obliged the world so that all due homage and divine reverence to the Person of Christ must be laid aside and this bold Impostor silence the constant faith of Christians by his high pretensions of being the Head and Father of such a Family whose Inscription must be Love who with this Family of his is God and Christ and Cherubims and Seraphims Angels and Arch-Angels already busie in their office of judging the quick and the dead and gathering the elect from all the corners of the Earth 5. But in my apprehension at the very first sight he shews himself very injudicious if not malicious in making a difference betwixt the true Houshold of Faith and Family of Love besides his gross and impudent injustice in usurping that badge of honour to himself that was won by another in a field of bloud For as I was going to say what has this H. N. done to merit this title more then in scribling many fanatical Rhapsodies of unsound language abusively borrowed from the sacred Scriptures and in perverting the sense and supplanting the end by his wicked elusions and vain Allegorical evasions and so under pretense of beginning an higher dispensation of Righteousnes and Religion in the world then ever was yet treacherously introducing in stead of true Religion nothing but Sadducisme Epicurisme and Atheisme This voluminous Enthusiasme of his together with the gracing of the Family with the splendour of his crimson habiliments is all I find that can pretend to any contestation or competition with the true Master of Divine Love or to any obligation of his Followers 6. I must confess our Saviour compiled no Books it being a piece of Pedantry below so noble and Divine a person But that short Sentence which he writ with his own most precious bloud As I have loved you so love you one another is worth millions of Volumes though written with the truest and sincerest Eloquence that ever fell from the pen of an Oratour Nor did he wear any gay Clothes but when by force the abusive souldiers put a scarlet robe upon him indespight and mockery Nor was he resplendent in any colours but what was the die of his own bloud in his solemn and dreadful Passion when he was so cruelly scourged when out of agonie of mind he sweat drops of bloud when he was nailed to the Cross and the lance let bloud and water out of his side All which ineffable and unsupportable torments this innocent Lamb of God suffered for no demerit of his for what thank is it to suffer for a factious Impostor or open evil doer but out of mere compassion and hearty love to mankind that he might by this bitter Passion of his and the glorious consequences of it his Resurrection and Ascension gain us to God And now let all men judge if there can be possibly any Authour or pretended Instructer of the World in that holy and divine Love indeed comparable to the Lord Iesus who has given this unparallel'd demonstration of his love unto us CHAP. III. 1. The occasion of the Familists usurpation of the Title of Love 2. Earnest precepts out of the Apostles to follow Love and what kind of Love that is 3. That we cannot love God unless we love our neighbour also 4. An Exposition of the 5 and 6 verses of the 1 chapter of the 2 Epist. of S. Peter 5. Saint Paul's rapturous commendation of Charity 6. His accurate description thereof 7. That Love is the highest participation of the Divinity and that whereby we become the Sons of God And how injurious these Fanaticks are that rob the Church of Christ of this title to appropriate it to themselves 1. HEarken therefore to me yet that would follow after righteousness ye that seek the Lord Look unto the rock whence you were hewen and to the hole of the pit from whence you were digged Look upon him whom ye have pierced and whose bloud is the seed of the Church whose Spouse was taken out of his side as Eve out of the side of Adam Acknowledge your original and recount with your selves the price of your Redemption even the inestimable bloud of that immaculate Lamb Christ Jesus The sense whereof is the strongest cement imaginable to unite us to our Saviour and one unto another But the Church having been given up so long a time to bitter factions and persecutions to warre and bloudshed and all manner of enmity and hostility one against another it is no wonder if a stranger has invaded that Title which she may justly be thought to have either refused or forfeited For my own part I know not how to apologize for either the fond opinions or foul miscarriages of the Wilderness of Christendome But sure I am That the Banner over the true Spouse of Christ is Love That Love is the badge and cognoscence of all his faithful members by which they are known to be His living members indeed That Love and Peace is the last Legacy which was left to the disciples by their dying Lord and Master an inheritance entailed upon all the true sons of God for ever That Love is the fulfilling of the Law and has filled almost every page of the Gospel and all the Writings of the Apostles and when they speak of Faith it is none other Faith then that which worketh by Love 2. Out of the many repetitions and inculcations of this holy and heavenly Vertue I was a gleaning out some to present you withall for an evidence how serious the Gospel of Christ is and how sufficient in the urging of his indispensable duty We go on therefore and adde to what we have already cited these following places Galat. 5.6 For in Iesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but Faith which worketh by Love And if Circumcision be nothing without Faith working by Love what can Baptizing or Rebaptizing or any external ceremony be without this true Faith whose life and spirit is Love which the Apostle directs us to And after v. 13 14. For brethren ye have been called unto liberty only use not your liberty for an occasion to the flesh but by love serve one another For all the Law is fulfilled in one word even in this Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Where this Law of Love is so carefully described that the abuse of this Title to Lust and Libertinisme is plainly excluded against such as talk so much of Love and are but Libertines at the bottom Which caution also is very soberly and prudently put in by S. Iohn Ep. 1. chap. 5. v. 2. By this we know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep his Commandements Which is a plain demonstration that that Love which Saint Iohn exhorts to so copiously in his Epistle is a Love purely divine and such as no man can be assured he doth practise unlesse he keep all the Commandements of God For even a carnall man may love the Children of
of God Be not deceived neither Fornicatours nor Idolaters nor Adulterers nor Effeminate nor Abusers of themselves with mankind nor Thieves nor Covetous nor Drunkards nor Revilers nor Extortioners shall inherit the kingdome of God And Hebr. 12.14 Follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. And thus we see that all the Happiness of man and his real good is utterly subverted and destroyed by this mischievous imagination of being righteous otherwise then by true and living Righteousness 10. And it is as plain that this imposture will rob God of his Glory as well as defeat man of his Happiness For whether we understand by the Glory of God the Image of God communicable to men as the Image that is the light of the Sun is the glory of the Sun or whether we understand the acknowledgment of that Excellency and Perfection that is in God first deeply conceived in our hearts and then fully and freely professed by our mouths both these are assuredly taken away by this false conceit And of the former there is no doubt being that the Spirit of Righteousness is that very Glory of God or Image of Christ. Wherefore whatever does intercept this does really eclipse the Glory of God And it is as true also of the other For seeing that the most rich and precious Excellencies of the Divine Nature cannot be discovered by the Soul as they ought to be but by becoming Divine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If thou beest it thou seest it as Plotinus speaks it must needs be that they cannot be worthily admired and extolled by any Soul but such as is Divine that is such a Soul as God has poured the Spirit of Righteousness and true Holiness on without which it is impossible to see God To all which Particulars that concern every private man you may add that great summe of an incomputable damage that respects the Publick For what Peace or Faithfulness can there be amongst men where the professed Mysterie of their Religion is the Explosion of real Righteousness Or what can possibly take place in stead thereof but Fraud and Falshood foul Lusts phrantick Factions rude Tumults and bloudy Rebellions To which you may cast in the loss of our very hopes that the World should ever grow better or that the holy Promises of God should take effect For there is not a more cruel or butcherly weapon for the slaying of the Witnesses nor a more impregnable Fort against the approaching Kingdome of Christ and that millennial Happiness which many good and faithfull Christians expect then this hell-hatch'd doctrine of Antinomianisme CHAP. XII 1. Of the attending to the Light within us of which some Spiritualists so much boast 2. That they must mean the Light of Reason and Conscience thereby if they be not Fanaticks Mad-men or Cheats And that this Conscience necessarily takes information from without 3. And particularly from the Holy Scriptures 4. That these Spiritualists acknowledge the fondness of their opinion by their contrary practice 5. An appeal to the Light within them if the Christian Religion according to the literal sense be not true 6. That the Operation of the Divine Spirit is not absolute but restrained to certain laws and conditions as it is in the Spirit of Nature 7. The fourth Gospel-Power The Example of Christ. 8. His purpose of vindicating the Example of Christ from aspersions with the reasons thereof 1. WE have now gone through the Three first Powers of the Gospel of which Three the last namely The Promise of the Spirit may seem so sufficient of it self to some without any thing further and I am sure does so to others that professedly they take up here and exclude or at least neglect all that advantage that accrues from the History of Christ and hereby do antiquate the Christian Religion These are those great Spiritualists that talk so much of The Light within them and the Power within them and boast that they want nothing without to be their Guide and Support but that they can goe of themselves without any external help For keeping to the Light within them the Power of God and the Spirit of God will assist them and will lead them into all truth And truly I cannot but say Amen to what they declare For I know assuredly that it is most true if they would leave off their canting language and say in down-right terms That keeping sincerely to the dictates of Reason and Conscience and the perpetually denying themselves in such things as they know or suspect to be evil with devout addresses to the Throne of Grace for the assistance and illumination of the Holy Spirit to discover and overcome all Errour Falseness Pride and Hypocrisie that may lurk in their hearts I say I am well assured that this Dispensation faithfully kept to will in due time lead unto all Saving Truth and that such a one at the last cannot fail to become a Christian in the soundest and the fullest sense such as firmly adhered to Christ in the first and most unspotted Ages of the Church But if they will call any hot wild Imagination or forcible and unaccountable Suggestion the Light within them and follow that this is not to keep to Reason and Conscience but to be delivered up to a reprobate sense and to expose a mans self to all the temptations that either the Devil or a mans own Lust or a sordid Melancholy can entangle him in 2. Wherefore by the Light within them they must understand an accountable and rational Conscience within them unless they be perfect Fanaticks or Mad-men or what is worse mere Impostors and Cheats who would pretend to a Conscience but yet irrational and unaccountable to any one and hereby have the liberty of doing what they please being given up at length to nothing but Fury and Lust. And then lastly This Conscience within them is not a thing so absolutely within them that it can take no information from what is without For it is manifest that this Lamp of God that burneth in us is fed and nourished from external Objects For the invisible things of him from the Creation of the World are clearly seen being understood by things that are made for by these from without are we advertised of his Eternal power and Godhead And as we are thus taught by the outward Book of Nature concerning the Existence of God and his general Providence in the world as to the necessities of life both of Men and Beasts so may we also by external VVritings or Records be more fully informed of a more special Providence of his to the Sons of men concerning the State in the other world and of that Eternal life manifested by Christ. But I grant that it is still this Light within us that judges and concludes after the perusal of either the Volumes of Nature or of Divine Revelation 3. But as he that gives his Mind to Mathematicks Architecture Husbandry
That the punctual Correspondence of the Event to the Prediction of the Astrologer does not prove the certainty of the Art of Astrology 5. The great Affinity of Astrology with Daemonolatry and of the secret Agency of Daemons in bringing about Predictions 6. That by reason of the secret or familiar Converse of Daemons with pretended Astrologers no argument can be raised from Events for the truth of this Art 7. A Recapitulation of the whole matter argued 8. The just occasions of this Astrological excursion and of his shewing the ridiculous condition of those three high-flown Sticklers against Christianity Apollonius Cardan and Vaninus 356 BOOK VIII CHAP. I. THE End and Usefulness of Christian Religion in general 2. That Christ came into the World to destroy Sin out of it 3. His earnest recommendation of Humility 4. The same urged by the Apostle Paul 361 CHAP. II. 1. Christs enforcement of Love and Charity upon his Church by Precept and his own Example 2. The wretched imposture and false pretensions of the Family of Love to this divine Grace 3. The unreasonableness of the Familists in laying aside the person of Christ to adhere to such a carnal and inconsiderable Guide as Hen. Nicolas 4. That this Whifler never gave any true Specimens of real love to Mankinde as Christ did and his Apostles 5. His unjust usurpation of the Title of Love 6. The unparallel'd endearmentâ— of Christs sufferings in the behalf of Mankiâ—d 364 CHAP. III. 1. The occasion of the Familists usâ—rpation of the Title of Love 2. Earnest precepts oâ—t of the Apostles to follow Love and what kind of Love that is 3. That we câ—nnot love God unlesse we love our neighbour also 4. An Exposition of the 5 and 6 verses of the 1 chapter of the 2 Epist. of S. Peter 5. Saint Paul's rapturous commendation of Charity 6 His accurate description thereof 7. That Love is the highest participation of the Divinity and that whereby we become the Sons of God Aâ—d how injurious these Fanaticks are that rob the Church of Christ of this title to appropriate it to themselves 368 CHAP. IV. 1. Our Saviour's strict injuction of Purity from whence it is also plain that the Love he commends is not in any sort fleshly but Divine 2. Several places out of the Apostles urging the same duty 3. Two more places to the same purpose 4. The groundless presumption of those that abuse Christianity to a liberty of sinning 5. That this Errour attempted the Church betimes and is too taking at this very day 6. Whence appears the necâ—ssiâ—y of opposing it which he promises to do taking the rise of his Discourse from 1 Iohn 3.7 373 CHAP. V. 1. The Apostle's care for young Christians against that Errour of thinking they may be righteous without doing righteously 2. Their obnoxiousness to this contagion with the Causes thereof to be searched into 3. The first sort of Scriptures perverted to this ill end 4. The second sort 5. That the very state of Christian Childhood makes them prone to this Errour 6. What is the nature of that Faith Abraham is so much commended for and what the meaning of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 7. A search after the meaning of the term Justification 8. Justification by faith without the deeds of the Law what may be the meaning of it 9. Scriptures answered that seem to disjoin Reall Righteousness from Faith 10. And to make us only righteous by imputation 11. Undeniable Testimonies of Scripture that prove the necessity of real Righteousness in us 376 CHAP. VI. 1. Their alledgement of Gal. 2.16 as also of the whole drift of that Epistle 2. What the Righteousness of faith is according to the Apostle 3. In what sâ—â—se those that are in Christ are said not to be under the Law 4. That the Righteousness of faith is no figment but a reality in us 5. That this Righteousness is the New Creature and what this new Creature is according to Scripture 6. That the new Creature consists in Wisdome Righteousness and true Holiness 7. The Righteousness of the new Creature 8. His Wâ—sdome and Holiness 9. That the Righteousness of faith excludes not good Works The wicked treachery of those that teach the contrary 384 CHAP. VII 1. That no small measure of Sanctity serves the turn in Christianity 2. As appears out of Scriptures already alledged 3. Further proofs thereof out of the Prophets 4. As also out of the Gospel 5. And other places of the New Testament 6. The strong Armature of a Christian Souldier 7. His earnest endeavour after Perfection 388 CHAP. VIII 1. That the Christians assistance is at least equal to this task 2. The two Gospel-powers that comprehend his duty 3. The first Gospel-aid The Promise of the Spirit with Prophecies thereof out of Ezekiel and Esay 4. Some hints of the mystical meaning of the last 5. Another excellent prediction thereof 391 CHAP. IX 1. The great use of the belief of The Promise of the Spirit 2. The eating the flesh of Christ and drinking his bloud what it is 3. Further proof of the Promise of the Spirit 4. That we cannot oblige God by way of Merit 5. Other Testimonies of Scripture tending to the former purpose 395 CHAP. X. 1. A Recapitulation of what has been set down hitherto concerning the Usefulness of the Gospel and the Necessity of undeceiving the world in those points that so nearly concern Christian Life 2. The ill condition of those that content themselves with Imaginary Righteousness figured out in the Fighters against Ariel and Mount Sion 3. A further demonstration of their fond conceit 4. That a true Christian cannot sin without pain and torture to himself 398 CHAP. XI 1. That the want of real Righteousness deprives us of the Divine Wisdome proved out of Scripture 2. As also from the nature of the thing it self 3. That is disadvantages the Soul also in Natural speculations 4. That it stifles all Noble and laudable Actions 5. And exposes the imaginary Religionist to open reproach 6. That mere imaginary Righteousness robs the Soul of her peace of Conscience 7. And of all divine Ioy 8. Of Health and Safety 9. And of eternal Salvation 10. That God also hereby is deprived of his Glory and the Church frustrated of publick Peace and Happiness 400 CHAP. XII 1. Of the attending to the Light within us of which some Spiritualists so much boast 2. That they must mean the Light of Reason and Conscience thereby if they be not Fanaticks Mad-men or Cheats And that this Conscience necessarily takes information from without 3. And particularly from the Holy Scriptures 4. That these Spiritualists acknowledge the fondness of their opinion by their contrary practice 5. An appeal to the Light within them if the Christian Religion according to the literal sense be not true 6. That the Operation of the Divine Spirit is not absolute but restrained to certain laws and conditions as it is in the Spirit of
heaven while he is such this murderous disposition being a demonstration that he is not born of God but of him that was a murderer from the beginning For Love being the very Heart and Center of Regeneration if there be no Antipathie in us against that which is so contrary to the deepest Principle of the Divine life it is a sign there is none of that Life in us Wherefore this Hypothesis of Mr. Mede cannot be made harsh or odious by the Opposer's surmise there being a capacity of being saved in such as I have above described though of the Papall denomination which are as it were the Woman in the wilderness And for that incapacity of being saved in the other there wants no Apocalypse to reveal the certainty thereof Nor do I know a more uncharitable opinion in the World then that which promises them Salvation that are so far from Charity themselves that they are professedly persecuters and murderers of the innocent nay of the sincere and faithful members of Christ. 27. But the Subtilty of our Adversaries is such that they will reply That there are as many snares and impediments in the Reformed Churches to true Holiness if not to all Holiness in the Opinions of Solifidianisme and Eternall Decrees and as great a demonstration of their utter insensibility of that Principle of the Divine love into which every true Christian is regenerated in their doctrine of Absolute Reprobation and inevitable damnation of innumerable myriads of men Providence determining them upon all the wayes and means thereto as in the Romanists either censuring all out of their Church to be in a state of perdition or in their inflicting a Temporal death upon them that gainsay the Articles of their Church For what is this in comparison of being content that all the World in a manner should be adjudged to everlasting torments for doing such things as they were from all Eternity decreed to do nor could any way possibly avoid it This Objection I must confess is very shrewdly levelled at the mark nor can I well undertake within the narrow limits of my now almost-ended Preface to make a full and direct Answer to the things themselves Onely I shall return thus much First That all of the Reformed Churches are not Solifidians nor hold any thing concerning the Divine Decrees inconsistent with either the Goodness of God or the Advancement of Godliness and that for my own part I am one of that number And then Secondly They that do do not profess themselves infallible in their opinion nor judge others to be in a damnable condition that are not of it and therefore do not low-bell men into their own errour by either uncharitable censurings or bloudy persecutions nor become incorrigible themselves upon pretence of Infallibility but are in a fair way of acknowledging the Truth when it shall be rightly and advantageously proposed Thirdly Their errours are not so many nor managed with that meditated craft and design as in the old Apostate Church they being not invented to serve some avaritious or ambitious end but fallen into if I may so speak by chance upon reading some passages of Scripture that looked upon alone may seem to favour their Conclusions and by reason of the obscurity of the things themselves such as have puzled contemplative men in all Ages and Places And fourthly and lastly If they have made their own Inventions and argumentative Conclusions Articles of Faith it is because they are not yet sufficiently cleansed from the corruption they contracted under the Mother of Apostasy which mainly consists in this in adding the fallible deductions of humane Reason to the infallible Articles of the ancient and Apostolick Faith So that whatever hazard of Salvation there is in the Reformed Churches it is by reason that they do still Romanize and do not clear up into a certain and uncontroverted Apostolick purity exhibiting nothing for Fundamentals but what is expresly so in the Text it self without the slipperyness of humane Ratiocination Which certainly as it is their Duty so is it also their greatest Interest and the most effectuall way for Peace and Righteousness upon Earth 28. As for that abusable Opinion of Imputative Righteousness that I have shewn my dissatisfaction touching that point which ordinarily the worst of men most of all build upon though I do not deny but well-meaning and piously-disposed persons may also heedlesly take up the forme I hope the judicious will not misconstrue it nor take it ill that I have been so free and faithful as to discover the danger and groundlesness of this overmuch Idolized doctrine For indeed it is a very Idol that is Nothing as the Apostle describes an Idol to be I mean nothing of it self but a mere Phrase if you prescind it from what is comprized in Remission of sins through the bloud of Christ shed upon the Cross. For this Remission of sins contains in it such a reconciliation with God that we are safe from all the Effects of his wrath both concerning this state and that which is to come that is to say we shall not be punished by his withholding his Grace from us here or that Glory which is expected in the other Life For these deprivements being the results of sin if we were not secured from them our sins were not remitted which is against the Hypothesis Now I appeal to the judgement and conscience of the most zealous assertour of Imputative Righteousness if he can find any thing more comprized therein then such a remission of sins as we have defined and whether when he talks of being cloathed with Christs righteousness in this imputative sense he can understand any thing but being as it were armed and defended from the wrath of God and all the ill consequences thereof For if this Righteousness we are thus cloathed with were a Righteousness that really kept us suppose from Envy from Drunkenness from Adultery and made us Charitable Sober and Chast it were not then imputative but inherent From whence it plainly appears that if you prescind it from remission of sins through the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross this Phrase of Imputative Righteousness has no signification at all and that therefore there is no loss or damage done to our Religion if it be not accounted a distinct Article from the remission of sins in the bloud of Christ. For it cannot afford any true and useful sense distinct there-from nay I may say any that is not very mischievous and dangerous and such as tends to that loathsome and pestilential errour of Antinomianisme But if you will understand by it Remission of sins I do again appeal to the sagacious if there may not yet be a great deal of fraud and hypocrisie in making choice of such an Expression as does easily insinuate to over-many a needlesness of seriously endeavouring to be really righteous we being so warmely secure by the imputation of anothers and does omit such circumstances
criminall to adde upon their authority any foolish inventions of his own And if these Agents for Religion neither injuring nor defrauding any one of their Civil rights shall be evilly entreated by those they offer to instruct if they abuse them by imprisonment or any other hard dealing or finally put them to death that State or Kingdom to which they belong may require their bloud at their hands as having grosly and barbarously transgressed against the Law of Nations and the common Right of all mankinde that have not forfeited it some way or other As these have not they allowing this Liberty among themselves and to all others that have a sense and conscience of the same Right and being firmly resolved if it should come to a war and they be Conquerours of their ill Neighbours to use no other means to turn their new Subjects from their old Religion but by peaceably and patiently shewing them the vanity thereof and the excellency and solidity of their own Which cannot by any means be called the Propagation of Religion by the Sword when there shall not be so much force put upon them to change their former Religion if they be found conscientious as to compell them to be present at the Solemnities of the New Only they shall swear fealty to their Conquerours and be well indoctrinated in that common Right of Mankinde That no man is to be persecuted for Religion if he have not forfeited that Right by taking upon him the liberty of persecuting others And therefore they may enjoy their Religion if they can still like it upon equal termes with the conquerours as to their private capacities If the Spaniard had made himself master of the Indies upon these conditions and had abstained from his execrable cruelties he might have justified himself to all the World For this had not been to propagate Religion by the sword but to maintain a mans natural right 3. This Theory I think is very sound at the bottome and that it is very clear what ought to be but hugely unpracticable by reason of that general perverseness and corruption of men Yet I thought it worth the while to expose it to view the acknowledgement thereof being the greatest advantage to Chritian Religion that can possibly be conceived there being nothing so effectual for the easie fall of Turcisme and Paganisme into the profession of Christ as this Prinâ—iple we have explained our Religion being not onely solid in it self but incomparably more demonstrable to all Rational spirits then any Religion ever extant in the World Besides though its use will not extend so farre at the first yet it may be something serviceable to these parts of the world whose eyes are more open to Truth then others are And verily in my judgement this Principle I do thus recommend as it seems to me to deserve the reception of all men as true so of all Christians especially not onely upon point of Policy but as more sutable to that spirit they are of abhorring from force and cruelty who are therefore to permit full Liberty of Conscience to all those that do not forfeit it by mixing with their Religion such Principles as are contrary to good manners and civil Right or repugnant to this very Principle of Liberty we speak of 4. Wherefore those that under pretence of Religion would corrupt the people with such doctrines as plainly countenance Vice and tend to the rooting out of the sense of true Honour and Vertue out of a Nation have lost this Common Right we contend for as being infecters and poisoners of the people amongst whom they live and therefore the therefore the publick Magistrate of what Nation or Religion soever has a power to restrain them their doctrine being so dangerous to the welfare of a State and contrary to the light of Nature and suffrage of the wisest men in all places of the World and in all Ages No Religion fraught with such rotten ware as this is to be received in any coast where they would put in but to be kept out by Strangers and suppressed at home 5. Again those also would forfeit this Right of Liberty whose Religion should contain any thing in it that would weaken the State which received it As if there were some such absurd Superstition as upon pretence of an high esteem fo Virginity and extreme abhorrence from warre should urge the emasculation of every third male-child or the luxation or cutting off their fore-finger or thumb whereby the Country would be depopulated and the Inhabitants made unserviceable for the defence thereof there is no question but the Magistrate might inhibit such a Religion as this 6. As he might in the last place all such as have intermixed with them that wolvish and ferine humour of persecuting others for their Religion that would live quietly by them and would not force any one to their own Faith nor disturb the publick exercise of Religion in others For these have no right to be suffered further then at the discretion of the Magistrate nor can more reasonably plead for Liberty then the Wolfe and Fox crave leave to have their kennels or holes in the midst of a Sheepfold or the Owle or Night-Raven to put in their note amidst a Quire of Nightingales 7. But you 'l say all Religions and Sects are such Foxes and Wolves and therefore there is no Liberty of Religion at all to be given Those that are so I confess are at the mercy of the Magistrate as having forfeited their Right Which forfeiture he may exact more or less severely accordingly as he has more or less security that these crafty and wild Creatures may do no mischief But I do not believe that all men that do profess Religion are of this partial nature nay on the contrary I do verily believe That they that are the most truly religious are the most abhorrent from persecution of conscience sake Wherefore as many as are ready to profess and that upon Oath if it be required That it is their judgement and their Practice does not contradict it that no man is to be incommodated in his Civil rights in his Libety Estate or Life for the cause of such a Religion as whose principles teach not to incommodate others and do avow that theirs is such and that they will be as faithful to the Prince or State in which they live as those of his own Religion these having in no wise forfeited their Right of liberty neither this way nor any other by intermingling Practices or Principles against the light of Nature and laudable Morality it were the highest piece of Injustice that can be committed to abridge them of the safe profession thereof CHAP. XII 1. To what Persons and with what Circumstances the Christian Magistrate is to give Liberty of Conscience And the great advantage thereof to the Truth of Christianity 2. That those that are not Christians are not to be admitted into places of trust by the
