Rom. 2. 15. So that Hierocles spoke well when he said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To be perswaded by God and right Reason is one and the same thing And Luther called Philosophy within its own bounds The Truth of God 3. The belief of our Reason is an Exercise of Faith and Faith is an Act of Reason The former part is clear from the last Particular and we believe our Reasons because we have them from God who cannot mistake and will not deceive So that relying on them in things clearly perceived is trust in God's veracity and goodness and that is an exercise of Faith Thus Luke 12. The not belief of Reason that suggests from God's clothing the Lillies that He will provide for us is made by our Saviour a defect of Faith Vers. 28. O ye of little Faith And for the other part that Faith is an Act of Reason that is evident also For 'T is the highest Reason to believe in God revealing 4. No Principle of Reason contradicts any Articles of Faith This follows upon the whole Faith befriends Reason and Reason serves Religion and therefore they cannot clash They are both certain both the Truths of God and one Truth doth not interfere with another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Aristotle Truth agrees with all things that are Whatsoever contradicts Faith is opposite to Reason for 't is a Fundamental Principle of that That God is to be believed Indeed sometimes there is a seeming contradiction between them But then either something is taken for Faith that is but Phansie or something for Reason that is but Sophistry or the supposed contradiction is an Error and Mistake 5. When any thing is pretended from Reason against any Article of Faith we ought not to cut the Knot by denying Reason but endeavour to unite it by answering the Argument and 't is certain it may be fairly answered For all Hereticks argue either from false Principles or fallaciously conclude from true ones So that our Faith is to be defended not by declaiming against Reason in such a case which strengthens the Enemy and to the great prejudice of Religion allows Reason on his side But we must endeavour to defend it either by discovering the falshood of the Principles he useth in the name of Reason or the ill Consequence which he calls Proof 6. When any thing is offered us for an Article of Faith that seems to contradict Reason we ought to see that there be good cause to believe that this is divinely revealed and in the sense propounded If it be we may be assured from the former Aphorisms that the Contradiction is but an Appearance and it may be discovered to be so But if the Contradiction be real This can be no Article of Revelation or the Revelation hath not this sense For God cannot be the Author of Contradictions and we have seen that Reason as well as Faith is his I mean the Principles of Natural Truth as well as those of Revelation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 faith Aristotle Truth is throughout contrary to falshood and what is true in Divinity cannot be false in Reason 'T is said indeed in the Talmud If two Rabbins differ in Contradictories yet both have their Opinions from Moses and from God But we are not obliged to such an irrational kind of Faith And ought not to receive any thing as an Article of it in a sense that palpably contradicts Reason no more than we may receive any sense that contradicts the direct Scriptures Faith and Reason accord as well as the Old Testament and the New and the Analogy of Reason is to be heeded also because even that is Divine and Sacred 7. There is nothing that God hath revealed to oblige our Faith but he hath given us reason to believe that he hath revealed it For though the thing be never so clearly told me if I have not reason to think that God is the Revealer of what is so declared I am not bound to believe it except there be evidence in the thing it self For 't is not Faith but vain credulity to believe every thing that pretends to be from God So that we ought to ask our selves a Reason why we believe the Scripture to be the Revelation of God's Will and ought not to assent to any sense put upon it till we have ground to think that that sense is his mind I say we must have ground either from our particular Reasons or the Authority of the Church otherwise our Faith is vain Credulity and not Faith in God 8. A Man may hold an erroneous Opinion from a mistaken sense of Scripture and deny what is the truth of the Proposition and what is the right meaning of the Text and yet not err in Faith For Faith is a belief of God revealing And if God have not so revealed this or that as to give us certain ground to believe this to be his sense he hath not sufficiently revealed it to oblige our Faith So that though I deny such or such a sense while I believe
it is not from God his veracity and Authority is not concerned since I am ready however to give a chearful assent to what-ever is clearly and sufficiently revealed This Proposition follows from the former and must be understood only of those Doctrines that are difficult and obscurely delivered And that many things are so delivered in Scripture is certain For some are only hinted and spoken occasionally some figuratively and by way of Parable and Allegory some according to Mens Conceptions and some in Ambiguous and Aenigmatical Phrases which Obscurities may occasion mistake in those who are very ready to believe what-ever God saith and when they do I should be loth to say that such err in Faith Though those that wrest plain Texts to a compliance with their Interests and their Lusts Though their Affections may bring their Judgments to vote with them yet theirs is Error in Faith with a witness and capable of no benefit from this Proposition 9. In searching after the sense of Scripture we ought to consult the Principles of Reason as we do other Scriptures For we have shewn That Reason is another part of God's Word And though the Scripture be sufficient for its own end yet Reason must be presupposed unto it for without this Scripture cannot be used nor compared nor applied nor understood 10. The Essentials of Religion are so plainly revealed that no Man can miss them that hath not a mighty corrupt bias in his Will and Affections to infatuate and blind his Vnderstanding Those Essentials are contained in the Decalogue and the Creed Many speculative remoter Doctrines may be true but not Fundamental For 't is not agreeable to the goodness or justice of God that Mens eternal Interests should depend upon things that are difficult to be understood and easily mistaken If they did No Man could be secure but that do what he could he should perish everlastingly for not believing or believing amiss some of those difficult Points that are supposed necessary to Salvation and all those that are ignorant and of weak understanding must perish without help or they must be saved by implicit Faith in unknown Fundamentals THESE are some Propositions that follow from my Discourse and from one another The better they are considered the more their force will be perceived and I think they may serve for many very considerable purposes of Religion Charity and the peace of Mankind ANd now as a Conclusion to the whole I shall add some Considerations of the dangerous tendency of the common practice at least among the Sects of declaiming against Reason as an Enemy to Religion 1. It tends to the introduction of Atheism Infidelity and Scepticism and hath already brought in a flood of these upon us For what advantage can the Atheist and Infidel expect greater than this That Reason is against Religion What do they pretend What can they propose more If so there will be no proving That there is a God or That the Scripture is his Word and then we believe gratis and our Faith hangs upon Humour and Imagination and that Religion that depends upon a warm Phansie and an ungrounded belief stands but till a Disease or a new Conceit alter the Scene of Imagination and then down falls the Castle whose Foundation was in the Air. 'T was the charge of Julian the Apostate against the Primitive Christians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That their Wisdom was to believe as if they had no ground for their Faith And those that renounce and decry Reason justifie Julian in his Charge If this be so Religion will have no bottom but the Phansie of every one that professeth it and how various and inconstant a thing Imagination is every Man knows These are the Consequences of defamations of Reason on the pretended account of Religion and we have seen in multitudes of deplorable Instances That they follow in practice as well as reasoning Men of corrupt inclinations suspect that there is no Reason for our Faith and Religion and so are upon the borders of quitting it And the Enthusiast that pretends to know Religion best tells them that these Suspicions are very true and thence the Debauchee gladly makes the desperate Conclusion Or at least when they hear that Reason is uncertain various and fallacious they deny all credit to their Faculties and become confounded Scepticks that settle in nothing This I take to have been one of the greatest and most deadly occasions of the Atheism of our days and he that hath rejected Reason may be one when he pleaseth and cannot reprehend or reduce any one that is so already 2. The denial of Reason in Religion hath been the principal Engine that Hereticks and Enthusiasts have used against the Faith and that which lays us open to infinite follies and impostures Thus the Arrians quarrelled with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because it was deduced by consequence but not expressed in Scripture The Apollinarists would by no means allow of Reason And St. Austin saith of the Donatists that they did calumniate and decry It to raise prejudice against the Catholick Faith and elsewhere Doctores vestri Hominem dialecticum fugiendum potius cavendum quà m refellendum censuerunt The Vbiquitarians defend their Errors by denying the judgment of Reason and the Macedonians would not have the Deity of the Holy Ghost proved by