thing concerning Christ or his Church or any matter of faith or rule of Christian life which is not contained in the Scriptures But there was nothing taught in the Apostolical Doctrine to assert or give any countenance to the Popes infallibility or his Universal Supremacy to the propitiatory Sacrifice of the Mass to the Doctrine of Purgatory Invocation of Saints and many other things now delivered as points de fide in the Church of Rome of which divers are mentioned in this Chapter And these new matters of faith have so altered and changed the ancient Christian Religion that with these mixtures it is very unlike what was declared by Christ and his Apostles 35. The Council of Trent declares their (n) Sess 4. c. 1. All these under the name of Traditions made equal with the Scripture receiving the holy Scripture and their Traditions to be pari pietatis affectu reverentia with the like pious affection and reverence Indeed it calls these Traditions such as were from the mouth of Christ or were dictated by the Holy Ghost and received in the Catholick Church But since after their declaring thus much and expressing the Canon of the Scripture with the additional Books received in the Romish Church they tell us that this was done that all men might know what foundation they would proceed on in their confirming Doctrines and reforming manners it is manifest that all Doctrines of Faith or practice delivered in that Council which are not contained in the Scriptures are reputed to be such Traditions as are of equal authority with the Scriptures And in the (o) Form Juram an 1564. Bull of Pius the Fourth many of these Doctrines are particularly expressed and in the end of it an hearty acceptance is declared of all things defined in the Council of Trent and it is added that this is the true Catholick faith extra quam nemo salvus esse potest out of which no man can be saved And this all who have cure of souls and preferments in the Church must own by their solemn Oath and Vow And yet how little that Council in its Decisions kept to the true Rules of Catholick Tradition is sufficiently evident from what they at this very time declared concerning the Canon of the Scripture for their taking into the Canon several of those Books which we account Apocryphal hath been plainly proved by Bishop Cosins to be contrary to the Vniversal Tradition of the Church 36. And if no man may with honesty and above it add any thing to a mans Deed or Covenant as if it were contained therein how great a crime is it to deal thus with Gods Covenant But the Church of Rome not only equals her Traditions containing many new points of Faith with the Scriptures and what is the true Christian Doctrine but it really sets them above the Holy Scriptures though they be in many things contrary thereunto For they make Tradition such a Rule for the Scripture that it must signifie no more than Tradition will allow Sect. IV. And to this purpose their (p) In Bull. pii 4. Clergy swear to admit the Scriptures according to that sense which the holy Mother the Church hath held and doth hold who is to judge of the true sense of Scripture And hereby they mean the Church of Rome there called the Mother of all Churches SECT IV. Of the publick allowance or injunction of such things amongst the Papists as either debase the Majesty of God or give divine honour to something else besides God THose things deserve to be condemned as greatly evil which debase the Majesty of God or deprive him of that peculiar Glory and Worship which is due to him alone and they who practise or uphold such things ought to be esteemed as evil doers in an high degree Honour which in a suitable measure belongs to every Superior as to a Father or a Prince in the highest measure of it is proper to God and that reverence which is due to him is necessary to be reserved solely for him both from the rules of Justice and Piety and also because God is in this respect a Jealous God 2. 1. Images of the Deity are used by the Papists But First It is an abasing the Majesty of God to represent the glorious infinite and invisible God who is a pure Spirit by a material Image This is frequently and publickly practised in the Church of Rome and is there allowed and defended by many of its Writers (a) De Eccl. Triumph c. 8. Cardinal Bellarmine hath one Chapter on purpose to prove Non esse prohibitas-imagines Dei that Images of God are not prohibited and he cites Cajetan Catharinus and others as defending the same and one chief argument which he useth to prove this is Ex usu Ecclesiae from the usage of the Church And he there declares jam receptae sunt fere ubique ejusmodi imagines that now such Images are almost every where received and that it is not credible that the Church would universally tolerate any unlawful thing Where he also declares that these were approved both in the second Council of Nice and in the Council of Trent But the making an Image of the true God stands condemned in the holy Scriptures even in the Second Commandment against the Divine Law Thou shalt not make to thy self any Graven Image thou shalt not bow down to them nor worship them And that the Divine Law doth not only forbid the Images of a false God or an