himself and in all his house of unblamable Godliness and Christianity that makes his Visitations in his Diocese in his own person and vibrates that sacred thunder and lightning the truely-dreadfull sentence of Excommunication by no other arme but his own nor to any other aime then the dissipating of Vice and Wickedness and all Rebellion and Disobedience to the known and acknowledged Lawes of Christ that inflicts no Mulcts but what are bestowed in relief of the poor of the respective Parish and the needfull repairs or comely adornings of the Church that is watchfull prudent and compassionate and has the art and patience of conversing with the meanest capacities and the skill and sagacity of finding out the reason where he findes the End of the Gospel notoriously defeated in any place that has counsell in readiness and fit applications whether the Pastour or his charge be discovered to be in fault that exhorts every where to sobriety and brotherly-kindess and is diligent to pluck up or prevent the growth of such Opinions as serve the end of Sin and encourage men to leudness that gravely and severely rebukes the bold offender and affectionately bewails the failings of the weak and chearfully expresses his sincere joy whereever he finds a people live orderly and unblamably and gives the best countenance and encouragement he can devise for the furthering the same I say I could not have forborn to pronounce that to decry such a Bishop as this for Antichristian were an unpardonable piece of Antichristianisme and to murmure against his Visitations to repine at the annuall return of the Sun by whose warmth all things live and flourish For there is not any effectualler means imaginable to make the People believe in good earnest that Religion is worth the looking after then to find themselves lookt after so carefully and affectionately in reference to Religion by persons of so honourable rank and quality 23. Lastly That will also be added to the number of Defects by some that I have not as well endeavoured to shew the Reasonableness of the Precepts of Christ as of his Actions and Miracles To have done this I confess had been pertinent enough had it been needfull For I could not imagine that the Precepts of Christ could seem unreasonable to any that did not pervert the meaning of them They may seem indeed severe and difficult at first sight but the Severity is no greater then the cure of the Disease requires Ut valeant homines ferrum patiuntur ignes And to deny thy self and to mortifie thy self is neither the killing nor denying of any thing in thee but thy Vices upon which there accrews unto thee unspeakable joy and ease Nor are thy Difficulties in these undergoings so great but that thy Helps are farre greater provided thou be an unfeigned Believer For what Lust canst thou stick to part withall for his sake who parted with his life for thee or what present enjoyment canst not thou easily quit if thou believe that future Happiness that attends thee in the other world and how canst thou fail to fly fornication whilest thou considerest that by practising this unclean vice thou makest a vile strampet corrivall with the holy Ghost whose Temple thy Body is if thou beest a Christian and whose Temple it cannot be if thou indulge to thy self so dangerous a liberty there being nothing that does more extinguish the operations of the Spirit then the letting thy self loose to lawless lusts But the Reasons of Christ's Precepts are so obvious in Theory and so faithfull in Experience that I think it needless to insist upon this Theam assuring every one that he shall best understand their solidity by life and practice 24. But there are others whose reprehensions I shall hardly escape for that I have gone about to render the Reason of any thing in Christian Religion Religion seeming to them in the best dress when it appears most unreasonable Which humour is the most treacherous to true Christianity that any thing can be and a sure barre to her progress amongst free and ingenuous persons But truly whenas the Efficacy of the Gospel is not deemed hopeless no not upon the coursely covetous enormously ambitious and sottishly sensual I could see no cause why Freedome Ingenuity Reason and Philosophy should be such crimes as to make men less capable of the benefit thereof and therefore I must profess that for their sakes chiefly that are over-prone to these more noble infirmities of the Mind I have represented Christianity no less Reasonable then it is and that is I hope as Reasonable as any judicious spirit could desire or expect 25. And if in my Discovery of the Reasonableness of things a more then ordinary heat has accompanied that light and may seem to have armed my Style in some places with over-much sharpness and vehemence I would desire so soft and prudent a Soul to consider with himself whether there be not men in the world as bad as I describe and whether he ought in charity to conceit I mean any other then those and being such as they are whether they can deserve less and if he be none of them himself why he should partake of their sinnes by disallowing of their deserved chastisement and rebuke Against which there can be no colourable reason unless that these which deserve this punishment may have grown past feeling Which insensibleness is more to be deplored and pitied then their being exposed to the search of a faithfull Chirurgion the method of whose Art forces him if he could possibly to launce them to the quick But those that have digested Wickedness into Principles and framed Religion it self into a compliance and furtherance to the foulest conversation it is no wonder while they can upon such fantastick grounds conceit themselves the darlings of Heaven and children of the most High that they look for proportionable honour and respect from men and would march on though in these ill wayes as solemnly and securely as the Children of Israel out of Aegypt of whom it is said that not a dogge should move his tongue against any of them 26. Concerning that sense of the Apocalyptick Visions which Mr. Mede has hit upon and which for the main I have professed my self to conceive to be true there is nothing seems to me so harsh therein as that Objection of some who contend that it implies that all the Adherers to the Romane Church after this her Apostacy will be certainly damned The concocting or ruminating on which sad sentence cannot but be to a benigne nature like the eating of the little book which contains the Visions of this Apostacy bitter in the stomack though the first pleasures of unriddling these prophetick aenigmes may be as honey to the mouth And to speak freely for a man to be easily contented that another should be damned is no good sign that himself is in the way of Salvation That was a witty decision of
of the Meritorious cause of the Remission of our sins namely the Bloud of Christ hanging upon the Cross as are not onely the plainest pledge of that inestimable favour of God but the strongest engagement imaginable and greatest endearement of our affections to Christ that we may be the more willing to mortifie our corruptions for his sake and to eschew Sin which was so hateful to God that he would not remit it without the atonement of the most precious bloud of his onely-begotten Son Which admirable artifice of the Divine Wisdome and unspeakable power of the Gospel in the Passion of Christ for the remission of sins is very cunningly and fraudulently declined in this new Phraseology of Imputative Righteousness which is but a dry Scene and works not at all upon our Affections unless to a carelesness and dissoluteness of life And therefore I cannot but set the easie entertainment of such a pretended doctrine upon the same score with the rejectment or neglect of the Anniversary Celebration of the Crucifixion of Christ though it was a Solemnity of more importance then any Festival of the Year As if the tendency of Reformation were to slur and defeat the chiefest arts of the Gospel and cut away the strongest ties to the most indispensable duties of a Christian. 29. But the last and greatest Exception I presage will be against what I have wrote for Liberty of Conscience especially considering what a foul face of things the late pretence to this right had superinduced upon this miserably-distracted Kingdome But this aggravation will really be found to have no weight if indifferently examined For if every Right should be forfeited or rather be accounted no right at all because it has been contended for in an undue manner or brought much calamity and confusion upon a nation not onely Liberty of Conscience but all Civil Rights also nay the Gospel of Iesus Christ it self would be forfeited Warre Bloudshed and Confusion being as frequently introduced upon these pretences as upon any Besides there was not a simple Permission of Liberty of Conscience but an Encouragement and Fomenting of Sects and Factions and an unworthy prostitution of this Sacred Right to the base Political designes of ambitious persons they that were in power conniving at the most uncouth and unseemly miscarriages out of a sense and consciousness that they had no right to rule and a desire of making their usurpation as sweet to the people as they could by forbidding them nothing but disobedience to themselves So that the gross disorders that had grown and were still growing more and more upon us are not to be imputed so much to Liberty of Conscience as to the unhinging of all Civill government and removing of the ancient and undoubted Soveraignty over the People And lastly what I have defined concerning Liberty of Conscience to those that would abuse that Right will seem rather the taking of it away then a patronizing of it But I must confess I have endeavoured as well to establish it upon its justest and clearest grounds as to circumscribe it within its due limits Which performance of mine cannot but be distastful to two sorts of men The one are such as being very cold at home letting their Hearts freeze to the indispensable duties of a true Christian which is to be conformable to the life of Christ in Humility holy Love and unspotted Purity of conversation do in stead thereof with zeal scalding hot seek to hale and force other men by externall compulsion to a Conformity to their foolish and useless Opinions and Ceremonies loving to order other folks with great Rigour and Lordliness to make amends as they think thereby for their own disorder and conspicuous impotency in not being masters of themselves When as yet they exercise the worst of Vices even in the actions whereby they would make an atonement for their other gross miscarriages For what is it but a notorious specimen of Pride thus to force others to acknowledge their Wisdome by making them profess to be of their opinion and what but Injustice and barbarous Cruelty to afflict men for what they cannot help and in what they do not sinne and what but plain Rebellion against God to wrest his Scepter out of his hand by which he rules in the consciences of men and to usurp this Empire unto themselves To say nothing how often they sacrifice here also to Mammon and the belly But to have such enemies as these to our Conclusion I hope will be thought one Argument added to the rest of the truth thereof nor ought I to be over-solicitous if what I have writ scandalize those that in their principles and practices are so scandalous To the other sort I ought to bear a more tender respect to those I mean that out of no corrupt principle but out of a sincere affection to Christian Religion dislike our Plea for Liberty of Conscience as being afraid that Christianity it self will be prejudiced thereby But to these I answer That as I highly commend their care and solicitude for the best of Religions so I must humbly crave leave to dissent from their judgements in managing the Interest thereof For I dare pronounce That there is nothing would make so much for the Interest of Christianity as if this Right of Liberty of Conscience were known and acknowledged all over the world For then assuredly by how much more manifest the Truth and Authority of every Religion is by so much more certainly would it prevail as we may observe that every Religion by how much more false it is by so much the more severely and tyrannically it is supported by external violence Wherefore if it could be agreed upon to take away this external support false Religion and vain Superstition would sinke those bladders and bulrushes being taken from under them and that onely would be found to swimme whose innate Truth was able to bear it up of it self And such certainly is the naked Simplicity of Christian Religion devested of those many encumberments of humane inventions both false and useless wherewith it is so laden that it could not chuse but sink notwithstanding any externall support did not the force of the undeniable Truths therein bear up all that luggage which Ignorance Hypocrisie and Covetousness has cast upon it How free and quick passage then would it have if this burden had once sunk from it and it were restored to the Primaevall purity thereof Surely That Religion that got ground so fast though cruelly persecuted and opposed could not but make admirable progresses might it but once upon equall termes grapple with other Religions I am prone to believe that it would not be long till all the Kingdomes of the Earth would become the Kingdomes of the Lord and his Christ. So great an Interest has the True and Primaevall Christianity in this common Right of Liberty of Conscience which though Christians might imagine extendible no further then to
themselves yet to be so streight to one another as not to acknowledge that mutual Right seems enormously harsh and unchristian For we all agreeing in the Truth of the Scriptures which certainly are sufficient to Salvation since the Belief and Practice of what is plain in them will not fail to carry a man to Heaven what an unreasonable thing is it that there should be that hatred and persecution against those that God so well approves that he will save them and Christ so dearly loved that he gave his life a ransome for them Again there being also a necessity as I have said in the Persecuted of thinking as he does and an uncertainty in the Opinions that the Persecutour would promote as being demonstrable by neither Reason nor Scripture how unwarrantable an action is it to do a certain injury for an uncertain conceit To all which you may adde That the Love of Knowledge is but the work of the Devil how much more then is bitter Zeal and brawling about it but the depretiating of humane devices tends much to the exaltation of true Sanctity that mask of Hyprocrisie patcht up of empty Opinions and Formalities being by this means torn off and leaving the face bare that their Complexion may be more discernable how pure and sincere it is or how unsound cadaverous and deformed And lastly a mutuall agreement of bearing with one anothers dissents in the Non-fundamentals of Religion is really a greater Ornament of Christianity then the most exact Uniformity imaginable it being an eminent act or exercise of Charity the Flower of all Christian graces and the best way I think at the long run to make the Church as Uniforme as can justly be desired For if true Christian Love could once get the rule in the Hearts of men the Apostle will undertake for her that she shall do nothing unseemly For Charity is indeed the Mother of Unity and bond of Perfection and he that is really spirited thereby I dare promise for him that he will never oftentate his Sanctimony by a pretended queziness of Conscience as if he had a more delicate sense and a more peculiar discernment in things appertaining to Godliness then others have But whatever a good round force would urge him to out of love to himself and his own safety he would not fail of his own accord to comply therewith out of the love of Order and the Reverence he bears to the authority of the Church he lives under Nor on the other side would the Church ever offer to obtrude upon her children what is either false or useless For they both of them being once imbued with that Divine sense we speak of cannot but be well assured That neither Circumcision nor Uncircumcision availeth any thing but Faith working by Love And whosoever walketh by this Rule peace be upon him and upon the true Israel of God H. M. From my Study at Christs Coll. in Cambridge Iune 12. 1660. AN EXPLANATION OF The grand Mystery OF GODLINESS CHAP. I. 1. The Four main Properties of a Mystery 2. The first Propertie Obscurity 3. The second Intelligibleness 4. The third Truth 5. The fourth Usefulness 6. A more full Description of the Nature of a Mystery 7. The Distribution of the whole Treatise 1. EVery legitimate Mystery comprehends in it at least these Four Properties It is a piece of Knowledge First competently Obscure Recondite and Abstruse That is It is not so utterly hid and intricate but that in the Second place It is in a due measure Intelligible Thirdly It is not only Intelligible what is meant by it but it is evidently and certainly True Fourthly and lastly It is no impertinent or idle Speculation but a Truth very Usefull and Profitable We may well add also for some Religious End 2. This Obscuritie and Abstruseness makes not only the Mystery more solemn and venerable to those to whom it is communicated but hides it also from their eyes that are not worthy to partake thereof From whence some Criticks have derived Mysterium from the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to hide Which is well aimed at as to the sense But others with more judgment in Grammar acknowledge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be a proper Greek word and fetch the Derivation of it from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they to whom it is communicated are to keep silence and not to impart it to unmeet persons And in this sense Chrysostome expounds Mysterium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A matter wonderfull unknown and not to be easily or rashly communicated to others 3. Nor indeed could it be at all if it were utterly Unintelligible Wherefore Intelligibleness adds this further requisite also to a Mystery that it thereby becomes Communicable to such as are fitly prepared to be instructed therein For which reason the Etymologists give also this Notation of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is to teach and instruct a man in Divine matters so far forth as the party is fit to receive Hence is also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mysta a Scholar or Commencer in Divine Mysteries one that is more slightly imbued in the knowledge of such Holy things 4. But there is afterward a clearer manifestation and a fuller satisfaction and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being now more firmly ascertained of the Truth which he did but obscurely apprehend before From which Clearness and Certainty of the thing represented there necessarily arises a full and free assent of his Understanding without any further doubt or hesitancy the Proverb being made good in this case That Seeing is Believing 5. But that there may not be a mere dry Belief without any love or liking of the Object thereof we added also that this Mystery is not only certainly True but very concerningly Usefull and Profitable which though the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it self does not implie yet another in the same language and of the like sense does which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Initiations into sacred Mysteries The Usefulness whereof a Platonist admirably well describes not without a verbal allusion in this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which if we would render it in our more familiar language sounds thus The scope or aim of all Religious Mysteries is the bringing back faln man into his pristine condition of Happiness and to lead him again to that high station which he then first forsook when he preferr'd his own Will and the pleasure of the Animal life before the Will of God and that Life and Sense which is truly Divine 6. Wherefore not to dwell too long on the threshold we conclude briefly and in general that a Mystery is a piece of Divine knowledge measurably Abstruse whereby it becomes more Venerable but yet Intelligible that it may be Communicable and
True and Certain that it may win firm Assent and lastly very Usefull and Effectual for the perfecting of the Souls of men and restoring them to that Happiness which they anciently had faln from that so near a Concernment may as well gain upon their Affections as the Evidence of Truth engage their Understandings and so the whole man may be carried on to a devout embracement of what is exhibited unto him by the knowledge of his Religion 7. What we have thus Generally proposed we shall now applie more Particularly and more fully prosecute those Four primary Properties in that Grand Mystery of Godliness which we call Christianity distributing our Discourse into these Four main Parts The First whereof shall insist somewhat upon the Abstruseness and Obscurity of our Religion the Second upon the Intelligibleness of it the Third upon the Certainty of it and the Fourth on the great concerning Usefulness thereof To which we shall add what Considerations we think fittest concerning the Secondary Properties which emerge out of these Primary ones CHAP. II. 1. That it is fit that the Mystery of Christianity should be in some measure Obscure to exclude the Sensuall and Worldly 2. As also to defeat disobedient Learning and Industry 3. And for the pleasure and improvement of the godly and obedient 4. The high Gratifications of the Speculative Soul from the Obscurity of the Scriptures 1. THat there is a considerable Obscurity and Abstrusenesse in Christian Religion is easily made evident as well from the Cause as the Effects of this Obscurity For besides that from the common nature of a Mystery Christianity ought to be competently Obscure and Abstruse that it may thereby become more Venerable and more safely removed out of all danger of contempt we cannot but see what a speciall Congruity there is in the matter it self to have so holy and so highly-concerning a Mystery as our Religion is Abstruse and Obscure For that Divine wisdome that orders all things justly ought not to communicate those precious Truths in so plain a manner that the Unworthy may as easily apprehend them as the Worthy but does most righteously neglect the Sensuall and Careless permitting every man to carry home wares proportionable to the price he would pay in the open market for them And when they can bestow so great industry upon things of little moment will not spare to punish their undervaluing this inestimable Pearle by the perpetual losse of it For what a palpable piece of Hypocrisie is it for a man to excuse himself from the study of Piety by complaining against the Intricacies and Difficulties of the Mystery thereof whenas he never yet laid out upon it the tenth part of that pains and affection that he does upon the ordinary trivial things of this world 2. Thus are the careless voluptuous Epicure and over-careful Worldling justly met with But not they alone For the Obscurity of this Mystery we speak of is such that all the knowledge of Nature and Geometry can never reach the Depth of it or rellish the Excellency of it nor all the skill of Tongues rightly interpret it unless that true Interpreter and great Mystagogus the Spirit of God himself vouchsafe the opening of it unto us and set it on so home in our Understandings that it begets Faith in our Hearts so that our Hearts misgive us not in the profession of what we would acknowledge as True For as for the outward Letter it self of the Holy Scriptures God has not so plainly delivered himself therein that he has given the staff out of his own hands but does still direct the humble and single-hearted while he suffers the proud searcher to lose himself in this Obscure field of Truth Wherefore disobedient both Learning and Industry are turned off from obtaining any certain and satisfactory Knowledge of this Divine Mystery as well as Worldliness and Voluptuousness According as our Blessed Saviour has pronounced in that devout Doxology I thank thee O Father Lord of heaven and earth because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes Even so Father for so it seemed good in thy sight 3. Nor are the Wicked onely disappointed but the Godly very much gratified by the Intricacy of this sacred Mystery For the Spirit of man being so naturally given to search after Knowledge and his Understanding being one of the chiefest and choicest Faculties in him it cannot be but a very high delight to him to employ his noblest endowments upon the divinest Objects and very congruous and decorous they should be so employ'd Besides the present Doubtfulness of Truth makes the holy Soul more devout and dependant on God the onely true and safe guide thereunto From whence we should be so far from murmuring against Divine Providence for the Obscurity and Ambiguity of the Holy Scriptures that we should rather magnifie his Wisdome therein We having discovered so many and so weighty Reasons why those Divine Oracles should be Obscure The wicked thereby being excluded the due Reverence of the Mystery maintained and the worthy partakers thereof much advantaged and highly gratified 4. For what can indeed more highly gratifie a man whose very Nature is Reason and special Prerogative Speech then by his skill in Arts and Languages by the Sagacity of his Understanding and industrious comparing of one place of those Sacred pages with another to work out or at least to clear up some Divine Truth out of the Scripture to the unexpected satisfaction of himself and general service of the Church the dearest Faculty of his Soul and greatest glory of his Nature acting then with the fullest commission and to so good an end that it need know no bounds but Joy and Triumph may be unlimited the Heart exulting in that in which we cannot exceed viz. the Honor of God and the Good of his people All which gratulations of the Soul in her successful pursuits of Divine Truth would be utterly lost or prevented if the Holy Scriptures set down all things so fully plainly and methodically that our reading and understanding would every where keep equal pace together Wherefore that the Mind of man may be worthily employ'd and taken up with a kind of Spiritual husbandry God has not made the Scriptures like an artificial Garden wherein the Walks are plain and regular the Plants sorted and set in order the Fruits ripe and the Flowers blown and all things fully exposed to our view but rather like an uncultivated field where indeed we have the ground and hidden seeds of all precious things but nothing can be brought to any great beauty order fulness or maturity without our own industry nor indeed with it unless the dew of His grace descend upon it without whose blessing this Spiritual Culture will thrive as little as the labour of the husbandman without showres of rain CHAP. III. 1. The Obscurity of the Christian Mystery argued from the Effect as from the Iews
lovely as he could in those notable ornaments of Wit and Manners and other more miraculous accomplishments that were found in that person But his constant devotions he did to the Sun though they shew him to be a very skilful and orthodox Hierophanta in the Pagan Superstition yet his ignorance in Philosophy demonstrates him no genuine Pythagorean but that he did craftily abuse that name and profession the better to promote his Heathenish design 6. It seems those Spirits that the Indian Magicians and Apollonius were acquainted withall were either very Envious or very Ignorant or at least Philostratus that wrote their Story For in the opening of their Mysteries such things fall from them as are inconsistent with the most Essential parts of Pythagoras his Philosophy and Truth it self But as for this of making the Sun the Supreme Numen these lapsed Spirits being haply as much concerned in the benefit of it as we Mortals as Homer intimates 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He rose to shine to Gods as well as men it is not improbable but being fallen so low from the true God that themselves make this the Object of their Worship from whom they finde the most sensible good and are kept from that utter darkness that a sad fate at the long run may bring upon them 7. All which things considered we may well grant what Macrobius so industriously drives at That the worship of the Heathen was terminated in One Supreme Deity which the profounder Mystagogi conceiv'd to be the Sun and they were taught by the Clarian Oracle to call him Iao as if he were the true Iehovah CHAP. II. 1. That the above-said concession advantages the Pagans nothing for as much as there are more Suns then one 2. That not only Unity but the rest of the Divine Attributes are incompetible to the Sun 3. Of Cardan's attributing Understanding to the Sun 's light with a confutation of his fond opinion 4. Another sort of Apologizers for Paganism who pretend the Heathens worshipped One God to which they gave no name 5. A discovery out of their own Religion that this innominated Deity was not the True God but the Material world 1. BUT it is easily demonstrated that they get nothing by this grant For whereas they please themselves most of all in the Unity of this Numen there being as they fancy but one Sun in the world as the Latine word Sol implies and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek Nay Macrobius dotes so much on this Notion that he will not have him called Apollo Delphicus from the place of his worship but from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an old Greek word which signifies Unus from whence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must be derived quasi jam non unus yet the noble and free Spirit of Philosophy will not be carried captive with these cobweb-fetters of Superstition and verbal Criticism and therefore those that are more knowing in Nature boldly point us to as many Suns as there are discovered Fixed Stars in the Firmament as is to admiration made clear in that never-sufficiently-extolled Philosophy of Des-Cartes Then which if rightly understood there cannot be found a stronger bar against either the Folly of Paganism or the Profaneness of Atheism 2. But not only this obvious Attribute of Unity is wanting to this Pagan Deity but several others also that are as necessarily included in the Notion of a God such as are Sprituality Immensity Omnipotency Omnisciency and the like For the reflexion of his beams is a demonstration that Light is a Body and therefore unless all Bodies were Light or at least diaphanous he cannot be Immense but he must be excluded by other Bodies And hence he is not Omnipotent no not so much as in his most eminent Property For he cannot illuminate both sides of the Earth at once nor free his own face of those importunate spots that ever and anon lie upon it like filth or scum maugre all the power of his Divinity as Scheiner and Des-Cartes have diligently observed He is also so far from being Omniscient that he has no knowledge at all a Body being uncapable of Cogitation as the Cartesian School judiciously maintains and I have fully demonstrated in my Book Of the Immortality of the Soul 3. But Cardan attributing Understanding to this Luminary writes more like a Priest of the Sun as indeed both himself and his Father have been suspected for Magicians then a man of Reason or a sound Philosopher But that the charge may not seem incredible I will produce his own words Cumque Sol luceat intellectu saies he qui ei est tanquam anima si ab eo secedere posset Intellectas non aliter luceret Sol quà m Terra That is And whereas the Sun shines by Understanding which is to him as a Soul if so be that Understanding should recede from him the Sun would shine no otherwise then the Earth In which he plainly makes Visible light and Intellect all one From whence yet it would follow That the Sun discerns nothing done in the dark and that therefore he is not Omniscient and that a Glow-worm or Rush-candle are better witnesses what is transacted in the Night then he can be For if Visible light and Intellect be all one every new-lighted Lamp or Taper will prove an Intelligence So vain is this Supposition that the Sun is the supreme Numen of the World 4. But there is another sort of Apologizers for Heathenism that frame their Defence more cautiously averring only in general That the various Rites done to Particular Deities were meant to One Supreme Cause of all things though they have the discretion not to venture to name him For the proof whereof they alledge First that when they invoked any particular Deity that was proper for them then to invoke the Priests afterwards added an invocation of all the Deities in general as Servius notes upon that of Virgil Diique Deaeque omnes studium quibus arva tueri Secondly that all the Deities were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is there were Altars that were consecrated to them all in general with such Inscriptions as these DIS DEABUSQE OMNIBUS and DIBUS DEABUSQE OMNIBUS and the like Thirdly that they had one common Feast for them all which was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Mr. Selden notes Lastly The Aegyptians a people more infamous for Polytheism and variety of Religions then any nation under the cope of Heaven yet their Priests are observed more compendiously to do their Ceremonies to certain Spheres or round Globes whereof there was one in every Temple but kept very close from the sight of the vulgar the Priests reserving the knowledge of the Unity of the Object of their worship as an Arcanum only belonging to themselves 5. But that This One Object of Worship was not the true God but the Material World the very figure they make use of does most naturally intimate and