Consequence The later Enthusiasts in Germany and other places set up loud and vehement out-cries against Reason and the Lunaticks among us that agree in nothing else do yet sweetly accord in opposing this Carnal Reason and this indeed is their common Interest The impostures of Mens Phansies must not be seen in too much light and we cannot dream with our eyes open Reason would discover the nakedness of Sacred Whimsies and the vanity of Mysterious Non-sense This would disparage the Darlings of the Brain and cool the pleasant heats of kindled Imagination And therefore Reason must be decryed because an enemy to madness and Phansie set up under the Notion of Faith and Inspiration Hence Men had got the trick to call every thing that was Consequent and Reasonable Vain Philosophy and every thing that was Sober Carnal Reasoning Religion is set so far above Reason that at length it is put beyond Sobriety and Sense and then 't was fit to be believed when 't was impossible to be proved or understood The way to be a Christian is first to be a Brute and to be a true Believer in this Divinity is to be fit for Bedlam Men have been taught to put out their eyes that they might see and to hoodwink themselves that they might avoid the Precipices Thus have all Extravagancies been brought into Religion beyond the Imaginations of a Fever and the Conceits of Midnight Whatever is phansied is certain and whatever is vehement is Sacred every thing must be believed that is dream'd and every thing that is absurd is a Mystery And by this way Men in our days have been prepared to swallow
whose Genius and Ways are so unlike him But the other excellent Souls I describ'd will as certainly be visited by the Divine Presence and Converse as the Chrystaline Streams are with the Beams of Light or the fitly prepared Earth whose Seed is in it self will be actuated by the Spirit of Nature So that there is no reason to Object here the want of Angelical Communications though there were none vouchsafed us since good Men enjoy the Divine which are infinitely more satisfactory and indearing And now I may have leave to proceed to the next Objection which may be made to speak thus XII XII THe belief of Witches and the wonderful things they are said to perform by the help of the Confederate Daemon weakens our Faith and exposeth the World to Infidelity in the great Matters of our Religion For if they by Diabolical Assistance can inflict and cure Diseases and do things so much beyond the comprehension of our Philosophy and activity of common Nature What assurance can we have that the Miracles that confirm our Gospel were not the Effects of a Compact of like nature and that Devils were not cast out by Beelzebub If Evil Spirits can assume Bodies and render themselves visible in humane Likeness What security can we have of the reality of the Resurrection of Christ And if by their help Witches can enter Chambers invisibly through Key-holes and little unperceived Crannies and transform themselves at pleasure What Arguments of Divinity are there in our Saviour's shewing himself in the midst of his Disciples when the Doors were shut and his Transfiguration in the Mount Miracles are the great Inducements of Belief and how shall we distinguish a Miracle from a Lying Wonder a Testimony from Heaven from a Trick of the Angels of Hell if they can perform things that astonish and confound our Reasons and are beyond all the Possibilities of Humane Nature To this Objection I reply 1. The Wonders done by Confederacy with Wicked Spirits cannot derive a suspition upon the undoubted Miracles that were wrought by the Author and Promulgers of our Religion as if they were performed by Diabolical Compact since their Spirit Endeavours and Designs were notoriously contrary to all the Tendencies Aims and Interests of the Kingdom of Darkness For as to the Life and Temper of the Blessed and Adorable JESUS we know there was an incomparable sweetness in his Nature Humility in his Manners Calmness in his Temper Compassion in his Miracles Modesty in his Expressions Holiness in all his Actions Hatred of Vice and Baseness and Love to all the World all which are essentially contrary to the Nature and Constitution of Apostate Spirits who abound in Pride and Rancour Insolence and Rudeness Tyranny and Baseness Universal Malice and Hatred of Men And their Designs are as opposite as their Spirit and their Genius And now Can the Sun borrow its Light from the Bottomless Abyss Can Heat and Warmth flow in upon the World from the Regions of Snow and Ice Can Fire freeze and Water burn Can Natures so infinitely contrary communicate and jump in Projects that are destructive to each others known Interests Is there any Balsam in the Cockatrices Egg or Can the Spirit of Life flow from the Venom of the Asp Will the Prince of Darkness strengthen the Arm that is stretcht out to pluck his Usurp't Scepter and his Spoils from him And will he lend his Legions to assist the Armies of his Enemy against him No these are impossible Supposals No intelligent Being will industriously and knowingly contribute to the Contradiction of its own Principles the Defeature of its Purposes and the Ruine of its own dearest Interests There is no fear then that our Faith should receive prejudice from the acknowledgement of the Being of Witches and Power of Evil Spirits since 't is not the doing wonderful things that is the only Evidence that the Holy JESUS was from God and his Doctrine True but the conjunction of other Circumstances the Holiness of his Life the Reasonableness of his Religion and the Excellency of his Designs added credit to his Works and strengthned the great Conclusion That he could be no other than the Son of God and Saviour of the World But besides I say 2. That since Infinite Wisdom and Goodness rules the World it cannot be conceiv'd that they should give up the greatest part of Men to unavoidable deception And if Evil Angels by their Confederates are permitted to perform such astonishing things as seem so evidently to carry God's Seal and Power with them for the confirmation of Falshoods and gaining credit to Impostors without any Counter-evidence to disabuse the World Mankind is exposed to sad and fatal Delusion And to say that Providence will suffer us to be deceived in things of the greatest Concernment when we use the best of our Care and Endeavours to prevent it is to speak hard things of God and in effect to affirm That He hath nothing to do in the Government of the World or doth not concern himself in the Affairs of poor forlorn Men And if the Providence and Goodness of God be not a security unto us against such Deceptions we cannot be assured but that we are always abused by those mischievous Agents in the Objects of plain Sense and in all the Matters of our daily Converses If One that pretends he is immediately sent from God to overthrow the Ancient Fabrick of Established Worship and to erect a New Religion in His Name shall be born of a Virgin and honoured by a Miraculous Star proclaimed by a Song of seeming Angels of Light and Worshipped by the Wise Sages of the World Revered by those of the greatest Austerity and admired by all for a Miraculous Wisdom beyond his Education and his Years If He shall feed Multitudes with almost nothing and fast himself beyond all the possibilities of Nature If He shall be transformed into the appearance of extraordinory Glory and converse with departed Prophets in their visible Forms If He shall Cure all Diseases without Physick or Endeavour and raise the Dead to Life after they have stunk in their Graves If He shall be honoured by Voices from Heaven and attract the Universal Wonder of Princes and People If he shall allay Tempests with a Beck and cast out Devils with a Word If he shall foretel his own Death particularly with its Tragical Circumstances and his Resurrection after it If the Veil of the most famous Temple in the World shall be Rent and the Sun darkned at his Funeral If He shall within the time foretold break the Bonds of Death and lift up his Head out of the Grave If Multitudes of other departed Souls shall arise with Him to attend at the Solemnity of his Resurrection If He shall after Death visibly Converse and Eat and Drink with divers Persons who could not be deceived in a Matter of clear Sense and ascend in Glory in the presence of an astonisht and admiring Multitude I
complained to his Wife That he thought he was haunted She apprehending it as an extravagancy of Fancy but he told her he believed there was more in it and was resolved to try He did not long want opportunity There was a Neighbour of his grievously afflicted with the Kings-Evil He stroked her and the Effect fucceeded And for about a twelve-month together he pretended to cure no other Distemper But then the Ague being very rife in the Neighbourhood the same Impulse after the same manner spoke within him I have given thee the Gift of curing the Ague and meeting with Persons in their Fits and taking them by the Hand or laying his Hand upon their Breasts the Ague left them About half a year after the accustomed Impulfe became more general and suggested to him I have given thee the Gift of Healing and then he attempted all Diseases indifferently And though he saw strange Effects yet he doubted whether the Cause were any Vertue that came from him or the Peoples fancy To convince him of his incredulity as he lay one night in Bed one of his Hands was struck dead and the usual Impulse suggested to him to make tryal of his Vertue upon himself which he did stroking it with his other hand and then it immediately returned to its former liveliness This was repeated two or three Nights or Mornings together This is his Relation and I believe there is so much sincerity in the Person that he tells no more than what he believes to be true To say that this Impulse too was but a result of his temper and that it is but like Dreams that are usually according to Mens Constitutions doth not seem a probable account of the Phaenomenon Perhaps some may think it more likely that some Genius who understood the Sanative Vertue