will add that if there be no principles in Nature to check Scepticism the principles of Revelation can never do it for without presupposing both that our Senses Reasons do not universally deceive us we can have no assurance that there is any such thing as a Supernatural Revelation at all I would not say that the Cartesians are Scepticks but I say they owe it not to the principles of their Philosophy that they are not so Supposing us once to disband lay by and to take for false all that we have imbib'd from Education or otherwise embraced I would fain know where we can begin and upon what foundation we can superstruct Science They who propose it as a Principle that we are to doubt of every thing ought in pursuance of their Hypothesis to suspect those very principles with they lay down for Certain If there be not some principles incontestable and beyond the precincts of being gainsayed it is not to be imagined but that we should be endlesly bewildred and entangled in a perpetual and inextricable maze According to this new Hypothesis no man can be sure that there are any Material effects or Beings in the World for we can have no other Certainty of the Existence of Corporeal Beings but by their affecting the Organs of Sensation and of this according to the principles of Des-Cartes there is no assurance can be obtained For 1. How can I be certain that there are any impressions made by forraign Objects upon the Fibres and Nerves seeing all may be but meer Phancy and Imagination 2. How shall I be ascertain'd that those impulses upon the Nerves which we ascribe to outward Objects are not begotten and caused by the Malus Genius we just now heard of And as I must in pursuance of this Principle abide in a perpetual Suspension of Mind whether there be any Material Beings in the World so I can no ways be assur'd from any effects which I observe in the Universe either that they have a second Cause at all or which particularly is their Cause not the latter seeing God may produce the like effects by different Causes not the former because whatsoever is brought forth by the ministry of second Causes may be produced immediately by God himself I will only subjoyn that if there be any Truth in this Cartesian Notion no man can be assured of his own Cogitation or whether he doth cogitate at all For we cannot otherwise know that we do know but by a latter reflex act of the Mind upon the former and of this I can have no certainty seeing I am not sure whether the Act I reflect upon were elicited by the mind it self or only an impression begotten in me by some powerful and malicious Guest which doth continually haunt us I am not ignorant of the restrictions limitations and expositions with some Cartesians give of the fore-going Principle but upon an examination of what is alledged against it by Gassendus Schoockius Daniel Voetius Vogelsangius and others and what is pleaded in justification of it by Claubergius De Bruin c. as well as Des-Cartes himself I must needs say that all the Cartesian plea's in behalf of it do either overthrow what themselves would establish and contradict what they endeavour to obtrude or that they are wholly weak and impotent But I am not without thoughts of discoursing this more largely some other time and therefore shall at present supersede the further prosecution of it The Second Cartesian principle which I impeach as disserviceable to Religion is this That whatsoever we have a clear and distinct perception of is infallibly true and that we are no ways longer to doubt of it This they make the only test of discerning and distinguishing Truth from Falsehood Nor do they allow any other Measure or Standard of discriminating betwixt Verity and Errour If we should be deceived in these things which we have clear and distinct perceptions of God himself saith Des-Cartes would be Fallax Deceptor horresco referens and all our Errours and Mistakes must be attributed to him Unless the Cartesians be infallible in what ever they imagine themselves to have a distinct perception and cognizance of God must be cease to be Good and True and must undergoe the blame of all their hallucinations I do the rather touch on this Cartesian Axiom because I not only find it introduced into Divinity by some Outlandish Writers but by some Modern Theologues at home particularly by the Author of Deus Justificatus Nor will it be amiss a little to enquire into it as well upon the account of its being erected by the Cartesians for the first and only principle of all Certainty and Science as upon the Score of the bad effects it is like to have upon the minds of men in Matters of Religion Now the meaning and sense of this Theoreme must either be this That whatever we apprehend and perceive as it is it infallibly is so and our perception of it is true But then according to this paraphrase of it there cannot be a more nugatory and ridiculous proposition form'd for it is as much as if we should say what we have a true cognizance of that we have a true cognizance of and what is truly known by us that we do truly know But this cannot be the meaning which the Cartesians intend by it for as much as they make the clearness and distinctness of perception the Rule by which we ought to judge of the Existence of Objects and things For according to them our perceptions are not therefore clear and true because of their congruity to the Objects about which our minds are conversant but on the contrary they determine concerning the Object from the clearness and distinctness of our perception The sense therefore of this Cartesian Axiom if it have any at all and be not perfect non-sense must be this namely That every thing really is as we perceive it provided our perception of it be clear and distinct That those Idea's of things which offer themselves to our Minds by clear and distinct perceptions are infallibly the true idea's of the Natures and properties of the things themselves Now admitting this to be the sense of it I affirm it to be the most silly fallacious and lubricous principle that ever men pretending to Philosophy laid down I shall wave that Medium that there may be clearness and distinctness of perception in acts of simple apprehension and consequently that whatsoever we clearly and distinctly perceive is not true because Acts of simple Apprehension are not capable of verity This I say I shall decline the urging of seeing I judge both Verity and Falsity to obtaâ—n in all the operations of the Mind For Verity being nothing else but the conformity of the Act to the Object there is as well an Incomplex Verity in acts of simple Apprehension as there is a Complex Verity in Acts of Judgment I may as well
what they please without running the hazard of being contradicted 2. Because finding themselves unable to justifie what they would obtrude upon the World unless it be in a Dramatick Drolling way they think it fit under the plea of dislike to a pugnacious disputing humour to except against all Logical and Scholastical Methods of treating things as knowing the weapons they are sure to be foiled at Did they only disallow quarrelling about Opinions which neither serve to render us sounder Christians nor better men and which were both at first commenced and are still maintain'd out of interest or did they only impeach the fetching of Topicks from Aristotle or Aquinas and the arguing with the same confidence from the Decretals as from the four Evangelists I should highly commend both their Wisdom and Zeal But while what-ever crosseth Socinus or Pelagius is immediatly branded as vain and empty speculations and Pauls Epistles are censured with little less modesty than they arraign the Writings of the School-men I must suppose them engaged in a design against the Gospel which they are not willing as yet publickly to own If they account that I impose upon them in this matter I shall upon the least intimation direct them to the Authors I aim at and the places whence I derived my information But in the mean time out of respect both to the interest of Religion and their Reputation I shall forbear The second is their arraigning Words Phrases and modes of speech wherein what they dislike is intended Hence are their Clamours concerning Metaphors even against such as the Holy Ghost condescendeth to use in order to the instructing us as well of our State as Duty Where the authority and credit of Men is meerly concerned I love not to quarrel with any about Terms and expressions further than as they have an Influence upon things and providing I were at an agreement with them in the latter I should as well give as claym a great liberty in the former But when both the Wisdom of God stands impeached and under the palliation of quarrelling with Terms Phrases the chief Doctrines of the Gospel are supplanted it then becomes the Duty of those who have a Zeal for his Honour and the Truth once delivered to the Saints to declare their resentment The unfolding the Nature Import and Use of Scripture Metaphors as it is in it self a laudable undertaking so there are two things which at present render it needful and expedient 1. The vindication of the Non-Conformists who are publickly charged for turning Religion into unaccountable Phansies and Enthusiasm's drest up with empty Schemes of speech and for embracing a few gawdy Metaphors Allegories instead of the substance of true and real Righteousness So that if you will believe a late Authour herein lyes the Material difference between the sober Christians of the Church of England and the Modern Sectaries that while those express the precepts Duties of the Gospel in plain and intelligible Terms these trifle them away by childish Metaphors and Allegories and will not talk of Religion but in barbarous and uncouth Similitudes And as another expresseth it That the mystery of Phanaticism consists in the wresting Metaphorical and Allusive expressions to a proper sense And as the former person phraseth it Abusing Scripture expressions not only without but in contradiction to their sense 2. The defence and vindication of the Doctrines of the Gospel many of which are undermined under the pretence of renouncing luscious and fulsome Metaphors Thus the Immediat Union of Believers to Christ is disclaimed as being built only upon Metaphors perversely sensed our spiritual impotency and inability to Good is contended against as being inferred from a Mis-understanding of that Metaphorical expression viz. Our being dead in Trespasses and Sins Our being meerly passive in the first communication of grace to us or Regeneration is likewise indicted as a falsity built upon a mistake of the meaning of our being Created to good Works which is a Metaphorical phrase It were endless to recount the many Doctrines which the Church of Christ hath in all ages been in the persuasion and belief of that are by this new artifice of crying out Luscious and rampant Metaphors subverted and overthrown The due stating therefore the Nature and import of Metaphors is become not only a seasonable but a necessary piece of Service I can very well allow that in Philosophy where the Quality and Nature of things do not transcend and over-match words the less Rhetorical ornaments especially the fewer Metaphors providing still that the phrase be pure and easie the better But in Divinity where no expressions come fully up to Mysteries of Faith and where the things themselves are not capable of being declared in Logical and Metaphysical Terms Metaphors may not only be allowed but are most accommodated to the assisting us in our conceptions of Gospel-mysteries § 2. But before I proceed further on this subject there are some few things which I desire to premise whereof the first is this The Holy Ghost in giving forth the Scripture hath usurped no Words Tropes Phrases Figures or Modes of speech but what are proportioned to his End namely the instructing us in Faith and Obedience To think otherwise is either to impeach his Wisdom as if he knew not what forms of speech in order to such an End were best to declare himself in or else his Goodness in not vouchsafing to speak to us in those terms which he knew to be most adapted to promote our knowledge of the Things which he had made it our duty to be acquainted with The Scripture stile can neither in the whole nor in any part of it be reflected upon without offering reproach to God who as well guided the sacred Amanuenses in the words and expressions they revealed things in as in the things themselves they did reveal The 2 d. is this that the Bible is replenished and adorned with all sort of figurative expressions There are hardly any Tropes or Figures in Rhetorick of which numerous Examples do not occurr in the Holy Writ Some Tropes confer a grandeur others an elegancy to the stile where they are met with and some reconcile an easiness to the things that are treated of Now among other Rhetorical Tropes to be found in the Bible I hardly know any of which we have more examples than of Metaphors in which God by similitudes borrowed from known and obvious things intimates to us the usefullest and sublimest Truths In such kind of phrases he condescends to lisp those Mysteries to us which would never be so well understood by any other way of expressing them Now though in this case we not only may but ought to call such to an account who abuse Scripture-Metaphors to a perverse sense yet we must always preserve the reputation of the Metaphor it self How tender in this Matter some late Authors have been we shall afterwards more largely declare I shall at
being many things interwoven which have no relation to the main scope but serve only as a Landskip to fill up a Table but it is the principal strokes that we are to observe and thereby to accommodate the design of the first part of the Parable to illustrate the second And where this is duely attained Parables are no less argumentative than plain and express Scripture-Testimonies nor do they only decipher illustrate and explain but demonstrate and prove Another Form of speech to which Metaphors have an Allyance is that which we call an Allegory 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if we regard the Etymology of the Word is so stiled because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it imports one thing in the signification of the Terms taken absolutely and abstractedly and intends another as they lye in such a texture and in a habitude to what precedes and what follows The Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 occuri's no where in Aristotle says Gerh. Vossius Plutarch tells us that what we call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the more ancient Writers stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Rhetorical Allegory is nothing but the Continuation of a Trope viz. of a Metonymie or a Synecdoche but most frequently of a Metaphor Of such Allegories the Scripture is replenished and forasmuch as no Text hath any more than one determinate sense otherwise it could have no sense at all the literal sense of such places is to be derived from the Words in their Figurative use as they are placed in such a texture and habitude and introduced by the Holy Ghost to such an End That which looks first forth in an Allegorick Scripture or what the words import in their immediate and proper signification is not the literal meaning of it but the Literal sense is that which ariseth only mediately from the words and immediately from the things with their affections adjuncts and properties which the words in their original signification do denote Whatsoever the Words in the scope and design of the Spirit according to their Tropical Import manifest that and nothing else is the Literal meaning of such a place For where the Words of the Text are Tropical and Allegorick there is no way of assigning any literal sense of them but with regard and in Analogy to the Trope They who will allow no other Literal sense of any place but what the Words in their proper immediate and original signification imply may be easily reduced to confess that many Texts have either no Literal sense at all or else an Absurd False or Blasphemous one Now besides this Rhetorical Allegory there is another kind of Allegory owned and acknowledged by Divines and that is when though the words bear a Proper sense which ought to be sacredly observed in our exposition of them yet they may be withall translated from their plain Natural sense to a Spiritual Mystical one An instance we have of this Gal. 4.24 c. compared with Gen. 16. and Gen. 21. As lkewise 1 Cor. 9.9 compared with Deut. 25.4 not to mention more Now in order to our demeaning our selves wisely in this Matter we are 1. to be careful that the proper and original sense of the Words be not neglected There have been those and yet are who will hardly allow any Text of Scripture a Proper sense but do every where obtrude an Allegorick meaning as if that alone were intended by the Holy Ghost and nothing else But such kind of Expositors do in effect little less than undermine the whole Scripture betray Religion and turn the Sacred Oracles into Burlesque Nor is there any Notion so Romantick which the Scripture by a luxuriant phansie may not at this â—ate be wrested and debauched to give countenance to yea a very small measure of Wit will serve to pervert the plainest Scripture-Testimonies to quite another sense than was ever intended by the Writer of them An Instance of this we have in the Quakers who by turning the whole Scripture into Allusions have wrested the Revelations of the Word to justifie their own wilde Phantasm's and fram'd the Words of Scripture 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to their own private Notions and thereby evacuated the sublimest Doctrines and most Glorious Actions into empty Metaphors and vain Similitudes Thus the person of Christ is Allegorised into themselves and the Birth Death Resurrection and Assention of our Saviour are construed after the manner of Aesops or Philostratus's Fables into useful Morals as if they were intended only to declare what is to be done in us by way of allusion But let them all such persons of what Communion and persuasion soever they are who turn the Gospel thus into a Romance and subvert the Mysteries of Faith by transforming them in Phantastick Allegories be treated with the derision and contempt of all who pretend to Wisdom and Modesty 2. We are not to imagine that every Text of Scripture besides it Proper Literal and Original sense is to have a Spiritual and Mystical one affixed to it Particularly neither Moral Precepts nor Texts recording Promises Comminations or declaring Doctrines of Faith are to be drawn to an Allegorick sense 3. It is necessary in our Allegorising of Scripture that we have a particular regard to the Analogy of Faith and that we press it to give Countenance to no Doctrine or Tenet by way of Allusion but what hath foundation and warranty in some plain Text else-where We are not to frame Hypotheses to our selves that are no where either 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in so many Letters and Syllables nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the sense and import in the Bible and then to Allegorise the Scripture in proof and confirmation of them 4. There must be a proportion and Similitude between the things themselves whereof the one is applyed to ground illustrate manifest and support the other Nor must the Analogy be strained and far fetched but obvious and pertinent Much less must we superstruct any Doctrine upon Allusions how accomodated soever unless where the Holy Ghost hath preceded us as in some cases he hath Where God himself hath informed us that though such a passage was originally and principally spoken of one thing that yet he intended to signifie some other thing by it there we may with safety build but no where else Yet I am not without ground to think that many of those Old Testament Texts which are supposed to be Allegorically applyed in the New are only alluded to upon the account of some similitude in the things themselves and that there was not any antecedent designation of them by the Spirit of God to intimate the things which they are applyed to For as there are many passages in the Old Testament which though in their Immediate signification and meaning they relate to Persons Things and Actions that then were yet so that those Persons Things and Actions were solemnly designed ordained and instituted to prefigure Christ and the things belonging to his Kingdom