proclivitie to lust of which the Goat is a notorious emblem And that he is made laughing signifies that the whole World is Res ludicra as that merry Prophet Mahomet speaks to whom we may adjoin the suffrage of the Poet who makes man's life a Stage-Play 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This Life 's a Scene of fools a sportfull Stage Where grief attends him that is over-sage But this I have touch'd upon already We pass therefore to their particular Deities CHAP. VII 1. That as the World or Universe was deified in Pan so were the parts thereof in Coelius Juno Neptune Vulcan Pluto Ops Bacchus Ceres c. 2. That the Night was also a Deity and why they sacrificed a Cock to her with the like reason of other Sacrifices 3. Interiour Manifestations that concern the Animal life namely that of Wrath and Love which are the Pagans Mars and Venus 4. Minerva Mercurius Eunomia c. Manifestations referred to the Middle life 5. The agreement of the Greeks Religion with the Romans as also with the Aegyptians 6. Their worship of the River Nilus c. 7. That the Religion of the rest of the Nations of the world was of the same nature with that of Rome Greece and Aegypt and reached no further then the Animal life 8. And that their worshipping of men deceased stood upon the same ground 1. THis Universal specimen of the Divine Power the World as they have deified the Whole so they have also made Deities of the Parts thereof For their Uranus or Coelius what is it but the Heavens their Iupiter and Iuno the Air and Clouds Neptune the Sea Vulcan that limping Deity the Fire who is said to halt quod sine ligneo tanquam baculo progredi nequeat as Phornutus notes meaning by his going with a stick the fewel he is sustained by By Pluto they mean the interior parts of the Earth out of which Gold and Silver and other precious commodities are digged By Ops or Bona Dea the exteriour parts of the Soil in general that afford the necessaries of life to both man and beast Hither also is to be referred Bacchus Ceres Pomona Flora and such like Deities as to Coelius the Hoast of Heaven and in special the Sun and Moon the most famous Deities among the Pagans The latter goes under the name of Diana the former of Apollo and it may be of Vesta For her Temple was round and a fire kept there constantly by the Vestal Virgins in the midst of the Temple which denotes that the Sun is in the midst of the world and her name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he stands still according to that more accurate Hypothesis 2. Neither were they sensible only to the pleasure of the Lights of Heaven but also of the convenience of Night that dark shadow of the Earth within whose Sable curtains all living creatures so sweetly repose themselves wherefore they made Night also a Goddess under the name of Latona or Nox and they sacrificed a Cock to her as Ovid tels us in his Fastorum because he was a disturber of that rest and silence the Night is the bestower of to wearied mortals So they sacrificed a Dog to Diana for his bold barkings at the Moon a Goat to Bacchus for brouzing on the Vine a Sow to Ceres for rooting up her Corn. Such obvious reasons as these brought in an infinite number of Ceremonies which will not be worth the while to run over The Nature of the Deities themselves which the Pagans worshipped being a sufficient Argument of the sense and meaning of their Religion and that it reached no further then the Animal life 3. We have named the most eminent exteriour Manifestations of the Divine Power in the World we shall now give a few instances of the Interiour And the most notable I conceive are those Two Natural Passions of Wrath and Love which Powers they adored under the names of Mars and Venus The Schoolmen would call them the Irascible and Concupiscible to which Two they reduce the rest of the Passions of the Minde but we cannot insist upon these things 4. There are also other Interiour Deities as I may so call them such as Pallas or Minerva Mercurius Eunomia and the like all which reach no further then the Middle Life I speak of and are the improvements of mans Reason in the knowledge of Nature the discipline of War Political Iustice skil in Trades and Traffick the Invention of Letters of Musick of Architectonicks and if you will of all kinds of Mathematicks an instance whereof you have in that Precept of the Oracle that bad them double the Cube which because they may be in us without any sense of the Divine life at all I think we may also venture to call Animal or Natural For as for him that is the best accomplish'd in these yet that of the Apostle may be still true of him Animalis homo non capit quae sunt Spiritûs Dei The Natural man is uncapable of Spiritual and Divine Matters 5. That the Religion of the Romans in which we have chiefly instanced hitherto reached no further then the Animal life is plain The Greeks differ'd little or nothing from them their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being intended to Twelve of those Deities which were acknowledged by the Romans and such as we have named already And for the Aegyptians it is evident also that their Religion was no better if not worse their Serapis being the same with Pan or the Universe according to the concession of his own Oracle and their Osiris and Isis but the Sun and the Moon Deities scarcely left out of the worship of any Heathens It is true there is a People in Africk that curse the Sun by reason of his immoderate Heat but it is the stronger argument where the comfort of his rayes is felt and in what nation are they not that the rude people did as much bless him and adore him 6. The River Nilus was a great God with the Aegyptians too as Ganges with the Indians they both of them fattening the Soil by their overflowings The Divinity of Nilus Apollonius also that rambling Greek did superstiâ—iously acknowledge by doing his devotions to the River within the sight and noise of his roaring Catarracts after he had visited the Gymnosophists But for themselves it is no wonder they should deify so grand a Benefactour they worshipping such things as liv'd on his benevolence For such were the living creatures Birds Beasts and Creeping things to which they did divine honour nay you may add Trees and Plants Onyons and Garlick not excepted as every one casts into their dish 7. What we have said of Rome Greece and Aegypt may be made as manifest concerning the Religion of all the parts of the world beside as of Arabia Persia India China Tartary Germany Scythia Guinea Aethiopia and in the New-found world as in
Virginia Mexico Peru and Brasilia But it would be as tedious as needless to harp so long on one string by so voluminous an Induction and it is more warrantable to be sparing then over-lavish in so copious and confessed a matter Whoever reads those Writers which are numerous enough that can inform them in this inquiry he will assuredly find That the Religion of the Heathen reached no further then the Objects of the Animal life and that though they may go under several names yet that they are the same things every where viz. Wrath Lust and Sensuality or such things as are in subserviency to these as Corn Wine and other Requisites for the necessities or delights of Man as also those Powers that have an influence upon these as the Sun Moon and Stars Fire Water Air and the like 8. We may adde to these Inanimate things Eminent persons whom they could not but acknowledge as their great Benefactors Such were their Law-givers Kings and Commanders that fought their battels successfully the first Inventours of Arts or any useful contrivance for the convenience of life Wherefore the most subtil defenders of the worship of the Pagans let them elude the charge of Idolatry as well as they can or Polytheism yet they can never avoid the imputation That their serving of God in the Heathens Ceremonies is not any thing more then the acknowledging that Power that is able to gratifie or grieve the Spirit of the mere Natural Man CHAP. VIII 1. That Judaism also respected nothing else but the Gratifications of the Animal life as appears in all their Festivals 2. That though the People were held in that low dispensation yet Moses knew the meaning of his own Types and that Immortality that was to be revealed by Christ. 3. That their Sabbaths reached no further then things of this life 4. Nor their Sabbatical years and Iubilees 5. Nor their Feasts of Trumpets 6. Nor their Feast of Tabernacles 7. Nor their Pentecost 8. Nor lastly their Feast of Expiation 1. AND truly that the absolute Transcendency of the Christian Religion may be the better understood I cannot here omit that Iudaism does very much symbolize with Paganism in this point we are upon For though the Iewes were very right and orthodox in this in that they did direct their worship to that One and only true God that made Heaven and Earth and is the Author and Giver of every good gift and that without the offence and scandal of Idolatrous worship yet under this dispensation of Moses he seems openly to promise nothing more to the people of the Iewes then the present enjoyments of this Natural life nor threatens any thing but the plagues thereof as seems manifest Deuteronomy 28. where the Blessings of obedience to Moses his Law and the Cursings of disobedience are largely set down 2. Not but that I can easily believe that Moses himself understood the Mystery of Immortality and the Promise of those Eternal joyes to be revealed by the Messias in the fulness of time as also the meaning of all the Types that refer unto him and that his Successors also in that nation their Holy Men or Prophets had some measurable Knowledge thereof But my meaning is that the Generality of the Iews were locked up in this lower kind of Dispensation and that Moses his Law in the Externals thereof drives at no higher then thus as is apparent from all the Festivals thereof they none of them concerning any thing more then the enjoyments and conveniences of this present life 3. For as for their Sabbaths they were but a Memorial of the Creation of this visible world the belief whereof the Sadducees embraced as well as others though they denied that there was either Angel or Spirit for there is not any mention of the Creation of any such thing in the external letter of Moses and therefore the Appearances of Angels they look'd upon as only present Emanations from God which ceased as he disappeared 4. And for their Sabbatical year as also the year of Iubilee which was celebrated at the end of seven times seven years besides that they are not without a reflection upon the Creation of the World which was compleated at the seventh day wherein therefore God rested the other reasons according to the Text of Moses reach no further then the things of this present life For as concerning the Sabbatical year the Precept runs thus Six years thou shalt sow thy land and gather the fruits thereof but the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lye still that the poor of thy people may eat in like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard and with thy olive-yard And for the Iubilee it is evident that it had a secular use for the releasment of Servants and restoring of lands to their first owners who were necessitated to sell them Those Feasts therefore were instituted in order to a Political good 5. Their Feasts of Trumpets and their New-Moons seem indeed to have an higher use to call the people together to hear the Law but I told you before that the Blessings and Cursings of the Law were merely Temporal And for their Sacrifices of Thanksgiving and of Atonement they were in reference to what is Good or Evil to this life of the Flesh. 6. Their Feast of Tabernacles was instituted in remembrance that the Children of Israel dwelt in Tabernacles and Boothes when God brought them out of the land of Aegypt As also their Passeover was a more particular representation of the manner of their delivery out of the hands of the Aegyptians as you may see Exodus the 12. 7. Their Pentecost that is the fiftieth day after the Passeover in this they offered two wave-loaves as upon the second day of the Passeover they offered a sheaf of the first fruits of their Harvest so that those Solemnities respected merely the Fruits of the Earth 8. And lastly as for the Feast of Expiation wherein the Scape-goat carried away the sins of the people and the evils deserved thereby into the wilderness being as I have already intimated that those plagues or evils denounced in Moses his Law be but of a secular consideration it is plain that this particular Ceremony in the Religion of Moses in the letter thereof reaches no further then the Pleasures or Aggrievances of this mortal life It being reserved for Christ alone to bring the most certain and most comfortable News of that Eternal Joy which we shall be made partakers of with him for ever in the Heavens who was to abolish Death and to bring Life and Immortality to light through the Gospel as S. Paul speaks CHAP. IX 1. The Preeminency of Judaism above Paganism 2. The Authors of the Religions of the Heathen who they were 3. How naturally lapsed Mankind fals under the superstitious Tyranny of Devils 4. The palpable effects of this Tyranny in the Nations of America 5. That that false and wilde Resignation in the Quakers does
that they that obey it not shall be damned That Christ knew the very thoughts of mens hearts that he raised the dead that he healed men of incurable diseases that he gave sight to the blind and made the dumb to speak That the Apostles of Christ Matthew Peter and Paul healed one Habib Anaiar of the Leprosie at Antioch and raised the King's daughter from the dead as also gave sight to a childe that was born blinde And lastly three Preeminences the Alcoran gives to Christ which it gives not to any other Prophet to Abraham Moses no nor Mahomet himself The first is That he was carried up to Heaven bodie and soul where it is expresly added in Zuna that he shall return from thence to judge the world with righteous judgment The second That he shall be called The Word of God The third That he should be called The Holy Spirit of God These things you may read more at large in Iohannes Andreas his Confusio Sectae Mahometanae as also in others out of whom you may also add that the Turks have so venerable an esteem of S. Iohn's Gospel that they wear it next their bodies as an amulet when they goe to war to keep them from gun-shot 8. This I thought worth the noting partly that that Honour which is due to Christ may not be given to Mahomet of whom the best that can be said is only this That he did not so utterly pervert and deprave the mystery of the Gospel by either his ignorance political tricks or fanatical humours and whimsies but that there was so much of the substance and virtue thereof left as being seconded with the dint of the Sword was able enough to hew down the more gross Heathenish Idolatry chastise the disobedient Hypocritical Christians and ruine the external dominion of the Devil in the World and partly that we may discern what great hopes there are that in due time when the chief scandals of Christendome are taken away they being so far prepared already in their reverend opinion concerning our blessed Saviour the whole Turkish Empire may of a sudden become true Christians that which is vain and false among them having no better prop then the foolish and idle Visions false pretended Miracles and groundless fables of a mere wily phansifull and unclean Impostour whenas the pure Christian Religion comprehended in the Gospel is so solid sincere rational that no man that is master of his wits but may be throughly satisfied concerning the truth thereof CHAP. XIII 1. The Triumph of the Divine Life not so large hitherto as the overthrow of the external Empire of the Devil 2. Her conspicuous Eminency in the Primitive times 3. The real and cruel Martyrdoms of Christians under the Ten Persecutions a demonstration that their Resurrection is not an Allegorie 4. That to allegorize away that blessed Immortality promised in the Gospel is the greatest blasphemy against Christ that can be imagined 1. YOU see then how large the Success or Event of our Saviour's coming into the World is in reference to the external overthrow of the Kingdome of the Prince of this World that old Usurper over the sons of men If you demand of me how great the Triumph of the Divine Life has been in all this victory I must answer I could wish that it was greater then it is that it had been larger and continued longer but something has been done all this time that way too 2. For Faith in God through our Lord Jesus Christ and a firm Belief of a Life to come and the Effect of this Faith which is the very nature and Spirit of Christ dwelling in us consisting of Purity Humility and Charity this sound constitution was very much in the Church in the Primitive times even then when they had no succour nor support from the hands of men nay when they were cruelly handled by them they chusing rather to be banish'd imprisoned tortured and put to any manner of death then to deny him who had redeemed them with his most precious Bloud and had prepared a place of Eternal happiness for them with himself in Heaven 3. Here Faith and the Divine Life was very conspicuously victorious and triumphant in that in the eyes of all the world it set at nought all the cruel malice of the Devil and the terrour of death it self in the most ghastly vizard he could put on as you may see innumerable Examples in the Ten bloudy Persecutions under the Heathen Emperours Which History must needs make a man abominate such light-headed and false-hearted Allegorists that would intercept the Hopes of a future life by spirituallizing those passages in Scripture that bear that sense into a present Moral and Mystical interpretation as if the Gospel and the precious Promises therein conteined reached no further then this life we now live upon Earth 4. Which is the highest reproach and blasphemie that can be invented against Christ Iesus as if he were rather a Betraier then a Saviour of Mankind and that he was more thirsty after humane bloud then those Indian Gods we have spoken of who were so lavish thereof in their sacrifices and as if it were not Love and dear Compassion towards us that made him lay down his life but hatred and a spightfull plot of making myriads of men to be massacred and sacrificed out of affection to him that thus should betray them Wherefore whosoever interprets the New Testament so as to shuffle off the assurance of Reward and Punishment after the death of the Body is either an arrant Infidel or horrid Blasphemer CHAP. XIV 1. The Corruption of the Church upon the Christian Religion becoming the Religion of the Empire 2. That there did not cease then to be a true and living Church though hid in the Wilderness 3. That though the Divine life was much under yet the Person of our Saviour Christ of the Virgin Mary c. were very richly honoured 4. And the Apostles and Martyrs highly complemented according to the ancient guize of the Pagan Ceremonies 5. The condition of Christianity since the general apostasie compared to that of Una in the Desart amongst the Satyrs 6. That though this has been the state of the Church very long it will not be so alwaies and while it is so yet the real enemies of Christ do lick the dust of his feet 7. The mad work those Apes and Satyrs make with the Christian Truth 8. The great degeneracy of Christendome from the Precepts and Example of Christ in their warrs and bloudshed 9. That though Providence has connived at this Pagan Christianism for a while he will not fail to restore his Church to its pristine purity at the last 10. The full proof of which Conclusion is too voluminous for this place 1. WE have given a light glance upon the condition of the Primitive Church before Christianity became the Religion of the Empire what change would be wrought then a man might
already shewn in my interpretation of the fourth and fifth verses of the Twentieth chapter and that it was both the Doctrine of the Apostles and Practice of the Church while it was Symmetral to obey the Magistrate and live peaceably under him though he were an Heathen how much more then are they to obey them that are Christians That Superiour and Inferiour are as natural in a people as Head and Feet in an humane body and that therefore no man can decry Government but out of madness or some villainous design to enthrall others at last under the yoke of their own lawless Fury That there are Kings and Governours under the renewed state of things in the Millennium as appears Revel 21. v. 24. and that no frame of Government can be evil where Governours rule by a good law And lastly That to make any thing essentially evil or good that is in it self indifferent and left so by Christ and his Apostles is a fundamental Transgression against the Law of the New Ierusalem whose Foundation and Structure is all upon Twelve But instead of convincing them by what is true to endeavour to stop their fury by imposing upon them by false Glosses is the next way to imbolden them the more and make them contemn the authority of them that should guide them and instruct them For the prefiguration of the Apostasie of the Church and her Recovery out of it which may be done at least without changing any Temporal Powers and Superiorities is a thing so plain that it cannot be hid 4. A third Use of the Apocalypse is the Answering a very crooked Objection both from the Iew and Atheist For seeing things have been so ill for so many Ages of the Church together that the World has grown Pagan again after a manner and that the Turk has also swallowed so great a part of the Church surely there is no true Religion at all nor Providence will the Atheist say and the Iew at least that their Messiah is not yet come Idolatry having in a manner filled all the Nations that profess him But to both we may answer That nothing has hapned in all this but what was foreseen by God and predicted plainly in these Visions of the Apocalypse to say nothing of what Daniel had more generally adumbrated before Which therefore is rather an Argument for Providence then against it and a demonstration of the Messiah's faithfull vigilancie over his Church rather then of his not yet having gathered one in the world For it is plain that Christ is the Author of those holy Visions and that the great Plagues that have fallen upon the Church either by the Turk or others have been by reason of their Apostasie from the Purity of the Apostolick Faith and Practice 5. A fourth Use and that an eminent one of the Apocalypse is to be as a clear Mirrour of both the Apostasie of the Church and of the Way of her Recovery The Apostasie of the Church is intimated more generally in the number of the Name of the Beast whose Root being 25 as the Root of the Number of the Apostolick Church 12 intimates that their Apostasie consists in the general of adding to the Root and Foundation of Christian Religion supernumerary Articles of their own invention and coining being not contented with the Essentials or Fundamentals of Faith which were clearly and plainly delivered by the twelve Apostles and are easily without any dispute and contest understood to be in the holy Scriptures I intimated also before from the Root of 666 being 25 resolvable also into 5 again That their Apostatical Religion was framed chiefly to gratifie and entertain the external Senses that it began there and ended there and let the Diviner and more heavenly motions of the Mind lie asleep But yet more particularly this Apostasie is indigitated by the Square 666 as if the poison of the sixth Head of the Beast that red bloudy Dragon that is cruel Persecution and Idolatry were spred through the body of the Apostatized Church Whose chief part the Two-horned Beast must needs be who made the whole Romane Empire very lively resemble the Beast whose deadly wound he healed that is the ancient Pagan Power But enough of this it being a Theam that will be over-eagerly listned to by some and obstinately without any consideration and reason rejected by others 6. But this Apocalyptick Glass is not only for the Romanist but all the Churches of Christendome to look their faces in and to consider how much they are still engaged or how far emerged out of this Lapse and Apostasie or whether they be quite emerged out of it or no. For I must confess I do much scruple the matter and that upon account of the 1260 daies wherein the Woman is in the Wilderness and the Witnesses mourn in sackcloth Concerning the Epocha of which daies the very highest Mr. Mede pitches upon is 365 namely from the death of Iulian which will end the 1260 daies Anno 1625. But many years before this were there the same different Churches that there are now Wherefore it is a sign that the Woman was not then nor yet is out of the Wilderness but that the true Church is still hid in these divisions of Churches and that all hitherto for the outward face of things is but a wilde Desart Moreover those Divisions of Churches which were made about an hundred years ago and which immediately became the Churches of this or that Polity if those Alterations then had been into a way purely Apostolical it had been plainly the enlivening of the Witnesses and the calling of them into Heaven many years before the expiration of the 1260 days Which is a strong presumption all is not yet right and that the Witnesses are not yet alive nor the Woman yet out of the Wilderness 7. Wherefore out of a due humility and modesty suspecting our selves not to have emerged quite out of this General Apostasy of the Church into which the Spirit of God has foretold she would be lapsed for 1260 years let us see if we can find out what Remainders of this Lapse are still upon us Which I suppose we shall be the more ready to acknowledge by how much more they shall be found to symbolize with that Church whom we justly judge to be so manifest an Apostate Now I demand Is not one Fundamental miscarriage in that Church That they make things Fundamental that are not and mingle their own humane Inventions with the infallible Oracles of God and imperiously obtrude them upon the people We are very sensible our selves of this in Ceremonies And are not uncertain and useless Opinions as arrant a ceremony as Ceremonies themselves which we so kick against and fly away from like wild horses Nay I may adde also That it will be hard to wash our hands clean from that other badge of the Beast Unchristian Persecution in points of Religion and that for differences where Christ himself has
made none but our selves onely imagine them Again as for Idolatry another known Character of the Beast cannot we find that also amongst our selves I do not mean Covetousness onely which the Apostle cals Idolatry but the adventuring to erect Imaginations if not Images of God some more horrid and affrightful then those that stand in the most polluted Temples of the Pagans the Statue of Saturn tearing his own children a pieces with his teeth and eating of them is but an Hieroglyphick of Mercy in comparison thereof while in the mean time the mournful Witnesses testifie both out of Moses and out of S. Iohn That the nature of God is quite another thing God is Love and he that abideth in Love abideth in God and God in him The Lord the Lord God gracious and merciful long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth And yet what forcible assaults are there to set up this Idol or false Image in the Temple of every mans Minde which otherwise should be consecrated to the Love of God and the warm and comfortable residence of his Holy Spirit That also is a blind Image of God worse then the Pagan Cupid which some conceited Fondlings set up in favour of themselves That God sees no sin in his Elect let them sin never so grosly whenas the Scripture expresly affirms That his eyes behold his eye-lids try the Children of men and That he is of purer eyes then to endure iniquity any where To say nothing that Opinions themselves that are framed by humane curiosity in points of Religion though otherwise harmless become Idols and have the very same effect that Idols have that is They lay asleep the Minde and besot it so that it becomes senseless of the indispensable motions of the Divine life And further That the tricking up our selves with such curiosities is but a self-chosen holiness and a worshipping and serving God after our own humour which assuredly is little better then Idolatry 8. And lastly more compendiously and at once Let us consider the nature of the Witnesses slain by the Beast of the bottomless pit Which is a childish thing to conceit to be Two persons forasmuch as they prophesy for 1260 years together as Mr. Mede has well defined and I also adde that they are dead in another sense even that time they are said to prophesy as I have above noted and I think there is very little doubt to be made of the Interpretation Let us therefore now consider what these Two Witnesses are And truely according to the richness of Prophetick expression I do not think they are restrained to one single signification but type out at least these two things The Old and New Testament which by a Prosopopoeia are here called the Two Witnesses or else The Magistracy and Ministery forasmuch as those things they are described by are allusions to Moses and Aaron and to Zerobabel and Ieshua The Concinnity of the former interpretation does not depend onely on that obvious allusion to that Latine word Testament but is further ratified from the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 frequently signifiing the Laws or Institutes of God rendred also for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Not to adde that the Old and New Testament are whether they were called so or no Two eximious Witnesses of the Mind of God unto the World Wherefore now more Prophetico making these Two Books Two persons they may be said to be alive or slain either in a Political or Moral sense They would be alive in a Political sense if they had the only rule in the transactions of the affairs of Church and Commonwealth that there should be no injunctions as indispensable in matters of Religion but such as they plainly determine much less any thing against them And so likewise in State-affairs all Oppression and Tyranny would be prohibited Wherefore while the Inventions of men rule in the Church instead of the Dictates of those holy Oracles and while course Oppression and Tyranny over the members of Christ is prevalent that is while men think they have power and wealth and wit and policy merely to tread down the people and not to succour them and guide them for their real good and to ennoble their spirits as much as they are capable rather then to make them besotted vassals and slaves to put out their eyes to make mill-horses of them that they may the better droile and drudge for the satisfaction of their lusts whereever things are carried on this way the Beast of the bottomless Pit has slain the Two Witnesses in the Political sense the Law of God in the mean time protesting against their proceedings both in the Old and New Testament as is plain to every one that peruses those Writings The Witnesses also would be alive in a Moral sense if those indispensable Precepts of life witnessed by them were really turned into life and practice in us For the External Word is but a dead letter but then is properly alive when that life is begotten in us whereof it testifies Which if it be neglected as also their Rule so farre forth as it respects Ecclesiastick Policy be declined and men act both in Political affairs and in their private capacities according to the Rules of men and their unprofitable Institutes and thereby neglect the indispensable Commands of God who cannot but see that the Two Witnesses we speak of are plainly slain and that the Old and New Testament are but as two liveless carkasses lying unburied indeed for they will not burn them and put their ashes into an urne and hide them under ground for fear of the people but useless and unactive having no power to curb the wicked enormities of the world who have taken up another self-chosen Law to themselves minted and forged by the false Antichristian Church consistent enough with nay very favourable to all those pomps and vanities that we are sworn against in our very Baptisme Whence it is said that the Inhabitants of the World are so glad and triumphant and send gifts to one another upon the slaying of the Witnesses their death conducing so much to the uncurbed fruition of all worldly and carnal enjoyments but the Church in the mean time becoming no better then Sodome and Aegypt a land of Tyranny and Beastliness a City of Carnality and Oppression Wherein to proceed to the other sense Moses and Aaron Zerobabel and Ieshua the holy and legitimate Magistracy and Ministery are slain that is kept out of all Political power by this Beast out of the bottomless pit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which as it may signifie the Sea may be understood of the Ten-horned Beast but as it may signifie a deep pit in the earth such as that from whence Smoke came and the Locusts may signifie the Two-horned Beast who is said to come out of the Earth and is the Master of that Wisdom that is earthly sensual and devilish and which is accompanied with bloudy zeal and