inferiour Deity but such also as were intended to represent the true God is manifest from Deut. 4.15 16. Take good heed to your selves for you saw no manner of similitude in the day the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire lest ye corrupt your selves and make you a Graven Image the similitude of any figure or the likeness of Male or Female And this Command is the more to be considered because of that emphatical caution which is used by way of Preface thereto 3. It was one of the hainous sins which generally prevailed in the Pagan World that they changed the Glory of the Incorruptible God into an Image made like to corruptible Man and to Birds c. Rom. 1.23 This is agreeable to the Pagan practice And though I charge not the Roman Church with running parallel to the Pagan Idolatry yet this disparaging the Divine Being by setting up visible Images and Representations thereof and giving Worship to them under that relation was one of the great Miscarriages of the Gentiles and yet the chief part at least of the Gentiles did not think these very Images to be the proper Beings of their Gods For besides their acknowledgment of the Wisdom Purity Goodness and Power of the Deity which many Testimonies produced by Justin Martyr Clemens Alexandrinus Eusebius and other Christian Writers do express there was also retained amongst them such Notions concerning the
nature an extension of matter and of that which hath parts added to one another and yet here is extension and consequently several parts distant from one another but still there is nothing extended nor any matter nor any thing that hath parts And the like may be said of other accidents 4. If it could be imagined that the substance of the Bread and Wine was abolished by consecration though it is not usual for the blessing of God to destroy but preserve the thing he blesseth the accidents or appearances thereof only remaining and that the substance of Christs Body and Blood should be there substituted without any corporeal accidents even this could not be Transubstantiation according to the Romish description thereof For if a corporeal substance should cease to be its accidents or modifications remaining this must be by annihilation and if there be a new substance this must be by a new production not a changing the former substance into a latter since corporeal substances are not capable of being changed but by the difference of their modifications or accidents but the ceasing or abolishing of the substance it self which is the being of a thing the subject matter which must be supposed in the changing things is wholly removed 22. And 5. That there must be new matter continually prepared in the Sacramental elements out of which the true substance of the Body and Blood of Christ is to be produced this also includes manifest contradiction For then the Body and Blood of Christ must be supposed to be produced out of a different matter at a different time and in a different manner from that Body which was born of the Blessed Virgin and in which he assumed our nature and yet this Body which is so many ways differing from that substantial Body which is ascended into Heaven must be acknowledged to be substantially the same When I consider such things as these with which this Romish Doctrine is full fraught I must acknowledge that the belief of Transubstantiation includes so much of self-denial that it is a believing against Reason But there is one thing wanting which hinders it from being an act of Christian self-denial or of true Religion and that is that it is not a believing God or Christ who never declared any such Doctrine but must resolve it self into the believing the declaration of the Roman Church which both Scotus and Cajetan cited by the Reverend (q) Hist Transubst c. 5. n. 3. Bishop Cosins make the necessary ground and support for this Doctrine 23. What account may be given that so many knowing men in the Church of Rome should own such unreasonable and unaccountable Doctrines And I have sometimes set my self to consider hour it should come to pass that so many understanding and learned men as are in the Church of Rome should receive such monstrous Doctrines as this and some others are and I have given my self some satisfaction by observing 1. That education and Principles once imbibed and professed have a mighty force upon many mens minds insomuch that bad notions embraced do almost pervent their very capacities of understanding as appears in the followers of many Sects and in the Pagan Philosophers who set them selves against Christianity and these things especially when linked with interest have such a commanding influence upon many men of understanding that they hinder them from attending to the clearest evidences against their assertions as was manifest from the Scribes and Pharisees in our Saviours time who generally stood up for their Traditions against his Doctrine and Miracles also And they of the Church of Rome are politickly careful in the training up and principling the more knowing part of their youth in their Doctrines 2. That when gross corruptions formerly prevailed in that Church through the blindness and superstition of ignorant and degenerate