of his Complexion and the readiness of his Mind and ability of his Body to put it in execution might give him notice of that which otherwise might have been for ever unknown to him and so the Gift of God had been to no purpose This is my Learned and Reverend Friend's Relation I shall say no more about it but this That many of those Matters of Fact have been since critically inspected and examined by several sagacious and wary Persons of the Royal Society and other Very Learned and Judicious Men whom we may suppose as unlikely to be deceived by a contrived Imposture as any others whatsoever I Have now done with my Considerations on this Subject which I could wish were less seasonable and necessary than I have reason to believe they are But alas we live in an Age wherein Atheism is begun in Sadducism And those that dare not bluntly say There is no God content themselves for a fair step and Introduction to deny there are Spirits or Witches Which sort of Insidels though they are not so ordinary among the meer Vulgar yet are they numerous in a little higher rank of Understandings And those that know any thing of the World know That most of the small Pretenders to Wit are generally deriders of the belief of Witches and Apparitions Which were it only a slight or meer speculative Mistake I should not trouble my self or them about it But I fear this Error hath a Core in it worse than Heresie And therefore how little soever I care what Men believe or teach in Matters of Opinion I think I have reason to be concern'd in an Affair that toucheth so near upon the greatest Interests of Religion And really I am astonisht sometimes to think into what a kind of Age we are fallen in which some of the greatest Impieties are accounted but Buggs and terrible Names Invisible Tittles Piccadillo's or Chimera's The sad and greatest Instances are Secriledge â—…ellton and â—…hcrast For the two former there are a sort of Men that are far from being profest Enemies to Religion who I do not know whether they own any such Vices We find no mention of them in their most particular Confessions nâ—…r have I observed them in those Sermons that have contained the largest Catalogues of the Sins of our Age and Nation 'T were dangerous to speak of them as Sins for fean who should be found guilty But my Business at present is not with these but the other Witchcraft which I am sure was a Sin of Elder Times and how comes it about that our Age which so much out-does them in all other kinds of Wickedness should be wholly innocent in this That there may be Witches and Apparitions in our days notwithstanding the Objections of the Modern Sadduce I believe I have made appear in the foregoing Considerations in which I did not primarily intend direct Proof but Defence Against which if it should be Objected That I have for the most part used only Supposals and conjectural Things in the vindication of the Common Belief and speak with no point-blank assurance in my particular Answers as I do in the General Conclusion I need only say That the Proposition I defend is Matter of Fact which the Disbelievers impugne by alledging That it cannot be or it is not likely In return to which if I shew how those things may be and probable notwithstanding their Allegations though I say not down-right that they are in the particular way I offer yet 't is enough for the Design of Defence though not for that of Proof for when one saith a thing cannot be and I tell him how possibly it may though I hit not the just manner of it I yet defeat the Objection against it and make way for the evidence of the thing de Facto But after all this I must confess there is one Argument against me which is not to be dealt with viz. A mighty Confidence grounded upon nothing that swaggers and Huffs and swears there are no Witches For such Philosophers as these let them enjoy the Opinion of their own Superlative Judgments and enter me in the first rank of Fools for crediting my Senses and those of all the World before their sworn Dictates If they will believe in Scott Habbs and Osborne and think them more infallible than the Sacred Oracles the History of all Ages and the full experience of our own who can help it They must not be contradicted and they are resolved not to be perswaded For this sort of Men I never go about to convince them of any thing If I can avoid it I throw nothing before them lest they should turn again and rend me Their Opinions came into their Heads by chance when their little Reasons had no notice of their entrance and they must be let alone to go out again of themselves the fame way they entred Therefore not to make much noise to disturb these infallible Huffers and they cannot hear a little for their own I softly step along leaving them to believe what they think I have only this further to add That I appear thus much concerned for the justification of the belief of
Countenance He had on a long Robe of Purple Silk and a kind of Turban on his Head of the same colour which had a Star of Gold wrought on it worn just before He imbraced me with much affection expressing great satisfaction in the opportunity of entertaining me alone He enquired after the welfare of our People and whether we wanted any Accommodation either for our Whole or Sick I bowed with a low reverence and answer'd That we wanted nothing but an occasion to speak our acknowledgments of the Bounty and Humanity of that blessed Place and particularly to express how much we were oblidg'd to his Lordships generous favours He replyed smiling That Complements were not in use in Bensalem and taking me by the hand he led me into an handsome square Chamber wainscotted with Cedar which fill'd the Room with a very grateful odour It was richly painted gilt and full of Inscriptions in Letters of Gold He sate him down on a Couch of Green Velvet and made me take my place by him After some more particular inquiry into the condition of our Sick of whom I gave him an account he told me That the Father of Solomon's House commanded him to acquaint me with the state of Religion in Bensalem as himself had with the condition of Philosophy there and that he would have done this too but that the urgent Business of the Publick State which lay upon him would not afford him time I rose up at these words and answered with a low submission That I knew not in what terms to express my sense of the Father's Condescention and Goodness and that his excellent Relation of the state of Philosophy and its ways of improvement in that Kingdom had inflamed me with desire to know what I might concerning the Affairs of its Religion since the so miraculous plantation of Christianity in it And particularly Whether it had kept its ancient Purity and Simplicity in that Realm which was lost in most other places This Question replyed He making me sit down again by him I shall fully answer in the things I have to say to you and having paused a little to settle his Thoughts he began his Narrative in this manner AFTER the Conversion of this Land by the Evangelism of St. Bartholomew of which you have heard Religion underwent some Revolutions that I shall not mention But take my ground from the last which hapned no very long time since For the understanding which you must know That upon the South-West of this place in the unknown Ocean also lies an Island famous for the rise it gave to a very spreading Sect in Religion From this unfortunate Country came certain Zealous Persons hither that pretended to extraordinary Illuminations and to more purity strictness and Spirituality than other Christians They taught That our Rites and Government were Superstitious and Anti-christian That we wanted Pure Ordinances and Gospel-Worship That our Good Works and Christian Vertues were nothing worth That the best of our People were but Formalists and meer moral Men That our Priests were uninlightned strangers to the Power of Godliness and Mysteries of Religion and that there was a necessity of a thorow Godly Reformation of our Government and Worship The Men at first were only gazed upon by our People as strange Persons But at length by the vehemence of their Zeal and glory of their Pretences they began to make impression on some who had more Affection than Judgment By them and the continuance of their own restless Importunities they wrought upon others And in process of time and endeavour through the secret Judgment and Permission of God prevail'd so far that the great Body of the People especially of those that were of warm and Enthusiastick Tempers was leaven'd more or less with their Spirit and Doctrines Here he stopt a little and then said 'T is wonderful to consider how some Ages and Times are dispos'd to changes some to one sort of alteration and some to another In this Age one Sect and Genius spreads like Infection as if the publick Air were poisoned with it and again in that those same Doctrines and Fancies will not thrive at all but die in the hands of their Teachers while a contrary or very different sort flies and prevails mightily There is something extraordinary in this the contemplation of which would be noble Exercise but not for our present purpose 'T is enough to note That the Age at the coming of those Seducers hither was inclined to Innovation and to such particular sorts of it So that in few years the generality of the Zealous and less considerate were tainted with those new and gay Notions And so pâ—…ssest they were with the conceit of the divineness and necessity of their Fancies and Models that they despised and vilified the Ecclesiastical Government and Governors and vehemently assaulted our most excellent SALOMONA the King of this Realm with continual Petitions and Addresses to establish them by Law and to change the whole Constitution of Religion in complyance with their Imaginations But he was a Wise and Religious Prince He saw the folly and danger of such Alterations and endeavour'd by all the ways of Lenity and Goodness to allay the heat of their unreasonable Prosecutions But they being the more emboldned by this moderate Course and provoked by the little