For as Aristotle says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Truth is always at peace with Truth be they of what nature or kind soever Therefore where the imposing a proper sense upon any Scripture Words or Phrases will obtrude upon us any Dogme or practice repugnant to the Rational Faculty that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or to principles of natural Light there we are to substitute a tropical one Forasmuch then as the interpreting those Texts of Scripture to a proper sense which attribute Eyes Hands Feet c. To God were to superstruct a Doctrine upon the Foundation of the Prophets and Apostles that is repugnant to the common notices which we have by the light of Reason of the nature of God therefore all such phrases must be acknowledged to be metaphorical The like judgment is to be made of all those Scriptures wherein the names and affections of brute Beasts are attributed to Men the things immediately and originally signified by those words and names lying in a direct contradiction to rational Natures Upon the same account must that phrase Mat. 8.28 Let the Dead bury the Dead be acknowledged to contain as an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the entire proposition so a metaphor in the first Term Dead There are innumerable Instances more of this Nature namely where we are compelled to recurr to a Metaphorick sense upon the account of the inconsistency of a proper one with principles of Philosophy and Maximes of Reason Now as these are the lights and measures of discerning when a Scripture is to be interpreted in a proper sense and when not for whatever Rules besides are assigned to this purpose they may be reduced to one of these so I know none more regardful of them in the sensing and expounding of Scripture than those stiled Nonconformists are And should any of them be found to transgress in this matter it ought to be ascribed to the ignorance vanity of the particular persons that are herein criminal nor is the Party answer for it as being no ways concerned seeing the common Principles upon which they are led to dissent from the present establishment of the Church of England in its Ceremonies and Discipline have not the least influence upon them in this affair Were our adversaries impartial in their censures the excess and exorbitancy in this particular will be found to lye among themselves For if any be guilty of introducing a Mystick Theology out of Plato and Proclus and of Allegorising the Scripture according to a pretended Cabala they are the men Nor do any else that I know of make such Phantastical applications of Scripture to purposes distant from its own as those who stile themselves sons of the Church of England do But indeed 't is not truth nor zeal for God but malice and interest that sway 's some men in their discourses and Writings The Non-conformists are the persons against whom they are prejudiced and of whom they never think but with forestalled Judgments or Biassed Passions and therefore they only must be loaded both by wresting the most innocent passages in their Writings to a perverse sense and meaning and by transferring imputing to them the Fooleries of others with every thing else that may render them contemptible § 6. That there are many Figures in Scripture and that many things are spoken in Metaphorical Terms in condescension and accommodation to our Capacities that there are certain Measures by which we may distinguish between things Metaphorically and Properly spoken hath been already declared The next enquiry is by what means we may attain the true conceptions that are lock't up under Metaphors There are no Schem's of speech that are more liable to be mistaken and wrested to a perverse sense than Metaphors are The instances in which one thing may resemble another are so many and the power of Imagination so great that in nothing may a man sooner prevaricate than in expounding Metaphorical Terms and Phrases The consideration therefore as well of this as that the Non-Con-formists are particularly arraigned of abusing Scripture expressions not only without but incontradiction to their sense and of prating in Scripture Forms of speech without having any Notion of the things they signify hath prevailed with me to discourse this more particularly I take at present for granted that every Scripture-Proposition whether the Terms of it be Figurative or Proper hath a certain and determinate sense which it is designed and adapted to convey to us Every expression in the Bible as well Allegorical and Metaphorick as Proper is every way apt to instruct us in the case that 't is made use of Nor needs there any other proof of this but what is levyed from the Wisdome and Goodness of God his End in all the Forms that he speaks to us in being to teach and inform us I also suppose it beyond all suspect and debate at least among persons that are not wild and Phrantick that where the Terms are Metaphorical yet the Truths expressed by them are Real 'T is a high blasphemy against the Spirit of God to imagine the Scripture a meer dress of words employ'd about nothing As every Scripture-Phrase is intended to manifest somthing that is true and real so for the most part the noblest and most sublime Truths lye under Metaphorick expressions Metaphors are not used to impregnate our Minds with gawdy Phantasms but to adjust the Mysteries of Religion to the weakness of our Capacities I Shall not here repeat what I have elsewhere pâ—oved namely that every Text of Scripture hath a Literal sense For as that is the literal sense of a place where words are used properly which flows from their Natural and Immediate signification so the Literal sense where words are imploy'd Tropically is that which ariseth from their Figurative acceptations I also suppose it universally acknowledged at least in Words though too many depart from it in effect that we ought to conform our opinions and expositions to the sense of the Scripture and not wrest Scripture-Words to them We are not to frame to our selves Idea's of Religion and then to accommodate the Scripture to their defence and patronage This is to teach God what he should have said not to learn what he hath I shall only further Subjoin in way of Premise that in unfolding a Metaphor our Terms ought to be proper and not Metaphorical I readily grant that it is of great advantage towards the enlightning our minds in the sense of a Metaphorical Scripture to consult other Scripture passages where the same Terms are Metaphorically used especially where all things are parallel but still the meaning of the Metaphor is to be ultimately declared in Words that are Proper For Metaphors properly signifying one thing and being applyed to signify another only because of some resemblance we are therefore in our sensing of Metaphors to remove the Metaphorical Term and to substitute in its room that word which Properly signifies
THE INTEREST OF REASON in RELIGION WITH THE IMPORT USE OF Scripture-Metaphors AND The Nature of the Union Betwixt CHRIST BELIEVERS With Reflections on several Late Writings especially Mr. Sherlocks Discourse concerning the Knowledg of Jesus Christ c. Modestly enquired into and stated By Robert Ferguson Nisi homini Deus placuerit Deus non erit homo jam Deo propitius esse debebit Tertull. Apol. cap. 5. London Printed for Dorman Newman at the Kings Arms in the Poultrey and at the Ship and Anchor at the Bridg-foot on Southwark-side 1675. TO THOMAS PAPILLON Esquire SIR IT cost me no long deliberation to whom I should direct these Discourses the Obligations I am under to you and your Family rendring them yours by the Title of a just debt The Interest you have in me by an Entail of peculiar kindnesses gives you a right to my Studies the Fruits of them The declining the Imputation of Ingratitude is my plea for prefixing your Name to these Papers And though the concerning you in their behalf may seem an Injury yet not to have done it my condition in the world allowing me to make no better returns would have been a Crime You must either be more wary and have a greater fore-sight in dispensing your Favours or else you must be content to forgive such offences as your self have made the results and effects of Duty So that were there any indecency in this Address yet the Laws of Gratitude do supersede those of Congruity But indeed this Dedication is as much yours by the Rules of Proportion as by the Measures of Justice For as you have few Rivals with respect of the Qualifications required in an active Life which I forbear to make any discovery of being that which every one observes and which all your Modesty cannot conceal so you are endowed with a capacity adapted to the highest contemplations Nor is the knowledg of Aristotle's Moods and Figures together with such Technical Terms as Affectation Design rather than necessity and usefulness have introduced needful to render a person a fit judge of what is solid and Rational I more dread being arraigned at the Tribunal of brisk Reason assisted by Faith and the Spirit of Life in the New Birth than being combated even by your Philosophick Hero's with their Artificial Premises and formal Ergo's Your accomplishments are not the less commendable because you owe them entirely to your self the Idea's of your Mind and the Exercise of your own Faculties and not to the Drs. Chair and an Apprenticeship under University Readers Though I pay as high a veneration to Academick Learning as any man doth and judg Philosophy instead of being Prejudicial to Religion to be very useful both to promote Faith and Obedience in our selves and to defend the Mysteries of Christianity against the rude assaults of petulant Adversaries yet as things are commonly managed I must needs say that it hath often proved a very great Nuisance 'T is through the encumbring our Minds with insignificant Terms and idle Phantasms the deflouring our Virgin Intellects by absurd Dogm's that too many instead of commencing either solid Scholars or being prepared to be good and humble Christians come abroad into the World either Disputations Whiflers or sworn Enemies to Evangelical Grace Sir as I know but few that owe their Religion more to a Rational choyce than you do so there are also few that have distincter Notions of the Reasons why we are not able adequately to conceive the Mysteries of it and of the Reasons why we are nevertheless to believe them And if true Eloquence be to speak pertinently and to proportion words to things 't is natural to you nor need you address to the most esteemed Masters of it to learn either how to arrange a Discourse in the best Method or to adapt the Sentiments and Words by which you express them to the Subject of which you Treat And as you are furnished with more than an ordinary prudence of knowing when to be silent and with a Faculty to be so when it is better to hold ones peace than to speak so by obliging your self to say nothing but what you think there is a Grace as well as commandingness accompanies what you say and you find others favourable to what you aim at through their being possest that you are byassed by no design but meerly influenced by Love to Truth and Justice Sir there is one thing more which I must not omit as having mainly contributed to the Inscription of these sheets to you namely that while such as pretend to be more sagacious than others or who have a mind to put in a claim to no vulgar discretion pitch upon this as the Medium to support their title to both that they dare deride the Mysteries of Faith or profess themselves Scepticks in the Essential Doctrines of the Gospel or which is as bad as any of the former betray their profession by an unsuitable Life you have learned to unite Obedience to Orthodoxie to espouse the precepts of the Gospel with the same zeal that you do the Articles of the Creed The Opinions here arraigned lye as cross to your belief as they do to mine nor do I impose upon you the patronage of any thing that thwarts your perswasion only I submit to your Judgment whether I have duely encountred them and how well I have defended the Truths which they undermine Nor shall I subjoyn any more save that I am as much as I can though not so much as I ought SIR Your most faithful and Humble Servant Robert Ferguson TO THE READER HE that hath enrolled himself under the Banner of Truth needs not make any Apology for his coming into the Field when the Cause in whose defence and service he is listed calls for his appearance Whosoever consuâ—ts either his Name or his Ease when an assault is made upon the Christian Faith deserves the punishment either of a Coward in his Profession or of a Traitor to it 'T is not any Personal provocation nor any pleasure I take in controversie but meerly a regard to the Truths of the Gospel and the Interest of the Souls of men that hath engaged me in this Vndertaking If there be not strength to be encountered in the Oppositiâ—â—s of our Adversaries yet there is petulancy that ought to be rebuk'd Though I cannot bring my self to believe that Mr. Sherlock deserves a Reply yet I am very well satisfied that the Doctrines which he undermines deserve to be explain'd confirmed And as I have made this my Principal Task so I have only employ'd my self about those Truths which seem to require some further Irradiations of Light than are every where reflected upon them I have espoused the Quarrel of no Man unless you will say that by defending the common Cause of Christians I have vindicated those whose chief Crime is their adherence to the Gospel and their declaring the Mysteries of it in
words which the Holy Ghost teacheth comparing spiritual things with spiritual And as I have endeavoured to regulate all my Conceptions by Scripture and Reason so whatever Proposition shall be made appear to lye in a Repugnancy to these I am ready openly to retract it If any shall attaque these Discourses with Reviling Reproachful Language I do declare before-hand that I reckon my self superseded from Replying I will combat no man at these weapons nor do I think it a reputation 〈◊〉 any to Rail how much in Fashion soever it is though he should be able to do it in fine Language How often Mr. Sherlock hath contradicted himself and by what falsifications he hath imposed Principles on the Non-conformists which they never held how he treats the Sacred Writers with as much contempt as he doth T. W. and Burlesques the Scripture no less than others have done Virgils Poems how he hath renounced the Doctrine of the Church of England and borrowed his Glosses on the Bible as well as his Dogmatical Notions from the Socinians how Illogical he is in all his deductions and slandereth his Adversaries by undue Inferences should have been the Theme and Argument of this Preface and accordingly I had digested Materials for it but the Book being swell'd to too great a bulk already and there being others engaged against the same Author within whose Province these things must needs lye as having undertaken the arraignment of his whole Discourse I do wave the prosecution of them all at this time And shall detain the Reader no longer than to tell him that since the Printing off the first Chapter which treats of the Interest of Reason in Religion there is come to my hands a Treatise of Humane Reason in which there are many iâ—l things though as it often happens they be well said I know not an Opinion more pernicious in its Consequences than that Men may be as safe in the Event by embracing Turcism as Christianity and as secure of happiness in their Errours as others are in the Truths which they do espouse Should Persons conspire to overthrow all Revelation they could not fall upon a Method more likely to effect it than by endeavouring to persuade the World that there are things equally as strange in the Bible as in the Alcoran 'T is enough that our Reason may serve us if duely attended to and pursued to discern that this or that Religion is false nor are we therefore to be judged Innocent because we neglect the Exercise of it in making the Discovery No man can embrace a false Religion but by a Criminal Deviation from Reason and who will admit one Transgression to take Sanctuary in another That whole Treatise proceeds upon a false Hypothesis namely that as mens belief of the Scripture is owing to the conduct of Reason so they may disbelieve it by the same Guidance Corrupt Ratiocinations are recommended by the Name of Humane Reason and being once cloathed with this Livery every Foolery as well as Abomination appeals to them if not for its justification at least for its being but a Venial offence No man ceaseth to be an Offender in Morals nor doth he therefore deserve pardon because he hath the concurrence of his judgment in what he does Though no man can chuse or prosecute what his understanding continues to represent to him as Evil yet its failâ—ur in point of duty neither alters the Essential Nature of things nor makes his condition more safe for acting under the conduct of it Some men would have no restraint laid upon their Vnderstandings because they will submit to none in their lives and they would have their corrupt Ratiocinations in Doctrinals as Venial as they seem in reference to Manners to presume the gratifying of their Lusts to be 'T is to be hop'd that for the undeceiving such as are already imbu'd with the principles of it and for the preventing others from being â—ainâ—ed and inveigled some one or other will bring the whole under an Examen In the interim I shall adventure to say that 't is as weak in regard of the Reasonings which occur in it as it is pernicious in its tendency Farewell THE CONTENTS CHAP. I. Of the Interest and Use of Reason in Religion INtroduction 1. Motives influencing to the handling of this subject 2. The Import of Reason 3. What 's meant by Religion 4. The serviceableness of Reason in demonstrating the Existence of a Deity with an account of the Topicks on which it proceeds 5. It s usefulness in proving the Divinity of the Scripture with the several Media which it makes use of to this purpose 6.7 Of the Authority of the Scripture as emerging from its Divine Original 8. Our Belief of the Bibles being the Word of God Divine and Infallible seeing built upon Media that are so 9. The serviceableness of Reason in our attaining the sense and meaning of the Word with an account of the Measures which we are herein to be guided by 10. Of Scripture-Consequences and the usefulness of Reason in making the Deductions 11. What appertains to Reason in reference to Doctrines which besides the Foundation they have in Revelation have also evidence in the Light of Nature this exemplified with respect to the Immortality of the Soul and the certainty of Providence 12. The concernment of Reason in defending the whole of Religion from the Clamors and Objections of Gainsayers 13. Nothing contradictious to Right Reason to be admitted as a Mystery of Faith Many things obtruded for Principles of Reason which are not so The prejudice done Religion by mistaken Philosophy pursued and declared in various instances 14. CHAP. II. Of the Import and Use of Scripture Metaphors THe Inducements upon which some men endeavour to discharge all Disputes in and about Religion The Grounds of their Quarrelling at Metaphors with an account of the reasons of my discoursing this Theme 1. No Forms of speech used by the Holy Ghost but what are proportioned to the end for which they are made use of The Bible adorned with all sorts of Figurative Expressions Some fancy more Tropes in the Bible than there are Mr. Sherlock among others guilty of this 2. The Nature of a Metaphor what Tropes it hath affinity with the Rules and Lines by which it is distinguished from them 3. The Reason why God who doth all things according to infinite sapience hath so often adopted Metaphorical Terms to declare himself and the Things of his Kingdom in and by 4. When an Expression is to be accounted Metaphorical 5. How to attain the true conceptions that are lock't up under Metaphors 6. An Enquiry into the use of other common Metaphors with an account of their usefulness and the Measures that are to be attended to in the Vsurpation of them 7. The Non-conformists injuriously charged for their Vsage of Metaphors the Contempt thrown upon them falls often with the same weight upon the Holy Ghost None so Guilty of turning Religion into