ages the politick governing part think it not expedient now to acknowledge those things for errors lest they thereby lose that reverence they claim to their Church when they have once acknowledged it to have erred and not to be infallible And therefore all these things must be owned as points of faith and such other things added as are requisite to support them 3. Many more modest and well disposed persons acquiesce in the determination of the Church and its pretence to infallibility and by this they filence all objections and suffer not any doubtful enquiry since whatsoever the Doctrine be no evidence can outweigh that which is infallible And these also are the less inquisitive from the odious reprensentations which are made of them who depart from the Romish Doctrine and from their being prohibited the use of such Books which might help to inform them better 4. Others are deterred from making impartial search into truth by the severity of that Church against them who question its received Doctrines both in the tortures of the Inquisition and in the loud thundrings of its Anathemas 5. The specious and pompous names of the Churches Tradition Antiquity Vniversality and uninterrupted succession have a great influence upon them who have not discovered the great falshood of these pretences And very many knowing men have not made such things the business of their search and others who have made search are willing to take things according to the sense and interpretation the favourers of that Church impose upon them and they are herein influenced by some of the things above mentioned 6. The just judgment of God may blind them who shut their eyes against the light that through strong delusions they should believe a lye 24. Fifthly This Romish Doctrine is contrary to the holy Scriptures The Scripture declareth the Body of Christ to be in the Sacrament and our Church acknowledgeth that (r) Art of Relig. Art 28. this Body is given taken and eaten in the Sacrament but then it tells us that this is only after an heavenly and spiritual manner Transubstantiation is against the Scripture and this is according to the sense of the Scriptures as I noted n. 16. But the Scripture is so far from owning Transubstantiation to be the manner of Christs presence that it plainly declares the elements to remain after the consecration and at the distribution of them S. Paul therefore mentions not only the Bread which we break 1 Cor. 10 16. but speaking also of receiving the Eucharist thrice in three verses together he expresseth it by eating that Bread and drinking that Cup 1 Cor. 11.26 27 28. and this must suppose the element of Bread to be remaining when the Sacrament was administred to the Communicants But (Å¿) Coster Enchir. some object that Bread here is not to be understood of that which is properly and substantially Bread but of Christ who is called the bread of life But 1. The Apostle having spoken before of Bread and the Cup 1 Cor. 11.24 25. where he understood thereby that which was properly and substantially Bread and Wine and
497. at the Council of Trent declared against the Infallible judgment of Councils and thought he had proved that sufficiently by observing that all the particular Bishops there assembled were fallible and that therefore the firmness of its Constitutions and Anathemas must depend on the Popes Confirmation And yet it might be thought that the Providence of God may as well order the decisions of General Councils to be infallibly true in points of Faith for the guidance of his Church as that it should infallibly guide the Bishop of Rome whenever he teacheth Doctrines of Faith who in other cases and in his own person is acknowledged by his chief Advocates to be fallible even concerning Matters of Faith 7. But there are others or Oral Tradition who call themselves Members of that Church but are in no great favour and esteem at Rome who lay no stress upon the unerring judgments of either Pope or Council more than of other men but place a kind of Infallibility upon the certainty of Oral Tradition and thence conclude that whatsoever is delivered down in a Church by way of Tradition must be infallibly true because no Age could make any change therein This is Mr. White 's way and particularly asserted in (n) J. S. h. sure footing the Discourses of Mr. Serjeant But what is said in defence of this way is pure Sophistry And if such persons furnished with these Notions or Fancies had lived in the beginning of Christianity they might have been Advocates either for Paganism or the Traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees on whose behalf the indefectiveness of Tradition might have been urged as well as for the Church of Rome and almost in a persect Parallel 8. Secondly Infallibility is not owned by the chief of the Romanists who neither own the Pope's judgment nor the Councils in deciding controversies There is good reason to think that the chief men of the Church of Rome give little credit themselves to the pretence of Infallibility For in such great Controversies wherein considerable numbers of that Church are ingaged on both sides these have some of them for many Ages continued without any satisfactory decision from