inclination the good King shew'd to their New Models broke out after some less violent struglings into down-right Rebellion which after many Revolutions too long to be mention'd now succeeded so far at last that the Pious Prince was depos'd and murder'd the Government usurp'd by the prevailing Tyrants And not to mention the disorders of the Civil State that follow'd the Ecclesiastical was most miserable For now all the Sects that have a Name in History in any part of the known World started up in this Church as if they had all been transplanted hither They arose as it were out of the Earth which seem'd to bring forth nothing but Monsters full grown at their Birth with Weapons in their hands ready for Battel and accordingly they fell one upon another with strange rage and fierceness For having torn and destroyed the Ancient Doctrine and Government every one contended to set up its own and to have its beloved Opinions and Models entertain'd and worship'd as the infallible Truths and Ways of God So that all places were fill'd with New Lights and those Lights were so many Wild-Fires that put all into Combustion We saw nothing of Religion but glaring Appearances and Contention about the Shells and Shadows of it It seem'd to run out wholly into Chaff and Straw into Disputes and Vain Notions which were not only unprofitable but destructive to Charity Peace and every pious Practice All was Controversie and Dissention full of Animosity and Bitterness For though they agreed in some common Falshoods and Follies yet that made no Vnion every dissent in smallest Matters was ground enough for a Quarrel and Separation
in their Thoughts By reading they rendred their Understandings full and by Meditation they kept that fulness from being disorderly and confus'd Being thus prepared They addrest themselves to the more close particular and thorow study of Divinity They thought it not enough to read a few Systems and bundles of Novel Opinions to understand the current Orthodoxy of the Times or to gain the faculty of speaking to the People in the taking Tâ—… and Phrase â—…hings that made up the Divines of that Age But enquired into the state of Religion in former days They read the Histories of the Church and applyed themselves to a careful perusal of the Fathers of the three first Centuries In them they looked for the Doctrine and Practices that were in the beginning They consider'd that Religion was most pure in those Primitive Times of Holiness and Matyrdom and that by knowing what was the belief and use then they might be enabled to judge better of the more Modern Ways and Opinions That though other Knowledge grew and was much advanced by Time yet Divinity was in its perfectoon in the days of the Apostles and nearest Ages to them and had still been degenerating more or less in following Times That it was therefore best to enquire after the old Ways and to take the Measures of Faith and Practice from Primitive Doctrine and Vsage and accordingly they endeavoured to form theirs They convers'd with the Works of your Excellent Writers whom I mention'd and other Learned Men whom Providence raised about that Season to direct the World to those eldest best Patterns They read also the Histories and observ'd the growth of Sects They examin'd the Books of the chief reputed Hereticks and consider'd the Arguments where-with they endeavour'd to establish their Opinions They descended even to the Wild Scribbles and Contentions of the several Parties in our distracted Land They acquainted themselves thoroughly with their Spirit Principles Phrases and ways of Reasoning as judging that none could deal effectually in the exposing and confuting any Sect but those who well understood it Besides all this They directed their Studies many of them to the Jewish Learning That they might be instructed in the Rites Opinions and Usages of that People for the better understanding of many things in the Scripture that relate unto them They enquired into the Reasonableness of the great Principles of Religion and particularly of the Christian and provided themselves thereby to deal with Atheists Infidels and Enthusiasts with which that Age abounded I could say much more but this is enough to shew that these Men were qualified to do something in the World Here I interrupted the Relation a little and said That it seem'd to me that such Preparations should have taken up the better part of their Lives and not have left much time for Action He answer'd That Diligence Meditation and a right Method of Studies would go very far and do mighty Matters in an indifferent Time and that he who knew the shortest cut and went constantly on would pass over a considerable Desart in a few days while another that loyter'd or was ignorant of the way might wander all his Life in it to little purpose That those Men took the direct Course and had the best Guides the choice Books of all sorts one anothers excellent Company and improving Converse That they spent no unprofitable time among the Voluminous Triflers and in the confused Rubbish of Learning That they went straight on towards their end without diverting to bie and impertinent Matters They that made even their most common Conversations to serve them in their study of Humane Nature the Inclinations and Passions of Men And even the wildness and humours of Sects afforded them instruction in the nature of Enthusiasm and Superstitions of all kinds So that their Understandings and Observations were advanced far while their years were not many and they had the happy Conjunction of the Judgment of Ripe Age with the vigour of Youth I bowed to declare my satisfaction and He went on IT will be time now after the Discourse of their Preparations to let you know what they did and what were the Effects of these promising beginnings This I shall do By representing 1. Some things that were more general 2. Their particular Endeavours in the Affairs of Religion 3. A more full account of their Genius and Thoughts in some main Parts of Learning I BEGIN with their more General Actions and Declarations of their Thoughts ONe of the first things they did was to deliver their own Minds and to endeavour the same for others from the Prepossessions and Prejudices of Complexion Education and implicit Authority Asserting the Liberty of Enquiry and thereby freeing their Reasons from a base and dishonourable Servitude and vindicating this just Right of Humane Nature For though they knew That Green Youth and Vulgar Inquirers ought not pragmatically to call their Teachers to account for their Doctrines or to venture upon deep Speculations without assistance Yet they thought that Men who were bred in the way of Study had first submisly heard the Opinions of their Instructors and been well acquainted with their Dictates who were arriv'd to maturity of Understanding and a good capacity to seek after Truth might at length be permitted to judge for themselves that so they might choose like reasonable Creatures and not have their Principles brutishly obtruded on them This they saw was a natural Right and that the Tyrannical Custom of over-ruling and suppressing it had held the greatest part of Mankind in fatal Chains of Ignorance and Error Here I say They begun and taught That all lovers of Truth whose Judgements were competently matur'd ought to free their Minds from the Prejudices of Education and usurping Authorities that is so far as not to conclude any thing certainly true or false meerly on the account of those Impressions But to try all things as Scripture and Reason require and incourage us and to suspend the giving up our full and resolv'd assent to the Doctrines we have been taught till we have impartially consider'd and examin'd them our selves That in our Researches we ought to retain a Reverence for Antiquity and venerable Names but not blindly to give up our Understandings to them against clear Evidence of the Divine Oracles or Impartial Reason That when other Considerations on both sides were equal the Inducements of old Belief and reverend Authorities ought to determine us to a probable assent on that side But when God's Word or our Faculties stood on the other we ought not to be enclin'd Thus they modestly asserted the Liberty of Judgment and bounded it with so much Caution that no Prejudice could arise to Legal Establishments from that freedom For they allow'd it not to immature Youth or to illiterate or injudicious Men who are not to be trusted to conclude for themselves in things of difficult Theory But advised such to submit to their Instructors and so practise
the plain things they are taught without busie intermedling in Speculative Opinions and things beyond their reach Such a Liberty of Judgment as this they taught and such was necessary for the Age in which the Minds of Men were inthrall'd by the Masters of Sects and the Opinions then stil'd Orthodox from which it was accounted Heresie and Damnatiou to recede So that nothing could be done to set them at large from those vain Fancies and Ways till they were perswaded to examine them with freedom and indifference and to conclude according to the Report of their Faculties They knew That Truth would have the advantage could it but procure an impartial Tryal That the False Doctrines and Fanatical Practices of the Times would be detected and sham'd were it not for the superstitious straightness that supprest all Enquiry and that those Old Truths that were exploded with so much abhorrence would in all likelyhood gain upon the Judgments and Assents of all that were free and durst to be inquisitive On such accounts they prest the Liberty of Judgment and in a time when it was very seasonable and no hurt could directly arise from it Since 2. They taught and urged much modesty together with it and allow'd not Dogmatical Affirmations but in things that were most fundamental and certain They consider'd That our Understandings at best are very weak and that the search of Truth is difficult that we are very liable to be imposed on by our Complexions Imaginations Interests and Affections That whole Ages and