in the Bible Nor can we Impeach the Genuine Issues of Reason without Reflection upon God who hath Endowed us with a Faculty necessarily swaying us to those Determinations The Connexion of one thing with another together with their mutual Dependencies ariseth not from the Arbitrarious Appointment and Designation of Men but is involved in the Essences of Beings and Results from the Habitudes which the Soveraign Author hath link't them in one to another Ipsa veritas Connexionum non instituta sed animadversa est ab hominibus notata ut eam possint vel discere vel docere Nam est in rerum ratione perpetua divinitus instituta August lib. 2. De Doctr. Christ. cap. 31. Might we not upon Proleptical Principles which are assented to as soon as the Terms are understood superstruct innumerable others There were no Room left for Meditation Study Ratiocination and Disputes All our Knowledge would be either Intelligence instead of Science or else we must in all things save a few Self-Evidents introduce and Establish Scepticism Were there no secondary Principles which when once deduced from self-evident Maxims we may with safety rely on we must either deny that there are any Habitudes Relations Dependencies or Oppositions betwixt one thing and an other or we must affirm the rational Faculty to be in it 's Natural Exercises universally Fallacious The indissoluble Connexion that is betwixt one thing and another transferrs the Denomination of Truth to the Acts of our Mind stiled Judgments and the Declarations of these Acts to others called Enunciations whensoever we Judge and Pronounce of things as they really are For as the Philosopher sayes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I readily grant that partly through the Weakness and Darkness which have arrested our Understandings partly through the Nature Quality Extent and Arduousness of Objects and our Inadequate Conceptions of them partly through Prepossessions Prejudices and the Bâ—as of Lusts and Passions that we are subject to partly through Supineness Sloth and Inadvertency we do often prevaricate in making Deductions and Inferences from self-evident and universal Maxims and thereupon establish Mistaken and Erroneous Consequences as Principles of Truth and Reason But then this is the Fault of Philosophers not of Philosophy or of Philosophy in the Concrete as Existing in this or that Person not in the Abstract as involving such a Mischief in it's Nature and Idea Our intellectual Faculties being vitiated tinctur'd with Lust enthralled by Predices darkned by Passions engaged by vain and corrupt Interests distorted by Pride and Self-Love and fastned to Earthly Images do often impose upon us and lead us to obtrude upon others absurd Axoms for Undoubted and Incontestable Principles of Reason It is this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Adulterate Reason which we charge for being Unfriendly to Religion And that it is not without Grounds shall be afterwards evinced For I doubt not but that I shall make it appear that the most malignant Heresies which have Infected the Church had their Foundation in Vulgar and received Axioms of Philosophy Whoever will trace the Errors which have Invaded Divinity to their Source must resolve them into absurd Maxims of Philosophy as their Chief Seminary Herein we intend not to offer any Disparagement to Reason but rather to pay it our Utmost respect by rescuing it from being accountable for every vain Imagination and false Consequence which are super-scribed with the Venerable Name of Principles of Reason § 4. Having setled the Notion of Reason we are next to fix the meaning of Religion And this is the more needfull in that men have always had the art of Baptizing their weaknesses fooleries yea blasphemies with the sacred name of Mysteries of Faith and afterwards defending them from the assaults of Reason by saying They are Mysteries against which Reason is not to be hearkned to By matters of Religion then we mean in general as well the Agenda as the Credenda of it What we are to perform as well as what we are to believe what relates to Obedience as well as what relates to Faith Now the rule measure and standard of both is the Revelation of God in the Scripture The Bible is now the only perfect Code and Register of natural Religion as well as the only Systeme of supernatural Those very Articles of Belief and Duties of obedience which were formerly Natural with respect to their manner of promulgation are now in the Declaration of them also Supernatural The Scripture is the only Canon of Faith and Rule of Practice So the Apostle stile 's it in more than one place Phil. 3.16 Nevertheless whereto we have already attained 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let us walk by the same Rule As if he had said what ever dissensions there be amongst us in lesser things let us orderly regulate our life and course for that is the import of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the Canon of the Gospel And in the same sense Gal. 6.16 as many as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 walk according to this Rule peace be on them c. The Apostle having to do with such as introduced 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an other Gospel Gal. 1.6 7. for their conviction and plainer refutation he gives us a brief epitomy and summary both of the Law and Gospel and at last shuts up the whole debate with this that whoever walks according to this Canon or Rule peace shall be on him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies originally either a Reed made into an instrument wherewith they measured buildings or the limits and bounds of land or a small Line which Architects square out their work by that all the parts of it may bear a just symmetry proportion one to another and from this proper use of it it is Metaphorically transferred to signifie any kind of Rule Thus Aristotle useth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By that which is right we know both its self and that which is crooked for the Canon is the judg of both And thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Canon is a law that cannot err and an infallible measure Phavorin Or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies that which is over Scales commonly called the Tongue of the Balance which is the director whereby whatsoever is put into the Scales is tryed and hath its just weight adjudged So the Scholiast upon Aristophanes tells us that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is that which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 over the Scales which brings them to equality This Original signification of the word also hath given rise to its Metaphorical use of denoting any rule or measure by which either Doctrines or Practices are tried and adjusted And thus the Scripture is the true and only perfect rule of all matters of Religion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the exact balance and Rule or Canon of all Truths The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rule of immutable and unshaken Truth Austin improveth this Notion of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 excellently De baptism cont Donat. lib. 2 cap 6. Let us not say's he bring our deceitful balances where we weigh what would and do as we would saying according to our fancy Behold this is heavy or behold this is light but let us bring the Divine Balances of the Scriptures and weigh things or rather not weigh them but learn and take notice what the Lord himself hath weighed I rather chuse to fix the import of Religion thus by its reference to its Rule than by an enumeration of particulars First that it may appear that whatever be the concernment of Reason in Religion yet it is not to invent or introduce any new Doctrine nor to propose or institute any new Media of Worship nor to obtrude and force upon us any new moral Duty Nothing Magisterial doth here belong to it its highest preferment is to minister Secondly Because there is nothing in the Scripture but what we are under the Sanction of and as it is occasionally made known we are to pay a rational subjection to it Though every thing in the Bible be not alike Necessary yet every thing in it is alike True and our concernment lie's more or less in it There is no other Rule by which we are to be regulated in matters of Religion but the Bible and therfore the import and meaning of those Terms can be no otherwayes decided but by their habitude to their measure For this end did God give forth the Scripture that it might be the foundation and standard of Religion and thence therefore are we to learn its Laws and constitutions The instructing mankind in whatsoever is necessary to his present or future Happiness was the design of God in his vouchsafeing the World a supernatural Revelation and foreseeing all things that are necessary to such an End the respect and veneration which we pay to his Sapience Goodness oblige us to believe that he hath adapted and proportion'd the means thereunto Now the Doctrines of the Bible are of two sorts 1. Such as besides their being made known by revelation and believed on the account of Divine Testimony have also a foundation in the light of Nature and there are natural Mediums by which they may be prov'd These are commonly called Mixt but I think amiss seeing they are not made up of dissimilar parts nor have they objects complicated of different natures are only discovered by different Lights proved by different Media and assented to as well upon Motives of Reason as Divine Authority of this kind are the Being and Attributes of God the Immortality of the Soul the certainty of Providence the Existence of a Future State and Moral Good and Evil 2 dly Such as have no Foundation at all in Nature by which they could have been found out or known but we are solely indebted to Supernatural Revelation for the Discovery of them Their Objects having their Source and Rise only from the Will of God a Supernatural Revelation was absolutely expedient to promulge them And these also are of two Sorts 1. There are some Doctrines which though our Understandings by Natural Mediums could never have discovered yet being once revealed our Minds can by Arguments drawn from Reason facilitate the Apprehension of them and confirm it self in their Belief Of this kind are the Resurrection of the Body and Satisfaction to Divine Justice in order to the Exercising of Forgiveness to penitent Sinners 2. There are others which as Reason could never have discovered so when revealed it can neither comprehend them nor produce any Medium in Nature by which either the Existence of their Objects can be Demonstrated or their Truth Illustrated Of this kind are the Doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation of the Son of God I know that there are many Divines who though they confess that the Doctrine of the Trinity could never at first have been discovered by Reason yet being once Revealed they contend that Reason cannot only Illustrate but Demonstrate it But upon the best Inquiry into their Arguments I find most of them palpably Fallacious and others of them so Disproportionate to what they are brought that they do not so much as afford some saint Adumbrations of it I readily grant that this and the other Mystery are by a clear and necessary Connexion united with other Doctrines of Faith which Reason enlightned by Revelation can give a rational Account of For the Mystery of the Trinity hath a necessary Connexion with the Work of our Redemption by the Incarnation of the Son of God and the Work of our Redemption by the Incarnation of an infinite Person hath the like Connexion with the necessity of satâ—sfying Divine Justice in oâ—der to the Dispensing of Pardon to repenting Offenders and the necessity of satisfying Divine Justice for the End aforesaid hath a necessary Connexion with the Doctrine of the Corruption of Mankind and the Corruption of Humane Nature is both fully confessed and can be demonstrated by Reason Thus though all the Objects of Faith have not an immediate Correspondence with the Objects of Reason yet these very Doctrines of Faith which lye remotest from the Territories of Reason and seem to have least Affinity with its Light are necessarily and clearly connected with those other Principles of Faith which when once discovered Reason both approves of and can rationally confirm it self in As two Neighbouring Kingdoms are joyned together though some of their Provinces touch not one another So by those Objects of Faith which have a clear Connexion with Objects of Reason there is a mediate Connexion between Reason and those Objects of Faith that lye farther off I need not add that the most Mysterious Doctrines of Religion are necessarily connected with the Belief of the Bibles being the Word of God and that is a Truth which Reason is so far from rejecting that it can demonstrate it § 5 Having setled the meaning of the Terms namely what we understand both by Reason and Religion We are next particularly to enquire of what Significancy and Use Reason is in Religion that so we may give to Reason the things that are Reasons and yet reserve to Faith the things that are Faiths And whereas we have said that there are some Principles of Religion which besides the Evidence that they have in Revelation have Foundation also in the Light of Nature it may be easily apprehended that more is to be allowed to Reason in and about those than about these the Knowledge of which we are Debters only to Revelation for As to the Latter Reason acquits it self in all that belongs to it by considering what Doctrines are revealed to us in the Scriptures and deduceâ—ng Consequences which by clear Connexions proceed from them leaving Faith to assent to them upon the Authority and Veracity of the Revealer But as to the former Reason doth not sufficiently discharge it self by discovering that they are Revealed and thereupon committing it to Faith to Embrace
them upon Divine Testimony But it ought further to enquire what Inducements and Media there are in the Light of Nature by which they may be also Known and Demonstrated And as this is to be allowed to Reason in all Matters of Religion which have Foundation in Natural Light so especially in and about such Principles of it as are necessarily pre-supposed to Faith of which kind are the Being of God and the Divinity of the Scripture Though all our Religion be in an eminent Manner built upon the Divinity of the Scriptures and some parts of it know no other Foundation but the Bible and accordingly among such as own that Book for the Word of God We need no other Bottome to Erect our Faith upon nor any other Measure to regulate our Debates and to determine our Controversies by yet when the Divinity of the Scripture it self is contended about it is neither a just nor a rational Way of Procedure barely to affirm that 't is Divine but we are to prove that it is so If we will not believe the Alchoran to proceed by Inspiration from God upon the Testimony of a Mahometan no more is it to be expected that a Mussulman should believe what we call the Bible to be God's Word upon the naked Testimony of a Christian. As upon the one hand we should betray Religion to every Infidel by pretending to build our Faith upon a Book whose sacred Authority we cannot justifie so upon the other hand we oblige our selves to the worst of Drudgeries in being resolved to believe what we can give no Reason for Besides we should not only by such a Method unavoidably expose our selves to the Dictates of every Enthusiast but with all Minister a just Plea to such as dislike Religion because of it's Unfriendliness to their Lusts for the renouncing of it Now our Belief of the Scripture supposeth the Existence of God and therefore our knowledge of his Being must precede our Faith of the Divine Authority of the Bible I readily grant that the Scriptures may be brought not only to such as own their Truth but even to Infidels as a proof of a Deity But then it must not be upon the Score of their naked Testimony but upon the account of their being of such a Frame Nature and Quality that they can proceed from no other Author And thus we Arrive by the Scripture at an Assurance of God's Existence as we do at the Knowledge of a Cause by it's Effect But so far as we assent to any thing upon the Credit of the Scriptures meer Testification we are necessitated to presuppose the Existence of God it being only upon the account of his Veracity in himself and that the Bible is a Divine Revelation that we do without the least guilt of vain Credulity because upon the highest Reason implicitely believe it In discoursing the Serviceableness of Reason in demonstrating the fore-mentioned Articles together with those other Doctrines that have their Foundation not only in Revelation but also in Natural Light and such common Principles which all men assent to I shall confine my self to wonderful Brevity and rather point at Arguments than pursue them And to begin with the Existence of God Were there no Supernatural Revelation in the World there is enough both within us and without us to Convince us of the Being of a Deity Hence though God hath wrought many Miracles to Convince Infidels and Mis-Believers yet he never wrought any to Convince Atheists Nor do the Pen-Men of Scripture attempt to prove it but take it for granted as being evidently manifest both by Sensible and Rational Demonstration I shall not here insist on the Cartesian Argument drawn from an Innate and Ingraft Idea of God For upon a most serious perusal of what is alledged by Cartes himself Claubergius De Bruin Doctor More and others in Vindication of it together with what is produced by Gassendus Ezekius Vogelsangius Derkennis Doctor Parker and others against it I look upon it as little better than a Sophism and to maintain an Article of such Import by a Medium either Weak or Fallacious is to betray the first Fundamental of Religion I know no Idea's formally Innate what we commonly call so are the Results of the Exercise of our Reason The Notion of God is not otherwise inbred then that the Soul is furnished with such a Natural Sagacity that upon the Exercise of her rational Powers she is Infallibly led to the Acknowledgment of a Deity And this is first effected by her looking inwardly upon her self and her own Acts and we are with Facility and by a short way of Argumentation conducted thence to the Existence of God For 1 st We perceive that the Faculty resident in us is not furnished with all perfections and therefore not Self-existent nor indebted to it self for those it hath otherwise it would have cloathed it self with the utmost perfections it can Imagine and by consequence finding it's own Exility and Imperfection it Naturally and with Ease arrives at a perswasion of deriving it's Original from some First Supreme and Free Agent who hath made it what it is and this can be nothing but God 2 dly We perceive that we have such a Faculty that apprehendeth judgeth reasoneth but what it is whence it is and how it performeth those things we know not And therefore there must be some Supreme Being who hath given us this Faculty and understands both the Nature of it and how it knoweth which we our selves do not 3 dly Our Natures are such that assoon as we come to have the use of our Intellectual Faculties we are forced to acknowledge some things Good and other things Evil. There is an Unalterable Congruity betwixt some Acts and our reasonable Souls and an Unchangeable Incongruity betwixt them and others Now this plainly sways to the belief of a God For all distinctions of Good and Evil relate to a Law under the Sanction of which we are and all Law supposeth a Superiour who hath Right to command us and there can be no Universal Independent Supreme but God 4 ly We find our selves possessed of a Faculty necessarily reflecting on it's own Acts and passing a Judgment upon it self in all it does Which is a further Conviction of the Existence of God for it implies a Supreme Judge to whom we are accountable 5 ly We find that we are furnished with Faculties of vast Appetite and Desires and that there is nothing in the World that can satisfie our Cravings and by consequence there must be some Supreme Good adequate and proportionate to the Longings of our Souls which can be nothing but God This is his Meaning who said of the Heathen that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By the Light of Nature they nodded after a Summum Bonum It were to put a Slur upon Nature to suppose that she hath put those Propensions and Inclinations into us only to delude and abuse us 6 ly We find the