their Infallibility even in such cases where such a decision would contribute much to truth would end quarrels and be greatly useful for the guiding all mens Consciences And therefore the determining such things would be an excellent work of charity but the leaving them undetermined or at least the allowing the liberty of rejecting any pretended or real determination may be politick lest they should disoblige the contrary party I shall instance in that Question which is at some times of concernment to all Mens Consciences of their Communion whether the authority of the Pope or a General Council be the greater Which hath never yet been decided by the consent of a Pope and a General Council Indeed in some smaller Councils (o) 70 Decret l. 3. Tit. 7. c. 1. Leo the tenth did at the Lateran assert the Authority of the Pope above a Council And Pius the second in a Provincial Council at Mantua declared (p) Ibid. l. 2. Tit. 9. c. 1. appeals from a Pope to a future Council to be void and Schismatical which was also confirmed (q) Ibid. c. 2. by Julius the second But this way of decision is so little satisfactory among themselves that the Cardinal of Lorrain did in the Council of Trent openly declare (r) Hist Conc. Trid. l. 8. p. 580. that the Council was above the Pope and that this was the general sense of the French Church And divers other Bishops spake their judgments there to the same purpose 9. And the General Councils of Basil and Constance asserted the authority of the Council above the Pope and yet this is no satisfactory decision to them of the contrary opinion So that here we have the pretence to Infallibility whether in the Pope or in a General Council slighted by themselves as they think fit And this is a thing of such concern that if the highest authority be in the Council this must fix the Infallibility there also if there be any such thing because infallible determination must be by a Divine guidance and so must include God's Authority in that Determination to which none can be Superior If this be seated in the Council it would take down the Pope's Plumes If in the Pope the World might be spared the trouble of General Councils as a needless thing and then all those Christian Churches Emperors and Bishops which will take in divers Bishops of Rome were very imprudent who either laboured much for them or took any great satisfaction in them Wherefore it must needs be a business of design and not of integrity to make a loud noise about Infallibility to prevail thereby upon the Consciences of other men when they have so low an esteem of it themselves 10. Thirdly No Infallibility of the Roman Church Romish Infallibility unknown to Primitive Christianity was ever known or owned in the Primitive Church and therefore was never delivered by Christ or his Apostles but the pretence thereof is an Innovation of later date And whereas the Pope unjustly pretends to a singular right of Succession to the Authority and Prerogatives of S. Peter it is observable that S. Peter himself though an eminent and prime Apostle even in a Council had no peculiar gift of Infallibility or judgment of decision above other Apostles For in the Council of Jerusalem Acts 15. when after much disputation S. Peter had declared his sense v. 7 11. and after him S. James expressed his judgment v. 13 21. the final determination of that Council did much more follow the words of S. James than of S. Peter v. 19 20. with 28 29. Wherefore the claim of (ſ) Hist Conc Trid. l. 7. p. 552. Pius the fourth in his Epistle to the Emperor must have an higher Plea than that of Succession to S. Peter that if the Bishop of Rome be present in a Council he doth not only alone propose but he also alone decrees and the Council adds nothing but Approbation 11. Nor can it be imagined that if the Primitive Church had owned any Infallibility in the Pope or Romish Church that so Pious and good a Bishop as Cyprian would so earnestly have opposed the declaration of Stephen Bishop of Rome concerning the Baptism of Hereticks But he not only declares Stephen to (t) Cyp. Ep. 74. be in an error but declares him to have written proudly impertinently ignorantly and imprudently which sufficiently shews him to have known nothing of his Infallibility And (u) Inter Ep. Cyp. Ep. 75. Firmilianus a renowned Bishop of Cappadocia declares his sense against the Epistle and Judgment of Stephen also approving S. Cyprian's answer to it and using severe expressions against the behaviour and determination of Stephen as bold insolent and evil improbè gesta And (w) Sent. Episcop Conc. Carth. in