great Kingdoms and Christian Churches and Learned Counsels have joyn'd in Common Errors and obtruded false and absurd Conceits upon the World with great severity and flaming Zeal That much Folly and great Non-sense have many times generally obtain'd and been held for certain and Sacred That all Mankind are puzled and bafled in the disquisition of the seeming plainest and most obvious things In the Objects of Sense and Motions of our own Souls That in earnest we cannot tell How we speak a Word or move a Finger How the Soul is united to the Body or the Parts of Bodies to one another how our own were framed at first or how afterwards they are nourish'd That these nearest things and a thousand more are hid from our deepest Enquiries Thus they consider'd often and fill'd their Thoughts with a great sense of the narrowness of humane Capacity and the Imperfections of our largest Knowledge which they used not to any purposes of unwarrantable Scepticism or absolute neutrality of Judgement but to ingage their Minds to a greater wariness in Enquiry and more shiness of Assent to things not very clear and evident to more reservedness in their Affirmations and more modesty in their Arguings After this manner they practised themselves and thus they discours'd to others and nothing could be more proper for those times in which everyone almost was immoderately confident of his own way and thereby rendred insolent in his Dictates and incurable in his Errors scornful to opposite Judgments and ready to quarrel all Dissenters So that the World was hereby fill'd with Animosity and Clamours whereas modesty in Opinions would have prevented those Mischiefs and it was taught by those Men as the likelyest way of Cure For there is no hopes either of Truth or Peace while every one of the divided thinks himself infallible But when they come to grant a possibility of their being out in their Beloved Tenents there is something then to work upon towards their better Information But 3. there was still less danger in the Liberty they promoted for as much as they practised and perswaded much prudence to be us'd in the publishing of their Tenents They allowed not any declaration of private Sentiments when such a Declaration might tend to the disgrace or dissettlement of Legal Appointments or any Articles of the Establish'd Religion provided there were no Idolatry or direct Heresie in the things injoin'd But believ'd and taught That Men ought to content themselves with their own Satisfactions in the Supposed Truths they have discover'd without clamorous Disputes or Wranglings And though in the large compass of Enquiry they took and the Considerations they had of all sorts of Idaea's that enter into the various Minds of thinking Men it could not be but that they should have several Apprehensions different from vulgar Thoughts Yet they were very cautious in discovering their Conceptions among the illiterate and unqualified They had no delight in speaking strange things or in appearing to be singular and extraordinary They were not so fond of their own Opinions as to think them necessary for all others Nor were they infected with the Common Zeal to spread and propagate every Truth they thought they knew No they consider'd there were Truths which the World would not bear and that some of the greatest would be receiv'd here with the bitterest contempt and derision So that to publish would be but to expose them to popular scorn and themselves also Their main Design was to make Men good not notional and knowing and therefore though they conceal'd no practical Verities that were proper and seasonable yet they were sparing in their Speculations except where they tended to the necessary vindication of the Honour of God or the directing the Lives of Men They spoke of other Matters of Notion only among their known Friends and such as were well prepar'd able to examine and dispos'd to pardon or receive them Among these they discours'd the greatest freest Speculations with as much liberty in their Words as in their Thoughts and though they differ'd in many Notions yet those Differences did nothing but serve the pleasure of Conversation and exercise of Reasoning They begot no estrangements or distasts no noise or trouble abroad Such was the prudence that They practised and taught and this also was very proper for those Times when every Man vented his Conceits for Articles of Faith and told his Dreams for Revelations and then pretended he was extraordinarily enlightned and strove to make Proselites and quarrel'd with all that did not embrace his Fancies and separated from the Communion of the Church and endeavour'd to involve the World in Hurries and Distractions and all this for the sake of a few pittiful needless sensless Trifles In such a time this prudent Spirit and Practice was singularly seasonable and useful But though they were thus cauteous and wary about Theories more remote and not necessary yet they were not altogether indifferent to what Men believ'd and thought No They were concern'd and zealous against the Fanatick Conceits and Humours of the Age which were the occasions of so much Folly Irregularity and Disturbance And my next Business is to declare in some great Instances how they demeaned Themselves in opposing of them This was the second thing I undertook to relate namely Their particular endeavours in the Affairs of Religion But before I fall on it I must declare to you That They had not any
Religion different from that of other Catholick Christians but were faithful adherers to the old acknowledg'd Christianity as it was taught by the Church of Bensalem To this Church they conform'd heartily though they were distinguishable from some others of her Sons by the application of their Genius and Endeavours I have told you They grew up among the Sects They were Born and Bred in that Age which they could not help But as they order'd the Matter it was no hurt to the Church or them that they were educated in bad times They had the occasion thence of understanding the Genius Humour and Principles of the Parties which those that stood always at distance from them could not so thorowly and inwardly know By that means they had great advantage for providing and applying the Remedies and Confutations that were proper and effectual And by daily Converse and near Observation they setled in their Minds a dislike of those ways that was greater and juster than the Antipathy of some others who saw only their out-sides that in many things were specious and plausible They studied in the Places where some of the chief of the Sects govern'd and those that were ripe for the Service preach'd publickly as other Academical Divines did This they scrupled not because they were young and had been under no explicit ingagements to those Laws that were then unhappily over-ruled But in those and in their other Vniversity-Exercises they much serv'd the Interest of the Church of Bensalem by undermining the Ataxites so the Sectaries are here call'd and propagating the Anti-fanatical Doctrines which they had entertain'd and improved So that I cannot look upon that Spirit otherwise than as an Antidote that Providence then seasonably provided against the deadly Infection of those days On which account they were by some call'd the Anti-fanites because of their peculiar opposition of the Fans or Fanites as the Ataxites were sometimes named And though some Persons thought fit to judge and spoke of Them as a new Sort of Divines Yet they were not to be so accounted in any sense of disparagement since the new Things they taught were but contradictions of the new Things that were introduced and new Errors and Pretences will occasion new ways of Opposition and Defence I have now I doubt said the Governor almost tired you with prefacing but these things were fit to be premised I exprest my self well-pleased both with the Matters he related and the order which he thought convenient to declare them in and so he proceeded to the second main Head Their particular Principles and Practices I MUST tell you then said He first That they took notice of the loud Out-cries and Declamations that were among all the Sects against Reason and observ'd how by that means all Vanities and Phanatick Devices were brought into Religion They saw There was no likelyhood any stop should be put to those Extravagancies of Fansie that were impudently obtruding themselves upon the World but by vindicating and asserting the use of Reason in Religion and therefore their private Discourses and publick Exercises ran much this way to maintain the sober use of our Faculties and to expose and shame all vain Enthusiasms And as Socrates of old first began the Reformation of his Age and reduced Men from the wildness of Fansie and Enthusiastick Fegaries with which they were overgrown by pleading for Reason and shewing the necessity and Religion that there is in hearkning to its Dictates So They in order to the cure of the madness of their Age were zealous to make Men sensible That Reason is a Branch and Beam of the Divine Wisdom That Light which he hath put into our Minds and that Law which he hath writ upon our Hearts That the Revelations of God in Scripture do not contradict what he hath engraven upon our Natures That Faith it self is an Act of Reason and is built upon these two Reasonable Principles That there is a God and That what he saith is true That our Erroneous Deductions are not to be call'd Reason but Sophistry Ignorance and Mistake That nothing can follow from Reason but Reason and that what so follows is as true and certain as Revelation That God never disparageth Reason in Scripture but that the vain Philosophy and Wisdom of this World there spoken against were Worldly Policies Jewish Genealogies Traditions and the Notional Philosophy of some Gentiles That Carnal Reason is the Reason of Appetite and Passion and not the Dictates of our Minds That Reason proves some Main and Fundamental Articles of Faith and defends all by proving the Authority of Holy Scripture That we have no cause to take any thing for an Article of