soul out of the Grave after he had lien there four daies together But that universal expression of mens rising out of the Grave is but a Prophetical Scheme of Speech the more strongly to strike our senses as I have already intimated in my exposition of the 15 of 1 Cor. against the Psychopannychites And therefore the greater accumulation of absurdities that can be made against that circumstance it will the more confirm that usefull Interpretation of mine 3. This succour we have against the Atheists out of Philosophy but I answer further as concerning the Scripture it self which is the only certain measure of the truth of our Religion and to which alone I dare finally stand not thinking my self bound to make good every conceit that either the Pride Precipitancie Inadvertencie or Ignorance of fallible Teachers have obtruded upon the World That I dare challenge him to produce any place of Scripture out of which he can make it appear That the Mysterie of the Resurrection implies the resuscitation of the same numerical body The most pregnant of all is Job 19 which later Interpreters are now so wise as not to understand at all of the Resurrection The 1 Cor. 15. that Chapter is so far from asserting this curiosity that it plainly saies it is not the same body but that as God gives to the blades of corn grains quite distinct from that which was sown so at the Resurrection he will give the Soul a Body quite different from that which was buried Now if it be not the same Body that was buried what need it run into the Earth to come out again Wherefore it is plain that the Apostle there writes as I said before in a Prophetical and Symbolical style 4. But the Atheist will still hang on and object further That the very term Resurrectio implies that the same body shall rise again for that only that falls can be said properly to rise again But the Answer will be easie the Objection being grounded merely upon a mistake of the sense of the word which is to be interpreted out of those higher Originals the Greek and Hebrew and not out of the Latine though the word in Latin does not alwaies implie an individual Restitution of what is gone or fallen as in that verse in Ovid Victa tamen vinces subversaque Troja resurges But this is not so near to our purpose let us rather consider the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Resurrectio supplies in Latin and therefore must be made to be of as large a sense as it Now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is so far from signifying in some places the Reproduction or Recuperation of the same thing that was before that it bears no sense at all of Reiteration in it As Matth. 22.24 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Genes 7. there 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie merely a living subsistence and therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in an active signification according to this sense will be nothing else but a giving or continuing life and subsistence to a thing The word in the Hebrew that answers to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Translators interpret a Living substance whence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to this analogie may very well bear the same latitude of sense that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they being both words that are rendred Resurrectio but simply of themselves signifie only Vivification or erection unto life or the being made a living Creature But seeing that men are Creatures that have been once alive and are to be made alive again and to become sensible and visible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at the day of Judgment therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are ordinarily translated Revivificatio and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are to be understood in the same sense that implies a Recuperation of life 5. Now the Iewish Rabbins as Buxtorf has noted are very critical in these words appropriating 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Resurrection of the just but the other to the Revivification of the wicked though they sometimes again confound them But that which is nearest to our purpose is to consider in what signification of the words the thing signified is competible to the unjust as well as to the just And I conceive it is that which the Apostle Paul speaks 2 Cor. 5.10 For we must all appear before the Tribunal of Christ that every man may receive according to what he has done in his body whether good or evil But as well the wicked as the just before they thus appear are really in life and Being though to us they be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dead vanisht and invisible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke 20. But all are alive and visible to God even the bad as well as the good Therefore the Resurrection or Revivification for the word signifies no more then so that is common to both is this That they become palpable and visible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and appear at that general Assizes at the last Day For then all the World good and bad shall not only be alive to God but also alive and visible to one another And this is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Revivificatio that is common to all And that this notion is solid appears from hence in that Luke by saying For they all live to God implies that they are dead in reference to men Wherefore so far forth as they are said to be dead so far forth may they be said to be revived or to be raised from the dead as the Ghosts of men are said to be by art Magick because they are made to appear But the Devil is not said to be raised from the dead because he was never properly said to be alive amongst us or to live amongst us CHAP. V. 1. An Objection against the Resurrection from the Activity of the Soul out of her Body with the first Answer thereto 2. The second Answer 3. The special significations of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first belonging to the unjust the latter to the just 4. That the life that is led on the Earth or in this lower Region of the Air is more truly a Death then a Life 5. The manner of our recovering our Celestial Body at the last Day 6. And of the accomplishment of the Promise of Christ therein 1. I Should proceed but that I must be contented to be interrupted by one Objection more which is this If the Souls of men live and act out of their Bodies before the Resurrection what need is there of any Resurrection of the Body For what want have they of any Bodies at all if their Soul can live and act without them But I answer First That we are not infallibly assured but that the Souls as well of the Good as the Bad after Death have
will become more kexy and loose of its Solidity For a Body that is porous and can imbibe moisture the more moist the more solid it is the more solid the Earth is the better it will keep its distance from the Sun as it is swung about him in this common Vortex of the Planets Wherefore the distance of the Earth lessening so as Astronomers observe might it not come from other causes would be a parlous Symptome and sign that the Earth grows old apace and much exhausted And the more it is exhausted the nearer still it will be wrought toward the Sun according to the Cartesian Philosophy So that at last what by its over-drieness and what by its approaching so near to the Fountain of heat not only Forrests and Woods which has happned already but the subterraneous Mines of Sulphur and other combustible Matter will catch fire and set the whole Earth in a manner on burning 4. I say therefore that the Earth will thus at the long run be burnt either according to the course of Nature of which manner of destruction these be the main concomitants That by reason of a long distemper and languishment she will be utterly unable or very wretchedly able to sustain either Man or Beast for abundance of Ages together before she be ruined and burnt up by this mortiferous Fever and after this death and destruction of hers far less able she becoming then but as a Caput Mortuum by reason of the long exhaustion of the life and heart of the soil before this lingring Conflagration or else by a more special or solemn appointment of Providence the Period of her Conflagration shall be shortned From which if any universal good doth accrue to the Creation it is not unworthy of the Son of God and his mighty and most glorious Host to be emploied in so weighty a performance For is not the whole Earth the Vineyard of the Lord a particular platt of his skillfull Culture and Husbandry 5. Thirdly and lastly There being so many obdurate rebellious Spirits as well among the Apostate Angels as Men that are so far revolted from God that they scarce retain any sense of him in their minds that peremptorily deny a particular Providence and stoutly phansie that if there be a Deity he takes no notice of the affairs of any particular Creatures that jear and flout at Religion and look upon the life of the Son of God when he lived in the world as a poor and contemptible Example of Pusillanimity and Dejectedness of Spirit that contemn all his true followers for moaped Fools but make their own Lusts their law in all things and therefore are insensible of whatever Injustice or Cruelty they commit or whatever Beastliness or Vileness they give themselves up to these being past all sense within but all of them sensible enough in their bodies or vehicles the Devils themselves not excepted how fitting nay how necessary is it that a fiery Whirlwind and Tempest of Vengeance should rattle upon their external persons and that corporeal pain should pierce them to the very quick and that all whatever they took delight in should be demolisht and that they should be smothered in tormenting Heat and Darkness of which they know no end 6. These Considerations which I have alledged make the Conflagration of the World not only possible but also very reasonable especially with that circumstance of not coming naturally for they would then look on it only as a common calamity but of being inflicted visibly by one whose Person and Laws are so much vilified and scorned by all the Powers of the Dark Kingdome And then again for further conviction and aggravation after such a time as they have seen the supernatural deliverance of the righteous before their eyes For this makes good that Promise and Threatning of our Saviour what difference he would make betwixt the Sheep and the Goats saying to one Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the kingdom and to the other Goe ye accursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels CHAP. XI 1. A Recapitulation or Synopsis of the more Intelligible part of the Christian Mysterie with an Indication of the Usefulness thereof 2. The undeniable Grounds of this Mystery The existence of God A particular Providence The Lapsableness of Angels and men The natural subjection of men to Devils in this fallen Condition 3. God's Wisdome and Iustice in the Permission thereof for a time 4 5. Further Reasons of that Permission 6. The Lapse of Men and Angels proved 7. The Good emerging out of this Lapse 8. The exceeding great Preciousness of the Divine Life 9. The Conflagration of the Earth 10. The Good arising from the Opposition betwixt the Light and Dark Kingdome 11. That God in due time is in a special manner to assist the Kingdome of Light and in a way most accommodate to the humane Faculties 12. That therefore he was to send into the World some Venerable Example of the Divine Life with miraculous attestations of his Mission of so sacred a Person 13. That this Person by reason of the great Agonies that befall them that return to the Divine Life ought to bring with him a palpable pledge of a proportionable Reward suppose of a Blessed Immortality manifested to the meanest Capacity by his rising from the dead and visibly ascending into Heaven 14. That in the Revolt of Mankind from the Tyranny of the Devil there ought to be some Head and that the Qualifications of that Head ought to be opposite to those of the old Tyrant as also to have a power of restoring us to all that we have lost by being under the Usurper 15. That also in this Head all the notable Objects of the Religious propensions of the Nations should be comprized in a more lawfull and warrantable manner 16. That this Idea of Christianity is so worthy the Goodness of God and so sutable to the state of the World that no wise and vertuous Person can doubt but that it is or will be set on foot at some time by Divine Providence and that if the Messias be come and the Writings of the New Testament be true in the literal sense it is on foot-already 1. WE have I think fully enough set forth the Reasonableness of Christian Religion in the Idea thereof it may be more fully then was needfull before we come to prove That it is more then an Idea We shall by way of Recapitulation contract the more Intelligible frame thereof into a lesser model that its due symmetrie and proportion may be better seen at once Which will be both a relief to our Memory and also a help to our Judgment when we shall have a more easie opportunity of considering the solid strength and handsome congruity of the whole Fabrick 2. And I dare challenge the most maliciously-wise and skilfull if he can find any rational exception against the structure of this so intelligible a
the Immortality of the Soul the main Branches of the ancient Cabbala was also communicated But it is no where said nor can be conceived That God the Father distinctly from the Son and Holy Ghost gave the Law to Moses but it was an act as all acts ad extra are of the entire Godhead Nor is the Father nor the Holy Spirit excluded in the oeconomie of the Gospel but their Glory is acknowledged coequal and their Majesty coeternal Nor again can the Church ever cease to be under the Belief of Iesus Christ so as that any other God-service should justle that out by its succession For the Belief of the Promises of Christs coming again visibly to Judgement and Crowning his true members with Eternal Life and Glory must of necessity continue till the Promises themselves be fulfilled Which are but phantastically conceived to be fulfilled in the Service of the Love 6. Moreover how can that Dispensation pretend to be the Ministry of the Spirit where men are kept off from believing the inward manifestations of their own Mind where alone they can be properly said to be taught of God and urged to give up all their Light and Consciences to be rul'd at the pleasure of the Elders of his Family This is not to be inspired by God but to be taught merely by men and to be carved and shaped out like a piece of dead Marble by the hand of the Statuary So wholy unlike the Dispensation of the Spirit is this Oeconomie of the Service of the Love Beside that it is a piece of Rapine and Robbery to appropriate that to their Family which is the Peculiar of every true Believer in Christ who assuredly have the assistance of the Holy Spirit as I have proved at large in the following parts of my Discourse 7. But if any one will adventure to affirme That after this dead Forme of Religion and external flattery of the Person of Christ which has continued too-many Ages there will succeed a more general Reign of the Spirit of Life and experimental knowledge of his Sceptre and Power in us subduing all his enemies there under his feet and renewing the World in true Righteousness and Holiness it is that which I in no wise oppose nay I must confess I have a fatal and unalterable propension to think it to be true and that this may be that Regnum Spiritús which the Cabbalists of old did presage and does begin with the Reviving of the Witnesses in the Apocalypse of S. Iohn Of which things I have already spoke But in the mean time this is not the special work of any one man but like the Vision of Ezekiel where Breath comes from the four Winds of Heaven upon the bones already covered with sinews flesh and skin and behold they lived and stood upon their feet an exceeding great Army an orderly Company such as the Church of Christ ought to be For this Internal power of the Spirit will not annul or destroy the External Frame of Christian Religion as it referrs to the Offices of the Person of Christ the Head of his Church as these Satanical Impostors would pretend but rectifie and corroborate it and make it more irreprehensibly and enravishingly beautifull as there was more lustre in those raised Bodies after the Spirit of life had entred into them then when they were mere dead carkasses 8. Besides if we did conceive that this Dispensation of Christ in the Spirit was to be in a more special manner promoted by the Ministry of some one Person it does not at all follow that H. Nicolas is the man and not onely so but I am confident I shall make it manifest that it is impossible that it should be he Which I shall have sufficiently performed when I have demonstrated that he is nothing at all of that which he pretends to be but only a mere mistaken Enthusiast if not worse which was the last part of my Purpose And this I conceive is fully evinced by proving him to have laid aside all the Offices of the Person of Christ as he is Man and intercepted all the hopes of his Visible Return to Judgement in the clouds of Heaven and of rewarding all true Believers with that glorious Crown of Life in an Heavenly Body at the last day Which things are so clear in Scripture that the Scripture it self must loose its authority if these things once loose their belief as is manifest by what we have said already in this present Treatise And therefore he that denies these things it is plain he is not inspired of God but is a Minister and Factor for the Devil CHAP. XV. 1. That the Personal Offices of Christ are not to be laid aside That he is a Priest for ever demonstrated out of sundry places of Holy Writ 2. That the Office of being a Iudge is also affixed to his Humane Person proved from several Testimonies of Scripture 3. Places alledged for the excluding Christ's Humanity with Answers thereto 4. The last and most plausible place they do alledge with an Answer to the same 1. NOW that the Humane person of Christ as I may so call it is not to be laide aside is evident not to repeat what I have elsewhere alledged from the whole Epistle of the Author to the Hebrews For he that there is said to be an high Priest for ever is that very man who was crucified on the Cross at Ierusalem who was said to be like unto his brethren in all things that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things appertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted he is able to succour them that tempted And it is further clear that it is this very man we speak of in that he is said to be born not of the Tribe of Levi but of the Tribe of Iuda chap. 7.14 and yet he is there declared a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec Read the whole Chapter nothing can be more clearly asserted then the Everlasting high-Priesthood of this man who sanctifying the People with his bloud suffered without the gate Which are such particularities as must needs affix the Eternal high-Priesthood to the Humane person of Christ. Again in that he is said to suffer but once it is apparent that it is to be literally understood of his Humane person And every priest standeth dayly ministring and offering oftentimes the same Sacrifices which can never take away sins But this man after he had offered one Sacrifice for sins for ever sate down at the right hand of God c. And yet more fully in the foregoing Chapter For Christ is not entred into the holy places made with hands which are the figures of the true but into Heaven it self now to appear in the presence of God for us Nor yet that he should offer himself often as the high priest entreth into
possession And you having flung away that precious Legacy of your dying Lord namely the Love of one another what Injustice is it that an Alien take it up and flourish it in your sight to your utter Shame and Reproach And truly he writes as one that knows his advantage passing well in this regard as you may see if you read his Introduction chap. 4. sect 35. to the end of the chapter as also sect 51 of the eleventh chapter to the end thereof 5. Fourthly Whereas you place all your Piety in an hypocritical Flattery of Christ's Person and have overwhelmed and smothered the Life of Religion with an unsupportable load and luggage of needless and thankless Ceremonies or else have wounded it to death with the acuteness and spinosity of harsh and dry Opinions not heeding at all the renovation of your own minds nor of theirs that are committed to your charge into the lively Image of Christ which assuredly does mainly consist in Christian Love how just is it with God to permit such an Enthusiast to arise who shall make it the great Arcanum of his Religion to slay Christ according to the flesh that is according to the History you having slain him so cruelly and remorslessly according to the Spirit that is extinguished his Life that ought to be in us by substituting your own foolish Opinions and loathsome Ceremonies in the place thereof Nay indeed you have handled the matter so that you have made Christ according to the flesh be the Executioner of himself according to the Spirit making every Article concerning Christ an Engine for either Sensuality or Strife In brief the exteriour oeconomie of Christian Religion being intended for the inward perfecting of our Minds in true Righteousness and Holiness which is Christ in us according to the Spirit you by your Devices defeating this end doe naturally take away the means thereto and thus yourselves are the principal Murderers of Christ even according to the flesh too and H. Nicolas is only your appointed Executioner And therefore it is as I said but just with God you having so long and so constantly abused all the Articles of the Creed to a contrary purpose then was intended by his gracious counsel that he permit such a Mock-prophet to arise that should hazard the peoples misbelief of all and Allegorize away all that solid and useful Truth of the History of Christ into a mere moral or mystical sense as if the Letter were but a Parable or Fable 6. Fifthly In that this Sect we speak of do rattle so about your ears with the loud noise of Perfection though for my own part I am well assured the best of them are far enough from it yet in the mean time I cannot but interpret it an exprobration and reproach to the great abhorrency you have to so searching a doctrine that will touch and wound your Hypocritical hearts with the sense and conscience of wilful sinfulness which you would cloak under that colour of Impossibility of being as you should be as also to your false dealing with those under your charge whom you do bedwarfe and becripple by your poisonous medicines would make them alwaies sorry boies with bibs and aprons or else conceal their age and keep them alwaies in minority for advantage sake like those infortunate Orphans that are betraied into the hands of treacherous Guardians What wonder is it therefore that those that truly hunger and thirst after Righteousness being starved at home with those dilute and corrupt doctrines of the Needlesness of Sanctity of invincible Infirmity slight Attrition frivolous Penances venal Indulgences crawl out abroad to seek better food and so get into the lap and suck the nipples of this sweet Enchantress the lovely Family of the Love whose breasts do promise such strong nourishment that they that drink thereof do not only pass from children to men but from being men doe become Gods 7. And Sixthly and lastly While I contemplate the universal face of Christendome what a Den of Thieves and Murderers it is become what a Region of Robbers and Oppressors what a Sty of Epicures what a Wilderness of Atheism and Prophaneness in a manner wholly inhabited by Satyrs and salvage Beasts when I consider within my self how generally men live as if there were nothing to come after this life and how many already have drunk down that doctrine That there is indeed nothing to come hereafter of which notwithstanding the History of Christ his Death Resurrection and Ascension and his appearing out of Heaven to Paul as he was a going to Damascus are as palpable pledges as Divine Providence could produce as also of his visible Return to Judgement according to the Scriptures I say when I consider how little effect all this has had for the raising of mens minds to an heavenly Conversation but that they live as if they were utterly sunk from this belief I cannot imagine any thing more reasonable then to conclude That out of very Wrath and Indignation God has raised this false Prophet to them that it might be with them according to the Proverb Like lips like lettice Like Prophet like People As if God should thus expostulate with Christendome Behold I have given to you my only-begotten Son out of my own bosome whose authority I ratified unto you by audible Voices from Heaven by mighty Signs and Miracles done by him while he was alive I gave him a sacrifice for sin to reconcile you to my self and to endear your affections unto him and me that ye might cordially follow his Example and keep his Precepts I raised him from the dead and exhibited him visibly to his disciples as an undoubted pledge of a blessed Immortality to them that believe on him which I further confirmed by his Ascension into Heaven and his appearing to that chosen Vessel of mine who has so fully prefigured unto you his glorious Return to Judgment and the Resuscitation of all his Saints into that Eternal Happiness which they had fallen from And now I demand of you what could I have done more for the gaining you back to my self and for the resettling you again in my Heavenly Paradise But because you are so besotted with Earthliness and Sensuality as to make no use of the inestimable advantages of the Gospel but have set your Happiness upon things here below behold I have raised up unto you a Prophet according to your own hearts desire who will help on the completion of your Infidelity and in the midst of a many fine words and sweet friendly phrases close up your eyes in Unbelief and so having sealed unto you by his witchery and enchantments this assurance That the Mystery of Christ reaches no further then the things of this life you may use the present market and enjoy your worldly lusts to the full 8. This surely if I understand any thing is the sense and meaning of God's permission that such a Prodigie as Familisme should appear with so
much success in the Christian World and though I have faithfully and industriously discovered the matter unto you yet I must profess that I conceive it not in my power nor any ones else to prevent the sad effects thereof That can only be by a true and sincere Reformation of Heart and Minde into the ancient and Apostolick Life and Doctrine For there is nothing so recommendable to Mankinde as the Christian Faith in the native Plainness and Simplicity thereof nor any thing so horrible and detestable as that vizard that the Depravedness of Christendome has put upon it Which Face of things if it continue Atheism having seized on so great a Proportion it is prone to conjecture that what remains may be easily swallowed up of Familism or of some such parallel Plague of the Church and so the right Faith in Christ may quite be laid asleep never to awaken till there is no use thereof I mean till men be affrighted into a belief by an universal Thunder and Lightning from Heaven and the glorious Appearance of the Son of man in the Clouds to recompence the good and to adjudge the wicked to everlasting Fire For the Counsels of God as his Prophecies are two-handed and both of them in some cases have a meaning conditional But as I desire so I hope the best and it is a great ease to my minde that I have so freely declared what I conceive tends so much thereto BOOK VII CHAP. I. 1. That the Subject of the Third part of his Discourse is The Reality of the Christian Mystery 2. That the Reasonableness of Christian Religion and the constant Belief thereof by knowing and good men from the time it is said to have begun til now is a plain Argument of the Truth thereof to them that are not over-Sceptical 3. The Averseness of slight and inconsiderate Witts from all Arguments out of Prophecies with their chiefest Objections against the same 4. That the Prophecies of the Messias in the Old Testament were neither forged nor corrupted by the Jews 5. An Answer to their Objections concerning the Obscurity of Prophecies 6. As also to that from Free Will 7. That all Prophecies are not from the fortuitous heat of mens Phansies but by divine Revelation proved by undeniable Instances 8. A particular reason of true Prophets amongst the Iews with some Examples of true Prophecies in other places 9. A notable Prophecie acknowledged by Vaninus concerning Julius Caesar's being kill'd in the Senate 1. WE are come now to the Third Part of our Discourse wherein the doubtfull Dawnings of this great Mystery we are clearing up will break out into a fuller Light and the Progress of Truth will be like that of Righteousness that shineth more and more till perfect Day The Possible as also Reasonable Idea of Christianity which I have hitherto represented is but as the Seminal Forme of a Plant hid in the seed under ground but we shall now exhibit it as it were to sense shot up into open view and demonstrate That this Possible Idea has already arrived to a Real and actual Existence in the World Which being a matter of so great consequence we will not huddle it up at once nor yet make any steps more for pomp then for use and the fuller conviction of the Truth we are to prove 2. And truly the very first step I shall make or rather have partly made already I hope to any indifferent man will seem not a little considerable We have very amply and intelligibly declared how highly Reasonable the Frame of our Religion is how becoming and consistent all those things are that Christ is recorded to have done or suffered Add therefore to the Reasonableness of the thing it self the constant and perpetual Tradition thereof for true and that it has been so seriously believed in all Ages that as well the Learned as Unlearned as well the Noble as Ignoble have been ready nay have actually laid down their Lives for a witness thereof And methinks no man that is not over-Sceptical but this Consideration should fetch off his assent For the Fame of those things that are seriously reported and constantly believed by knowing and judicious men cannot rationally be called into question unless the things themselves affirmed seem unreasonable or else over-artificial and in too trim and cunning a dress of Reason That the things recorded are very Reasonable I have already demonstrated And how little of the cunning Artifice of either Logick or Rhetorick they partake of I dare appeal to any that peruse them Wherefore if any man persist in his Unbelief the impediment is not in the Mystery offered to him but in himself that has no desire it should be true either out of Pride as not being willing to find himself to have been ignorant hitherto of the true Religion or out of the love of either the Pleasures or Profits of this present World which the Belief of Christianity does naturally curb But we proceed to what is still more close and cogent That the Iews have for this many hundred years expected and do still expect him whom they call their Messias every one knows as also that this name Messias is the same with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from whence our Religion is denominated Wherefore if I can prove That this Messias is already come and that Iesus whom we worship is that Christ I have then performed the Promise of the Third Part of my Discourse which is to prove That Christianity the Idea whereof I have hitherto described is not a mere Idea but a real Truth Which first I shall attempt from Prophecies after from History the comparing of both which together will be so strong an Argument that to the unprejudiced it cannot appear less then a perfect Demonstration 3. I know some are of so impatient and superficial a Spirit that they vilifie the very name or mention of Prophecies as arguments of no validity because they cannot find themselves at leisure to weigh the force of them But if they will rationally speak against them they must alledge some of these four Objections viz. That either they are often forged or at least corrupted by some wily Politicians to serve some State-design Or are so obscure that there is no certain sense or meaning of them Or if there be that it does not infallibly import that things thus predicted will surely come to pass there being so great dependance of the affairs of the World upon the actings of men Or lastly to strike home that there never was nor ever will be any Prophecies from any extraordinary Inspiration but that some men have very hot Phansies and their minds running on future things vent what they think and their Predictions like Dreams sometimes prove true sometimes false and that the report of those that have hapned true has begot that false perswasion of there being Prophets in the World 4. Such slight Considerations as these doe marvellously gratifie the Light-minded
we needed to charge this Prophecie with though it be probable enough it is contained in it There are sundry other places that serve for the proof of this seventh Character but because it is sufficiently enough demonstrated already and little or no controversie made of it I pass to the eighth 7. Which is the Messiah his abolishing the Superstition of the Gentiles that is such worship as they had no divine warrant for they being so grosly mistaken in the Object This is so plainly included in the two last Characters that I need add no other proof But if there were need that in the 2 and 110 Psalms might further confirme it Where he is constituted a new King and Priest and therefore implies new Religion and Laws and such as the heathen were ignorant of before but such as they must obey upon pain of high displeasure 8. The last Character is the long Duration of the Messiah's Kingdome Psalm 89. v. 35. Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not lye unto David His seed shall endure for ever and his throne as the Sun before me It shall be established for ever as the moon and as a faithful witness in heaven Also Psalm 45. v. 6. Thy throne ô God is for ever and ever the sceptre of thy Kingdome is a right sceptre c. Which Prophecie makes good the former and shews how it is to be fulfilled in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Messiah See also Psalm 72. which the Hebrew Rabbins do acknowledge to be understood of the Messiah Also Daniel 2.44 and 7.27 This Character is so clear that I need not insist any longer upon it 9. These are the main Marks and Characters of the Person of the Messiah by which we may infallibly find out who he is And who indeed can he be according to these Characters but Iesus whom we Christians worship For what competitor for the Messiahship but he was being a Iew rejected by the Iews and crucified Who is it that arose from the dead and ascended into Heaven but he Who ever delivered so pure Doctrine to purge the World from wickedness and to enlighten the Nations as he It is he therefore whom the Nations waited for and have received It is he for whose sake they parted with their old vain and impure Superstitions by whose Doctrine they are brought to the knowledge of the Eternal God And lastly it is he whom for his bitter sufferings God has exalted above Angels and Archangels and all the host of Heaven and has set him at his own right hand to be a Priest and King over his Church for ever CHAP. IX 1. The peculiar Use of Arguments drawn from the Prophecies of the Old Testament for the convincing the Atheist and Melancholist 2. An Application of the Prophecies to the known Events for the conviction of the Truth of our Religion 3. That there is no likelihood at all but that the Priesthood of Christ will last as long as the Generations of men upon Earth 4. The Conclusion of what has been urged hitherto 5. That Christ was no fictitious Person proved out of the History of Heathen Writers as out of Plinie 6. And Tacitus 7. As also Lucian 8. And Suetonius 9. That the Testimony out of Josephus is supposititious and the reasons why he was silent concerning Christ. 10. Julian's purpose of rebuilding the Temple at Jerusalem with the strange success thereof out of Ammianus Marcellinus 1. WE have now made a very considerable Progress in the proof of the Reality of Christian Religion That it is more then a mere Idea Let us here make a stand and breath a while and contemplate with our selves the peculiar Use and advantage of this present Argument for the stopping the mouths as well of the bold Atheist as the suspicious Melancholist For indeed it is too true and every good man could wish it were not so that the latter Ages of the Church have not dealt faithfully with the World but beyond the bounds of all modesty and conscience obtruded upon the people fond Legends and forged Miracles as if they were given up into their hands onely to be imposed upon and abused Which consideration does cast some men into an unchangeable misbelief of the whole business of Christianity and makes them look upon it all as a mere Fiction and Fable For they measure the Genius of the Primitive Church by what they see practised before their eyes now-adayes and look upon the whole Tribe of the Priests as Impostors Which censure though it be most unjust yet it will be very hard to convince these Censurers but that it is very true unless by some such Argument as now lies before us viz. That the ancient Prophecies in the Old Testament could not be forged by the Christian Priests and that the Jews would not forge them against themselves Nay they that know any thing of the Jews will acknowledge them so religiously addicted to the Letter of these holy Writings that knowingly and wittingly they durst not alter a tittle Wherefore all those Prophecies we have alledged are real and we have made good they clearly foretel That the Messiah should come many hundred years ago therefore it is plain he is come 2. I therefore demand of either the Prophane or Melancholick who is this Messiah if Iesus be not he Nay I appeal to them if the very Characters of his Person be not certainly to be known by their own Senses agreeably to the Prediction of those infallible Oracles The Prophecies have said He should be rejected of his own Ask the Iews they will acknowledge they have rejected him The Prophecies foretold he should be cut off be killed by them Ask the Iews they will not deny but that they did condemn him to death but deservedly as they contend for their own excuse The Prophecies foretold his Doctrine should enlighten the Gentiles Ask thine own eyes if the Gentiles be not turned from their vain unwarrantable Superstitions to the knowledge of that one God that made heaven and earth and of Iesus Christ whom he hath sent The Prophecies prefigured his rising from the dead and his ascending up into Heaven and ask thine own Conscience if thou dost not believe that this was alwaies the belief of the Christians and consult with thine own Reason if it had been possible that the Death of Christ could have drawn all the World after him if it had not been seconded with his Resurrection Certainly those that believed on him before had deserted him after his death if he had not risen from the dead but of that more fully hereafter Lastly the Prophecies foretold that the Messiah should be worshipped as a divine Person and receive divine Honour and that God would make him a King and Priest for ever Ask thine own senses if thou dost not find it so How many thousand Temples are there consecrated to his name in how many Nations and Kingdomes of the earth is he