of the Bible The ancient Heathens reproaching the Primitive Christians that they grounded all their Doâ—â—rine upon meer Belief that their Religion consisted In sola ratione credendi and that their simple Faith was all they had to trust to The Christians complained of the Charge as a gross and impudent Calumny appealed to Reason for Proof of their Belief and offered to joyn Issue with them upon that Title And as they that owe their Belief of the Bibles being the Word of God to Report Principles of Education or the Felicity of their Birth and the Clime where they were born receive the Scripture upon no better Motives than the Turks do the Alcoran So if pretended Inspiration may pass for a Demonstration of the Truth of what every bold Pretender will obtrude upon us We expose our selves not only to the Belief of every Groundless Imagination but of innumerable Contradictions For not only the grossest Follies but Doctrines palpably repugnant both to Reason and one another have been delivered by Enthusiasts and pretended Inspirato's I readily grant that the Testimony of the Holy Ghost in the Souls and Consciences of men to the Truth of the Scripture is the most convincing Evidence that such Persons can have of it's Divinity But 1 st The Holy Ghost convinceth no man as to the Belief of the Scripture without Enlightning his mind in the Grounds and Reasons upon which it's proceeding from God is evidenced and established There is no Conviction begot by the Holy Ghost in the Hearts of men otherwise than by rational Evidence satisfying our Understandings through a discovery of the Motives and Inducements that ascertain the Truth of what he would convince us of 2. No mans particular Assurance obtained thus in way of Illumination by the Holy Ghost is to be otherwise urged as an Argument of Conviction to another than by proposing the Reasons which our Faith is erected on The way of such Mens Evidence is communicable to none unless they could kindle the same Rayes in the Breasts of others that have Irradiated their own and therefore they must deal with others by producing the grounds of their Conviction not pleading the manner of it And that an other is convinced or persuaded by them depends wholly upon the weight and Momentousness of the Reasons themselves not on the manner that such a person came to discover them For should he have arrived at the discerning them by any other Mean they had been of the same Significancy to the Conviction of an Adversary 3. The Holy Ghost as a distinct Person in the Deity is not a Principle demonstrable by Reason Seeing then it is by the Scripture alone that we are assured of the Existence of the Divine Spirit as a distinct Person in the Godhead therefore his Testimony in the Hearts and Consciences of men to the Scripture cannot be allowed as a previous Evidence of it's Divinity To prove the Divine Authority of the Scripture by the Testimony of the Holy Ghost when we cannot otherwise prove that there is a Holy Ghost but by the Testimony of the Scripture is to argue Circularly and absurdly I know the Papists to be even with the Protestants for the Circle we charge on them in their proving the Church by the Scriptures and the Scripture by the Church do pretend to fasten the same way of Circular Argumentation upon us in that we prove the Spirit by the Scripture and the Scripture by the Spirit Whereas even those Protestants who contend that the Spirit and Scripture do mutually prove one another may easily acquit themselves from a Circle Seeing whatever Proof the Scripture and Spirit mutually Minister to one another it is in Diverso genere The Scripture proves the Spirit either in way of Witness by plainly testifying that there is such a Being as the Divine Spirit or Objectively and by way of Argument bringing into Light such Truths as can be conceived to proceed from none other save 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 From the Holy Ghost But then the Spirit proves the Scripture not in way of a naked Witness nor in way of Argument but under the notion of an Efficient Cause Elevating and preparing our Understandings to discern the Lineaments Characters and Signatures of Divinity which God hath impressed upon the Scriptures which through that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is upon our Minds we many times do not at all discern much less do we at any time discern 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without it Or else by giving Efficacy to Scripture Truths in and upon our Hearts and Consciences so that the Word arriving with us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Demonstration of the Spirit and Power we have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the effectual Working of his Power 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a spiritual Sense and Taste of the things themselves And this Spiritual Gust that I may use Origen's Phrase is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Diviner thing and more Convincing than any Demonstration For the Word of God as well as God himself is best known 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by an Intellectual Touch as the Philosopher sayes But as I have said already this is no convincing Proof to an Adversary nor doth the evidence of it reach further than the party immediately concerned And therefore our Recourse must be to Arguments of another Nature In brief when we have to do with such as either Question or Deny the Divine Authority of the Scripture we are to prove it by Ratiocination from common Principles received amongst Mankind and by Topicks that lye even and proportionated to Intellectual Nature And here Reason is justly magnified as hugely Subservient to Religion in that it demonstrates the Divine Authority of the Scripture upon which our Faith as to all particular Articles and Duties of Religion is grounded Not do I doubt but that Reason can acquit it self in this Undertaking to the Conviction of all that are not wilfully obstinate and for such I know no means either sufficient or intended by God to satisfie them Many great Men both Ancient and Modern as well at Home as Abroad have already laboured and to good purpose in this Theme Nor can there be much added by any to what is already said much less am I likely to do it Neither is it my Intention to treat this Subject at large but rather to touch at the Heads of Arguments than handle them And I suppose this will sufficiently answer my Designe which is to vindicate the Non-Conformists from the Aspersions lately cast upon them as if they were Defamers of Reason disclayming it from all Concern in Religion and deserving to be charged with the Reproach which Julian slanderously fastned upon the Primitive Christians that they had no Ground for their Faith but that their Wisdom was only to Believe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Method I shall here confine my self to shall be First To justifie the Necessity of some Supernatural Revelation in order to
did not alter their Opinions As a supernatural Revelation than is necessary in order to the regulation of mankind in Religious Concernments so it is also needful that it should be somewhere or other consigned to writing and that by persons immediately inspir'd There is no other medium that we can imagine but it would be obnoxious to fallibility Nor is there any way besides a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Divine Inspiration of such Records by which we can rationally justify our reception of them or attain to an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 security in the things that are so Recorded I have discoursed the two foregoing particulars in way of surplusage the Theme I am upon not requiring them For if we can but demonstrate the matter of Fact viz. that God hath given the World a Supernatural Revelation of his Will and that it is consigned to writing in the Book we call the Bible our Obligation to receive that Book is indispensable and our Concern in it is infinitely Momentous though we should grant that a supernatural Revelation from God to Man in order to his conduct in matters of Religion was not needful and much more that it was not necessary to commit it to Writing Yet pursuing the Threed I have begun and taking it for proved both that a Supernatural Revelation is necessary and that it ought to be Registred some where or other in writing I advance to the Third particular namely that no written Records besides the Bible can lay claim to the priviledg of being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Divine Inspiration or that they were written by persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 acted and moved by the Holy Ghost There is no Book can rival the Scripture in this pretence First the writings of the Ethnick Legislators Poets and Philosophers are not fit to put in a Demurrer to the Bible in this matter Many of the Records of the Institutions and Laws of the Ethnick Religion are lost beyond all possibility of Reprive and those which remain whether relating to their Mythick Politick or Natural Theology contain matters so extravagant and absurd and are stuff't with Dogm's so repugnant both to natural Light and one another that he must have forfeited his Reason who can suppose them to have proceeded from God The whole Heathen Religion was nothing but an abuse of that natural Inclination which all men have to worship a God whom because they neither knew nor how he would be served they guessed at both in the dark Mankind being furnished with Faculties instructing them both in the Existence of God and that he ought to be Worshipped fell to exercising their rational Powers not only in enquiries after the Nature of the Supreme Being but in what manner he would be served And whereas had they attended to Reason they might by short ratiocinations have learned a great deal as to both in the Negative namely what He is not and what service will not please Him and had they improved the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Seeds of God which were in them they might have arrived at something not inconsiderable as to the affirmative in reference to the First Yet partly through a stretching their Line beyond its Measure partly through Supiness and Carelesness in their Deductions they became vain in their imaginations and prevaricated in the whole they undertook And whereas they might have been assisted in their Theologick Speculations by the Works of God and ancient Traditions which were the objective helps left them they did as to both shamefully corrupt themselves For instead of being conducted to the acknowledgment of God by his Works these they Deified serving the Creature which should have guided them to the Creatour And hence sprung Sabaism and all the Oriental Idolatry And for ancient Traditions these they wofully disguised and adulterated by Innumerable Fables and thence arose their Mythick Theology But still finding themselves at a loss and being also possessed with a persuasion that a Revelation from God was necessary to instruct them in Religious Concernments they became exposed to a twofold further inconvenience First Cunning Men by pretending either to Inspiration or converse with some Deity obtruded upon them what they pleased And here statesmen did in a special manner play their parts whence it came to pass that much of the Heathen Religion was nothing but Stratagems of Rulers and litle Arts of government Secondly Sathan took an occasion hence of abusing mankind by Oracles either immediately uttered or by men whom he acted and who were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Divels Organs uttering what he inspired them with Nor do I mean this only with reference to their Oracular Priests and Pythian Virgins but I include both their Poets and Philosophers The Poets were the first and most Ancient Authors of the Ethnick Divinity and were generally judged Inspired Plato expresly tells us that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God speaketh to us by them in his Dialogue stiled Jon. It is likely enough that some of them were inspired but by whom their Writings abundantly discover Nor were their Philosophers whom Plato also affirmed to have been 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 acted by any better Spirit Many of them of one Sect as well as another being rank Magicians In brief the multiplicity of their Gods their stuffing their Worship with Adulteries and impure Mixtures their appeasing their Deities by Humane Victims not to mention a Thousand things else that might be mustred against the Religion of the Gentiles are so many Demonstrations that it could not be Divine Who can suppose that to be Sacred which is impure or conceive that which Over-throws Humanity should have proceeded from God There is little Hope of finding any thing there for our Conduct in Religion where we are so much at a Loss to find the Measures of Moral Vertue The Writings of the Heathen whether Poets or Philosophers being then Void of all just pretence of Admission for Supernatural and Divine Records Reason will with the like Demonstrative evidence convince us that this Claim is unduly also ascribed to the Alcoran It is true Mahomet pretended to have received it by Inspiration Most think that he Counterfeited in his pretence and it is certain that as to receiving it by Inspiration from God he did so but that there was not an immediate Interposure of the Devil in the Case so that he was deceived himself ere he went about to deceive others I am not so well assured The Epileptical Distemper to which he was subject hath in others been attended with Diabolical Insinuation The Age in which he lived was Enthusiastically inclined And the Grosseness of the Arabian Wits together with the Subserviency of Ethnick Idolatry which remained up and down among them might encourage Satan to make an Attempt that way among that people But whether it was indeed so or whether the whole be singly to be attributed to himself and one or two Impostors more that assisted him is