Faith till we see Reason to believe that God said it and in the sense wherein we receive such a Doctrine That to decry and disgrace Reason is to strike up Religion by the Roots and to prepare the World for Atheism According to such Principles as these They managed their Discourses about this Subject They stated the Notions of Faith and Reason clearly and endeavour'd to deliver the Minds of Men from that confusedness in those Matters which blind Zeal had brought upon them that so they might not call Vain Sophistry by the name of Humane Reason and rail at this for the sake of Fallacy and the Impostures of Ignorance and Fancy Hereby they made some amends for the dangerous rashness of those inconsiderate Men who having heard others defame Reason as an Enemy to Faith set up the same Cry and fill'd their Oratories with the terrible noise of Carnal Reason Vain Philosophy and such other misapplyed words of reproach without having ever clearly or distinctly consider'd what they said or whereof they affirm'd And this they did too at a time when the World was posting a-pace into all kinds of madness as if they were afraid the half-distracted Religionists would not run fast enough out of their Wits without their Encouragement and Assistance And as if their Design had been to credit Phrensie and Enthusiasm and to disable all proof that could be brought against them This I believe many of those well-meaning Canters against Reason did not think of though what they did had a direct tendency that way And accordingly it succeeded For the conceited People hearing much of Incomes Illuminations Communions Lights Discoveries Sealings Manifestations and Impressions as the Heights of Religion and then being told that Reason is a low Carnal Thing and not to judge in these Spiritual Matters That it is a Stranger to them and at enmity with the Things of God I say the People that were so taught could not chuse but be taken with the wild Exstatical Enthusiasts who made the greatest boasts of these glorious Priviledges nor could they easily avoid looking upon the glarings of their own Imaginations and the warmths and impulses of their Melancholy as Divine Revelations and Illapses To this dangerous pass thousands were brought by such Preachments and had so
well learn'd to apply the Doctrines they had been taught that he that should endeavour to undeceive them was sure to hear what an Enemy this Reason this Carnal Reason this Vain Philosophy was to Free Grace and Faith and how little able to judge of those Rich those Precious those Spiritual Enjoyments 'T was time now in such an Age as this to assert the sober use of Reason and to rescue Religion by it And They did this happily and shamed all false pretences to the Spirit shewing That there was nothing but Nature and Complexion in the Illuminations Incomes Raptures Prophesies New Lights fluency of Expression mysteriousness of Phrase and other wonderful things of the Enthusiasts which were ignorantly taken to be Divine Communications to the great abuse of Religion and the Souls of Men Perceiving I say that this dangerous Phanatick Spirit was the evil Genius of the Age they bent all their force against it and detected the imposture and labour'd zealously to disabuse the credulous People who were exceeding apt to be taken with such glorious Nothings But of this I shall have another occasion to speak more ANd because the wildness of Enthusiasm and reproaches of Reason had expos'd Christianity it self to the Suspicions of some and Contempts of others as if it were a precarious unreasonable thing that depended only upon Mens Fancies Therefore here They labour'd also with very pious pains to demonstrate the Truth and Reasonableness of the Christian Religion The Beeing of God The Immortality of Humane Souls And Authority of Scripture which they did with much Zeal and much Judgment And these Doctrines were too seasonable and necessary in that Age in which the most glorious Professors laid the whole stress of Religion upon Fancies and thereby undermin'd the Foundations of Faith and Truth and by many Vanities and endless Divisions had made so many Infidels and unhappily dispos'd so many others to go the same way Against these therefore They bent their strength and rescued multitudes especially those of the springing Generation from the hands both of the Enthusiast and the Infidel Answering and discrediting all the new Pretensions and Objections both of the one and the other And their Endeavours here were very needful because the Ancient Books of those kinds were despis'd and neglected by the concern'd Parties and they were not so suitable to the Guize and Fashion of our Age and many Exceptions were started a-new and many other vain things boasted of to which those elder Discourses did not apply their force But these new Defenders of the Christian Truths met them all and spake the things that were suitable as well as those that were strong and true By these means the reasonable sober Spirit began to propagate and the Enthusiast who took notice of it and knew it would destroy his Glorious Imaginations rais'd a loud clamour against these Men as Socinians and advancers of Proud Reason above Free Grace and Faith From this envious and foolish Charge they sufficiently justified themselves by several Sermons and publick Determinations in their Academical Solemnities against the chief Principles of Socinianism sirenously asserting the Deity of Christ and Immortality of Humane Souls c. and vigorously opposing the main Socinian Tenents In consequence of which they shew'd the sure and safe ways to destroy those Opinions without hurting the Catholick Doctrines which many had wounded to do them spight and in this Design some of them appeared in publick with great success HAving thus asserted the Honour of our Faculties and maintain'd the Fundamental Interests of Religion They took notice what unworthy and dishonourable Opinions were publish'd abroad concerning God to the disparagement of all his Attributes and discouragement of vertuous Endeavours and great trouble and dejection of many pious Minds and therefore here they appear'd also to assert and vindicate the Divine Goodness and love of Men in its freedom and extent against those Doctrines that made his Love Fondness and his Justice Cruelty and represented God as the Eternal Hater of the far greatest part of his reasonable Creatures and the designer of their Ruine for the exaltation of meer Power and arbitrary Will Against these sowr and dismal Opinions They stood up stoutly in a time when the Assertors of the Divine Purity and Goodness were persecuted bitterly with nick-names of Reproach and popular Hatred They gave sober Accounts of the Nature of God and his Attributes suitable to those Declarations of himself he hath made by the Scriptures and our Reasons They shew'd continually how impossible it was that Infinite Goodness should design or delight in the misery of his Creatures That God never acts by meer arbitrary Will but by a Will directed by the Perfections of his Nature That to act arbitrarily is Imperfection and Impotence That he is tyed by the excellency of his Beeing to the Laws of Right and Just and that there are independent Relations of True and Good among things antecedent to all Will and Vnderstanding which are indispensible and eternal That Goodness is the Fountain of all his Communications and Actions ad extra That to glorifie God is rightly to apprehend and celebrate his Perfections by our Words and by our Actions That Goodness is the chief moral Perfection That Power without Goodness is Tyranny and Wisdom without it is but Craft and Subtilty and Justice Cruelty when destitute of Goodness That God is not pleased with our Praises otherwise than as they are the suitable Actings of his Creatures and tend to make them love him in order to their being happy in him By such Principles as These which are wonderfully fertile and big of many great Truths they undermined and from the bottom overthrew the fierce and churlish Reprobatarian Doctrines And those Truths they proved from the Scripture and the Nature of God and Reason of Things with all possible clearness and strength of Evidence OBserving further That Faith was preach'd up as the whole of Religion and that represented variously phantastickly and after an unintelligible manner drest up in Metaphors and Phrases and dangerous Notions that prescinded it from Good Works and made them unnecessary Here they appeared also and detected the vanity and canting of this Airy Divinity Stating the Notion of Faith plainly and clearly and stripping it out of its Chymerical cloathing Teaching That Faith in the general is the Belief of a Proposition affirm'd and Divine Faith the belief of a Divine Testimony and Evangelical Saving Faith such a Belief as works on the Will and Affections and produceth the Works of Righteousness So that the Faith that is said to justifie in the forensick sense is a complex thing and takes in an Holy Life and all the Graces of the Spirit which are call'd by the name of Faith because that is the Root of all the rest Thus they asserted the necessity of a real inward Righteousness against the Solifidian and Antinomian Heresies which had poison'd the whole Body of the then Current