and feet of Malefactors were pierced with nails whereby they were fastned to the Cross. Nor ought the various readings of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 weaken the perfectness of this prediction For when they have made the best they can of it yet are they whether they will or no forced to acknowledge that there is some special execution or mangling done on the hands and feet by the sense of the Text. But that it is just so as we ordinarily interpret it the suffrage of the most learned of the Jews themselves as Iacob Ben Chaiim Moses Hadarsan and the Seventy do sufficiently confirm To which also the Exposition of the Chaldee Paraphrast Aquila and the Masora contribute something To which we may add that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without another word is not sense and that there might by some neglect first be a change of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which sound both alike and then of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which are writ almost like 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 having no difference but of bigness and that not much and therefore are very often confounded This is more likely then the leaving out a whole word which they that read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do That allegation also of Grotius against this reading does not want its weight namely that the similitude of the Lion is used but three verses before and therefore not likely to be used again so soon especially it being mentioned also some four verses after Lastly the Event ought to make an end of this Critical controversie with those that are not prejudiced And though it will not stop the mouths of the contumacious yet it will chear the hearts of those that are pious and rational with the pleasure of the contemplation of so punctual a Providence over the affairs of men CHAP. XIII 1. That if the Gospel of Christ had been false and fabulous it would not have had that success at Jerusalem by the preaching of the Apostles 2. The severity also of the Precepts and other hardships to be undergone would have kept them off from being Christians 3. As also the incredibleness of the Resurrection of Christ and of our being rewarded at the Conflagration of the World 4 5. The meanness also and contemptibleness of the first Authours would have turned men off nor would they have been listned to by any one if the Resurrection of Christ had not been fully ascertain'd by them 6. Which the Apostles might be sure of being only matter of Fact nor is it imaginable they would declare it without being certain of it by reason of the great hazards they underwent thereby 1. I Might note other remarkable Particulars out of this Psalme and other places that do contribute to the more punctual characterizing the Person of Christ but I have already exceeded the limits of my own design which was to engage in these things only so far as might suffice to demonstrate the Reality of the Mystery we treat of Which when we have confirmed by one Argument more and answered an Objection or two we shall then put an end to this Third part of our Discourse The last Argument therefore is briefly this A Religion so unassisted by men nay so opposite to them both their natural Belief and Interest could never have spred it self so in the World if it had been false and fabulous and not really true at the bottome How mightily it spred it self appears out of the History of the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles as also out of the Epistles of S. Paul even then when the greatest opposers of it the Jews were upon the spot to whom it was necessary for them first to preach it and who had opportunity to enquire diligently touching the matter of Fact of every thing that was alledged by the Apostles after the Passion of Christ as done by him or hapning to him or done by themselves after they had received the Gift of the Holy Ghost according to promise and wrought such Miracles as he did There were many thousands of the Jews converted whom it is impossible to imagine at least all of them and the more inquisitive and nasute might have undeceived the rest to have been so supine and careless as not to enquire diligently into things in a matter of so great importance as their Eternal Salvation and of so present dammage and loss to them that they forfeited the favour of all their countriemen and unavoidably charged them and their Rulers with the most impious Crime that ever Mortals could commit 2. But the Success rested not here but reached out of Iudaea into all parts of the Romane Empire there being gained innumerable companies of Believers every where till at last Nations and Kingdomes and Sceptres and in a word the whole Roman Empire became Christian. This is the Truth of the story which no man can deny and that this story could not be true unless the Christian Religion be true also I mean those miraculous things which are recorded of Christ and his Apostles is further demonstrable as well from the harshness as the incredibility of the Doctrine of this Religion as also the weakness and contemptibleness of the first Founders and Disseminators of it For whether we consider the Precepts of Christianity they are very strict and severe very unkind and unwelcome to flesh and bloud such as the Animal life cannot at all relish nor entertain unless some extraordinary thing be adjoined that forces admittance Self-denial Mortification the putting a man in a way of necessary or very probable persecutions and afflictions from without besides the renouncing of those pleasures that no external power hinders him of can be no acceptable news to the natural man Besides the Scoffs and Reproaches of the world that would undoubtedly follow their change of Religion Which change could not but seem still more grievous and intolerable in that it was to be whole and entire from the present Superstition they were educated in which they were utterly to renounce Whence their hazard and infamie could not but be greater 3. In the undergoing of which hardships they had nothing to sustain themselves but the belief of such things which a man would think might startle them most of all that is their Reward after this life no other waies ascertained to them but by the rising of one from the dead after he had been three daies buried which was exhibited to them as a pledge of that blessed Resurrection which those that embraced the Christian doctrine should enjoy at the burning of the World and turning the Earth into ashes and cinders A thing so incredible to humane wit that no man unless he was really convinced by some infallible way that it was so indeed could ever admit of or abstain from denying with an addition of scoffs and derision as it fell out with the
where though his degenerate Spirit was afraid of so holy a Neighbourhood nor could abide the belief of so present a Numen Thus has the Annual Course of the Earth dashed off all that Superstitious power and sanctity that ancient Paganisme has given and the Aristotelean Atheist would now give to the Sun Planets and Starres and we are forced even by the light of Nature and humane Reason to acknowledge the true Principle from whence all miraculous things come that is a God every where present in whom we live and move and have our being 6. Besides this suppose that all Prodigies Apparitions and Prophecies were from the intermediate Influence of the celestial Bodies these Intelligences or that Anima Coeli working thereby upon the persons of men to inspire them and turning the Aire into representations and visions to converse with them This covering is too scant to hide the folly of this sorry Sophist his Supposition plainly ruining it self For he does acknowledge that those Inspirations and Prophecies are true that are thus derived from those â—idereal Powers But it is evident that those that have been the most illustrious Prophets have had converse with Angels and talked with them and have so recorded the matter to the World As for example the Prophet Daniel who discoursed with the Angel Gabriel Christ also discoursed with Moses and Elias on Mount Tabor and Moses with the Angel of God on Mount Sinai Besides Christ who was so highly inspired and assisted from Heaven has over and over again pronounced a future Happiness after this life All which allowing them for a while to be the dictates or representations of the Astral Influences I demand of Vaninus how he comes to be wiser then those that were so miraculously assisted That these Visions of Angels should not be so as they that saw them have related That Moses and Elias should not be the Spirits of Moses and Elias but onely transient Figurations of the Aire raised by the Influence of the Heavens Moreover I would ask of him if he think that that Heavenly assistance that can according to his own acknowledgement inform men of things to come at a thousand years distance for such was the prediction of the death of Iulius Caesar in the Senate though a matter very contingent cannot certainly inform them whom it pleases so wonderfully to assist whether the Souls of men be mortal or immortal which is far more cognoscible to those aethereal Powers then the other Wherefore this wretched Figment of his to excuse himself from the acknowledgement of the Existence of Angels or Daemons and the Subsistence of the Soul after death from which he so much abhors will stand him in no stead but argues him more intoxicated whifling and giddy in admitting the truth of such Narrations and yet denying the genuine consequences of them then they that give no credence to the Narrations themselves 7. That which was objected of Christianity justling out Iudaisme and of Mahometisme in a great part of the World justling out Christianity is partly false and partly nothing to the purpose That Christianity has properly justled out Iudaisme is very false For Iudaisme has rather been ripened into the perfection of Christianity then been stifled and sufflaminated by any Counter-blast of those sidereal Influences he dreams of For we see how things have gone on in one continued design from Abraham to Christ as the Prophecies and the Predictions in Scripture plainly testifie God promised to Abraham that in his seed all the Nations of the Earth should be blessed Iacob foretells on his death-bed that the Jewish Polity and Religion should not fail till the Messiah a Iew and Son of Abraham was come to whom the gathering of the Gentiles should be and so in other Prophecies which we have already recited and applied From whence it is manifest that it is the hand and counsel of God who is constant to himself and whose Wisdome and Providence reaches from end to end that has begun and carried on this matter according to his own will and purpose and not any Bustles or Counter-blasts of various Aspects of the Heavenly bodies that do and undo according to the diversities and contrarieties of their Schematisms and Configurations 8. Nor could any thing but Levity of minde and Vain-glory induce Cardan to pretend the calculating of our Saviours Nativity whenas the year of his Birth is so uncertain amongst the most accurate Chronologers and Astrology it self a thing wholly groundlesse and frivolous as I shall demonstrate anon Nor is it any specimen of his Wit but of his grosse Impiety so boldly to equalize the rise of Mahometisme to that of Iudaisme and Christianity as if Moses Christ and Mahomet were all Astrall Law-givers alike assisted and inspired from the influence of the Stars A conceit that Vaninus is so transported with that he cannot tell what ground to stand upon when he cites the passage out of Cardan he is so tickled with Joy But that this exultation of his is very childish and groundlesse appears both in that he falsly attributes Prophecies Divine Laws and Miracles to the influence of the Stars a superstitious errour that arises only out of the ignorance of the right Systeme of the World and then again if it were true that he imagines Mahomet who was a mere crafty Politician and did neither Miracles nor could prophesie to be a Law-giver set up by the miraculous Power of the Heavens such as enables Divine Law-givers and Prophets to do reall Miracles To which you may adde the ridiculous obstinacy of this perverse Sophist who the more we give him of what he contends for viz. that Mahomet also is a Star-inspired Prophet that is to say illuminated from the Anima coeli which according to his opinion is the highest and most infallible principle of miracles and divine wisedom the more ample testimony we have against his own folly that so peremptorily denies the existence of Daemons and Subsistence of the Soul after Death Which are openly avouched by this third Witnesse of his own introducing and therefore he abhorring so from such Truths as are certainly dictated from the Celestiall Bodies did not excesse of Pride and Conceitednesse blinde his judgement and make him senseless he could not but have found himself stung with that lash of the Satyrist O curvae in terris animae coelestium inanes But I have even tired my self with running the Wilde-goose chase after these fickle and fugitive Wits whose carelesse flirts and subsultorious fancies are as numerous as slight and weak against the firm and immovable foundations of solid Reason and Religion 9. I should now pass to the Fourth Part of my Discourse did not the reflexion upon the insufferable impudence of Cardan in pretending to cast our Saviours Nativity and that villainous insulting of Vaninus thereupon as if all Religion was but an Influence of Nature and transent blast of the Starres invite me nay indeed provoke me
Gardening and the like if he out of a foolish conceit of Light and Reason being only â—â—â—hin one and not without as certainly neither Ink nor Paper nor both put together are any more partakers of the Light of Reason then of Sense and Life would make no use of the Writings of Euclid suppose for Mathematicks nor any other Authour that has writ of such matters and so of the rest of the Faculties I named nor converse with any man by word of mouth nor cast his eyes upon what they have done but only think with himself and sit still by the light of his own lamp within dores will be a very sorry Mathematician Architect Husbandman or Gardener So certainly for Moral and Divine Truth he that will be so taught by himself that he will not use outward advantages such as the Holy Scriptures especially afford will be found at last to have been the Scholar of a very foolish and imperfect Master 4. Besides that these men contradict themselves in their own practices For they vilifie that by which they have been taught and retain the very phrases of what they have learned out of Scripture and know not how to speak without Scripture-terms nor can make any show without Scriptural allusions and that grand Document of keeping to the Light within us they borrow out of S. Iohn's Gospel and yet they are so phrantick and peevish that they would fling away the staffe without which they are not able to make one step in Religion Moreover if this Light within us is so precisely within us that it wants no information from without us why do they themselves scribble such abundance of Pamphlets make Catechisms set out Prophecies why do they exhort rebuke nay reproach and raile against men to convert them if what is without cannot reach that which is within or why do they meet together to hear some one of their Assembly after he has fallen down as in a trance and got up again dictate Oracles out of his disturbed breast For his words which they hear are without and beat upon the Ear they are not the Light within Wherefore it is plain that the Light within may be informed by something which is without whether by voice or writings And if so there is an obligation upon this Light within to be so considerate as to seek the most punctual information it can from what is most likely to inform it from without 5. And therefore they are with all diligence to examine the most venerable Records of Religion and especially of that Religion under which they were not only born but which is absolutely of it self the most renowned Religion that ever was in the World Which therefore none but such as are utterly averse from all Religion as being wholy given up to lust and prophaneness can without examination dare to relinquish and if they will examine it I mean the Christian Religion as it referrs to the Person of Christ that died betwixt two thieves at Jerusalem but rose again the third day that ascended visibly into Heaven and shall again return in a visible manner to judge the quick and the dead I appeal to this Light within them to their Reason and Conscience and that of the most cunning Impostors amongst them all or of whoever will join with them if the evidence for this Religion from Prophecie History and from the Nature of the Religion it self is not such as that nothing but Ignorance of the true meaning thereof and of its right design can hinder it from being acknowledged as a most certain Truth by any but those that are afraid that any Religion that leads to Holiness or promises any thing after this Life should be found true 6. As for that Objection taken from the mighty Power of the Spirit of God as if that were so sufficient of it self that belief therein and assistance therefrom would anticipate the mention and use of any other power whatsoever that may seem to confer to the End of the Gospel the Sanctification of our Souls I answer to this That they that do after this manner argue do erre not knowing the Scriptures For this Power of the Spirit communicable to Believers is not an absolute and omnipotent Power not to be resisted not to be frustrated if there be not due means and wise accommodations concurring with its workings or attempts to work But I may in some manner illustrate the condition thereof from what is observable in the Spirit of Nature the Principle of all natural Generations Growths and Perfections in which there is a kind of Hypothetical Omnipotency as to the work of Nature that is That this Spirit will not fail to assist and complete provided that such and such circumstances in Corporeal Agents be not wanting So is it also in this Divine Spirit or the Holy Ghost as it is communicable to us it will certainly assist and finish its work if there be no impediment on our side which it behoves us to remove out of the way nor any thing wanting which we can applie our selves to for the advance of our Faith perfecting of the holy life such as Meditating on the Scriptures Conferring with Holy men experienced Christians Using with devotion and reverence all the Ordinances of Christ. For though this assistance of the Holy Spirit be unspeakably powerfull to the sincere and diligent yet in the negligent and perverse as I said his attempts are frustrated And therefore Steven expostulates with the Jews in this sense Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in hearts and ears ye do alwaies resist the Holy Ghost and elsewhere we are exhorted not to grieve the Spirit nor quench the Spirit Which expressions do plainly demonstrate that the Communication of the Spirit is not absolute and omnipotent but received according to certain laws and waies of God's own appointing who of his infinite wisdome has traced out such a method in Christian Religion as is most accommodate to gain Souls to himself of which we have heard part already and shall now proceed to the Four last Powers of the Gospel which are mainly instrumental to the work of the Spirit upon the Hearts of all true Believers 7. And the first of these is the Example of our ever-blessed Saviour who has given us no other Precepts then what himself was the exactest Pattern of and himself such a Pattern of Life that is of Faith in God of Humility Love and Purity that we cannot doubt in following his footsteps that we are in a wrong way he being by voices from heaven and by his miracles upon earth proved and declared to be the only-begotten Son of God Wherefore the nearer we keep to his path the surer we are that we walk upon sound ground Besides that he is our Lord and Soveraign and therefore natural Ingenuity will urge us forward to compose our lives so as is most agreeable to his fashion And he does expresly require this as a Testimonie of
Madness by the formal Pharisee 12. His Proneness to judge the true Christian according to the motions of his own untamed corruptions 13. His prudent choice of the vice of Covetousness 14. The Unreasonableness of his censure of those that endeavour after Perfection 15. His ignorant surmise that no man liveth vertuously for the love of Vertue it self 16. The Usefulness of this Parallelisme betwixt the Reproach of Christ and his true Members 1. AND thus you have seen Christ vindicated from all those several Suspicions and Aspersions laid upon him by malicious and ignorant men whereby they would represent him as not possessed of nor acting from so Noble and Divine a Principle of Righteousness as he himself profest and his Followers have ever witnessed of him In which I confess I have been something more large then might have been expected in pleading the cause of a Person so perfectly pure and innocent But I considering our Saviour Christ not so much in himself as in his members I mean his true members who have one common Spirit with him and how they are liable to the same accusations and misconstructions of spightfull and inconsiderate men that himself was in the flesh I thought it fit more fully to insist upon the clearing and well and rightly interpreting of all the Carriages of Christ that thereby those that call themselves his members may know better how to interpret one another or if they be not so themselves that they may however learn not to judge rashly and inconsiderately of them that are and walk indeed as he walked And that my foregoing pains may be the more effectual to this purpose I shall not stick to second them so far as to shew how men ordinarily cast the same or the like soil and dirt upon the truest members of Christ that they did upon Christ himself 2. And that you may take in this with the more evidence give me leave to prefix in your mind the right Image of a true Christian or living member of Christ. And such an one is he who is a branch of the same Vine has derived into him the same sap and Life partakes of one and the same Divine spirit with Christ the fruit whereof is to love God with all a mans heart and with all his Soul and his neighbour as himself and to doe so to others as he himself would be done to And that I may not name that only which seems nothing in too many mens eyes I add also To know and acknowledge the only true God and Iesus Christ whom he hath sent And surely whosoever has this in its due measure and vigour of life is conscious to himself and finds the sweet of so great and glorious an accomplishment of Mind that whatever the Wit or Humour of man can add to it will seem of little more value then dust and straws we tread under our feet 3. And now I have told you what a true and living Member of Christ is let me also tell you what a false or titular or Pharisaical Christian is And he is this One that has not the Divine Sap or Spirit derived to him as being and growing in and becoming one with the true Vine Christ Jesus and is not possess'd nor is sensible of that Sufficiency Joy and Satisfaction that is in the inward Life of Christ and the Spirit of Righteousness and eternal and undispensable Truth of God But being dead to what is most necessary pretious and saving in Christianity and only alive or mainly to the Spirit of the world loves himself with all his heart and all his soul and God and his Neighbour only for his own sake or rather uses and rides his Neighbour having haltered him or obliged him with some prudentially and judiciously-bestowed courtesies and worships God rather then loves him nè noceat beseeching him that upon a special Dispensation though he be no better then others nor ever intends nor hopes to be better yet that it may be better with him in the end then with other folk Let me die the death of the righteous and let my latter end be like his Or it may be what is little better then that in stead of the living Righteousness of Christ he will magnifie himself in some humorous pieces of Holiness of his own For he imagines there is a God and that it is safe to make a friend of him one way or other and therefore that his conscience may be the better excused from those things that are more weighty and substantial he will take up things according to his own humour and phansie as fasting twice in the week making long prayers hearing long sermons sticking curiously to some unnecessary uncertain and fruitless opinions concerning God and Religion such as are warrantable neither out of Scripture nor Reason and growing very hot and zealous in the agitation of these things though to the Disturbance of the Church of God and Injury of his Neighbour yet these trinkets and trumperies of his own humour and complexion this Heat this Noise this Zeal these are the Altar Fire and Holocaust wherewith he sacrifices to God and presents himself an Oblationer before the Almighty And all this to be excused from that which is the very End of all Religion and Worship that is the sacrificing of our own corrupt life and acquiring that prize that is set before us the holy Spirit of Righteousness Equity and Purity whose moderation and guidance is the Light of the world and the Life of man 4. And having thus though but loosely and rudely scattered the delineaments of these two opposite professours of Christianity the true Christian and Pharisaical Humorist I shall from hence as from the Cause and Original derive evidence and light to what I shall now propose to you by way of Parallelisme betwixt what our Saviour in his own person suffered of false Accusations and Aspersions and what his true and living Members are obnoxious to from that Spirit of Pharisaisme that has ever and does to this very day rule still in the world And first of the first Accusation that was laid to our Saviours charge viz. Blasphemy He hath spoken Blasphemy Matth. 26. It is apparent the Pharisaical nature being desirous to be excused from destroying and bringing to nothing in ones self all haughty and ambitious Designes Self-seeking Covetousness and Intemperance doth easily endeavour to make amends for this and to pacifie the conscience and approve ones self to God by laying out all our parts in spinning excellent high Subtilties and amazing Mysteries from any hints taken in Scripture and in adorning the nature of God and Religion according to the garishness of a mans own natural Phansie and Nicety of Wit Whence it may come to pass that these Traditionary Pharisees having made it their business to rack their natural unregenerate minds to find some magnificent conceptions as they imagine them to bestow upon the Deity that one freed by Christ
who is the Truth that makes one free indeed by not admitting or gainsaying these high and divine inventions of theirs concerning God and Christ wherewith they have wrapped him and clothed him though they doe but what Dionysius did to the golden vestments of Iupiter take them off and put on a linsy-wolsy one may well be suspected and accused of Blasphemy and injury to God when it is nothing but a refusal of the groundless Conclusions of rash and inconsiderate men or else worse that of purpose cloth God and Christ and represent him to the people in such a dress as will make most for the countenancing their own Hypocrisie Profit and Interest I will only name one instance of many How has the Roman Clergy forced and rack'd their wits to make good the grand mystery of Transubstantiation whose ordinary Priests must have greater power of working miracles then the Devil could invent to puzzle our Saviour withall For what is the turning a stone into bread in comparison of turning bread into God incarnate And yet a Mass-priest after the uttering of a few formal words of Consecration has brought about the prodigie And he that will be so bold as to call bread but bread and not Christ or God how can he chuse but be thought to blaspheme But yet this Blasphemy is not against the Nature of God or Christ but against the forgery and fictions of men and so indeed is no more Blasphemy then Bread is Christ or mans Phansy the Deity The Rule therefore that Christians are to take notice of here is this There being so much Humour and Interest and Stupour of Education that may begin or continue false conceptions of God if any one professe himself that he cannot conceive such things as some so peremptorily and imperiously obtrude upon his belief that he is not straightway to be accounted a Blasphemer of God it haply being but a dissent only from the conceits of men 5. The second Aspersion cast on our Saviour was That that miraculous good that he did was from the power of Satan not of God And methinks it is not hard to find something parallel to this in some Aspersions cast upon his true members by rash Pharisaical censure Which is this The eximious and exemplary life of good and holy men is many times by those that are more addicted to such a dress or outward platform of Religion consisting of certain Ceremonies and Opinions then to the truth and essence of Religion it self imputed to corrupt natural principles such as Vain-glory and the esteem of the World Political advantage and the like which answers to the Pharisees giving out that Christ cast out Devils by Beelzebub the Prince of the Devils So say our modern Pharisees of such as are not of their Sect if those men live never so holily and unblamably in this present evil World exercising Vertue and avoiding Vice that it is not from any Divine Principle in them but from the instigation of Pride the Prince of Vices 6. So in the third place They that affect even more then a Iudaical strictness in the observation of the Sabbath though God knows it is too many times that their consciences may be the more free to work unrighteousness all the week after yet they will take upon them to censure them of no less crime then Prophaneness that observe neither the same measure of Superstition nor Hypocrisie with themselves 7. Fourthly Neutrality and cold Indifferency in publick controversies how can it possibly chuse but seem very abominable to the Pharisee or formal Professour For they knowing no other Religion then what consists in certain dispensable and unnecessary Opinions and Performances when they are shaken and hazarded he that will not engage to the utmost then as if God and true Religion it self were at stake cannot but be deemed very unworthy and detestable Whenas to be but coldly and indifferently affected in things indifferent is in all reason to be esteemed just and good 8. Nor is it a whit strange to hear the Pharisaical Tribe complain of the true regenerate Christian as Unjust whenas the one acts according to an outward Rule or Tradition which was made for the meeting with their own wicked and untamed corruptions malo nodo malus cuneus and which notwithstanding they craftily and perversly make use of by leguleious cavills to the injuring of one another or them that are better then themselves but the true Christian acts and judges according to the living Law of Equity and the Eternal Love of God springing up in his heart 9. Sixthly As for the accusation of Railings and Revilings even a sober and wel-carriaged Christian may well be subject to that calumnie For the Pharisee bearing himself very high in the opinion of his own either Formal or Phantastical righteousness making a shift rather any way to perswade himself he is righteous and religious then by partaking of true Religion and Righteousness indeed he acting therefore according to the nature he really has not according to what he phansies himself to be it cannot but happen that the true Christian endued with the Divine nature and spirit of Righteousness not intending at all to raile or revile but using the most easie and unaffected propriety of words calling a Spade a Spade as the Proverb is doing but so as Adam did in innocency giving the creatures names according to their natures it cannot but happen I say that the Actions and Persons being foully bad of such as notwithstanding be in their own conceit as good as any when they be called by what names express the truth of their natures and no more that yet they will presently judge the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Railer and Reviler 10. Now for tumultuary Zeal I must confess that Pharisaical Hypocrisie is such an abominable provoking thing in the sight of all the Sons of God that it can scarce fail scorching and heating their tender and lively spirits no more then a natural flame can fail to swinge and pain our natural flesh which none of us can suffer with such patience but we are ready to testifie our sensibleness both by gestures actions and words Besides that in a moderate and well-guided zeal against the Pharisaical Interest all being so rotten there so sore and patched over with pitiful plaisters the least Action or Opposition will make them cry out even afore they be hurt being conscious to themselves how unsound and unable they are to abide the least measure of rough handling So that the least vigour of Opposition in good earnest against their hypocritical and unwarrantable waies will by them be deemed but bitter and tumultuous Zeal Eighthly The just and seasonable bemoanings of the dear servants of God and fellow-members of Christ when Nature is very much oppressed with adversity or torment are not to be judged rashly the Symptomes of Impatience or Despair For the expressing of the sense of ones Misery is no Vice since the suppressing