faithful delivery of Christian truths by word of mouth to be a very useful way to bring many to the Faith or to establish them in it and we doubt not but that very great Multitudes who have not the advantage of using reading or hearing the Scriptures may by this means be brought to believe Such was the case of some barbarous Nations in the Primitive times and of many Pagans in these later times But since the ceasing of the extraordinary gifts of revelation in the Church the most faithful delivery of these truths is that which is guided by the Scripture and takes that for its Rule and such are the sober instructions of knowing and well grounded Protestants and no other delivery can be faithful but that which is agreeable to the Scripture and its ruling Power and this was the commendation Irenaeus gave to Polycarp Eus Hist Eccl. lib. 5. c. 20. that he delivered all things consonant to Scriptures Yet though this way of delivery by word of mouth is very useful yet it was then only a sure Rule of Faith when these truths were delivered of them who were inspired of God and thereby were infallible in their delivery and such was the delivery by the Apostles and Evangelists both in their preaching and in their Writing Next to the Apostles but not equally with them we would value the delivery of Apostolical men But in after-ages we deny any certainty of infallible delivery of truths in the way of Oral Tradition and acknowledge that only a certain delivery which appears such by its accord and agreement with the Scripture Rule And as to the sense of Scripture we doubt not but when God gave the Primitive Church gifts of interpretation there was a delivery of the sense of Scripture not only in plain and necessary things which are obvious from the words but even in many more hard and difficult Texts of Scripture Yet all obscure Scriptures were not even in those times explained and their explications generally received since S. Peter speaks of many things in S Pauls Epistles which were hard to be understood which if the interpretation of them had been generally delivered and received in the Churches in Gods name they could not have been The great and necessary Doctrines were then received and delivered according to the true intent and meaning of Christ and that was agreeable to the Scriptures Hence the delivery of any truth to all Churches in the Apostles times and its being received by them so far as this could be made evident was a very useful way to destroy Heresie yet the Fathers who made use of this way did also shew that these truths were plain in Scripture To these Churches so far as the Doctrine by them received can be manifested we would willingly appeal for a trial of Controversies and do readily imbrace such truths as by sure evidence appear to be the Doctrine held by those Churches Partly as thus delivered and chiefly as clear in Scripture we receive those Articles of Faith contained in the Creed commonly owned in the Catholick Church but the Creed we conceive to be delivered in a much more sure and safe way than Oral Tradition since the words of it have with common consent been agreed on fixed and determined the want of which advantage in the Romish Tradition doth manifest it to be very alterable and uncertain in other Doctrines But that all points of Christian Doctrine or Apostolical interpretations of hard Scriptures are infallibly delivered from the Primitive Churches by the way of Oral and Practical Tradition we deny Nor can there be more reason to perswade us that the present delivery of the Romish Church doth faithfully preserve such Doctrines and interpretations than would also perswade that when Ezra read the Law and caused the people to understand the sense of it we might certainly find the Doctrines by him taught and the interpretations by him given amongst the Traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees as surely as we could have them from Ezra's mouth or from them who heard him and were faithful relaters of his teaching I will only further here observe that Tradition may be considered either as a meer speculation and notion and thus a man may imagine a constant delivery of the self same things truths and actions by the successions of several generations without considering whether there really be any such delivery or whether it can be rationally expected and to treat of such a Tradition as this being a Rule of Faith is but to discourse of aiery fancies and imaginations Or else Tradition may be considered as something reall and in being and thus we may inquire whether such a Tradition as is to be found in the Church or in the World be a sure way to deliver truth infallibly to Posterity This is that we Protestants deny and if this Author intend not the proof of this he will speak nothing to the purpose and will only shew that such Tradition as they of Rome or any other in the World have not might be the Rule of Faith and notwithstanding all this they will be destitute of it I shall now examine his Discourses of Tradition in which every Reader will be able to observe that he hath made no proof considerable unless he hath said more for the Tradition of the Romish Church than can be said to prove Religion not corrupted before the Flood or after the Flood amongst the Gentiles or before the Captivity and at the time of Christ amongst the Jews § 1. Coming to inquire whether that Tradition be the Rule of Faith which he calls Oral and Practical he thus explains it We mean a delivery down from hand to hand by words and a constant course of frequent visible actions conformable to those words of the sense and faith of the fore-Fathers Our business in this Discourse is to inquire whether this can be a Rule of Faith which the Discourser affirms and Protestants deny § 2. To understand this way of Tradition he observes on this manner