of his affirmations and the strange effects of his distemper others are perswaded into the same vain opinion of him that he hath of himself to the great disparagement of Religion and deception of the simple This whole mystery of vanity and delusion They lay'd open to the World and shew'd that all was but a natural disease and far enough from being sacred or supernatural That very evil Men and even the Heathen Priests have felt all those effects and pretended to the same wonderâ—… and were as much inspired and divinely acted as those exstatical Dreamers 5. And whereas those high flown Enthusiasts talk'd much of mysteries and the Sects generally contending which should out-do the other here made up their schemes of divinity of absurdities and strange unintelligible fancies and then counted their groundless belief of those wild freaks a great sign and exercise of Faith and spirituality The Divines of whom I am speaking imploy'd themselves worthily to detect this taking imposture also They gave the true senses in in which the Gospel is a mystery viz. A secret hid in the councils of God and not discoverable by reason or humane enquiries till he was pleased in the fulness of time to unfold it clearly and explicitly by his Son and by his Spirit who revealed the mystery that had been hid from ages That Religion may yet be call'd a mystery as it is an Art that hath difficulty in the practice of it And though all it 's main necessary Articles are asserted so clearly that they may be known by every sincere Inquirer and in that respect have no darkness or obscurity upon them Yet They asserted that some of those propositions may be styled mysterious being inconceiveable as to the manner of them Thus the Immaculate Conception of our Saviour for instance is very plain as to the thing being reveal'd clearly That it was Though unexplicable and unreveal'd as to the mode How They said That our Faith is not concern'd in the manner which way this or that is except where it is expressly and plainly taught in Scripture but that the belief of the simple Article is sufficient So that we are not to puzzle our selves with contradictions and knots of subtilty and fancy and then call them by the name of mysteries That to affect these is dangerous vanity and to believe them is silliness and credulity That by and on the occasion of such pretended mysteries The simplicity of the Gospel hath been destroy'd the minds of Men infatuated sober Christians despis'd the peace of the Church disturb'd the honour of Religion expos'd the practice of holiness and vertue neglected and the World dispos'd to Infidelity and Atheism it self 6. And since the being Orthodox in Doctrine and sound in their new concâ—…ed Faith was in those times a great matter and one mark of Saint-ship as errour on the other hand was of unregeneracy and Reprobation They shew'd That bare knowledge of points of Doctrine was nothing worth in comparison of Charity Humility and Meckness That it did not signify in the divine esteem without these and such other concomitant Graces That a man was never the better for being in the right opinion if he were proud contentious and ungovernable with it That ignorance and mistake in lesser things when joyn'd with modesty and submission to God and our Governours was much to be prefer'd before empty turbulent and conceited Orthodoxy That errors of judgment are truly infirmities that will not be imputed if there be no corrupt and vicious mixture with them That they are not hurt to him whom they do not seduce and mislead nor do they make any alteration in our state That God pardons them in us and we ought to overlook and pass them by in one another By such ways and representations as these They disabl'd the main works wherby the fond Ataxites concluded themselves to be the Godly and destroy'd the chief grounds on which they built their proudest pretences So that their wings being clipt they came down to the ordinary level with other mortals leaving the title of Godliness and Saint-ship to be made out by quiet devotion and self-government by Meekness and Charity Justice and Patience Modesty and Humility Vniversal Obedience to Gods Commands Reverence to Superiours and Submission to Governours and not by the other fantastical and cheap things consisting but of imaginations and phrases and mystical nothings ANd for as much as each Sect confin'd the Church Saintship and Godliness to it self and entail'd the Promises and Priviledges of the Gospel upon it's own People Therefore here They stood up and reprov'd the Anti-christian pride and vanity of that cruel and unjust humour Shewing That the Church consists of all those that agree in the profession and acknowledgment of the Scripture and the first comprehensive plain Creeds however scatter'd through the World and distinguish'd by names of Nations and Parties under various degrees of light and divers particular models and forms of Worship as to circumstance and order That every lover of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity who lives according to the few great acknowledg'd Doctrines and Rules of a vertuous and holy life is a true Christian and will be happy though he be ignorant of many points that some reckon for Articles of Faith and err in some which others account sacred and fundamental By which Catholick principle foundation is lay'd for universal Charity and Union and would Christian men be perswaded to govern themselves according to it all unnecessary Schisms and Separations would be prevented and those Hatreds and Animosities cur'd that arise from lesser disagreements AGain whereas as the Ataxites had made Religion a fantastick and unintelligible thing as I have told you and drest it up in an odd mumming and ridiculous disguise Those Divines labour'd much to reduce it to it 's native plainness and simplicity purging it from sensless phrases conceited mysteries and unnecessary words of Art Laying down the genuine notions of Theology and all things relating to Faith or Practice with all possible perspicuity and plainness By which means many scandals were remov'd and vain disputes discredited divisions stop'd Religious practice promoted and the peace of the Church at last establish'd They told the Ataxites that though they talk'd much of closing with Christ getting in to Christ rolling upon Christ relying upon Christ and having an interest in Christ and made silly people believe that there was something of Divine Mystery or extraordinary spirituality under the sound of these words That yet in good earnest either they understood not what they said and mean'd nothing at all by them or else the sense of them was but believing Christ's Doctrines obeying his Laws and depending upon his Promises plain and known things They shew'd that all the other singular phrases which they us'd and which the people were so taken with were either non-sense and falsehood or but some very common and ordinary matter at the bottom That
they had generally silly and fantastick conceptions of Free Grace Gospel-liberty Saving knowledge Pure Ordinances The motions of the Spirit Workings of Corruption Powerful preaching Liberty of Conscience Illuminations and Indwellings That their Admirers generally talk'd those words by rote without knowing the meaning of them and that the Teachers themselves understood them in a false and erroneous sense That bating such words and the talk of Outgoings Incommings Givings-in Dawnings Refinings Withdrawings and other Metaphors there was nothing extraordinary in their whole Divinity but the non-sense and absurdities of it Thus They declar'd freely against the Gibberish of that Age and stated the right Notion of those points of Religion which the others had so transformed and abused FUrther Whereas the Sects kept up loud cryes against the Church of Bensalem as guilty of Superstition Will-worship undue Impositions and Persecution They took them to task here also and declar'd That Superstition in the properest sense of it imports An over-timerous and dreadful apprehension of God which presents him as rigid and apt to be angry on the one hand and as easie to be pleas'd with flattering devotions on the other so that Superstition works two wayes viz. by begetting fears of things in which there is no hurt and fondness of such as have no good in them on both which accounts they declar'd the Ataxites to be some of the most superstitious people in the World They shew'd That their dreadful notions of God which represented him as one that by peremptory unavoidable decrees had bound over the greatest part of men to everlasting Torments without any consideration of their sin only to shew the absoluteness of his power over them I say They declar'd that those black thoughts of Him were the Fountain of numerous superstitions That their causless fears of the innocent Rites and usages of the Church of Bensalem which were only matters of order and decency appointed by the Governours of the Church and not pretending any thing in particular to divine Institution was very gross and silly superstition That they were very superstitious in being afraid and bogling at prescribed Forms of Prayer kneeling at the holy Sacrament the Cross in Baptism and the like becomming and decent Institutions That 't was Ignorance and Superstition to fly off with such dread from a few injoyn'd Ceremonies because forsooth they were symbolical and significant That the Ceremonies that are not so are vain and impertinent That the Ruling Powers may appoint such for the visible instruction and edification of the People and for the more reverence and solemnity of Worship That the current principle among them That Nothing is to be done in the Worship of God but what is particularly commanded and prescribed in Scripture is a foolish groundless conceit and the occasion of many Superstitions That though this is always pretended and said yet it was never proved That to observe the Church in such appointments without any opinion of their antecedent necessity is a due act of obedience to it But to fly from them as sinful and Anti-christian is great Superstition These things they declar'd and prov'd against the negative Superstitions of Taste not Touch not handle not And They shew'd also how justly chargeable the Ataxites were with many Positive ones in that they doated upon little needless foolish things and lay'd a great stress of Religion upon them That the keeping such stir about pretended Orthodox opinions and the placing them in their Creeds among the most sacred and fundamental Doctrines was a dangerous and mischievous Superstition That it was very superstitious to dignify private conceits or uncertain tenents with the style of Gospel-light Gods Truths precious Truths and the like expressions of admiration and fondness That to intitle the Spirit of God to the effects of our imaginations and the motions of natural passions was Superstition