which they form in their minds nor the Arrayment of them in Words are adapted and proporpotioned to things They are like boys walking upon stilts who seem higher then they are and their discourses are like a load of flesh in the body of man that serves only to embarass it with an unprofitable weight But to imaigine so of God or to ascribe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 great swelling words of vanity to him 2 Pet. 218. Jud. 16. or to think that in the enditing the Bible he did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 only feed us with gaudy phantasms poetical Schemes luxariunt phrases is to impeach more than one of his perfections In a word Gods design being to instruct us and it being repugnant to His Nature either to be deceived himself in the nature of things or to deceive others it necessarily follows that the Scripture doth actualy dedenote all and whatsoever it is capable of denoting Nor are we in the interpreting of the Word to restrain and confine its sense but to take it in the greatest Latude of signâ—fication it can bear I shall shut up this wâ—th that of the Apostle 1 Cor. 14.6 11. So likewise yee except yee utter by the Tongue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Words easy to be understood how shall it be known what is spoken For yee shall speak into the Air Therefore if I know not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the meaning of the voice the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 posse vocis the whole force vertue power and signification of the Words I shall be unto him that speaketh a Barbarian § 11. The next thing considerable with respect to the interest of Reason in Religion is its Use and serviceableness in drawing Consequences from Revealed and supernatural Truths And this follows from what we have said concerning the sence of Scripture-propositions It is by this means that Divines have always laboured to clear Mysteries of Faith by making appear the Connexion of things obscure with these that are plain and those that are contested with these that are not It is by this Method also that the Fathers have refuted Heresies by shewing that those evil Doctrines which they introduced into the Church either had not any agreement with the true Mysteries of Faith or that they were altogether opposite to them To disclaim all Scripture Consequences the ministration of Reason in deducing them is plainly to deny all the Connexions Relations dependencies and oppositions of one thing to and upon an other and to betray Religion into the Hands of its Enemies And as this is one of the last so I look upon it as one of the most shameful Refuges of the Romanists Finding themselves in their disputations about matters of Religion foiled and bafled by the Protestants some of them have thought it their safest course to renounce all Principles of Reason in the concernments of Faith to reject all Conclusions as well inferr'd from premisses where both are of Revelation as where one only is of Faith and the other of Reason It must be a desperate Cause that cannot otherwise be maintaitained And nothing but a failure in other defences would have reconciled them to a method pregnant with so many absurdities But when men are pre-engaged in the defence of a Cause what will they not rather seek relief from than reject what their lusts interests and educations oblige them to The first forgers of this new Armature forwarding off the blows of Protestants with the entertainment that the Invention met with at Rome as well as Sorbon he that hath a mind to inform himself may learn from Vedelius in his Rationale Theologicum and Bochart contre Veron And how far the Socinians those Idolaters of Reason when it serves their designs do conspire with the Papists to disparage it in this matter we are now enquiring about when it doth not be-friend them such as are inquisitive may read in Hoornbecks Socinianismus confutatus Tom. 1. lib. 1. cap. 9. p. 211. But that we may address to the matter it self By a Consequence we mean either a proposition standing in that habitude relation and having that connexion with another that if that be true this is also true or a proposition lying in that repugnancy and opposition to another that if the first be true the latter must be false There is either that coherency betwixt them that the one infers and draws the other after it or that contrariety that if truth be the portion of the one falsehood must fall to the lot of the other Now conclusions are of two kinds first when there is nothing in the Antecedent but what is in the Consequent and this is always between two Terms and no more and these Terms are either convertible as no Innocent person is a sinner therfore no sinner is an Innocent person Or they are subalternate the one the other as every man is guilty before God therefore this and that man is so Or else they are Terms Equivalent as Believers have the guilt of sin remitted to them therefore their liableness to legal Wrath is removed 2 dly When there is somthing In the Antecedent that is not in the Consequent and to Conclusions of this Nature there are always required three Terms and the Foundation of deducing one proposition here from another is either the connexion or opposition that is betwixt the one and the other All Conclusions are virtually included in their premises and he that assents to these doth in effect grant those It is all one whether both the premises be in Scripture or one onely be there the other being either fetch 't from undoubted Principles of Reason or evidence of Sense for in all these Cases the Conclusion is as much the Word of God as if it were in so many letters and sillables in the Bible Hence that common saying quaedam in Scripturis sunt et dicuntur quaedam in iiâ—dem sunt etsi non dicantur There are some things in the Scripture and are accordingly reported to be in them and there are somethings in them though they be not in so many Words there related c. Men through Ignorance ositancy or the like do not always discern what ariseth and followeth from what they say and do often therfore affirm that from whence something doth ensue which they are so far from holding that they do detest it and accordingly we frequently argue against them per deductionem ad absurdum seu impossibile But God always foresees whatsoever followes upon every declaration he makes he understands all the habâ—tudes connexions dependencies and oppositions of one thing upon and to another and accordingly we not onely may with safety but he expects that we should inferr and deduce from what he hath said all and every thing that necessarily bears upon and follows from it And though what is thus inferred be not in the Scripture 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in so many letters yet while it is there either 〈◊〉
controlled in nothing we say or do c. were ever intended for the Felicity of an Intellectual and Rational Being The Soul of a Brute would have served all the Ends that some men propound to themselves but surely the bestowing of an Immortal Spirit on us ought to instruct us that Blessedness consists in something else than Gauds Trifles Grandeur Airy Titles and the like And he who cannot want these things without thinking himself Miserable at once reproacheth his Maker as if he had Created him for nothing more worthy and degrades and dishonours himself by intimating that such gratifications are suitable to Him 6. The advantages which Good men receive by afflictions do amply compensate their feeling of them They hereby both discern their sincerity themselves and discover it to others Nor is it easie to imagine the satisfaction that the Consciousness of a constant sincerity ministers to a Soul To find that we love God notwithstanding the narrow allowance he affords us is a more soveraign Cordial to the Mind that would approve its self to God than the flushest enjoyment of sublunary things can yield Their Adversity also gives them either relief in Mortifying those Corruptions which endanger them or in exercising those Graces which glorifie God And who dare reproach the Wisdom or Goodness of God for disposing things in such a manner as may turn not only most to his own Honour but our advantage Storms and Frosts are as Useful to the Universe as serene and clear weather Nor are Sugar and Honey more necessary than Salt and Brine are If after all this there remain Inexplicables in the works of Providence 't is no more than what we daily meet with in the Works of Creation Nor must a finite Understanding hope to comprehend the Methods of an Infinite God And the future state will set all that straight which we now judge Crooked Having vindicated the Providence of God from those Objections which seem to affront it my next task is to suggest those Arguments which Reason abstracting from all Revelation can muster to attest it 1 Were there not an Omnipotent Power and an Omniscient skill to restrain and govern the quarrelsome Spirits that are in the World it would soon sink under the bottom of its own Confusion This the Heathen intimated in the Fable of Phaethon who being admitted to drive the Chariot of the Sun but for one day burnt both himself and it together It was well said by the Stoick that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is not worth the while to live in a World empty of God and Providence Nay it were the greatest unhappiness imaginable to be brought forth into the World to be perpetually tossed up and down by blind Fortune 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If there were not a Providence there could be no Order in the World And as another Philosopher saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If there were no Supreme Orderer whence comes order to be in the World 2. Preclude Providence we remove one of the greatest foundations of venerating the Diety 'T is not a persuasion of the Excellency of his Nature that can engage us to a hearty Adoration of Him if we once discharge him from all concernment in us and our affairs Though there be the like Eminency of Dignity in the French King as in the King of Great Brittain yet we have a greater reverence for the one than the other because the one protects us which the other doth not Nor can we well believe the Divine Nature to be excellent should we assert it devoid of Goodness which is the greatest perfection much less will it be easie to honour him for a God whose Felicity we judge to consist in Idleness We find our selves capable of yea endowed with the affections of Fear and Love and God is an Object most adapted for them but seclude him from the administration of the World and there is no Foundation left for the begetting and maintaining either the one or the other in the hearts of men towards him For if he regard not what we do instead of having provided due means for our fearing and loving of him he hath left us under an unavoidable temptation of acting towards with him with slight and contempt 3 If there be no Providence there is not the least ground for addresses to God out of hope of assistance or the thanking him for the benefits we partake of and yet the chief of natural Religion consists in these Who would pray to God to be delivered when in straits or praise him when he hath scaped his entanglements if God no ways interest himself in us and our affairs 4 If God govern not the world it is either because he Cannot or because he will not to say the first is to represent him contemptible for his Weakness and besides he that made the World cannot be supposed unable to Rule it to affirm the Second is to bestow Omnipotencie upon Him in vain and to impeach every one of his perfections because of a faileur in their most natural and agreeable effects 5 God is Soveraign of the World and therefore he must needs Govern it Through all things being the products of His will and Power he hath an incontestable Dominion over them Now we cannot fasten a greater reproach upon a Soveraign than that he throws off all the Care and Gubernation of his Subjects 6 We see effects in the World which could proceed from no cause but God and discoveries made to it which he alone can reveal and by consequence he hath not wholly withdrawn himself from the Rectorship of it 7 He must needs Rule the World who hath given it Laws for Law is the Relative of government and that he hath given it Laws the inbred Notions which we have of Good and Evil the Fears and hopes that haunt us do abundantly demonstrate These he hath woven into the composition of our Natures and by these order is maintained in the World Now 't is the greatest affront that can be offered to Reason to think that God should make use of a Fiction to preserve Truth Justice and Righteousness amongst mankind or that he should keep up the Respect of himself by falsehood and Deceit Thus by singling out one or two Truths that have evidence given to them in the Light of Nature as well as in Revelation we have shewn what belongs to Reason about all Doctrines of this Genius and complexion § 13. The next concernment of Reason in about Religion is to defend the whole of it from the Clamours and Objections of gainsayers For as Bisterfield says Though they who reject arguments levied from Reason against the Mysteries of Religion act modestly yet they do not throughly serve the interest nor hereby deserve well of the Cause of Truth which they own and profess 'T is true that the Authority of Divine Testimony is enough to warrant our Faith whatever Objections lye against the thing so testified
but to rest here without warding off the thrusts of Adversaries is to tempt them either wholly to throw off the belief of all Revelation or to affix perverse Senses to it Now there are some Articles of Religion which may not only be defended by shewing from the Testimony of the Bible that their Objects have an Existence but by explaining how they are and that either from principles of Natural Light or from the account that the Scripture it self Gives of the Modes of their Existence For Example How the Earth could be peopled in so little a time as the Mosaick History doth tacitely inform us when all Mankind sprung 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from one stock for so the word there signifies and proceeded from one Man and one Woman as their Original Progenitors How an Ark of that Capacity which the Scripture instructs us Noahs was could receive into it all kinds of living Creatures with provisions of Aliment for so long a time How the Israelites could multiply to such a number in Egypt within the compass of two hundred years or little more when there went down but such a handful thither of whom they descended There are other Articles of Religion which we can only shew from Revelation that the Objects of them are but the manner and way how they exist we cannot tell And seeing the Measure of Faith doth only follow and suit the measure of Revelation we are therefore in reference to such things only to believe that they are but the Mode of their Existence is to be no Article of our Creed And I crave liberty here to suggest that it is both a piece of Tyranny to impose the belief of the Modes of their existence upon the Consciences of men and hath been found disserviceable to Religion to undertake to explain the Manner according to which such a thing exists when God hath only revealed the Existence of the thing it self but concealed the Way how it is If in the explicating the Phaenomena of Nature which is the proper province of Reason the most that a discreet Philosopher will pretend to is to declare the possible ways by which a Phaenomenon may be accounted for without presuming to say that it is only performed in this way and that there is no other in which it may be explained Much more doth it become us in the Great mysteries of Revelation to abstain from defining the Manner how they are and to content our selves with what God hath been pleased to tell us viz. that they are without prying into the Mode of their being which he hath hid from us Now in and about such Doctrines these things appertain to Reason First To shew that 't is not required that it should comprehend them Whatsoever God hath said is to be assented to though we cannot frame adequate Notions of the thing it self nor understand the manner how it should be 'T is as much against Reason as Faith to think to fathom the perfections Counsels and Works of God seeing Reason acknowledgeth him to be infinite and it self to be Finite If we will pretend to Reason in Religion we are to be believe whatever God hath said to be True this being the greatest Reason that he who is Veracious cannot lye There is nothing more consonant to the transcendency of so a high a Nature as that of God than that it be acknowledged incomprehensible nor is there any thing more agreeable to his infinite Wisdom than that his projects designs and contrivances should be held past finding out 'T is both unjust and irrational to think that man should penetrate those depths and Abysm's which the Angels desire only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to look into as vailed and hidden from sight But more of this anon 2 dly We are to hold our selves assured that every Argument from Reason repugnant to a Doctrine revealed in the Scripture is a Sophism though may be we cannot discover the Fallacy 'T is one thing to be assured of a Truth and another to be able to answer all the Objections that are pressed against it There are Innumerable things even in Philosophy of which we are fully assured and yet we cannot resolve all the difficulties that attend them If every pusling Objection be enough to make us renounce what we have express Revelation for by a parity of Reason we must disclaim many a Natural Truth which we have the evidence of sense and Reason for because we cannot answer all the Objections that do encounter them It were the way to introduce an Universal Scepticsm to doubt of the Truth of every thing the knotts intricacies about the Natures Properties Operations and Modes of whose Existence we cannot unty What a man hath embraced upon just and weighty grounds he is not to desert it meerly because he can not answer every Objection that is urged against it 'T is the height of folly and Madness to forego an opinion when the Objections wherewith it is entangled are not of greater yea nor of the same importance with the reasons on which we received it 3 dly We are to answer the Objection not by explicating how the thing contested is but by shew-that there is nothing in the argument that prove's it impossible to be And this is done by shewing that what is stiled a Principle of Reason in truth and reality is not so at least in the degree and latitude that it is applied There are many vulgar Axioms urged as Maximes of Reason which are as far from obtaining in Philosophy as in Divinity there are others which though they hold in reference to some Objects and in relation to some Agents yet they are not to be allowed with respect to every Agent and every Object For example though a Finite Agent require a preexistent subject in order to its operation yet this holds not in relation to an infinite and Almighty worker And though Impenetrability may be affirmed of all Substances that are Corporeal yet to apply it to all Substances Universally and thereupon to reject Spirits as Mr. Hobbs doth is grosly to prevaricate Most received Maximes have their limitations nor are they principles of Reason farther then as they are circumscrib'd by such conditions and confinements and to urge them beyond their bounds is to contradict Reason which tells us that they hold only so far and no farther That great Maxime which is the Foundation of all Argumentation viz. that Extrem's identified to a middle Term are identified the one to the other admitts more than one or two limitations which if they be not attended to all our Syllogising is but meer Sophistry For if either the Extrem's be only collectively identified to the Medium not distributely or if they be one with it inadequately only and not adequately or if they Center in the Middle Term only in the Concrete and not in the Abstract there is no concluding of an Identity betwixt the Extremes themselves And I dare say that through a