Children learn the names of Persons Rooms and things they converse with and afterwards to write read and use civil carriage And looking into the thing they gain the notions of several objects either by their own senses or by the help of having them pointed at and this he observes is the constant course of the World continued every Age yea every Year or Month. This is Tradition in Civil matters Concerning this Tradition it may be observed that about matters visible to sense the Objects or Things and the names of the things must be distinctly considered The common notions of Objects visible as of Heaven Earth Sun Moon Rooms Man Trees c. are by common apprehensions even of Children received from Senses not by tradition of a former Generation and those apprehensions are preserved by the view of the visible objects But the words or names are indeed delivered in such a way of Tradition but words thus delivered are not
Tradition § 11. He proceeds to the sixth Property That it is certain in it self because this will prove the fourth fifth and seventh Now though this be not true that what is certain in its self can satisfie the piercing Wits and convince obstinate Adversaries and be ascertainable unto us because there may be a certainty in the thing which is not discerned and it is not the being but the evidence of certainty submitted to that works these effects else could there be no dissatisfaction in any thing since all truth is certainly in it self truth yet if he can prove the certainty of Tradition I shall over and above yield the rest This he thus goes about to prove Since Faith must be certain and must have a certain Rule he hath as he saies shewed that Scripture is not certain therefore Oral Tradition is This loose Argument deserves no better answer than that I have shewed Scripture is certain in it self therefore Oral Tradition is not Yet I must tell him his Argument is otherwise faulty than in supposing his having proved Scripture not certain for there is something besides Scripture which is a better guide or leader to the Faith than the Oral Tradition and that is the Doctrine of the Primitive Church as preserved in the Ancient Fathers or approved Writers of their time For though they were men and might in some things mistake and therefore their testimony is much inferiour to Scripture yet since they lived in times near the Apostles and when the vigour of Christian piety was much continued the Doctrines then received are more like to be truth than what is now owned in the Church of Rome after many successions of Ages and great degeneracy of life even in the dreggs of time And we have as much and more reason to think these men both capable of knowing Doctrines then delivered as the Faith of Christ and faithful in relating them as we can have to judge so concerning any persons now in the Church of Rome But that there is not an agreement in all considerable points in what was then delivered and owned by the Fathers and the present Traditions of the Romish Church may be collected from one instance I shall hereafter mention Disc 8. and so far as concerns this Author from their Rule of Faith which shall be discussed in the end of this Book § 12. He would prove the certainty of Tradition in that he saith It hath for its basis the best nature in the Vniverse man's and that not in speculations which may mistake by passion but his eyes and ears which are necessarily subject to the operations of nature and this in most many times every day which is a much higher certainty than a sworn Witness hath of what he saw or heard but once These upon serious inquiry appear empty vain words For doth Faith consist only in seeing and hearing Must there not be a delivering and receiving which supposeth conceptions and many other acts of the mind He who considers this aright will find the hasis of Tradition to be like Fame's basis a man clad with all his infirmities with a memory that may let things slip especially if they be numerous as revealed truths are with an understanding that may mistake especially in things difficult as many truths are with affections that may disrelish or slight them if corruption prevail as it may oft do in the members of the Church with imaginations which may alter or add somewhat when they think they only explain and yet still may they not deliver all they know and remember In this case he who may be certain that he hath heard such and such words delivered may remain very uncertain whether they be true or not And he who is a Witness in any Court may be much more sure that what he once saw or heard if he perfectly remember it was so heard or seen by him than any man can be of the true relation of things he hath oft heard spoken by men who took them themselves upon others relations and they on others and so on So that the great imperfection of Tradition is chiefly as to the delivery of it by former Ages which this Author doth not so much as touch of here in his proof of its certainty and what pretensions he makes use of in after Discourses shall be answered in their place But what he saith That in most many times every day are these impressions made upon their senses this may be true concerning some Christian truths