and that so was the opinion of the necessity and spirituality of suddain conceiv'd prayer That there was much Superstition in their Idolizing their particular ways of Worship and models of Discipline as the pure Ordinances and Christs Government and Scripture Rules And that in these and many other respects they that talk'd so much against Superstition were themselves most notoriously guilty of it As to Will-worship They taught after your most learned Hammondus That the Apostle in the only place where it is mention'd Col. 2. doth not speak of it in an evil sense But that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports a free and unconstrain'd worship which is the more acceptable for being so That Sacrifices before the Law Free-will-offerings under it The feasts of Purim and Dedication Davids design of building the Temple the Austerities of the Rechabites and St. Paul's refusing hire for his labour among the Corinthians were of this sort That men are not to be blamed for Will-worship except they would impose it without Authority as necessary That when they thus teach for Doctrines their own Traditions and grow so proud and conceited with them as to separate from the publick Communion upon the fancy that they are more pure and holy then others That this their Will-worship is sinful and Pharisaical which was the case of the Ataxites who therefore were Will-worshippers in the evil sense But the Anti-fanites shewed that the pious Institutions of just Authority were no way lyable to any such imputation That such might impose particular Circumstances and Decencies and that those Impositions were no way contrary to Gospel Liberty That that was only Freedom from the Jewish yoke from the bondage of sin and power of Sathan not Liberty from the Injunctions and Appointments of Civil or Ecclesiastical Governours That all or the chief power of these conconsisted in fixing and appointing circumstances of order and decorum that were left undetermined and not prescrib'd in Scripture That if they may not do this they are in a manner useless That the Church of Bensalem impos'd nothing that was grievous or prohibited They minded the Ataxites that themselves were great Imposers That they imposed Oaths and Ceremonies in that part of Religious Worship a form of words the lifting up of the hand and That they would have impos'd numerous doubtful and false opinions to have been subscrib'd as a necessary Confession of Faith making thereby their own private tenents of equal moment and certainty with the great fundamental Articles which is proper imposing upon the Conscience That they would not by any means allow Liberty of Conscience when they were in power that this then was the great Abomination and the most accursed thing in the world That they persecuted the Bensalemites for their Consciences with wonderful inhumanity That when other power is taken from them they are grievous persecutors with their Tongues and are continually shooting the Arrows of bitter scornful words against all that are of different judgment Thus Those Divines disabled all the charges and pretences of the Fanites and turn'd the points and edge upon themselves And
solid edifying and useful And indeed things were come to that pass in Bensalem that there was scarce any other use made of Preaching but to pass judgments upon the Preacher and the Sermon which was not only undertaken by the people of Age and Experience or by those only of better education and more advanc'd knowledge But every Age and every condition was thought fit to judge here every Youth and Ignorant every Rustick and Mechanick would pass absolute and definitive sentence in this matter Accordingly the most empty and fantastical Preachers were generally the most popular And those that dealt most in jingles and chiming of words in Metaphors and vulgar similitudes in Fanatick Phrases and Fanciful schemes of speech set off by pleasing smiles and melting Tones by loudness and vehemency These were sure to be the taking precious men though their discourses were never so trifling and ridiculous But the Divines whom I describe were no admirers of this ill-gotten and ill-grounded Fame They had no ambition to be cry'd up by the common Herd nor any design to court their applauses They car'd not for their favour or kind thoughts further than those afforded advantage and opportunity for the doing of them good This they consider'd as the end of their Ministry and this they made the Rule and Measure of their Preaching which I shall describe to you under these following Characters 1. It was Plain both in opposition to First Obscurity and Secondly Affectation First They preach'd no dark or obscure notions For though their thoughts were conversant about the deepest Theories both in Philosophy and Religion yet they knew that such were not fit for Pulpits or common hearers They had no design to make themselves admir'd by soaring into the Clouds Their great aim was the edification and instruction of those to whom they spoke and therefore they were so far from preaching the heights of speculation That they usually avoided as much as they could all the Controversies of Religion in which the Essentials of Faith and Practice were not concern'd And when either of these call'd for discourse of Doctrinal matters their great care was to be understood For secondly They did not involve their discourses in needless words of Art or subtile distinctions but spoke in the plainest and most intelligible Terms and distinguish'd things in the most easie and familiar manner that the matter of discourse would bear They took this for an establish'd Rule That unwonted words were never to be us'd either in Pulpits or elsewhere when common ones would as fitly represent their meaning and they always chose such as the custom of speaking had rendred familiar in the Subjects on which they spoke when those were proper and expressive And though many sorts of thoughts and Subjects cannot be made obvious to the meer vulgar yet they endeavour'd to render such as were out of the common road of thinking clear and plain to those that are capable of the matters they were to express Thirdly They did not trouble their hearers with pretended Mysteries They led them not into the dark places of Daniel and the Revelations nor fed them thence with their own imaginations under pretence of secret and hidden Truths No they taught them from the plain Texts and Doctrines of the Holy Writings and gave them the sincere milk of the Word without any mixture of elaborate fancies or mystical vanities Fourthly They slighted and avoided all canting Fanatick Phrases which were so much the Mode of those times For They saw they did but please with their sound without conveying any sense into the minds of those that were so much delighted with them So that the pretended plain preaching of those days was really not at all understood nor as much as intelligible Therefore instead of such phrases They us'd the most proper and natural expressions and such as most easily opened the mind to the things they taught I do but slightly mention these particulars here said the Governour because I have spoken of them before in my larger accounts of these men And so he went to the second thing mentioned viz. 1. The plainness of their preaching in opposition to Affectation Now the usual affectations of Preachers said he relate either to Learning Wit or Zeal from all which They were very free For first They affected not to ostentate Learning by high-flown expressions or ends of Greek and Latine They did not stuff their Sermons with numerous needless Quotations or flourish them with the names of great Authors ways to be admired by the Vulgar and despised by the Wise No their Learning was not shewn in such cheap trifles as these but it abundantly appear'd to the intelligent by the judgement and strength the reason and clearness with which they spoke Secondly They despis'd the small essays of appearing witty in their Sermons They us'd no jingling of words nor inventions of sentences no odd fetches of observation or niceness in labour'd periods They affected no gayness of metaphors or prettiness of similitudes no tricks to be plaid with the words of their Texts or any other of the conceited sorts of fooling but spoke with seriousness and gravity as became the Oracles of God and shew'd their wit in the smartness and edge of the things they deliver'd without vanity or trifling Thirdly They did not put on fantastical shews and appearances of affected zeal They us'd no set Tones or clamorous noise no violent or Apish actions They spoke with a well-govern'd affectionateness and concerment and such as shew'd they were in earnest and very sensible of the weight of the affairs they were about But without any thing of indecency or extravagance And now said He after what I have mention'd under this first Head I may spare my pains of speaking much under the rest that follow and therefore I shall be brief on them II. Those Divines were methodical in their preaching not that they were nice in running their Texts into all the minute divisions of words or formal in tying themselves just to one order on all Subjects But they divided their matter into the substantial parts of Discourse or resolv'd it into some main Proposition and so treated of their subject in the method that was natural to it and most beneficial for the people they were to instruct They went not on in a cryptick undiscover'd order on the one hand nor did they spin out their matter into numerous coincident particulars on the other But made their Method very easie and obvious and their Heads few and very distinct which is helpful both to the understandings and memories of the hearers III. Their preaching was Practical For though they taught all the great substantial principles of Religion yet still they directed them to Practice and laid the main stress on that According to the saying of our Blessed Lord If ye know these things blessed are ye if ye do them They taught the true practical Divinity without whimsies and Romantick strains and laid