false if there be any incontestable Principles of Reason or True Maximes of Philosophy For to omit at present that 't is Repugnant to Metaphysical and Physical Axioms that Accidents should exist without a subject or that there should be Whiteness and nothing white Sweetness and nothing sweet that one Body should be penetrated by another when we find every Material substance irresistibly to defend its self from coexistence in the same place with another that is Corporeal that one the same Being should be entirely at one and the same time in distant places which is to be distant from it self yea that it should be there with contradictory adjuncts that the Sign and thing signified or Relate and Correlate should be the same I say to pass these by as having been a thousand times urged against the Papists and nothing replyed but what renders their Folly and Extravagance the greater and more remarkable I shall only say that Transubstantiation is inconsistent with the first Principles of Logick 1. No Enunciation is true but upon the account of Congruity to its Object and the previous existence of the Object according to what is affirmed of or denyed concerning it is that which grounds the verity of the Enunciation If therefore the Sacramental Elements be not the Body and Blood of Christ antecedently to the words of Consecration the Enunciation by which the Priest affirms the one to be the other must necessarily be false 2. Every Enunciation supposeth a previous Act and judgment of the Mind of which it is Manifestative for the End of words is to indicate Conceptions Unless therefore previously to consecration the Bread be judged to be the real Flesh of Christ no one can truly assert that it is so 3. In every true Enunciation the subject may by Conversion become the predicate as is evident by an induction of all propositions in the World while therefore the Body of Christ cannot in a proper and Physical sense be said to be Bread no more can Bread in a proper sense be said to be the Body of Christ. 4. No Disparate can be truly affirmed in casu recto of another that interfering with the Nature of opposites Bread and the Body of Christ therefore being Disparates the one cannot in a proper sense be predicated of the other 5. No real positive Attribute or predicate can be affirmed of a subject which is not for non entis nulla sunt attributa And therefore if the Bread be annihilated as indeed it must be unless instead of allowing Christ to have only one Body and that formed of the substance of the Virgin we should hold that he hath many Bodies and those formed of Material Particles distinct from what he was fram'd of in the Womb of the Virgin Our Saviour spake very illogically in asserting concerning that which it is not at all that it is his Body I shall wave what might be further added to this purpose only conclude it with this brief remarque That if Principles of Reason obtain so far in Things purely Supernatural as that there can be no repugnance betwixt the one and the other they ought more especially to have so much place in those things which Grace borrows and transports from Nature for its Use. Secondly When we say that there is nothing in Religion which is truly repugnant to Principles of Reason we do not by Principles of Reason understand all that this or that sort of men vote and receive for such The Universal Reason of Man-kind is of great Moment but mistaken Philosophy and false Notions of things which this and that Man admit for theorem's of Reason are of very small importance Men being mislead by their Senses Affections Interests and Imaginations do many times mingle errours and false conceits with the Genuine Dictates of their Minds and then appeal to them as the Principles of Truth and Reason when they are indeed nothâ—ng else but the vain Images of our fancies and the conclusions of Ignorance and mistake Though Reason in the Abstract and those inbâ—ed notices implanted in our Souls which upon the first exercise of our Faculties command an Assent be all consistent wâ—th the Mysteries of Faith yet Reason in the Concrete and as it exists in this and that man being weak maim'd imperfect and extremely remote from a full and just comprehension of things we do accordingly find many Articles of Revelation to have been little befriended by Axioms and principles of vulgar Philosophy But this proceeds from the Corruption of Reason its being vitiated by Lusts byassed by Interests perverted by Education darkned by Passions enthralled by Prejudice rather than from Reason it self and is to be ascribed not to the Light of Reason but to the Darkness that envelop's it It hath been usual for men according to the School they have been bred in to expound and judg of Religion in Analogy to the principles they have suckt in from thence By this means hath Religion been embased through mens subjecting the Examen and conduct of it to mistaken Philosophy He that would examine an Article of Faith by a Proposition of Reason must be careful that his Measure be just and true and not deceitful and fallacious No man ought to distrust an Article of Religion for its being against a proposition which we take to be true only because we were taught it The Prejudice done to Religion by mistaken Philosophy ought not to be dissembled and I shall therefore crave a little liberty here to unfold it And not to insist on the ill Influence that the Phenician and Chaldaick Philosophy had on the Judaick Theology though it be of easie proof that their Planetary Deities and their Teraphims sprung from thence Nor to do any more but mention that the chief Errours of the Pharisees Sadduces and Esseans took their rise from the Grecian Philosophy their Dogm's being a mixture of Pythagorean Platonick Stoick and Epicurean Notions I shall rather observe that the chiefest Errours that have infested the Christian Church arose from a mingling Gentile Philosophy with the Doctrine of the Gospel Both Irenaeus and Tertullian affirm the Errors of the Gnosticks to have sprung from the Platonick Ideas Though I think it not improbable but that their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 took their birth from Pythagoreanism The Aeons of the Valentinians if we will believe Tertullian were also â—orrowed from the Idea's of Plato but if any shall judge that they were rather derived from Hesiod I shall not contend seeing the Ancient Poets were not only the Ethnick Theologues but their chief Philosophers Epiphanius tells us that the Heresies of the Marcionites came out of the School of Plato Theodoret inform's us that Sabellius became a Heretick by his obstinacy in Plato's Doctrine Tatian being deeply tinctur'd with Platonism became thereupon Head of the Eucratists if you will give Credit to Baronius Holstenius hath shown us how the Manichean principles were fram'd from
apprehend things to be as indeed they are as I may affirm one thing of another as indeed it is However though I wave this Medium yet my first Argument shall be drawn from acts of simple Apprehension but built upon another Medium and it is this whatsoever I can clearly apprehend separate and apart I can apprehend the same with the same clearness united and Conjunct for example as I can clearly and distinctly apprehend a River and Wine apart I can with the same clearness apprehend them conjunct and united and yet I should be loath to trust this Cartesian principle so far as to assert that there is really a River runs Wine meerly because I can frame a complex apprehension of these two together 2. It interferes with what the Cartesians else-where and upon other occasions affirm For according to them when possibles offer themselves to our Rational Natures by a clear and distinct perception we do not otherwise perceive them than as actually existent and yet they themselves will not say that they do actually exist 3. The Objective Verity of Things is the Rule and Measure of the verity of perception for therefore are our perceptions true because consonant to the Nature of things and consequently clearness and distinctness of perception is not the Test by which we are to judge of the Natures Qualities and Modes of Beings 4. We are bound to pay an assent to many Doctrines and believe not a few things whereof we can have no clear and distinct perception such for example are the Mysteries of the Trinity and Incarnation of the Son of God c. If we could distinctly and clearly perceive them they were no longer Mysteries and if we do not assent to and belâ—eve them notwithstanding that we do not distinctly and clearly perceive them we are hardly yea I may say not at all Christians This is so indubitable that we may yea ought to assent to many things which we have no clear and distinct perception of that Des-Cartes himself is forced to subscribe to it his words are that multis possumus assentiri quae non nisi perobscure confuse cognoscimus which as it is most true so he could have said nothing more contradictory to and subversive of his own principles 5. Experience not only tells us that Men do often err and mistake but that they do so in things about which they suppose themselves to have clear and distinct perceptions Yea if we will believe Des-Cartes impetrare a nobis non possismus ut obscure confuse cognitis quamdiâ— talia nobis apparent assensum praebeamus We cannot obtain of our selves to assent to any thing so long as we only obscurely and confusedly know it Now though this be egregiously false yet nothing could be said more to the overthrow of this great and fundamental principle of his For if men can assent to nothing but what they have a clear and distinct cognizance of and if daily experience assure that one or other is always embracing venting and justifying Errour then farewell to this principle of the Cartesians that whatsoever presents it self to us by a clear and distinct perception is really and in it self so as we do perceive it 6. Were it most true that it is impossible for any thing to be otherwise than what we clearly and distinctly perceive it yet this can be no first principle of Science because we are still at a loss how we shall know whether we have a clear and distinct perception of things yea or not Let us suppose two men imbued with Opinions whereof those of the one are repugnant with those of the other and each of them pleading a clearness and distinctness of perception in reference to his own Now I would enquire of the Cartesians by what means these two men shall be satisfied that their knowledge is clear and distinct for clearness and distinctness of perception can no more be ascribed to both of them than truth can be predicated of the two parts of a contradiction 7. The Cartesians in the justifying of this principle involve themselves in a most shameful Circle For if it be enquired how we shall know but that God hath fram'd us with such Faculties as may in the most clear and distinct perceptions we have abuse and delude us They reply that we know it from the idea which we have of Gods being perfect i e. infinitely Good and True and if they be again asked what assurance they have that this is a true idea of God they recurr to their Canon of clear and distinct perception for the justifying of it Thus they prove the truth of their Rule and Measure from the perfection of God and the perfection of God from the truth of their Rule which if I mistake not is to argue circularly Shall I add in the eighth and last place that it is nothing but Socinianism new furbished and seems indeed shapen to justify them in their most detestable Errours For it is remarkable that when they are in a sober mood they tell us that they do not renounce the Articles of the Trinity Incarnation of the Son of God c. because they are above our reason but because they judge them repugnant to the distinct and clear perceptions which they of things The words of Smalcius are We readily acknowledge many things in the Christian Religion which are above our Reason and we know that Religion transcends Reason Their quarrel with these mysteries is this that there are many things which they clearly and distinctly perceive to which these Doctrines are contradictious This I thought convenient to discourse a little the more largely because though nothing in Religion be repugnant to any true principle of Reason yet there are many things voted for principles of Reason which indeed are not so and it is no disparagement to Articles of Faith to interfere with such The Mind is so darkned by the Fall and Eclipsed by habitual Lusts that there is but little right Reason in reference to spiritual things in the World Thirdly Reason is not the positive Measure of things Divine As there are many Doctrines of Faith which Reason in its highest exaltation could never have disdiscovered so being made known it cannot in its clearest light fully comprehend them Though Revelation presupposeth Reason and doth in no one thing contradict it yet the very End of Revelation is both to certifie Reason in such things wherein through its contracted darkness it doth mistake and to inform it in those which through the essential quality of its Nature it could never have discovered Accordingly men in all ages have not only been listning after some supernatural Revelation or other but whatever they took for such they always without more ado resigned themselves to the conduct of it 'T is true they disparaged their Reason in admitting that to be a Divine Revelation which indeed was not so but on supposition that it had been such they acted most
rationally in surrendring themselves to the guidance of it The Article it self may be plainly revealed and yet not only the reason and mode of it lye altogether hid but the thing it self may over-power our Faculties and dazle them with its Majesty and Splendour 1. Reason is often non-plust and puzled about its own proper Objects and the phaenomena of Nature and shall we think it a competent judge of Objects it was never adapted for It is below many of the Works of God and therefore much more below Mysteries of Revelation See this Argument elegantly and strenuously handled by Bradwardine de causa Dei lib. 1. c. 1. Here are many things which we ought to admire but must never hope fully to understand Our work here is to believe not to enquire 2. If our minds will not submit to a Revelation until they see a reason of the proposition they do not believe or obey at all because they do not submit till they cannot chuse Faith bears not upon demonstration but upon the Authority and Veracity of the speaker and therefore to believe nothing but what we do comprehend is not to believe but to argue and is Science not Faith Ye that will believe in the Gospel what you please and what ye think fit ye will not believe you renounce the Gospel saith Austin to the Manichees for you believe your selves not it 3. To believe nothing but what we can fully comprehend is to remonstrate to the Wisdom and Power of God at least to challenge to our selves an Omniscience proportionable to the Divine Wisdom and Omnipotence 4. The Rule and Measure of Faith must be certain but no mans Reason universally is so because one Mans Reason rejects what anothers assents to Every man pretends to right Reason but who hath it is hard to tell If it be lawful for one man to reject a plain Revelation in one particular because he cannot comprehend it why may not a second do the same with reference to Revelation in another particular As the Socinians by making their Reason judge of what they are to believe will not admit many of the prime Articles of the Gospel so the Philosophers would make their Reason judge of what they should receive their Reason would not admit the Gospel at all 5. The certainty of Revelation is preferred to all other Evidence and we are commanded to subject our Reason to the Authority of God in the Scripture and by consequence Reason cannot be the positive Measure of Religion The Sacred Writers do every where remit us to the Scripture it self as the Rule of Faith and not at all to the Tribunal of Reason Herein are the Socinians justly impeachable for though sometimes they acknowledge Religion to be above Reason as we lately heard yet at other times they speak in a very indifferent Manner By Reason alone saith Smalcius can we define what is possible and what is impossible in matters of Faith See to the same purpose Ostorod Instit. cap. 6. Schlicting de Trinit advers Meisner p. 67. c. Hence that of Socinus that he would not believe Christ to have satisfied for our sins though he should read it not only once but often in the Scripture and that the Infallibility of the Revealer had not been enough to establish it supposing Christ to have said it and to have risen from the Dead to declare his own Veracity unless he had declared it by its Causes and effects and so shewn the possibility of it To which agrees a passage of Smalcius in reference to the Incarnation of the Son of God that he would not submit to it though he should meet with it not only often but in express Terms in the Bible I wish others did not say the same in effect But while they renounce Doctrines upon no other account but their incomprehensibleness or because we cannot fully fathom them they must give us leave to think whose principles they have drunk in and whose cause they plead Thus have I discoursed the whole Interest of Reason in Religion and as I know not that I have said any more in this Matter than what is generally maintained by all the sober Nonconformists so I hope I may say that the charge which some men have fastned upon us as if we wholly renounced Reason in all Concernments of Religion and that no Contradiction can astonish or stagger us and that this is the foundation and support of the Credit of the party especially amongst Vulgar Hearers is a false aspersion groundless calumny and an impudent Crimination And though I do not think that it savour's of over-much Modesty that a few young Theologues of the Church of England if indeed they be so should monopolize to themselves the name of Rational Divines yet for my own part I neither envy them the Title nor have any quarrel with them upon that account it being indeed their want of Reason that I find fault with And as it hath generally been the unhappiness of others who have too much boasted of and relyed upon Reason to fall into the most irrational sentiments so I do not see but that it is in a very great measure the misfortune of our New Rationalists As the Philosophers of old made Reason their only Rule and yet most of their Religious opinions whether in reference to Faith Worship or Moral Obedience were perfectly Irrational And as the Socinians pretend to pay more than an ordinary veneration to Reason and yet there are none in the world whose Tenets lye more cross to the Fundamental Maxims of it than some of theirs do For to give Religious Adoration to a meer Creature for such they allow Christ only to be to deny God the fore knowledge of future contingents to ascribe passions and affections to God in the manner they are incident to us are such Repugnancies to Reason that a man had need renounce that as well as Revelation ere he can admit them So I account it of easie proof that many of the Darling Notions about Original Sin Converting Grace the Nature of Regeneration and Justification it self c. of our pretended late Rational Divines are as well repugnant to Reason as they are to Scripture CHAP. II. Of the Import and Vse of Scripture-Metaphors SECT I. SOme men having espoused corrupt designs in reference to the Truths of the Gospel are in pursuance thereof led to Methods which may subserve and countenance their Undertakings For the End being fixed Means must be found out and adapted for the compassing of it Now among other little arts and contrivances supposed conducible to their Undertaking I find some late Writers improving their skill and industry especially in these two things First under pretence of banishing all wrangling brawling and vain talking they study to cashier and discharge all Disputes in and about Religion and 't is become their Interests upon two accounts so to do 1. That they may have the liberty to vent