the Earth and Air when once that Final Vengeance has seised upon the Wicked 5. This is the sad Evening-close of that terrible Day of the Lord and the Morning-Appearance thereof will not be much more chearful to either the Hypocrite or Prophane person For the hopes of the Hypocrite cannot but fail and his heart sink like a stone while he sees the righteous Judge that tries the heart and reins coming in the clouds of Heaven to execute vengeance on the wicked and to deliver the godly from that imminent fate that attends the Earth And the proud scoffing Epicurean that laugh'd at Religion as a piece of weakness and foolery and impudently denied there was either God or Providence in the world he will then to his utter shame and confusion acknowledge his own Philosophy which he thought such an high piece of wit before the most unhappy Folly and Madnesse he could have light upon For he shall be confuted to his very outward Senses when he shall see Christ himself appear with all his Heavenly Host attending him when he shall hear the sound of the Trump and see forthwith the whole Air filled with his glittering Legions consisting of Saints and Angels For the Trump shall sound saith the Apostle and then those that have already departed this life shall immediatly appear in their celestial Harness in their glorified bodies For those that are alive shall not prevent those that are dead but rather the contrary For those that sleep in Jesus will God bring with him and harness them with the bright Armour of Life and Immortality whereby they become part of that glorious Angelical Host wherewith our dread Soveraign and blessed Saviour Jesus Christ will face the Earth a while to the exceeding great astonishment and terrour os the wicked World 6. Out of which by the Ministry of his Angelical Troops will he gather his Saints that are found alive in the flesh from all the corners of the Earth as the Angels plucked Lot out of Sodom when the City was to be destroyed with Fire and Brimstone from Heaven a Type questionless of this Final Judgement And whether it be by the quick descent of fiery Chariots like that of Elias who was safely thereby conveighed to Heaven and about a thousand years after conversed with our Saviour on the Mount or bright shining clouds glistering with the glory and lustre of their celestial guides be made foot-stools for them to get up on for there is no fear that the weight of their Bodies should break through their Earth and Flesh being of a sudden changed into pure Aether or whatever other pomp and solemnity there may be in their transportation from the rest of the World unto that glorious Company that strikes all mens eyes with amazement while they look up into the sky This visible Selection of the Good from the Bad must needs fill the hearts of the Wicked with unspeakable Dread and Horrour And that partly by reason of the present wonders of this unexpected supernatural Visitation which thus suddenly has surprised them through unbelief and partly from the sad presage of what will follow even that horrid and dismal Tempest which we have already described that endless Night of Thunders and Lightnings and Earthquakes of roarings and howlings and utter confusion and destruction for ever 7. Which direful vengeance having once entred upon that execrable crue forsaken of God and given up to the merciless Rage of the incensed Elements the victorious Church of Christ retreats with the rest of the Angelical Hosts marching up the Ethereal Regions in goodly Order and lovely Equipage filling as they go along the re-echoing sky with Songs of Joy and Triumph For this is the greatest day of Solemnity the highest Festival that can be celebrated in the Heavens whose Inhabitants if they rejoice at the conversion of one sinner what Joy and Rejoicing must they express at the complete Redemption of the whole Church when Jesus Christ the Prince of our Salvation who is able to save to the utmost has perfectly redeemed us body and soul and leading Captivity captive rescuing us from the power of Hell Death and the Devil does resettle us again in our own Land and reestablish us into the ancient Liberties of the Sons of God making us fellow-citizens with the pure and unpolluted Angels and free Partakers of all the Rights and Immunities of the celestial Kingdom even of that Kingdom where there is Order and Government without Envy and Oppression Devotion without Superstition Beauty without Blemish Love without Lust Sweetness without Satiety where there is outward Splendidness without Pride Musick without Harshness Friendship without Designe Wisedom without Wrinkles and Wit without Vain-glory where there is Kindnesse without Craft Activity without Weariness Health without Sickness and Pleasure without Pain and lastly where there is the Vision of God the Society of Christ the Familiarity of Angels and Communion of Saints where there is Love and Joy and Peace and Life for evermore Upon the consideration of which ineffable Happiness what inference can be more genuine then what S. Paul has made already on the same Subject Wherefore my beloved Brethren be stedfast unmoveable alwayes abounding in the work of the Lord forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. CHAP. XIX 1. That there can be no Religion more powerful for the promoting of the Divine Life then Christianity is 2. The external Triumph of the Divine Life in the person of Christ how throughly warranted and how fully performed 3. The Religious Splendour of Christendom 4. The Spirit of Religion stifled with the load of Formalities 5. The satisfaction that the faithfully-devoted Servants of Christ have from that Divine homage done to his Person though by the wicked 1. I Have now sufficiently exposed to your view the Nature and Use of this seven-fold Engine these Seven Powers of the Gospel how potent they are to beat down every strong hold of sin and to raise up the Divine Life and Spirit of Righteousness in us That they have done so little execution in Christendom hitherto that disquisition I shall deferre till its due place In the mean time I appeal to all the World if there can be invented a Religion more powerful for this purpose then the Christian Religion is 2. But for the external Triumphs of the Divine Life in reference to the Person of Christ the Usefulness of our Religion in that point is demonstrable not only from the Frame thereof in it self but from the long and constant Effects it has had in the Christian World For as for the Frame of our Religion we have therein a full warrant to do the highest Divine homage to Christ that we can express He being so clearly therein declared The true Son of God not only by several Testimonies from Heaven but also by that supernatural manner of his generation in the womb of the Virgin by the overshadowing of the Holy
whom their dying Lord left that sacred legacy of mutual love sealing it on their mindes with his own stupendious example who being so high above them yet stooped to the shameful and bitter death of the Cross that they might love one another so ardently and entirely that if need required they would not stick to lay down their lives one for another His firm belief in the Providence of God and his special assistance to them that fight his battels His moderate love of this present World and certain expectation of the immediate enjoyments of the Happiness of the other life upon the quitting of this The consideration I say of all these things will arme our Christian souldiery let them be in their private demeanour as milde and humble as tame and lamb-like as you please with such miraculous valour and courage that I cannot but presage that that Benediction of Moses will not fail to attend their enterprizes Five of them shall chase an hundred and an hundred of them shall put ten thousand to flight For the Lord will go before them and the God of Israel will be their Rereward What Nation therefore can grapple with such a people as this For there is neither Strength nor Counsel against the Almighty BOOK IX CHAP. I. 1. The four Derivative Properties of the Mystery of Godlinesse 2. That a measure of Obscurity begets Veneration suggested from our very senses 3. Confirmed also by the common suffrage of all Religions and the nature of Reservednesse amongst men 4. The rudenesse and ignorance of those that expect that every Divine Truth of Scripture should be a comprehensible Object of their understanding even in the very modes and circumstances thereof 5. That Contradictions notwithstanding are to be excluded out of Religion 6. And that the Divinity of Christ and the Triunity of the Godhead have nothing contradictious in them 1. WE have now finished the four Primary Properties of the Mysterie of Godlinesse having treated of the Obscurity Intelligiblenesse of the Truth and Usefulnesse thereof and have already intimated that there arise from these four other properties which if you please you may call Derivative as from the Obscurity of this Mystery arises Venerability from the Intelligiblenesse Communicability from Truth a Power of gaining Assent and lastly from Usefulnesse an affectionate prizing of it and a Zeal or desire of promoting the knowledge and virtue of it in the World as much as we can It remains therefore that we speak something of these but with all brevity possible 2. That a due measure of Obscurity makes a Mystery the more venerable is a Truth suggested to us by several observations How Shades and Silence affect our very Senses every one can witness who is not of so course a contexture of Body that onely gross and fierce Objects can move him But he whose Senses are more passive and delicate can with pleasure relate how he is affected when he enters into some shady and invious VVood or Grove the thickness of whose Trees and redoubled Shadows stops his sight and hopes of ever passing through all that growes on that Sacred ground but what he sees he approves of as delightful and conceives a peculiar pleasure in that confused divination or obscure representation of things there where his Eyes cannot reach nor his Feet approach The Silence also of the place encreases the solemness thereof in which as Plutarch saies well there is something profound and mysterious And for this very reason the shadiness and stilness of the Night ordinarily seems a very venerable object to those whose Senses are so quick and fine that they can feel and rellish all manner of mutations in Nature which impress enriched the Poets Phansie with that expression Noxque tenebrarum specie reverenda tuarum 3. The common Suffrage also of all Religions gives with us who have alwaies affected something not easily Intelligible at first sight And their Temples were so built as to have their Adyta some more Sacred and inaccessible places in them And we may further observe that Sparingness of speech and Reservedness in men does naturally conciliate reverence to them For there is still something behind in them impervious and inaccessible which if they would impart they might lessen their respect and become more contemptible For it is very obvious to humane Nature to brood some strange over-weening conceit of those things they know not and to neglect and slight that which they know These are Thieves that willingly leave the house when they have carried away all the treasure But perpetual expectation continues respect And what makes matter if the bottom of the Well be fathomless if the Water we reach be but pure and useful Wherefore those that contend for such an absolute plainness and clearness in all points of Religion shew more of clownishness and indiscretion then of wit and judgement and their zeal is not so much for Truth as out of Pride Vain-glory they taking it very ill that any thing in the Mysterie of Godliness should be so mysterious as that their conceited Reason should not be able to comprehend it 4. But I demand of those great Pretenders to Reason who would usurp or monopolize that Title to themselves in matters of Religion By what Faculty can they demonstrate that the Divine Oracles should mention nothing to us but what is the adequate Object of our Understandings and that we shall not be puzzled in our endeavouring to comprehend the modes and circumstances of that General Truth which they propose to us For the General proposal may be useful to us whenas the curiosity of Circumstances may serve for nothing but the feeding of our foolish desire of devouring all Truth we can meet with and priding our selves in the booty I speak this in reference to the most obscure Articles of our Religion touching the Triunity of the Godhead and the Divinity of Christ. For that the Holy Scripture does affirm both I have already sufficiently shown And being that they come to us with the same authority that the whole new Testament does we cannot with any face deny the assertions and yet profess our selves Christians For the adverse party have no plea but the Incomprehensibleness of the manner of the thing which allegation is most unjust and ridiculous For that which comes to us by Divine Revelation is as certain as our Senses But our Senses do assure us of such things as no faculty can conceive how they are such as our Senses warrant them to be As for example The immediate Union of Matter with Matter and The power we have by Will and Thought to move any member of our Body These things we know to be but are as incomprehensible as any thing that the Scripture has declared of the Triunity of the Godhead or Christ's Divinity And therefore all their Arguments against those two Articles are weak and vain For it is sufficient that for those useful purposes I have often
Spirit in us that was in him here on Earth And therefore there will be in our very Souls an high Sympathy and ineffable pleasure and liking of that Nature and Spirit that breaths in all the actions and speeches recorded of our Saviour and a transporting delight in all the Precepts of the Gospel whether delivered by himself or his holy Apostles they will be sweeter then the honey and the honey-combe and more desirable then thousands of gold and silver as the Prophet David speaks 5. Wherefore we are never to be quiet till we find our selves fully enamoured on the very Character and Genius as I may so speak of our blessed Saviour and find our selves so affected as he was affected in the world And therefore we are to adde to our external profession fervent Prayer to God not only to resist temptations or to doe outward good works but that he would also wholly renew our nature in us that our Regeneration may be perfected and that we may be entirely transformed into the lively Image of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And this not only at set times but continually as we have opportunity and vacancy from the throng and urgency of worldly affairs For then should we commune with our hearts and meditate on that divine Image and Character The Life of Christ and observe wherein we are most wanting and to what part thereof our affections are the most cool and so with serious and earnest ejaculations to God implore the help and assistance of his Spirit to compleat the good work that he has begun in us and so we shall fulfill that Precept of the Apostle Pray continually that is whether upon the emergency of some temptation or upon self-examinations and devout Meditations 6. And as we are to pray continually so we are to watch continually that is to pass from one transaction to another with circumspection making our very converse with men and affairs in the world an advantage to our main design of improvement in the Divine Life For coming thus out into company and emploiment we have thereby a present exercise of that Grace that is in us and can find thereby the better our own inabilities and defects as also what strength we are of and what proficiency we have made in the way we have chosen And so what we have will be thereby corroborated and what we want being discovered to our selves we know the better to ask it at the hands of God 7. Thus will the work assuredly go on by perpetual Meditations Prayer and Watchfulness And while thou art thus taken up with thy self take heed how thou meddlest with other men And particularly beware of despising the publick Ordinances of thy Church For thou mayst hear the same advice given thee in the open congregations that thou hast assented to as true in thine own Conscience from a faithful and knowing Ministry Which if thou beest what thou pretendest to will delight thy heart both in that it is a Testimony of the Truth and that it may take effect in others by God's blessing as well as in thee Wherefore it is no sign of a New-Covenanter but of a proud and carnal mind and of a wicked designer to vilifie these things 8. Moreover thou art to take this Advertisement along with thee concerning thy converse with men That first thou censure not any man for external matters of an indifferent Interpretation in Diet Apparel or Civil behaviour whether he be more courtly or plain in carriage whether more chearfull or more sad whether he drink wine or refrain from drinking whether he wear good clothes or goe in a meaner dress and so of other things of like nature Thou oughtest I say to passe no censure no not so much as in thy tacit thoughts about these things but esteem every man from what is truly Christian or Unchristian in him And then secondly Thou art carefully to take heed that the just liberty of another lead thee not into any inconvenience by tempting thee to imitate him But thou art strictly to keep to what thou knowest in thine own Conscience to be most for thine own safety that the good work may goe on in thee and that Righteousness may have its firm rooting and full growth But in the mean time thou art to look after thy self as a tender child or sick person who are rightly forbidden such things as grown men and in health take their liberty to make use of These two Cautions will prevent all Scandal whereby thou maiest either harm thy self or be injurious to others 9. Lastly I shall more particularly and expresly recommend to thee the frequent Meditation of these three branches of the Divine Life Humility Charity and Purity together with their deepest Root Faith in God through Iesus Christ. For if this be not taken in thy progress in the Second Covenant may degenerate into a mere accustomary or complexional frame of Morality and have nothing in it that is really Divine I am sure it will not be of that nature as to fit thee for that Eternal salvation that is promised to those that are true Believers And as concerning those Three branches of the Divine Root I would have thee to place them ever in thine eye and examine all the motions and excursions of thy Spirit into outward actions how sutable they are to these and closely observe when thou thinkest thy self so zealously carried out by the moving of one of these Principles if thou dost not run counter to another Nay it may be thy Enthusiastick Heat may carry thee so far as to sin against that very Principle that thou thinkest thy self to be moved by 10. Thus whilst thou affectest too extravagant expressions of thy Humility the discreet and knowing in Religion will thereby find out thy Pride As if thou shouldest not be content to entertain the poor at thy table but thou wilt also wait upon them with a trencher in thy hand bare-headed and doe all the offices of a Servitour to them as if thou wert celebrating the old Saturnalia Look to thy self that there be no touch of Vain-glory in it and that thou dost not desire to be talked of Consider also if it be not an offence against Charity and a scandalizing those that are without who if they can fansie thee sincere will be forcibly invited to deem thee very fanatical and melancholick and that all Religion is nothing else But true Charity doth nothing unseemly 11. When the desire of Purity also puts thee upon the chastisement of thy body doe it so hiddenly that thou maiest not offend against Humility by thy Pharisaical ostentation Wherefore if thou dost give thy mind to the mortification of the flesh shew it not to men in thy sordid clothes nor in thy sour face and hard looks but keep it to thy self as secret as thou canst that he that seeth in secret may reward thee openly 12. Art thou warmed with the sense of Charity which thou
6. Which sad Scene of things cannot but move any thoughtful Christian that does in good earnest wish well to his Religion to sift out if it be possible the true Causes of his lamentable condition of Christendome and what are the Impediments that hinder the Gospel which of it self is so powerful an Instrument as it is of Salvation from taking effect with out selves or from having freer passage into other Countries that are yet Pagan That it is our Sinnes every well-meaning man will be ready to reply But the question still remains there being amongst us the most effectual Engine that the Wisdome of God could contrive for the destroying of Sin out of the world why there is no more execution done thereby against the power of Sin and the Kingdome of Darkness then there is The enquiry therefore must be what tampering there has been with this Engine what adding or taking from it to spoil its efficacy what mistakes of the use thereof and the like For that there is something most wretchedly amiss in the use of the Gospel throughout all Christendome is very plain in that the Purpose of it is almost totally frustrated every where and Prophaneness Infidelity and Atheisme have in a manner seized the hearts of all Which most men are ready to confess some with a true Christian sorrow or hearty indignation others with a tacit joy or exteriour flearing as being glad their corrupt thoughts and practices have the countenance of so many suffrages 7. To omit therefore such Principles as are unintelligible and are for ever seal'd up out of our sight let us look upon what is intelligible and visible Let us produce such Causes into view which no man can deny but that they are as general as these horrid diseases and are extremely inclining if not absolutely effectual and necessitating the Christian world into this abominable condition it is found in at this day and many Ages before CHAP. II. 1. The most fundamental Mistake and Root of all the Corruptions in the Church of Christ. 2. That there maybe a Superstition also in opposing of Ceremonies and in long Prayers and Preachments 3. That self-chosen Religion extinguishes true Godliness every where 4. The unwholsome and windy food of affected Orthodoxality with the mischievous consequences thereof 5. That Hypocrisy of Professours fills the World with Atheists 6. That the Authoritative Obtrusion of gross falsities upon men begets a misbelief of the whole Mystery of Piety 7. That all the Churches of Christendome stand guilty of this mischievous miscarriage 8. The infinite inconvenience of the Superlapsarian doctrine 1. WHerefore freely to profess what I think in my own conscience to be true The most universal and most fundamental Mistake in Christendome and that from whence all the Corruption of the Church began and is still continued and increased is that conceited estimation of Orthodox opinions and external Ceremony before the indispensable practice of the Precepts of Christ and a faithful endeavour to attain to the due degrees of the real Renovation of our inward man into true and living Holiness and Righteousness in stead whereof there is generally substituted Curiosity of Opinion in points imperscrutable and unprofitable Obtrusion of Ceremonies numerous cumbersome and not onely needless but much unbeseeming the unsuspected modesty of the Spouse of Christ who should take heed of symbolizing any way with Idolatry which is spiritual Adultery or Fornication For while the Heart goes a whoring after those outward shows and an over-value be put upon them the inward life of Godliness will easily be extinguished and Love to the indispensable Law of Christ grow cold and dead Nay they that have the greatest zeal and fierceness as I may so speak towards Religion there is invented such an heap and cumbersome load of external performances that such a Zelot as this may spend all his strength upon the mere Outworks of Piety before he can come near to take the Fort Royal or enter the Law of perfect Liberty the Divine Life which consists in true Humility perfect Purity and sincere Charity For all such Ceremonies make but a show in the flesh nor can reach to the Regeneration of our Mindes into the unfeigned Love of our brethren Whence the most seemingly religious this way may be the most accursedly cruel and unjust the most implacable and uncharitable that can be And yet according to that false model of Religion that humane invention has set out to the world he may both take himself and others also may take him to be Seraphically pious though in the judgment of Christ and of his true Church he lie in the gall of Bitterness and bond of Iniquity 2. And in other parts of Christendome where the pomp of Ceremonies and exteriour Superstition is not so much urged though a man at first sight might hope that things would be much better yet experience will teach him that there is little amendment and that the Causes of Degeneracy of gross Hypocrisy and Wickedness are even as operative and as well appointed to work their effect there as in other places For this also is Superstition to place our Religion in opposing external Ceremonies and to think every man the more pious by how much the more zealous he is against them Wherefore our affections being drawn out in this hot Antipathy our hearts grow cold to the indispensable duties of the Gospel which are Love Patience Meekness and brotherly-Kindness with the rest of those fruits that demonstrate that the Tree of life that the Life of Christ is planted in us and that the Spirit of God abideth in us Besides that we are to remember that we may idolize long Prayers and frequent Preachments and that they may make up an external Religion to us in stead of that Godliness that is indispensable and internal and an ever-flowing fountain of all comely and profitable Actions and deportments towards God and towards men 3. I say therefore that this Self-chosen Religion in all the parts of Christendome though it be but such as a wicked man may perform as dexterously and plausibly as the most truly righteous and regenerate being so highly extolled and recommended to the people is almost an irresistible temptation to make them really and morally wicked For that natural inclination and appetite in mankinde to Religion being satisfied or eluded by this unwholsome food they can have no desire to that which is true Religion indeed and will be very glad to be excus'd from it it being more hard at first to embrace or practice whence it is in a manner necessary for them to let it alone 4. And they will the more easily abstain from it there being another poisonous Vâ—and that swells them so that they are ready to burst again which is that highly-esteemed Knowledge called Orthodoxness or Rightness of Opinion Of which the Apostle Knowledge puffeth up but Charity edifieth This seems so glorious in their eyes that they phansy themselves
Reprobationers have defined it namely That God has irresistibly decreed from all Eternity to bring into Being innumerable Myriads of Souls of men exceeding far the number of them that shall be saved who as without their own consent they were thus thrust into the World so let them doe what they will are certainly determined to unspeakable torment so soon as they go out of it and at the last day shall be adjudged to an higher degree of misery so great and so exceeding that all the racks and tortures that the Wit or Cruelty of the most enraged Tyrants could ever invent or execute would be ease and pleasure in Comparison of it and that these Pangs and Torments shall remain fresh upon them for ever and ever 8. This is the Representation of that sour Dogma Which to Reason is as contradictious as if one should name a square Circle or black Light and as harsh and horrid to the eares of the truly-Regenerate into the nature of God who is Love it self as the highest blasphemie that can be uttered Nor is the nature of those that are irreligious enough so much estranged from the Knowledge of God but that they think if there be any at all he cannot be such a one that laid such dark plots from all eternity for the everlasting misery of his poor impotent and unresisting Creature that never did any thing but what the Divine Decrees determined he should doe and therefore was alwaies the Almighties obedient servant For which at last he must be condemned to eternall punishment by him whom he did ever obey The serious and imperious obtrusion of such a dismal Conceit as this for one of the greatest Arcanums of Religion will make the free Spirit and over-inclinable to Prophaneness confidently to conclude That the whole frame of Religion is nothing but a mere Scar-crow to affright Fools and that there is no Hell at all since such Innocent Persons and constant Obeyers of the Divine Decrees must be the Inhabiters ot it CHAP. III. 1. The true Measure of Opinions to be taken from the designe of the Gospel which in general is The setting out the exceeding great Mercy and Goodness of God towards mankinde 2. And then Secondly The Triumph of the Divine Life in the Person of Christ in the warrantableness of doing Divine Honour to him 3. Thirdly The advancement of the Divine Life in his members upon Earth 4. The Fourth and last Rule to try Opinions by The Recommendableness of our Religion to Strangers or those those that are without 1. I Might adde several other Opinions in several parts of Christendome that tend very much to the defeating and eluding the serious End and purpose of Religion but before I go any further I shall set down the main designes of the Gospel of Christ that we may have a more plain and sure Rule and Measure to try all Opinions by The designe therefore of the Gospel in general is the magnifying of the Goodness and Loving-kindness of God that he has afforded mankinde so glorious a light to walk by so effectual means to redeem them from the love of the perishing vanities of this present world and to recall them back again to himself and to the participation of the ineffable joyes pleasures of his celestial Kingdom For God so loved the World that he gave his only-begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life For God sent not his Son into the World to condemn the World but that the World through him should be saved And Titus 3. For we our selves also were sometimes foolish disobedient deceived serving divers lusts and pleasures living in malice and envy hateful and hating one another But after that the Kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared Not by works of Righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost which he shed on us abundantly through Iesus Christ our Saviour To which sense also the Apostle speaks Ephes. chap. 2. And you who were dead in trespasses and sins Wherein in times past ye walked according to the course of this world according to the Prince of the power of the Aire the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh fulfilling the desires of our fleshly minde and were by nature the children of wrath even as others But God who is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in sins hath quickened us together with Christ by grace ye are saved and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in Heavenly places in Christ Iesus That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us through Iesus Christ. To which lastly you may adde Tit. 2.11 For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men Teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts we should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world c. These Scriptures give plain testimony of this more general designe of the Gospel 2. The next designe is an external exaltation of the Divine Life that did so mightily and conspicuously appear in the Person of our Saviour Christ as I have already abundantly declared How the mystery of Christianity comprehends in it chiefly this designe of exalting into Triumph the Divine Life above the Animal and Natural and that either externally in the religious worship we do our Saviour and is done even by Hypocrites and wicked Persons or else internally in the advancing of true Faith and Holiness in his living members and sincere followers of his doctrine Philip. 2. Let the same minde be in you which was in Christ Iesus Who being in the forme of God thought it no robbery to be equal with God But emptied himself and took upon him the forme of a servant and was made in likeness of men And being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient to the death even the death of the Cross. Wherefore hath God also exalted him and given him a name above every name That at the name of Iesus every knee should bow of things in Heaven and things in Earth and things under the Earth and that every tongue should confess that Iesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father And Hebr. 1. Thy throne O God is for ever and ever the Scepter of righteousness is the Scepter of thy Kingdom Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity therefore God even thy God hath anointed thee with the oile of gladness above thy fellows that is to say hath exalted thee to this due honour and rule having put all things under his feet Angels themselves not excepted as S. Peter tells us 1 Epist. 3.22 Who is gâ—ne into Heaven