to himself and would obtrude upon the World such harsh and uncouth Tropes as none but himself and some Socinians ever dream'd of Thus while other Interpreters expound Christs being made of God unto us Wisdom Righteousness Sanctification and Redemption 1 Cor. 1.30 of his being the Author of all these not only in the revealing wherein Wisdom Righteousness c. do consist but in way of Causality by an easie Metonymie of the Effect for the Cause yet after a different manner in Analogy to the things themselves that are spoken of Mr. Sherlock tells us That by Christs being made Wisdom to us he can understand no more than the Wisdom of those Revelations Christ hath made of Gods Will to the World p. 103. I would willingly know how he would paraphrase the rest of the verse so as to make sense of it yet preserve a Consistency to his commentary upon the first paâ—â— without framing other Tropes than those do whose miscarriages in this particular he so much blames in their Interpreting of Scripture Likewise whereas other Commentators expound Joh. 14.6 where Christ sayth of himself I am the Way the Truth and the Life by admitting only a simple and familiar Metaphor in the Term Way Mr. Sherlock doth over and above fancy a Metonymie in the Pronoun I. For p. 31. he paraphraseth the Text thus I alone declare the True Way to Life and Happiness which he again repeats p. 229. I will not be so severe as to railly upon his manner of expressing himself in this Matter p. 135. where he say's that it is not the Person of Christ i. e. Christ himself but the Gospel of Christ which is the Way the Truth and the Life because I suppose his meaning to be that though Christ is so yet that it is not otherwise than by the Gospel though I could have wished that out of respect to Sense as well as Modesty he had otherwise declared himself than there he doth 4 I am the less surprised to find the Popular Discourses of some Non-Conformists arraigned as stuft with Metaphors and their Sermons and Didactical Writings not only branded upon that account as unintelligible and that their Notions would appear Jejunâ— and ridiculous stuff did they want the varnish of fine Metaphors and Glittering Allusions but their Persons loaded with Calumnies as if they trifled away the Duties of the Gospel by Childish Allegories and similitudes I say I am the less surprised at this in that I find the Scripture it self impeached in the same manner by others upon the like accounts For as upon the one hand the Scripture is blam'd as Dull flat and unaffecting by men of a wanton and prophane wit because of its not being adorned with Flowers of Rhetorick so upon the other hand there are some who find fault with it as dark and obscure because of the many Rhetorical Tropes and Figures with it is replenished which Nor is there any one Topick which the Papists to justify the with-holding the Laity from the reading of the Bible and to serve the design of erecting a living Infallible Judg manage with more confidence in opposition to the perspicuity of the Scripture than that there are many Tropes Figures and Rhetorical Schem's in the stile of it The Divine Ends in interweaving so many figurative expressions into the phraseology of the Bible shall be inquired into and declared afterwards and the Scripture acquitted from any just imputation of Darkness and Obscurity upon the account of the Rhetorical Ornaments with which it is embellished But as to the charge fastened upon some of late of obscuring Religion and darkning what is otherwise plain and easy meerly for indulging themselves now then in the use of a Metaphor and Similitude I shall briefly return these things 1 That it is for the most part in Popular Discourses where less accuracy and propriety in expression is required than in Polemical and Controversal Writings that this is to be met with Our great End being to instruct and perswade and the Modes of speaking and Writing being but an Organical Art in order thereunto all Methods of Discourse must be estimated by their Commensurateness to this End 2 Many of the expressions quarrelled with in Sermons and Practical Tracts are nothing else but the very Terms and Phrases which the Holy Ghost condescendeth to declare sacred things by Nor can any reproach be fastned on them in the Writings of men where they occurr without reflections on the Wisedom of God who useth them in the like cases and to the same purposes Fitter and more Emphatical Expressions to declare Divine things there are none than what the Holy Ghost hath preceded us in there being none that teacheth like God Nor is the Scripture only the Rule of what we are to believe and practice but also the Measure of our expressions about sacred things which we are to declare 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not in the Words which Mans Wisedom teacheth but which the Holy Ghost teacheth God not only inspired the Minds of the Prophets and Apostles with a knowledge and apprehension of the things they were to reveal but he suggested the very words by which they were to express what their Minds had conceived Hence we are not only obliged to teach no other Doctrine but what the Scripture Authoriseth but we are advised to pay a particular regard 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to wholsome Words even the Words of our Lord Jesus Christ. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Apostle there perstringeth refers not only to the teaching of Doctrines unadapted to the promotion of Godliness but the declining Scripture Words Phrases in the unfolding Mysteries of Faith the sacred Oracles being not only our Standard in the former but also in the latter Hence likewise it is that we have in command to observe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Form of sound Words i. e. to conform our selves in the explicating of Gospel Mysteries to the Terms and Expressions which the Apostle had manifested and declared them by And it is made a Character of a good Minister of Jesus Christ to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nourished up in the Words of Faith and of Good Doctrine The mysteries of Faith require a Rhetorick proper and peculiar to themselves And as it is only from the Scripture that we can be supplyed with Glorious Images and excellent Idea's of the things themselves which we treat of so it alone can best fuâ—nish us with all Ornaments of Speech and Eloquence as well to beautify as declare them 3. Rhetorical Tropes and Figures have been usually accounted for Lights Colours to illustrate things and not for shades and Clouds to darken and obscure them As of all Tropes Metaphors are the most usual in Prophane Authors so unless perhaps we except Metonymies they are more obvious in sacred Writers than any other And as they add a wonderful
the thing whereof we conceive the former to have been only a Figure To paraphrase Metaphors in Metaphorick terms is instead of making them Intelligible to continue them dark and Mysterious For as we are not to terminate in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Images themselves but to penetrate into the things couched under and represented by them so much less is a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Mimetick Phancy in our commenting on them to be indulged In a word it is the work of a Judicious Interpreter to bring forth and declare the scope and matter of all such Phrases in the most plain and easy expressions Now in order to the arriving at true notions conceptions of those divine and Spiritual things which are lock't up under Metaphorick Terms we ought 1 in some considerable degree to understand the Nature and properties of the things from which the Metaphor is taken For Metaphorick Terms signifying one thing and being only applyed to shadow forth another by reason of some resemblance between them we are wholly inept to declare the Heavenly Truth that such Forms of Speech are adapted have a tendency to instruct us in while we remain ignorant of the things which those Words originally and immediately import And seeing the Scripture expresseth somewhat of Religion by all the parts of the Creation by the Imployments very utensils of Humane life and by the usages and customs of Mankind Metaphors are not a subject for any undertaker to exercise upon who hath not more than a tincture of knowledg in all those Though to understand the Bible well be enough to promote Faith and Good life yet to understand some passages of it well a great many other things must be first understood It cannot otherwise be but that to persons ignorant of natural Philosophy Agriculture c. as well as unacquainted with the customes and usages of the Oriental Nations many Texts will seem obscure which are not at all so to such as are imbued with true Ideas of the Natures and properties of things and enriched with a knowledge of Arts and the Customes of the World A luxurious Fancy will be apt to frame very wild and absurd Notions out of Metaphors if the Understanding be not furnished with a knowledg of the qualities operations and use of those things from which they are drawn A familiarity therefore with the works of God as it will oblige us humbly to adore the Mysteries of the Word which we cannot fathom through finding our selves non-plus't in the most obvious phaenomena of Nature so it will exceedingly contribute to our understanding many passages in Scrâ—pture of which we must otherwise either continue wholly ignorant or judg of them according to the suggestions of Imagination I may add that when a word or Term is borrowed from any Art Science or Discipline and metaphorically applied to illustrate some mystery of Faith or the mode of its Existence the genius and value of the word with respect to its usage in the Discipline whence it is transferred is carefully to be observed How expedient and necessary upon this account an acquaintance with the civil-Law is in order to the fixing the importance of divers Scripture-phrases such as Adoption Surety Earnest c. were easie to Demonstrate 2. There being diverse Metaphorical expressions in the Scripture the meaning of which is not to be arrived at by meer recourse to the immediate signification of the words and Terms as bearing rather upon the things which the Eastern Nations in their symbolical representation of matters applied them to It will therefore be needful to know the meaning of many of the Oriental Symbols and what things and events because of some similitude between the Symbols themselves and the things and events they stood for they represented by them For as there are many Prophetick passages both in the old and new Testament which are not strictly Metaphorick that cannot otherwise be understood So there are many Metaphorick expressions in the Scripture of whose meaning we can have no assurance but by knowing something of the use and import of the Symbols of the Ancients 3 The same Terms according as they are metaphorically applyed to different subjects importing often different things their signification must be stated by considering the subject they are applyed to Through the different Affections Properties Adjuncts and Effects that appertain to things which Words originally and properly manifest and denote it frequently falls out that things hugely opposite are resembled to them and stiled by their Names Now in this case the quality of the Subject Metaphorically denoted by such a Term can alone determine the resemblance which intercede's between the thing originally and immediately signified and the thing to which it is Tropically applyed I should be too tedious did I undertake to enumerate the several Words that with respect to the various properties or effects of the things which they properly signifie are applied metaphorically to represent not only things different but opposite some of them in a good sense in Analogy to one property or effect and others in an evil in Analogy to another 4 Great care is required that when diverse properties and affections of things Originally signified by Terms and Words may without injury to Truth be in Way of similitude applyed to the Things which those Terms are Metaphorically brought to illustrate that the comparison and Resemblance be not carried beyond what the Holy Ghost doth there peculiarly design We ought not only to take heed that we hurry not a Metaphor beyond the precincts of Truth but that we drive it not beyond the limits which the place where it is used and the end of the Speaker confine it to 'T is not enough that we do not trespass against the Analogy of Faith in the application of a Metaphor but it is also requisite that we exceed not the Intention of the sacred Writer in that very place There is in all Metaphorical expressions some one Property Affection Operation or other wherein the proportion and resemblance between the things immediately signified by the Words and the things which they are brought to manifest and illustrate doth peculiarly consist and this the nature of the Discourse the Context and speakers scope must determine us in Want of due attendance to this may occasion a prevaricating from the sense of the place where yet there may be an Harmony maintained in reference to the universal System of the Scripture A failure in this if in any thing relating to the subject before us is that which hath ministred occasion for the clamours of partial and angry men But that others besides some of the Non-Conformists are guilty of it were easy to set beyond all exception did I love to expose the Wisdom and discretion of any as some do Yea 't is not so easy to fasten a just imputation upon any in this matter as some are prone to imagine For besides that fecundity of sense
reflection upon those portions of Holy writ which God hath honoured him to be the amanuensis of But this I do not much wonder at in the Author of the foresaid Sermon seeing it is from St. Paul that we have learned to distinguish between Faith and good works in the Matter of Justification which he there so severedly censures But to return Though the Reverence which Mr. Sherlock pays to the writings of the Apostles may be possibly consistent with reconcileable to his burlesque manner of treating them yet one would think that the admiration which he hath for our Saviours Sermons above the Writings of the Apostles though the Apostles were not less inspired by the Holy Ghost in the penning and giving forth the Epistles than the Evangelists were in writing the Gospels which convey to us the Sermons of Christ should have secured them from the like entertainment But it hath here also fallen out otherwise for rather than T.W. should escape our Authors censure the Words of Christ in the true intendment and meaning of them are introduced as the matter of his Mirth and Scorn As the Serpent says he pretending to blazon T. W'S. Folly and to lay him Obnoxious to Contempt and Derision was lifted up to be lookt upon by the stung Israelites which looking implyed a secret hope they had of cure so if we do but look on Christ fiducially we shall be cured of our sins Now let this be compared with the words of Christ himself Joh. 3.15 16. And as Moses lifted up the Serpent in the Wilderness even so must the Son of man be lifted up that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life and I dare leave it to the Judgement of every sober and Judicious person whether the very Scripture-expressions in their proper sense be not made to bear a Share in this Gentlemans derision Had Mr. Sherlock only raillied upon some things in T. W's discourse concerning the resemblance of Christ to the brazen Serpent and preserved the dignity and Reverence of the Type it self without reflections upon the main scope and designe of the Comparison he should have easily escaped my Censure but having included the Sentence I have rehearsed in the same indictment with others wherein may be T.W. hath prevaricated I must renew my Charge namely that some of their loudest Clamours against the Non-conformists for Similitudes and Metaphors fall with the same weight upon expressions which the Holy Ghost in his Wisdom hath been pleased to use I shall add one passage more relating to the resemblance betwixt Christ and the Brazen Serpent for which amongst others Mr. Sherlock is pleased in way of Irony to stile T.W. very happy in expounding Types the equivalent whereof besides that it may be found in a hundred Dull Authors he knows whom I mean being an Epithete lately bestowed upon a certain set of Writers by one of his Friends I have read in a Person whom though he do not may be universally like for his Divinity yet he bears him more respect than to laugh at him for a Fool. The passage in T. W. is this The Brazen Serpent was made like a Serpent but was no real Serpent so Christ was made in the likness of sinful Flesh but was no sinner The equavalent of it is this Haec Imago effigies Serpentis erat similis Serpenti ita Christus qui purus ab omni veneno peccati fuit in cruce pependit speciem referem hominis peccatoris vel ut Paulus loquitur in similitudine carnis peccati Rom. 8.3 I need not English this and therefore shall only tell him where he may meet with it viz. in a certain Gentleman called Wolzogenius commenting upon Joh. 3.14 so that at least here is one more as happy in expounding Types as T. W. is And as I see not how Mr. Vincents advice to young Women to chuse Christ for their Husband is either a peece of fantastical Wit as our Author is pleased to call it or comes to be spoyled by the Churches being Christ's Spouse seeing His relation of a Husband to the Church doth no way hinder his being so to every Member of it It affords me another instance of Mr. Sherlocks intolerable sauciness towards the Scripture rather than he should fail in exposing those whom he thinks he hath cause to be displeased with For not to mention what occurs in the Canticles justifying the utmost of what Mr. Vincent says in this matter even the Apostle Paul not only speaks of his having espoused the Church of Corinth to one Husband that he might present them a Chast Virgin to Christ 1 Cor. 11.2 but he speaks of every particular Believer among the Romans as being married to Christ. Wherefore my Brethren ye also are become dead to the Law by the Body of Christ that ye should be married to another even to him who is raised from the Dead that we should bring forth Fruits unto God Rom. 7.4 To all which not only the passage of our Author That every Christian is not Christs Spouse is directly repugnant but his supposition that Christ in case particular Believers be espoused to Him must be a Polygamist argues him as well an ignorant as a confident man and imposeth the same brand upon the Inspired Writers that he would expose the Non-conformists under the infamy of He that would see more of Mr. Sherlocks Burlesquing the Scripture and how he hath in a prophane Sacrilegious manner abused the very Words of it to make his Readers sport and to render his Adversaries Ridiculous Let him consult amongst other places p. 62 63 65 66 69 70. of his Book for I cannot allow my self to transcribe what either may have a tendency to the tainting the Minds of some or the offending the Consciences of others A Second thing which I would reply upon our late Writers for their upbraiding the Non-conformists upon the account of turning the plainest Scriptures Into Metaphors and Allegories or as Mr. Sherlock expresseth it of turning all Religion into an Allegory is this That the guilt in this matter lodgeth principally with themselves 'T is but fit that instead of being always upon the Defensive we should sometimes carry the War into their Quarters Not that I design this as a justification of any amongst us who may be guilty in this particular but meerly to shew that this way of assaulting us was none of the wisest considering how open they lye themselves to Recriminations of this kind They are indeed most Criminal herein who put the imputation furthest from them though they ought to look well to themselves who undertake to accuse others I would say Quis tulerit Gracchâ—s But that I expect to be told that I have Classically expressed my self as an acquaintance of Mr. Sherlock Jyb'd a Learned Person meerly for saying that he neither desired nor designed serram reciprocare In the pursuit of this insteed of producing particular
affirm withal that till the sanctifying Spirit effectually infallibly and by an unresisted Operation transform us into the Divine Nature and communicate to us a vital seed we remain polluted unholy and uncapable of doing any thing with all that dueness of circumstances as may commend us or our performances to Gods acceptance Not but that antecedently to the Holy Ghosts renewing us by a communication of Grace to us we may both Dogmatically believe the Doctrines of the Scripture and be found in a discharge of the material parts not only of natural Duties but of the Acts of Instituted Religion But to say that we ought thereupon to be denominated Holy is to remonstrate to the Scripture in a thousand places and to overthrow the very Tenour and design of the Gospel Now while we remain thus Un-holy we are so far from being actually united to Christ or capable Subjects of Justification and Forgiveness that till we be actually made partakers of the washing of Regeneration and the renuing of the Holy Ghost we cannot possibly have any Union with Him or have a right to Pardon of Sin or any thing that ensues or depends thereupon by Him I know not one amongst the Non-conformists who Affirmeth that wicked Men while They continue such are actually united to Christ and thereby have an actual Right to Pardon and Righteousness and Eternal Life yea that they must be united to Christ if ever they be United while they continue in sin as Mr. Sherlock is pleased without respect either to Modesty or Truth to brand them Nor do I know any Opinion maintained by them that draws such a pernicious Consequence after it But 't is no matter with some if the Deduction be odious and reproachful whether it be Rational and Coherent or not All that we plead for is this that as previously to our Union with Christ we are polluted and Un-holy so by that very Act whereby he Unites us to Himself He infuseth those Principles into us by which our Natures are cleansed and we come to be denominated Holy and Pure The Foundation of our Union and that by w ch we become 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 6.17 ligu'd and cemented to the Lord is the matter of our inward Purity and the vital Seed and living principle of our following Obedience By the same Act that he assumes us into Union with Himself He transforms our Natures and by having made a Change in the Heart there infallibly follows a Change in the conversation Those very Principles by which we are regenerated are both the Ligaments which Knit and Unite us to him and the springs sources of all our Gospel Obedience 'T is a needless enquiry whether our renovation in order of Nature precede our Union with Christ or whether our Union go before our Renovation seeing in order of Time they are not only inseparable but that which is the New Creature the Seed of God and Divine Nature in us is the very Bond of our Cohesion And as none continuing Un-holy are united to Christ so neither doth our being united to Him Destroy our Obligation to Holiness and Obedience for the future of which Mr. Sherlock foolishly as well invidiously impeacheth it For besides that both the Consideration of Gods distinguishing mercy in the renewing our Natures will be a forcible Motive and Argument to Holiness and the principles already inlaid into our Hearts like a vital Form in the Soul turning it into an universal consent with Gods own Will adapt connaturalise and incline us to it The same Spirit which was the Author of our Regeneration continues both to watch over cherish foster excite and draw forth those principles and habits which he hath already infused into our souls and to communicate such farther supplies as upon our serving his promises God in his Soveraign infinite wisdom in order to his own glory thinks meet These we have described are the persons whose being united to Christ we plead for which I hope neither derives a dishonour upon the person of our Saviour nor offers any contradiction to his Gospel We disclaim being the Patrons and advocates of the Union of any Unholy person while he continues such to Christ Nor is our adversary able by any Rule of Argumentation to infer it from any of our Opinions How far he may be able to prejudice those against us who are led by Noise Clamour and Confidence instead of calm and sedate Reason I know not but amongst persons of a better figure who will not meerly be talkt into a contempt of us who hate us not out of Interest and so regulate their Faith concerning us by their Indignation I defie him a Proselyte I wish Mr. Sherlock were not in this very particular lyable to have that retorted upon himself which he hath as unjustly as invidiously fastened upon us For as I should be sorry that any thing in our own opinion should lye in such an inconsistency to the frame of the Gospel as to entitle Unholy persons to an actual Union with Christ so 't is no pleasure at all to me to find the Doctrine of an Adversary pregnant with consequences subversive of true Holiness But we must take things here as they are and he ought not to be offended to have his own Notions in this Matter modestly exposed having with so much Satyr and Contempt injuriously represented the Opinions of others And first he grants in so many words that in one sense we must be united to Christ before we can be Holy and he gives this reason for it Because the first lowest degree of our Union with Christ is a Belief of his Gospel and the belief of the Gospel being the great principle of Obedience it must needs go before it While Mr. Sherlock impeacheth us as disserving Holiness and Religion by our Notion of Union who yet allow no man to be in Christ who is not a new Creature and that Christ only dwells in us and we in him by the Spirit which he hath given us He is at the same time so unhappy and so little mindful of what he says as not only Consequentially but in Terminis to plead that men must be United to Christ before they can be Holy I know he adds That our Union is not perfected without actual obedience but if to be in Christ signify no more than being members of his visible Church which is made up of Hypocrites as well as sincere Christians as our Author tells us elsewhere I see not but that Union is compleated as well as begun without a Mans being Holy seeing to be united to Christ is no more in its full import than to be in Him Yea as if it had not been enough barely to assert that men whilest they continue in sin may be United to Christ the Scripture must be suborned to countenance it Christ sayes he speaks of such branches in him as bear no fruit and therefore
being in him can signify no more than being Members of his Visible Church which is made up of Hypocrites as well as sincere Christians But neither doth this nor any other text in the Bible militate in behalf of such an impious Notion however it or they may be pressed wrested and distorted to such a service Should we allow Mr. Sherlocks reading of the words referred to Joh. 15.2 which our present English Translation hath preceded him in yet there is nothing in them towards the Patronage of the Cause they are brought for The meaning of the place is not that there are any really in Christ who bear not fruit but only that there are some void of all fruits of Righteousness who make profession of their being so Who are therefore in an equivocal sense styled branches because they are numbred amongst the Members of the Church For it is usual to speak of persons and things as if they were that which they appear to be But withall the place is capable of another Lection which if admitted our Authors Hypothesis is far from being befriended by it For the words may be as well read Every Branch that beareth not Fruit in me he taketh away as every Branch in me that beareth not Fruit. And then the true import of it is that unless we be in Christ we can bring forth no Fruit to God and that what shew of being branches we make by virtue of an External Member-ship in the Church Yet that shall be no Obex to Christs disclaiming and renouncing our Works Nothing hath the true denomination of Holiness but what proceeds from the Spirit of Christ in us and Principles of Grace by infusion communicated to us which are the Foundation matter and Bond of our Union with Him And under whatever gloss or varnish we or our works appear to the World yet without such a Relation to Christ we are none of His nor are our Duties as to the Principles and Circumstances of them acceptable to God The Obligation upon Men to Obedience in what state soever we suppose them The consistency of Gods Right of Commanding with our contracted inability to the yeilding of due Obedience the Capacity that all men remain in notwithstanding any Congenite Impotency for the performing many External Duties good in themselves and in the matter of them with the subservience of these performances to Conversion as they are means appointed of God in order thereunto all these I in some measure understand and can reconcile with the Oeconomy of the Gospel But that our Lives can be Holy till our Hearts be so through the renuing of the Holy Ghost or that our Works can be adequately Good antecedently to our Reception of supernatural Grace I do no wise understand and I should account my self obliged to Mr. Sherlock would he unfold these things to me without obtruding Pelagianism upon the World And this conducts me to a Second thing wherein our Authors Notion of Union with Christ disserveth and undermines Gospel-Holiness beyond what the highest Malice steel'd with a proportionate Confidence can by any Laws of Reason fasten upon his Adversaries of such a tendency For as if it were not enough to have said that men are in a sense United to Christ before they either are or can be Holy even that very Obedience in which he states the compleatness of our Union with Christ and by which he declares it to be perfected is not owing to an Infused Principle derived from Jesus by the effectual operation of the Holy Ghost but is only the result effect of our Natural Abilities awakened and excited by the Gospel Hence that I may not again repeat what we have heard from him before Sect. 2. he tells us That a Holy Life must at least in order of Nature goe before our Union with Christ because by this we are United to Him and that we are not real and living Members of Christ till we first sincerely Obey Him Now I say that this Obedience wherein our Author places the very perfection of our Union with Christ is not only formally distinct from true Gospel-Holiness but indeed lies in a contrariety to it The Gospel acknowledgeth no Acts of true Holiness performed by any where there is not antecedently at least in order of Nature a principle of true Holiness in the persons performing them No Acts operations or Duties of ours are in the esteem of the Gospel Holy but what proceed from and are done in the virtue power and efficacy of Grace previously derived from and Communicated to us by Jesus Christ. There is pre-required to all acts of Gospel-Obedience a new real spiritual Principle by which our Nature is renewed our Souls rendred habitually and subjectively Holy Grace is not the effect and product of any previous good Actions of ours what ever subserviency through the appointment and dispose of God they may lie in as to his bestowing of it but all Acts Operations truly Good are the fruits and efflorescencies of Grace To talk of sincere Obedience precluding our antecedaneous adeption of a new Principle and the Communication of a Divine Vital Seed to us is to impose Pelagianism upon us and that in a more fulsom way and in cruder Terms than many of the followers of Pelagius used to declare themselves Excluding our being furnished with an active supernatural infused subjective Principle the utmost influence the Gospel hath upon Obedience is only by the equity and reasonableness of its Laws the nobleness and certainty of its Promises to solicite our Minds and to awaken the Strength we have but as to the conferring any real Strength or the begetting a vital Form in our Hearts thereby repairing and restoring the Image of God which we have lost it is altogether incompetent and ineffectual So that upon the whole that very Obedience wherin Mr. Sherlock states the Nature and Perfection of our Union with Christ to consist is not only contra-distinct from but subversive of the Holiness which the Gospel requires being an Obedience educed meerly out of our natural Abilities and no ways owing to any Antecedent Renovation of our Natures by the Holy Ghost which is that alone that the Gospel honours with the name of Holiness Nor is this either all the Invasion which our Author by the Idea he gives of Union with Christ hath made upon Gospel-Holiness but admitting once his account of it to be true that which God alone doth entitle by the Name of Holiness is wholly shut out of the Religion of Christians So that a Third Reason why I except against his Notion of our Union with Christ as pernicious to Holiness beyond what the Opinion of any others is whom he so Tragically declame's against is this that it render's all True Holiness even in persons actually and compleatly united to Christ impossible for the future For as our Union with Christ is perfected without any Communication of New Principles by a real Physical and
the beauty pulchritude and order of the Creâ—tures especially the Fabrick of Animals and the suitableness of their Members for their Functions Chance hath no orderly designs nor is symmetry and proportion to be attributed to the fortuitous jumbles of blind matter If contrivances of art be not effected without an industrious skil much less are the works of Nature which infinitely exceed the former performed without the conduct of an intellectual Principle The consideration of the Fabrick of things made Plato say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which I may english in the words of the Holy Ghost that all things are made in number weight and measure Who can observe the great Luminary the Sun his distance from the Earth the motion communicated to him that he move's in an orbicular and not in a straight Line that in his circular motion he chalk's out to himself an oblique road that in his journey throug the Zodiack he employ's so much time and not confess a Wise as well as a Powerful Agent to have been the contriver of all this seeing in every instance things might have been otherwise and yet it cannot but be acknowledged that it is to the best and most universal advantage for them to be as they are Is it possible philosophically to view the body of Man the Fabrick of the Organs of sense the situation of the Heart the structure of its Ventricles the communication betwixt it and the Boâ—dy by Veins and Arteries the contrivance of the Larynx the Frame and use of the Epiglottis the contexture of the Brain the correspondency betwixt it and all the parts of the Body by Nerves the Fabrick of the Muscles those pullies of motion c. and not confess an Almighty and Wise Artist to have contrived and performed those excellent operations In the Third place what convictions are we furnished with of the Being of God from the Innate Harmony that is in the several parts of the Creation and the convenient disposure of all the Creatures to a subserviency to one another in mutual offices Chance cannot have link't one thing to another nor can contraries combine into a mutual coalition without the influence of a supreme Being who over-rules them An establshed order among multiplicity of things void of understanding is the work of an infinite Understanding Order and Harmony being nothing but a congruous disposition of things according to their Dignity and usefulness He must be supposed to know their natures Dignity and uses that regularly disposeth them and this can belong to none but to an Infinite Wisdom To this might be added the orderly and sagacious operation not only of Brutes but inanimate Creatures for ends which they neither perceive nor understand which as certainly argues a Supreme Wise Superintender of all things as the regular course of a Ship in the Ocean argues that there sits a Pilot at the Helm Upon these foregoing Motives not to mention many other hath mankind in all Ages and places subscribed to the Being of God So universal hath the Notion of a Deity been that men have rather chosen to worship any thing for God then wholly to be without one Being both persuaded that there was a God and that he was infinitely good they made every thing that was beneficial to them a Deity Nor can the Atheist who denies the Existence of God give any rational account of the universal consent of mankind that there is One. Wheras he that maintains One can easily resolve it by shewing how such a persuasion flows naturally from the exercise of every mans understanding And forasmuch as it is alledged that there have been some who have dissented and consequently that the persuasion is not Universal It Amounts to no more but that there have been some who did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speak falsely of and bely our Nature that I may use Porphyries phrase Nature may be so perverted by Vice that men will not acknowledg what lyes most proportionable to Reason 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Being corrupted by bad Education evil Customs and wicked institutions they destroy their natural Notions saith a Philosopher If the Contradiction of a single Individual or two were enough to invalidate an universal Persuasion or to impeach a Natural Truth there were neither the one nor the other in the World For not only Cicero tells us that there is nothing so absurd which some of the Philosophers have not maintained But Aristotle informs us that there have been some who have held That a Thing might at the same time be and not be And as the same Person tells us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is universally known not which every one acknowledgeth but what every one who hath not Debauch't his Faculties doth discern Topic. 6. c. 4. It is enough that the Existence of God lyes even to our Understandings though some who affront their Faculties will not acknowledge it I shall shut up all this with a Saying or two of Heathen Philosophers The Denyal of God is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Irrational and can be approved by none but those who have neither Understanding nor Sense The Atheist doth eâ—adicate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That which is Naturally planted in all reasonable Souls sayes Plutarch Nothing but the Prophaness of the present Age hath tinctur'd it with Atheism Sensuality smothers the most connate Notions and Reason becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Infected with those evil Opinions which proceed from Lusts as Plotinus saith When Men are once sunk into the grossest Sensualities their Reason becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 complyant with their sensual Appetites Besides such Men living as if there were no God can make no Apology to the World for it but by espousing such Notions which may justifie them in their courses Withall Men being resolved to live as they list it becomes their Interest in reference to their Tranquillity in the mean time to Believe through Holding that there is none to call them to Account that they may do so He that finds cause to Fear a God will soon wish that there were none Et Quod valde volumus facile credimus What we earnestly desire we easily believe However I hope there is enough suggested to prove that there is sufficient Foundations in the Light of Nature were there no such thing as Revelation in the World whereby we may Arrive at a Persuasion of the Existence of a Deity Nor shall I further Combate the Atheist by shewing how imprudent disingenuous and absurd his Opinion is all these being Largely done by other Hands And my Concern was only to declare that there are Demonstrative Arguments in Nature whereby our Reasons can previously to all Revelation Assure us of the Being of God § 6. The next thing to be considered is the Use and Serviceableness of Reason in proving the Divinity of the Scripture And here Reason is of great import for by this alone we demonstrate the Divine Authority