and is on the right hand of God Angels and Authorities and Powers being made subject unto him There is a further enumeration of the Angelical classes Colos. 1. where the Apostle speaking of this high exaltation of the Person of Christ he intimates not only the Subjection of the Orders of Angels to him but their Reconciliation to God by him and as some would have it a fuller Confirmation of them in his favour vers 15. Who is the Image of the invisible God the First-born of every Creature For by him were all things created that are in Heaven and that are in Earth visible and invisible whether they be Thrones or Dominions or Principalities or Powers all things were created by him and for him and he is before all things and by him all things consist And he is the Head of the body the Church He is the Beginning the First-born from the dead that in all things he might have the preeminence For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell And making peace through the bloud of his Crosse to reconcile all things by him unto himself whether they be things in Earth or things in Heaven So mighty and wonderfull was the result of the Humiliation of our Saviour and so clear and warrantable an Object is he of Divine Adoration 3. Thus is the Divine Life Triumphant in the Person of Christ the Head of his Church But another main design of the Gospel is That the Divine Life may be advanced in us that is that Faith in God through Christ that Humility Love and Purity may have their due growth in us here that thereby we may be fitted to receive that immortal Crown of Glory which he will bestow upon all true believers at the last day when he shall carry his whole Church with songs of Joy and Triumph into his celestial Kingdome That this is the main purpose of the Gospell I have already sufficiently proved and therefore need adde nothing in this place 4. The fourth and last Rule or Measure of Opinions is The Recommendableness of our Religion to those which are without that is to say We must have a special care of affixing thereto any of our own Inventions or Interpretations of Scripture for Christian Truths which may seem uncouth and irrational to strangers and such as are as yet disengaged For though those that by reason of their education have had full acquaintance with Christianity will adhere to their Religion though it may be corrupted with many false glosses and fond opinions of men as indispensably obtruded as the undoubted Scripture it self yet strangers that are free and unaccustomed to them will not fail to boggle at them and being offered to them also with equal Authority with the very Word of God they will be necessitated to fly back and to relinquish the Holy Truth by reason of the indissoluble intertexture of the gross falshoods they find interwoven with it A thing that is seriously to be considered by all those that bear any love to the Gospel and desire that it may be propagated and promoted in the World For certainly it was intended for a more general good and larger diffusion then has been hitherto by reason of its having fallen into faithless and treacherous hands who make it only an instrument of gaining wealth and power to themselves and of riding the people and not of gaining souls to God CHAP. IV. 1. The general use of the foregoing Rules 2. A special use of them in favour of one anothers persons in matters of opinion 3. The examination of Election and Reprobation according to these Rules And how well they agree with that Branch of the Divine Life which we call Humility 4. The disagreement of absolute Reprobation with the first Rule 5. As also with the third 6 And with the second and fourth 1. THese are the four main Rules which I conceive very usefull to examine either other mens Opinions or our own And if the heat of our spirits or the confidence of others would urge upon us pretended Truths for to admit of open falsities or forgeries for what advantage soever is intolerable that are not subservient to these designs above named we may well look upon them as idle curiosities and if they pretend also to Revelation or Inspiration that it is nothing but Madness and fanatick Delusion But if they do not only not promote but countermine those designs above mentioned they are to be looked upon then not as frivolous but dangerous and impious and so to be declined by all means possible And lastly though they appear such as may contribute something to those designs if followed and embraced yet I must adde also this caution that they are not to be forc'd so as that unless a man will profess them he must be accounted no good Christian. For they coming from a fallible and doubtfull hand they ought not in reason to infringe that undoubted right of Christian liberty the Scripture alone being full enough to perfect a Christian both in life and doctrine 2. There is also a further use to be made of these Rules in favour of one anothers persons though of different Opinions that is by taking notice what good they drive at as well as what evil they tend to which makes much for peace and brotherly kindness and may blunt the edge of eager and bitter zeal that makes the over-fervid Zelot think that he that is of a contrary opinion to him intends nothing but mischief by his opposite doctrine In examining therefore every Opinion we are to observe what design of the Gospel it agrees with as well as what it crosses And that the Use of our Rules may the better appear I shall now shew the practice of them by trying some few Opinions of no small note by this Touchstone For it were an endless business to examine all and needless because by these examples he that lists may examine the rest indeed any that either has been or ever will offer it self to the World in matters of Religion 3. The first that occurrs is such an Election and Reprobation that wholly excludes Free will The Controversie is so well known that I need not state it Applying this doctrine to the four Rules I have set down I find in the Third that it has some compliance with that choice branch of the Divine Life namely Humility and a submission of a mans self and all the World to the will of God It is the Lord let him doe what he pleases And that therefore a serious and humble Soul being much taken up and transported with this consideration may think of nothing else but take this Doctrine to be very Truth nay live and die in it and go to heaven when he has done Whence it were a piece of Satanical Fury to persecute any such Opinionist and want of Charity these living as well as other Christians not to bear as good affection to them as to
it intolerably mischievous and destructive even to the present Happiness of States and Kingdomes and therefore to be shunned and repressed as the very plague and pest of humane Polities But for those that seriously make profession of the Existence of God Creator of all things and of his Providence and acknowledge that there is a life to come wherein the wicked shall be punished and the vertuous rewarded it seems to me that there does naturally accrew such a Right to these men of freedome in their Religion as is inviolable and such as the power of the Magistrate ought not to invade unless there be some perverse mixture in it that forfeits their Right In the mean time supposing there be nothing but simple mistake which they of the contrary Religion will call Superstition yet the Conscience of the other party being bound up to this it is his natural Right to have his Freedome therein because his Conscience is necessarily subjected thereby to a greater power then any is on earth and therefore not to give him the Liberty of his Religion is both a piece of Inhumanity and Injustice towards him and a kind of Rebellion against God whose liege subject he is 2. Nor can any thing that I know weaken the solidity of this Truth unless you will say that no False Religion is the command of God or at least that it is countermanded by the Promulgation of the True To which I answer That there is so much Truth in those Religions I speak of that they contain a belief of the Existence of God that there is a Life to come which is a demonstration that the rest of their Religion in the belief and exercise whereof they seriously and sincerely seek the favour of God and Eternal happiness does bind their Conscience most severely and indispensably to obedience Which immediate Dictate of Conscience in a soul that is sincere what is it but the Command of God and before his voice be heard here his will is not promulgated to that person For nothing but Conviction of Conscience that this or that is the Will of God is properly the promulgation of his Will to every particular soul Otherwise it is but as a recital of the Law in a language the People understand not and therefore can take no hold upon them Again how can an Erroneous Conscience oblige to obedience if its Dictate be but as from it self and not the command of God For it is improper to say a man is obliged to obey himself especially in matters of Religion Wherefore it is plain that the Obligation is to God and from God who has proclaimed in the heart of every man that is conscienciously and sincerely religious how he will be served and worshipped and by inevitable trains of Providence has for a time fixt him to this or that perswasion Which being the most express the most complete and articulate way that God can promulgate his Law by namely the Conviction of mens Reason and Conscience for I speak of such as are in their wits not mad-men and Fanaticks nor yet such as embrace for Religion Precepts contrary to the Light and Law of Nature which is the highest and most uncontrovertible Law of God as being not Topical but Universal and therefore there can be no perswasion against that but it is to be imputed to the villany of man not to the command of God who in all Nations by the inward Light of Nature commands to the contrary be their Topical Religion what it will In these things I say whose falseness is not easily discoverable by the Light of Nature such as are sundry matters of fact done many Ages ago and Religious Precepts and Ceremonies thereupon depending if there be this Conviction of Conscience concerning them there is necessarily implied the command of God to that people so convicted For when can God be said to command a person if not then when he conveys a practical perswasion so unto him be it by the intervention of what Providence it will that there is no place left to doubt but that it is his Command For if he spoke to him face to face which he does not doe to one of infinite thousands nor it may be properly to any there could be no greater assurance of receiving a command from him Wherefore a man being as fully assured that he has received a command from God as he can be assured and this assurance being contrived into him by the Providence of God himself it is evident that the command is truly from God To which a man is still obliged till he does in as express a manner receive a Countermand from the same Soveraign Power 3. Which Countermand according to what I have already laid down is not received nor promulgated till the Conscience be convinced but is still as a Law repeated in a strange language and therefore being not understood is not obligatory Nor does the great Law-giver of the Universe contradict himself in this variety nay contrariety if you will of Religions For he does not command them all to the same people at the same time but every one according as his Conscience is convicted receives a new command and where they are inconsistent relinquishes the old And truly there seems no harshnesse nor incongruity at all in admitting variety and contrariety of Religions in the world and all commanded by God if this Diversity and Opposition were discoverable only in several degrees of Perfection or in the manner of Worship and Ceremony but they being contradictory one to another in the very Articles of their Creeds this seems an insuperable difficulty how God should command them to believe Contradictions of which one part must of necessity be false As for example It is impossible That Christ died on the Crosse and That he died not on the Crosse or That he rose again from the dead and That he did not rise again from the dead should both parts be true In the former of which examples the Turks in the latter the Iews Belief is opposite to ours 4. This truly at first sight seems a very hard knot But the difficulty will not prove so formidable after we have considered wherein it lies and how it may be answered And surely it lies mainly in this Whether it be consistent with the Nature of God to conveigh a false Perswasion into the minde of man or no. This is the utmost of the intricacy To which methinks the Answer is not difficult I freely therefore do affirm That it is not inconsistent with Gods nature so to do For he is thereby neither the Authour of any sin committed by us nor doth he commit any thing himself herein unworthy of his Divinity He is not the Authour of Sin in us in that invincible ignorance is no sin nor any act that proceeds therefrom There is indeed lesse perfection in these actions but every imperfection is not sin for they may be such imperfections as
are utterly involuntary and unavoidable as we suppose this false persuasion is and all the effects of it 5. Nor does God do any thing unworthy of himself in introducing such an invincible or unavoidable perswasion though it be false For to cause another to think that which is not true is not simply evil in it self Otherwise it were unlawful to fence and to use ordinary stratagems of warre wherein the Enemy endeavours to deceive each other which is not done but by bringing them into a false belief And we are the worst kinde of Enemies against God being Rebels and Apostates from him And therefore though he needs insinuate no mistakes into us by way of stratagem yet he may fix upon us the belief of such things as are false by way of punishment and though he command homage from us as his Subjects yet he may do it with several badges of disgrace as some offended Prince might command a Rebel for a time to wear some sordid token of his Rebellion upon his outward garments whenever he went abroad or an incensed High Priest for Penance adjudge some offender to do his devotions alwaies in some dark pit or dungeon in stead of a convenient closet or well-adorned Church Which things though they be but ugly in themselves yet they being part of that duty they are tied up to by them that ought to command they are free from the molestations of others that are inferiour to that Power that commanded them nor are these Offenders the one to be drag'd into the Church to do his devotions there nor is any one to pull off by violence from the other the badge of dishonour that he is commanded to wear Now the dishonourable badges of the Soul are those grosse Errours and Ignorances with which God may justly be deemed by way of reproach and punishment to command those to worship him that are convinced so to do nor know yet any thing better And the dark pit may be any blinde dispensation which Divine Providence has adjudged men to till their conviction to the contrary For Conviction is the immediate Command of God in the Conscience as I have often repeated 6. And as God by way of Punishment may introduce a false perswasion into the Minde of man so also by way of Probation For if to introduce a false perswasion in it self be not simply evil how can it be evil when used for a good End and by an unerring Wisedom and from an infinite Goodness Which powers if we were invested with none could make any controversie of it but that we might also take the liberty to do so too And people hold it ordinarily very pardonable if not allowable to impose upon children and sick persons by false stories for their health and to save the spilling of innocent bloud by concealing the pursued from the knowledge of him that would murther him Nay in smaller exigencies as in the trial of a servants trust no man would be much offended if one made his servant believe he trusted him further then he did either to encourage his faithfulness or to detect his fraud as if he should in his presence put up into a box some false Jewels that made a great show but of small value and should commit them unto his servants custody carefully sealed up as a most precious Treasure thereby to try if he will run away with them adding thereunto a sealed bag of Counters with an old inscription of so much in Gold Such a Trial as this which implies an introducing of a false opinion into the minde of the servant few or none would hold culpable in his cautious Master What injustice therefore can it be in God if he try the Souls of men first in a false Religion perswading them that it is true and thereby commanding the practice thereof since by this means their faithfulness is discovered whether they will be sincere when that is committed to them which is wholly true indeed 7. It is plain therefore that some falsehoods in a Religion which has so much Truth in it as to engage a man in the exercise thereof in hope of Eternal life doe not hinder but that this whole Religion that obliges the Conscience is the command of God to them whose Conscience it does oblige and therefore that they are free from the commands of any external power if some other things of another nature do not make them forfeit their liberty For the simple falsities in Religion are not enough that is are not sufficient to detect that such a Religion is not commanded to such and such persons by God himself who thought good to try Abraham's Faith by that false perswasion that he was actually to sacrifice his son to him whenas God intended no such matter Which Example does prove that God has not only a power but has put also into act this right that he has of causing men to think otherwise then what is really true But what is that to thee they must stand or fall to their own Master nor hast thou any power to countermand them till they have a countermand from God by clear conviction that the way they are in is false For then onely ceases it to be the Command of God to them 8. But if thou wilt be so humour some for all this as to deny that such a Conviction of Conscience so stated as I have stated it is the real command of God in every particular namely in the apprehensions which are false yet though this were admitted it will notwithstanding be evident that it is a piece of Rudeness and Barbarity to incommodate a person thus perswaded for the profession of his Religion For first his speaking and acting according to the unavoidable perswasions of his minde is not a sin it arising according to our hypothesis out of invincible Ignorance nor is he supposed to act any thing against the known laws of Nature and therefore no just right of any one is endamaged but in the mean time the Soveraignty of the Godhead is fully acknowledged and the Loyalty and Sincerity of the Religionist exercised therein Wherefore what reason can there be that any one for so good an action that is not exceptionable for any thing that is properly sinful should be rudely treated punished or any way disturbed or hindred For whosoever endeavours his forcible hindrance does not only suppress an innocent and laudable action but he does necessarily perpetrate a foul and sinful one For such is the solicitation of others to the omission of that duty of Loyalty our own Conscience tels us we owe to God Wherefore he that hinders the sincere Religionist from the Profession of his Religion tempts him to a sin against God which no Powers in the World have a right to do but are ipso facto guilty of rebellion against their Maker by corrupting his liege Subjects and urging them to faithlesness and neglect of their duty How culpable are they then in forcing
them and haling them to such actions as they are perswaded God has severely forbid them Verily if this be not unjustly to command him who is under the power of another I cannot imagine what is nor what can be deemed a sin against God if urging others to sin against him be not So that again even upon our Adversaries own terms it is plain that the Soveraign power of God sets the sincere Religionist free in matters of Religion from any external force or power whatsoever 9. Now as this Position recommends it self sufficiently from its own native concinnity and solidity so will it also appear still more solid and more consonous to Reason if we consider the absurdity of the contrary Position namely That liberty of Conscience is by no means to be granted in Religion For from hence it follows that every Religion may nay ought to keep out all other Religions with all care possible For every mans Conscience tels him His is the best or else he would not be of it nay that there is none true and saving but his own For if they will say they may be saved in others then is our former argument a perfect demonstration against them that they are not only injurious to men but absolute rebels against God indeed in treating those ill that are his liege people and whom he loves so well that he intends to save them and in persecuting them even for those very actions wherein they do most seriously express their obedience to him But if there be but one true and saving Religion at once in the world this is the greatest disinterest to it that can be imagined For upon this Position it will be as carefully kept out and as forcibly as any of the rest which in my apprehension is very foul play and therefore this is another evidence of the truth of our Thesis viz. That the contrary is the greatest injury and disinterest to the True Religion that can be supposed which nothing but external force hinders from spreading over all For Magna est veritas praevalebit I mean in the Mindes and Consciences of those men where she may have free audience not in the noise and terrour of tyrannical impositions and obtrusions Besides the frequent misery and calamity this Position brings upon Nations and Kingdoms viz. Wars bloud-shed subversion of Families deposing stabbing or poisoning of Princes perpetual enmity and hatred and all the works and actions of the kingdom of Darkness Of so mischievous consequence is this Opinion we do oppose Whenas if it were acknowledged universally That Liberty of Religion is the natural right of mankinde all these mischiefs would be prevented The Prince could not pretend any quarrel against the People nor the People against the Prince or against one another but in Civil Rights that are more plain and intelligible CHAP. XI 1. That there is a Right in every Nation and Person to examine their Religion to hear the Religion of Strangers and to change their own if they be convinced 2. That those Nations that acknowledge this Right and act accordingly have naturally a Right to send out Agents into other Nations Their demeanour there and the right of revenging their injuries And how this Method had justified the Spaniards Invasion of the Indians 3. The unpracticablenesse of the present Theory by reason of the general perverseness of the World The advantageousnesse of it to Christendome and suitablenesse of it to the Spirit of a Christian. 4. That Religion corruptive of manners is coercible by the Magistrate 5. And that which would plainly destroy the defence of the Countrey 6. As also whatever Religion is inseparably interwoven with Principles of Persecution 7. An Answer to that Objection That all Sects are persecutive and that therefore there can be no Liberty of Conscience given 1. IT is manifest therefore That Liberty of Religion is the common and natural Right of all Nations and Persons that is to say That they have a power as they are Rational men and believe that there is a God and a Life to come to examine what is the best way to serve him for their future advantage and not to be tied up so to that Religion is first proposed to them but that they have a Right to suspect especially if they do not like it that there is some better and therefore that they may confer with those of other Religions send for them out of one Nation into another and entertain them when they are arrived hear them diligently and if they be convinced openly profess it Or if they come of their own accord they are to be entertained with the same security that an Agent of State is and may freely converse with them of the Nation that have a minde to hear them For this is a piece of their Right of Liberty to speak as well as the others to hear Which Transactions would breed no disturbance at all if this Right of Liberty of Religion was universally understood and acknowledged by all the Nations of the World as certainly it is their Right 2. And it being so it seems plainly to follow That any Nation or People that do heartily ackowledge the Reasonableness of this Right and their practice is accordingly that there accrues to them this part of the Right also that they may send of those of the Religion themselves are into their neighbouring Nations to communicate their Religion to them and to try if they can convince them of that which they are perswaded is true and to shew them the errours of their own but at seasonable times and without reproach or tumult or any way confronting them in the exercise of their Religion a thing very barbarous and insufferable at home much more abroad in Countreys where they are Strangers For the avoiding of which wilde enormities it seems reasonable in it self and a thing to be agreed upon that there shall be no security to any stranger that takes upon him to gather the people together under pretence of instructing them in a more perfect Religion unless he be an Agent from his own Nation for that purpose Nor is he to begin with the rude people but to act above-board and to make his applications to the Governours of the places where he arrives and not to pretend to the Juglings of Inspirations and the irresistible blusters and impetuosities of an unaccountable Conscience but first with a discreet candour to allow and commend what is good and praise-worthy in the Religion of the place and then after an unaffected profession of the love and kindeness of them that sent him towards the Nation with all prudent insinuations possible to lay before them the groundlesness or gross falsities which are in their Religion and after that to shew the most demonstrative Reasons he has for the recommending of his own namely such as are agreed upon by the mature deliberation and counsel of them that sent him upon this errand to which it should be
not look then like a piece of irreligious rudeness which is truly a kinde of Prophaneness to expect that Almighty God and his Son Jesus Christ should give us the meeting in squalid and sordid places even then when we pretend most to shew our Reverence and Devotion to him For though we may make bold one with another to meet where we please yet we making our approaches to God in those places and he thereby making his special approaches to us for in a Philosophical sense he is every where alike questionless it cannot but be an expression of our Reverence unto him to have the Structure of the place proportionably capacious well and fairly built and handsomely adorned and as properly and significantly of our Religion and devotional homages we owe to our crucified Saviour as can be without suspicion of Idolatry or any scandalous Superstition For it is true from the very light of Nature which the knowledge of Christ does not extinguish but direct and perfect That Houses of Publick worship ought to have some Stateliness and Splendour in them expressive of the Reverence we bear to the Godhead we do adore And therefore the Christian Magistrate for the honour of his Saviour who suffered so much shame for him as also for making Christian Religion more recommendable to them that are without for Religion will not seem Religion to any without Publick worship nor a desirable Religion unless this Publick worship be performed with inoffensive Splendour and Decency ought to assist and abett such good practices as these 3. It is beyond the limits of my present Discourse to make any curious inquisition or determination concerning the particularities of this Publick Worship though I cannot abstain from giving some general hints concerning the due managements of the chief matters thereof such as are most obvious to think of and most useful to consider And such are the Enquiries into the nature of the Place of this Publick worship and the Holiness thereof and our Demeanour therein and especially of those chief performances of Preaching Praying Receiving the Sacrament of Baptisme also and of Holy-days To which we may adde those accessory helps of Devotion as some account them Musick and Pictures Concerning which I shall rather simply declare my sense of things then solicitously endeavour to demonstrate my Conclusions by over-operose Reasonings which will but raise a dust and provoke the Polemical Rabble 4. Concerning therefore this House of Publick Worship the Christians meet in I conceive there is no need to phansie it a Temple nay rather it seems fit to look upon it as no Temple the use of that Ceremony being antiquated by the excellency and supereminency of our Religion For the famed Iehovah is not now a Topical Deity nor Christ confined to this or that City or People but is the declared Worship of the whole Earth and is not contained within the wals of any Temple but has his personal Residence in Heaven whither our Devotions are to be directed and our Mindes suspended and lifted up thitherward not debased nor defixed to the corners of any earthly Edifice into which when a man looks he findes nothing worthy of adoration To which Truth both Stephen and Paul give their suffrage the one declaring to the Iews the other to the Areopagites That the most High who is Lord of Heaven and Earth dwelleth not in Temples made with hands And our Saviour himself to the Samaritan woman who was solicitous which of those Temples that of Samaria or that of Ierusalem was the right place of Worship he tels her plainly that such Topical or Figurative worshipping of God was shortly to cease That the hour was coming and then was when the true Worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in truth For the Father seeketh such to worship him God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in truth that is by the inward Sanctity of their Souls and with the true service of Prayers and Praises and Alms-deeds of which Incense and Sacrifices were but the figures and shadows Let my prayer be set forth before thee as Incense and the lifting up of my hands as the Evening Sacrifice To do good and to communicate forget not for with such Sacrifices God is well pleased And lastly S. Iohn in his Apocalyps describing the condition of the New Ierusalem which is the Church of Christ in her best state I saw saith he no Temple there for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the Temple of it That is their worship is directed immediatly towards God and Christ not to any place as the Jews ever worshipped toward the Temple of Ierusalem 5. But though the nature and name of a Temple does not belong to this House of Publick worship according to the sense of Scripture which made also the Primitive Christians carefully abstain from that nomination yet I do not see any ground at all why some of our phanciful Sects should take offence at the name of Church applied thereto For the Church being an house wherein we meet to serve the Lord whether God the Father or Christ his Son both which are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this house is naturally there from denominated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek whence is our English word Church as every trivial Grammarian can tell them 6. But now it being thus plain that it is an house for Divine worship and therefore has a special relation to God though it be not dedicated in such a solemn manner as Solomon's Temple yet it does necessarily contract a kinde of Holiness hereby and by this Holiness some measure of respect namely that it should be kept in handsome repair and be carefully defended from all foulness and nastiness both within and without And because Custome has appropriated it to the service of God unless very great necessity urge it is not to be made use of to any other purposes Those that are otherwise affected in this matter may justly seem guilty of a kinde of Incivility against God as I may so call it and hazard the being accounted Clowns in the sight of the Court of Heaven and all the holy Angels As that also might be reputed a piece of unskilfulness and obsolete Courtship to complement any one part of this House as if there were the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there and the Ark of the Covenant For this would be to turn the Church of Christ into a Temple Wherefore those that at their entrance into the Congregation either kneel down or standing do their private devotion and continue bare-headed before Divine Service begin they mean not this Devotion to the Edifice but testifie only with what fear and reverence they make their approaches to God and their Hearts being in preparation to a nearer approach shew their sense of his coming nearer to them by this reverential observance For Veneration is done at the coming of great
Divine life over the Animal life 4. Whence it is most reasonable the Chieftain of the Kingdome of Light should be rather an Humane Soul then an Angel 5. His last Assertion an Inference from the former and a brief Description of the General nature of Christianity 41 CHAP. VIII 1. That not to be at least a Speculative Christian is a sign of the want of common Wit and Reason 2. The nature of the Divine and Animal life and the state of the World before and at our Saviour's coming to be enquired into before we proceed 3. Why God does not forthwith advance the Divine life and that Glory that seems due to her 4. The First Answer 5. A Second Answer 6. A Third Answer 7. The Fourth and last Answer 43 CHAP. IX 1. What the Animal life is in General and that it is Good in it self 2. Self-love the Root of the Animal Passions and in it self both requisite and harmeless in Creatures 3. As also the Branches 4. The more refined Animal properties in Brutes as the Sense of Praise natural Affection Craft 5. Political Government in Bees 6. And Cranes and Stags 7. As also in Elephants 8. The Inference That Political Wisdome with all the Branches thereof is part of the Animal life 46 CHAP. X. 1. That there is according to Pliny a kind of Religion also in Brutes as in the Cercopithecus 2. In the Elephant 3. A confutation of Pliny's conceit 4 That there may be a certain Passion in Apes and Elephants upon their sight of the Sun and Moon something a kin to that of Veneration in Man and how Idolatry may be the proper fruit of the Animal life 5. A discovery thereof from the practice of the Indians 6. whose Idolatry to the Sun and Moon sprung from that Animal passion 7. That there is no hurt in the Passion it self if it sink us not into an insensibleness of the First invisible cause 49 CHAP. XI 1. Of a Middle life whose Root is Reason and what Reason it self is 2. The main branches of this Middle life 3. That the Middle life acts according to the life she is immersed into whether Animal or Divine 4. Her activity when immersed in the Animal life in things against and on this side Religion 5. How far she may go in Religious performances 51 CHAP. XII 1. The wide conjecture and dead relish of the mere Animal man in things pertaining to the Divine life and that the Root of this life is Obediential Faith in God 2. The three Branches from this Root Humility Charity and Purity and why they are are called Divine 3. A description of Humility 4. A Description of Charity and how Civil Justice or Moral Honesty is eminently contained therein 5. A Description of Purity and how it eminently contains in it whatever Moral Temperance or Fortitude pretend to 6. A Description of the truest Fortitude 7. And how transcendent an Example thereof our Saviour was 8. A further representation of the stupendious Fortitude of our Saviour 9. That Moral Prudence also is necessarily comprized in the Divine life 10. That the Divine life is the truest Key to the Mystery of Christianity but the excellency thereof unconceivable to those that do not partake of it 52 BOOK III. CHAP. I. THat the Lapse of the Soul from the Divine life immersing her into Matter brings on the Birth of Cain in the Mystical Eve driven out of Paradise 2. That the most Fundamental mistake of the Soul lapsed is that Birth of Cain and that from hence also sprung Abel in the mystery the vanity of Pagan Idolatry 3. Solomon's universal charge against the Pagans of Polytheisme and Atheisme and how fit it is their Apology should be heard for the better understanding the State of the World out of Christ. 4. Their plea of worshipping but one God namely the Sun handsomely managed by Macrobius 5. The Indian Brachmans worshippers of the Sun Apollonius his entertainment with them and of his false and vain affectation of Pythagorisme 6. The Ignorance of the Indian Magicians and of the Demons that instructed them 7. A Concession that they and the rest of the Pagans terminated their worship upon one Supreme Numen which they conceived to be the Sun 56 CHAP. II. 1. That the above-said concession advantages the Pagans nothing forasmuch as there are more Suns then one 2. That not only Unity but the rest of the Divine Attributes are incompetible to the Sun 3. Of Cardan's attributing Understanding to the Sun 's light with a confutation of his fond opinion 4. Another sort of Apologizers for Paganism who pretend the Heathens worshipped One God to which they gave no name 5. A discovery out of their own Religion that this innominated Deity was not the True God but the Material world 60 CHAP. III. 1. The last Apologizers for Paganisme who acknowledge God to be an Eternal Mind distinct from Matter and that all things are manifestations of his Attributes 2. His Manifestations in the External World 3. His Manifestations within us by way of Passion 4. His more noble emanations and communications to the inward Mind and how the ancient Heathen affixed personal Names to these several Powers or manifestations 5. The reason of their making these several Powers so many Gods or Goddesses 6. Their Reason for worshipping the Genii and Heroes 62 CHAP. IV. 1. The Heathens Festivals Temples and Images 2. Their Apology for Images 3. The Significancy of the Images of Jupiter and Aeolus 4. Of Ceres 5. Of Apollo 6. Their Plea from the significancy of their Images that their use in Divine worship is no more Idolatrous then that of Books in all Religions as also from the use of Images in the Nation of the Iews 7. Their Answer to those that object the impossibleness of representing God by any outward Image 8. That we are not to envy the Heathen if they hit upon any thing more weighty in their Apologies for their Religion and why 65 CHAP. V. 1. An Answer to the last Apology of the Pagans as first That it concerns but few of them 2. and that those few were rather of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then pure Pagans 3. That the worship of Images is expresly forbid by God in the Law of Moses 4. That they rather obscure then help our conceptions of the Divine Powers 5. That there is great danger of these Images intercepting the worship directed to God 6. He referrs the curious and unsatisfied to the fuller Discussions in Polemical Divinity 68 CHAP. VI. 1. A new and unanswerable charge against Paganisme namely That they adored the Divine Powers no further then they reached the Animal life as appears from their Dijoves and Vejoves 2. Jupiter altitonans Averruncus Robigus and Tempestas 3. From the pleasant spectacle of their God Pan what is meant by his Pipe and Nymphs dancing about him 4 What by his being deemed the Son of Hermes and Mercury and what by his beloved Nymph Syrinx his wife
Three main Effects of Christ his sending the Paraclete foretold by himself Iohn 16. When the Paraclete shall come c. 2. Grotius his Exposition upon the Text. 3. The Ground of his Exposition 4. A brief indication of the natural sense of the Text by the Author 5. The Prophesie of Christ fulfilled and acknowledged not only by Christians but also Mahometans 6. That the Substance of Mahometism is Moses and Christ. Their zealous profession of one God 7. Their acknowledgment of Miracles done by Christ and his Apostles and of the high priviledge conferred upon Christ. 8. What Advantage that portion of Christian Truth which they have embraced has on them and what hopes there are of their full conversion 164 CHAP. XIII 1. The Triumph of the Divine Life not so large hitherto as the overthrow of the external Empire of the Devil 2. Her conspicuous Eminency in the Primitive times 3. The real and cruel Martyrdomes of Christians under the Ten Persecutions a demonstration that their Resurrection is not an Allegorie 4. That to allegorize away that blessed Immortality promised in the Gospel is the greatest blasphemy against Christ that can be imagined 167 CHAP. XIV 1. The Corruption of the Church upon the Christian Religion becoming the Religion of the Empire 2. That there did not cease then to be a true and living Church though hid in the Wilderness 3. That though the Divine life was much under yet the Person of our Saviour Christ of the Virgin Mary c. were very richly honoured 4. And the Apostles and Martyrs highly complemented according to the ancient guize of the Pagan Ceremonies 5. The condition of Christianity since the general apostasie compared to that of Una in the Desart amongst the Satyrs 6. That though this has been the state of the Church very long it will not be so alwaies and while it is so yet the real enemies of Christ do lick the dust of his feet 7. The mad work those Apes and Satyrs make with the Christian Truth 8. The great degeneracy of Christendome from the Precepts and Example of Christ in their warrs and bloudshed 9. That though Providence has connived at this Pagan Christianism for a while he will not fail to restore his Church to its pristine purity at the Last 10. The full proof of which Conclusion is too voluminous for this place 168 CHAP. XV. 1. Grotius his reasons against Days signifying Years in the Prophets propounded and answered 2. Demonstrations that Days do sometimes signifie so many Years 3. Mr. Mede's opinion That a new Systeme of Prophecies from the first Epocha begins Chap. 10. v. 8. cleared and confirmed 4. What is meant by the Three days and an half that the Witnesses lye slain 5. Of the Beast out of the bottomless pit 6. Of the First Resurrection 7. The conclusion of the matter in hand from the evident truth of Mr. Mede's Synchronisms 173 CHAP. XVI 1. Of the Four Beasts about the throne of Majesty described before the Prophecie of the Seals 2. Of the Six first seals according to Grotius 3. Of the Six first seals according to Mr. Mede 4. Of the inward Court and the fight of Michael with the Dragon according to Grotius and Mr. Mede 5. Of the Visions of the seven Trumpets 6. The near cognation and colligation of those seven Synchronals that are contemporary to the Six first Trumpets 7. The mistakes and defects in Grotius his interpretations of those Synchronals 8. Of the number of the Beast 9. Of the Synchronals contemporary to the last Trumpet 10. The necessity of the guidance of such Synchronisms as are taken from the Visions themselves inferred from Grotius his errours and mistakes who had the want of them The Author's apology for preferring Mr. Mede's way before Grotius's with an intimation of his own design in intermedling with these matters 182 CHAP. XVII 1. That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 does not implie That most of the matters in the Apocalypse appertain to the Destruction of Jerusalem and to Rome Heathen 2. The important Usefulness of this Book for the evincing of a Particular Providence the Existence of Angels and the ratification of the highest points in Christianity 3. How excellent an Engine it is against the extravagancy and fury of Fanatick Enthusiasts 4. How the Mouths of the Jews and Atheists are stopped thereby 5. That it is a Mirrour to behold the nature of the Apostasie of the Roman Church in 6. And also for the Reformed Churches to examine themselves by whether they be quite emerged out of this Apostasie with the Author's scruple that makes him suspect they are not 7. What of Will-worship and Idolatry seems still to cleave to us 8. Further Information offered to us from the Vision of the slain Witnesses 9. The dangerous mistakes and purposes of some heated Meditatours upon the Fifth Monarchy 10. The most Usefull consideration of the approach of the Millennium and how the Time may be retarded if not forfeited by their faithlesness and hypocrisie who are most concerned to hasten on those good daies 200 BOOK VI. CHAP. I. THree chief things considerable in Christ's Return to Iudgment viz. The Visibility of his Person The Resurrection of the Dead and the Conflagration of the World 2. Places of Scripture to prove the Visibility of his Person 3. That there will be then a Resurrection of the dead not in a Moral but a Natural sense demonstrated from undeniable places of Scripture 4. Proofs out of Scripture for the Conflagration of the world as out of Peter the 3 Chap. of his second Epistle 5. An Interpretation of the 12 and 13 verses 6. A Demonstration that the Apostle there describes the Conflagration of the World 7. A Confutation of their opinion that would interpret the Apostle's description of the burning of Jerusalem 8. That the coming of Christ so often mentioned in these two Epistles of Peter is to be understeod of his Last coming to Iudgment 9 10. Further confirmation of the said Assertion 11. Other places pointed at for the proving of the Conflagration 212 CHAP. II. 1. The Fitness and Necessity of Christ's visible Return to Iudgment 2. Further arguments of his Return to Iudgment for the convincing of them that believe the Miraculousness of his Birth his Transfiguration his Ascension c. 3. Arguments directed to those that are more proue to Infidelity taken out of History where such things are found to have hapned already in some measure as are expected at Christ's visible Appearance 4. That before extraordinary Iudgments there have usually strange Prodigies appeared by the Ministry of Angels as before great Plagues or Pestilences 5. As also before the ruine of Countries by War 6. Before the swallowing down Antioch by an Earthquake 7. At the firing of Sodome and Gomorrha 8. And lastly before the destruction of Jerusalem 217 CHAP. III. 1. The Resurrection of the dead by how much more rigidly defined according to every circumstance and punctilio delivered by
becoming the Spirit of a Christian to allow what is good and commendable in other Religions then so foully to reproach them 4. What are the due demonstrations of our Affection to the Gospel of Christ. 5. How small a part of the World is styled Christians and how few real Christians in that part that is so styled 6. That there has been some unskilfull or treacherous tampering with the powerfull Engine of the Gospel that it has done so little execution hitherto against the Kingdome of the Devil 7. The Author's purpose of bringing into view the main Impediments of the due Effects thereof 490 CHAP. II. 1. The most fundamental Mistake and Root of all the Corruptions in the Church of Christ. 2. That there may be a Superstition also in opposing of Ceremonies and in long Prayers and Preachments 3. That self-chosen Religion extinguishes true Godliness every where 4. The unwholsome and windy food of affected Orthodoxality with the mischievous consequences thereof 5. That Hypocrisy of Professours fills the World with Atheists 6. That the Authoritative Obtrusion of gross falsities upon men begets a misbelief of the whole Mystery of Piety 7. That all the Churches of Christendome stand guilty of this mischievous miscarriage 8. The infinitie inconvenience of the Superlapsarian doctrine 492 CHAP. III. 1. The true measure of Opinions to be taken from the design of the Gospel which in general is The setting out the exceeding great Mercy and Goodness of God towards mankind 2. And then Secondly The Triumph of the Divine Life in the Person of Christ in the warrantableness of doing Divine Honour to him 3. Thirdly The advancement of the Divine Life in his members upon Earth 4. The Fourth and last Rule to try Opinions by The Recommendableness of our Religion to Strangers or those that are without 497 CHAP. IV. 1. The general use of the foregoing Rules 2. A special use of them in favour of one anothers persons in matters of opinion 3. The examination of Election and Reprobation according to these Rules And how well they agree with that Branch of the Divine Life which we call Humility 4. The disagreement of absolute Reprobation with the first Rule 5. As also with the third 6. And with the second and fourth 499 CHAP. V. 1. That Election and Reprobation conferrs something to Humility 2. That some men are saved irresistibly by virtue of Discriminative Grace 3. That the rest of Mankind have Grace sufficient and that several of them are saved 4. The excellent use of this middle way betwixt Calvinisme and Arminianisme 5 6. The exceeding great danger and mischief of the former Extremes 502 CHAP. VI. 1. The Scholastick Opinions concerning the Dâ—vinity of Christ applied to the foregoing Rules 2. As also concerning the Trinity 3. The Application of the Antitrinitarian Doctrine to the said Rules It s disagreement with the third 4. As also with the second 5. The Antitrinitarians plea. 6. An answer to their plea. 7. How grosly the denying the Divinity of Christ disagrees with the third Rule 504 CHAP. VII 1. Imputative Righteousness Invincible Infirmity and Solifidianism in what sense they seem to comply with the second and last Rule and how disagreeing with the third 2. The groundlesness of mens Zeal for Imputative Righteousness 3. And for Solifidianism 4. The conspiracy of Imputative Righteousness Solifidianism and Invincible Infirmity to exclude all Holiness out of the Conversation of Christians 5. That large confessions of Sins and Infirmities without any purpose of amending our lives is a mere mocking of God to his very face With the great danger of that Affront 507 CHAP. VIII 1. The flaunting Hypocrisie of the Perfectionists and from whence it comes 2. The easie Laws whereby they measure their Perfection And the sad result of their Apostasie from the Person of Christ. 3. That there is far more Perfection in many thousands of those that abhor the name of Perfection then in these great Boasters of it 4. In what consists that sound and comely frame of a true Christian Spirit 510 CHAP. IX 1. Sincerity the middle way betwixt pretended Infirmity and the boast of Perfection with the description thereof 2. A more full character of the Sincere Christian. 3. That they that endeavour not after that state are Hypocrites and they that pretend to be above it Conspiratours against the everlasting Priesthood of Christ. 4. The Personal Reign of Christ upon Earth and the Millennium in the more sober meaning thereof applied to the above-nam'd Rules 512 CHAP. X. 1. That in those that believe There is a God and a life to come there is an antecedent Right of Liberty of Conscience not to be invaded by the Civil Magistrate 2. Object That no false Religion is the command of God with the Answer thereto 3. That there is no incongruity to admit That God may command contrary Religions in the World 4 5. The utmost Difficulty in that Position with the Answer thereto 6. That God may introduce a false perswasion into the mind of man as well for probation as punishment 7. That simple falsities in Religion are no forfeiture of Liberty of Conscience 8. That though no falsities in Religion were the command of God yet upon other considerations it is demonstrated that the Religionist ought to be free 9. A further demonstration of this Truth from the gross absurdities that follow the contrary Position 515 CHAP. XI 1. That there is a Right in every Nation and Person to examine their Religion to hear the Religion of Strangers and to change their own if they be convinced 2. That those Nations that acknowledge this Right and act accordingly have naturally a Right to send out Agents into other Nations Their demeanour there and the right of revenging their injuries And how this Method had justified the Spaniards Invasion of the Indians 3. The unpracticableness of the present Theory by reason of the general perversness of the World The advantageousness of it to Christendome and suitableness of it to the Spirit of a Christian 4. That Religion corruptive of manners is coâ—rcible by the Magistrate 5. And that which would plainly destroy the defence of the Countrey 6. As also whatsoever Religion is inseparably interwoven with Principles of Persecution 7. An Answer to that Objection That all Sects are persecutive and that therefore there can be no Liberty of Conscience given 521 CHAP. XII 1. To what Persons and with what Circumstances the Christian Magistrate is to give Liberty of Conscience And the great advantage thereof to the Truth of Christianity 2. That those that are not Christians are not to be admitted into places of trust by the Christian Magistrate if he can supply himself with those that are 3. That the Christian Magistrate is to lay aside the fallible opinions of men and promote every one in Church and State according to his merit in the Christian life and his ability of promoting of the interest of the Church of Christ and the
Nature 7. The fourth Gospel-Power The Example of Christ. 8. His purpose of vindicating the Example of Christ from aspersions with the reasons thereof 408 CHAP. XIII 1. That Christ was no Blasphemer in declaring himself to be the Son of God 2. Nor Conjurer in casting out Devils 3. That he was unjustly accused of Prophaneness 4. That there was nothing detestable in his Neutrality toward Political Factions 5. Nor any Injustice nor Partiality found in him 6. Nor could his sharp Rebukes of the Pharisâ—es be rightly termed Railing 7. Nor his whipping the Buyers and Sellers out of the Temple tumultâ—ary Zeal 8. Nor his crying out so dreadfully in his Passion be imputed to Impatience or Despair 9. The suspicion of Distractedness and Madness cleared 10. His vindication from their aspersions of Looseness and Prodigality 11. The câ—oâ—ked and perverse nature of the Pharisees noted with our Saviours own Apology for his frequenting all companies 12. That Christ was no Self-seeker in undergoing the Death of the Cross for that joy that was set before him 412 CHAP. XIV 1. The reason of his having insisted so long on the vindicating of the Life of Christ from the aspersions of the Malevolent 2. The true Character of a real Christian. 3. The true Character of a false or Pharisaical Christian. 4. How easily the true members of Christ are accused of Blasphemy by the Pharisaical Christians 5. And the working of their Graces imputed to some vicious Principle 6. Their censuring them prophane that are not superstitious 7. The Parisees great dislike of coldness in fruitless Controversies of Religion 8. Their Ignorance of the law of Equity and Love 9. How prone it is for the sincere Christian to be accounted a Railer for speaking the truth 10. That the least Opposition against Pharisaical Rottenness will easily be interpreted bitter and tumultuous Zeal 11. How the solid Knowledge of the perfectest Christians may be accounted Madness by the formal Pharisee 12. his Proneness to judge the true Christian according to the motions of his own untamed corruptions 13. His prudent choice of the vice of Covetousness 14. The Unreasonableness of his censure of those that endeavour after Perfection 15. His ignorant surmise that no man liveth vertuously for the love of Vertue it self 16. The Usefulness of this Parallelisme betwixt the Reproach of Christ and his true Members 422 CHAP. XV. 1. The Passion of Christ the fifth Gospel-Power the Virtue whereof is in a special manner noted by our Saviour himself 2. That the Brazen Serpent in the Wilderness was a prophetick Type of Christ and cured not by Art but by Divine Power 3. That Telesmatical Preparations are superstitious manifest out of their Collections that write of them 4. Particularly out of Gaffarel and Gregory 5. That the Effects of Telesmes are beyond the laws of Nature 6. That if there be any natural power in Telesmes it is from Similitude with a confutation of this ground also 7. A further confutation of that ground 8. In what sense the Brazâ—n Serpent was a Telesme and that it must needs be a Typical Prophecie of Christ. 9. The accurate and punctual Prefiguration therein 10. The wicked Pride and Conceitedness of those that are not touched with this admirable contrivance of Divine Providence 11. The insufferable balsphemy of them that reproach the Son of God for crying out in his dreadful Agony on the Cross wherein is discovered the Unloveliness of the Family of Love 429 CHAP. XVI 1. The End of Christs Sufferings not onely to pacifie Conscience but to root out Sin witnessed out of the Scripture 2. Further Testimonies to the same purpose 3. The Faintness and Uselesness of the Allegory of Chrâ—sts Passion in comparison of the Application of the History thereof 4 The Application of Christs Sufferings against Pride and Covetousness 5. As also against Envy Hâ—â—red Revenge vain Mirth the Pangs of Deaâ—h and unwarrantable Love 6. A General Application of the Death of Christ to the mortifying of all Sin whatsoever 7. The celebrating the Lords Supper the use and meaning thereof 436 CHAP. XVII 1. The sixth Gospel-Power is the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ. The priviledge of this Demonstration of the Soul's Immortality above that from the Subtilty of Reason and Philosophy 2. The great power this consideration of the Soul's Immortality has to urge men to a Godly life 3. To â—ean themselves from worldly pleasures and learn to delight in those that are everlasting 4. To have our Conversation in Heaven 5. The Conditions of the Everlasting Inheritance 6. Further enforcements of duty from the Soul's Immortality 440 CHAP. XVIII 1. The Day of Judgement the seventh and last Gospel-power fit as well for the regenerate as the unregenerate to think upon 2. The Uncertainty of that Day and that it will surprize the wicked unawares 3. That those that wilfully reject the offers of Grace here shall be in no better condition after Death then the Devils themselves are 4. A Description of the sad Evening-close of that terrible Day of the Lord. 5. The Affrightment of the Morning-appearance thereof to the wicked 6. A further Description thereof 7. The Translation of the Church of Christ to their Aethereal Mansions with a brief Description of their Heavenly Happiness 443 CHAP. XIX 1. That there can be no Religion more powerful for the promoting of the Divine Life then Christianity is 2. The external Triumph of the Divine Life in the person of Christ how throughly warranted and how fully performed 3. The Religious Splendour of Christendome 4. The Spirit of Religion stifled with the load of Formalities 5. The satisfaction that the faithfully-devoted Servants of Christ have from that Divine homage done to his Person though by the wicked 447 CHAP. XX. 1. The Usefulness of Christianity for the good of this life witnessed by our Saviour and S. Paul 2. The proof thereof from the Nature of the thing it self 3. Objections against Christianity as if it were an unfit Religion for States Politick 4. A Concession that the primary intention of the Gospel was not Government Political with the advantage of that Concession 5. That there is nothing in Christianity but what is highly advantageous to a State-Politick 6. That those very things they object against it are such as do most effectually reach the chief end of Political Government as doth Charity for example 7. Humility Patience and Mortification of inordinate desires 8. The invincible Valour that the love of Christ and their fellow-members inspires the Christian Souldiery withall 449 BOOK IX CHAP. I. THe four Derivative Properties of the Mystery of Godliness 2. That a measure of Obscurity begets Veneration suggested from our very senses 3. Confirmed also by the common suffrage of all Religions and the nature of Reservedness amongst men 4. The rudeness and ignorance of those that expect that every Divine Truth of Scripture should be a comprehensible Object of their understanding even in the very modes and
circumstances thereof 5. That Contradictions notwithstanding are to be excluded out of Religion 6. And that the Divinity of Christ and the Triunity of the Godhead have nothing contradictious in them 453 CHAP. II. 1. That there is a latitude of Sense in the words of Athanasiuâ— his Creed and that One and Unity has not the same signification every where 2. The like in the terms God and Omnipotent 3. Of the word Equal and to what purpose so distinct a knowledge of the Deity was coâ—municated to the Church 4. In what sense the Son and Holy Ghost are God That Divine adoration is their unquestionable right And that there is an intelligible sense of Athanasius his Creed and such as supposes neither Polytheâ—sme Idolatry nor Impossibility 5. That there is no intricacy in the Divinity of Christ but what the Schools have brought in by their false notions of Suppositum and Union Hypostatical 6. That the Union of Christ with the Eternal Word implies no Contradiction and how warrantable an Object he is of Divine worship 7. The Application thereof to the Iewes 8. The Union of Christ with God compared with that of the Angels that bore the Name Jehovah in the Old Testament 9. The reasonableness of our Saviours being united with the Eternal Word and how with that Hypostasis distinct from the others 455 CHAP. III. 1. That the Communicableness of Christian Religion implies its Reasonableness 2. The right Method of communicating the Christian Mystery 3 4. A brief example of that Method 5. A further continuation thereof 6. How the Mystagogus is to behave himself towards the more dull or illiterate 7. The danger of debasing the Gospel to the dulness of shallâ—â—ness of every weak apprehension 459 CHAP. IV. 1. The due demeanour of a Christian Mystagogus in communicating the Truth of the Gospel 2. That the chiefest care of all is that he speak nothing but what is profitable for life and godliness 3. A just reprehension of the scopeless zeal of certain vain Boanerges of these times 4. That the abuse of the Ministery to the undermining the main Ends of the Gospel may hazard the continuance thereof 5. That any heat and zeal does not constitute a living Ministry 461 CHAP. V. 1. The nature of Historical Faith 2. That true Saving Faith is properly Covenant and of the various significations of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. In what Law and Covenant agree 4. In what Law and Testament 5. In what Covenant and Testament agree 6. That the Church might have called the Doctrine of Christ either the New Law or the New Covenant 7. Why they have styled it rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The first Reason 8. Other Reasons thereof 9. The occasion of translating 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The New Testament 463 CHAP. VI. 1. That there were more Old Covenants then one 2. What Old Covenant that was to which this New one is especially counterdistinguished with a brief intimation of the difference of them 3 4. An Objection against the difference delivered with the Answer thereto 5. The Reason why the Second Covenant is not easily broken 6. That the importance of the Mystery of the Second Covenant engages him to make a larger deduction of the whole matter out of S. Paul 466 CHAP. VII 1. The different states of the Two Covenants set out Galat. 4. by a double similitude 2. The nature of the Old Covenant adumbrated in Agar 3. As also further in her Son Ismael 4. The nature of the New Covenaent adumbrated in Sarah 5. As also in Isaac her Son and in Israel his offspring 6. The necessity of imitating Abraham's faith that the Spiritual Isaac or Christ may be born in us 7. The grand difference hetwixt the First and Second Covenant where in it doth consist With a direction by the by to the most eminent Object of our Faith 8. The Second main point wherein this difference consists namely Liberty and that First from Ceremonies and Opinions 9. Secondly from all kind of Sins and disallowable Passions 10. Lastly to all manner of Righteousness and Holiness 468. CHAP. VIII 1. The adequate Object of saving Faith or Christian Covenant 2. That there is an Obligation on our parts plain from the very Inscription of the New Testament 3. What the meaning of Bloud in Covenants is 4. And answerably what of the Bloud of Christ in the Christian Covenant 5. The dangerous Errour and damnable Hypocrisie of those that would perswade themselves and others that no performance is required on their side in this Covenant 6. That the Heavenly Inheritance is promised to us only upon Condition evinced out of several places of Scripture 476 CHAP. IX 1. What it is really to enter into this New Covenant 2. That the entring into this Covenant supposes actual Repentance 3. That this New-Covenanter is born of water and the Spirit 4. The necessity of the skilfull usage of these new-born Babes in Christ. 5. That some Teacheâ—s are mere Witches and Childe Suckers 479 CHAP. X. 1. The First Principle the New-Covenanter is closely to keep to 2. The Second Principle to be kâ—pt to 3. The Third and last Principle 482 CHAP. XI 1. The diligent search this new-Covenanter ought to make to find out whatsoever is corrupt and sinful 2. That the truly regenerate cannot be quiet till all corruption be wrought out 3. The most importunate devotions of a living Christian. 4. The difference betwixt a Son of the Second Covenant and a Slave under the First 5. The Mystical completion of a Prophecy of Esay touching this state 483 CHAP. XII 1. That the destroying of Sin is not without some time of conflict The most infallible method for that dispatch 2. The constant ordering of our external actions 3. The Hypocritical complaint of those for want of power that will not do those good things that are already in their power 4. The danger of making this new Covenant a Covenant of Works and our Love to Christ a mercenary friendship 5. Earnest praiers to God for the perfecting of the Image of Christ in us 6. Continual circumspection and watchfulness 7. That the vilifying of outward Ordinances is no sign of a new-Covenanter but of a proud and carnal mind 8. Caution to the new-Covenanter concerning his converse with men 9. That the branches of the Divine life without Faith in God and Christ degenerate into mere Morality The examining all the motions and excursions of our Spirit how agreeable they are with Humility Charity and Purity 10. Cautions concerning the exercise of our Humility 11. As also of our Purity 12. And of our Love or Charity The safe conduct of the faithfull by their inward Guide 485 BOOK X. CHAP. I. THat the Affection and esteem we ought to have for our Religion does not consist in damning all to the pit of Hell that are not of it 2. The unseasonable inculcation of this Principle to Christians 3. That it is better