but to assert this concerning all truth is such an apparent falsity as no ingenuous man could be guilty of For it is plain that in many things they of the Romish Church cannot agree which is truth and have had in many Cases Councils and Decrees to determine what things are matters of Faith and in many other things they are yet undetermined which could not be if these things were daily cleared to their senses unless they be men of much duller sense than the rest of mankind are § 13. He reminds of what he had said before § 8. That it is as evident that while the next Age believes and practises as the former Age did they are of the same Faith as it is that to believe the same is to believe the same But this is not at all to the purpose concerning Oral Tradition only this Discourser pleaseth himself generally in shifting off or wholly omitting matters difficult and sometimes going about to prove what no Adversary would dissent in But there is no certainty in the way of Tradition as we have above shewed that any Age doth in all things believe as the former Age held See n. 13 14. § 14. He tells his Reader That Dissenters or Doubters can say nothing against the way of Tradition not with all the quirks ingenuously misused Logick and abused into Sophistry can furnish them with Indeed what he hath hitherto pleaded for Tradition hath been nothing else but disingenuously abused Logick and Sophistry but what he now asserts is a bold daring to let his Reader know that under some contrived expressions he will strain to vent any falshood though never so gross Will he say that nothing can be said against this Rule when he cannot but know that Protestants who dissent from it do say very much against it yea they say so much as they know can never be solidly answered Yea that we may see how little he designs truth in his Discourse he who here would perswade his Reader that nothing can be said against his way of Oral Tradition yet Disc 7. § 1. himself tells him of somewhat that seems mainly to prejudice it and spends that Discourse in Answer Though indeed much more than that is by us observed against Tradition He concludes § 15. from his Discourse that the four last conditions of the Rule of Faith agree to Tradition but since by Trial his Discourse appears very unsound and faulty I conclude from the
incomparably more powerfal causes to carry the will than temporal ones therefore a world of Believers cannot be willing to do that which would lose them and their Posterities infinite goods and bring them infinite harms To this I answer That if this be spoken of the generality of professed Christians these words would still as much plead against Adams fall and the corruptions of Gentiles and Jews as against defection in the Romish Church since all these had the greatest goods and harms proposed to them But I further answer That a considerable number in former Ages would indeavour to know and deliver ttuth aright but they still are liable to mistakes and others that hear them to misunderstandings and also it is possible that the subtilty of some Deceivers may take place and be received sooner than their delivery of truth by which means those truths may many of them be lost or perverted and even in these last Ages I doubt not but even in the Roman Church there are many who would desire good and love truth and therefore as they have discerned it many have forsaken the Romish way but they who most desire to find it can in the way of Tradition see no more than is there to be seen and if others by subtilty corrupt some of that it is not in the power of these honest meaning persons to hinder the prevalency of such corruptions if they be promoted by a more potent party and interest § 8. If any think the proposal of Sensible Objects more considerable than of Spiritual he indeavoureth to shew the excellent proposal of the truths of God and thereby evidenceth they may be applied This doth not much concern Protestants we acknowledge that there is nothing wanting as to the proposal of Gods truth but yet there was in many neglect of receiving what was sufficiently propounded whence followed all the abovementioned miscarriages And even God himself propounded his truths as he thought most meet that is he proposed such as were not so necessary for all to know more mysteriously whence many might be ignorant of them or misapprehend but other necessary truths he propounded with abundant evidence and plainness But in the present way of Tradition what this Authour observes to make the proposal evident is very imperfect for though they have obvious Metaphors daily Practices Language and Actions Sacraments and Ceremonies yet these things may themselves partake of corruptions and then may help to clear what is propounded that somewhat may be understood but not withal to secure that this is certainly from God and therefore is Divine truth Nor do most of these things reach all truth to be delivered nor secure from all misapprehension so far as they are intended to signifie truth in such matters as are more difficult and mysterious An Answer to his seventh Discourse concerning Heresie § 1. HE observes That that which seems only and mainly to prejudice his Argument is that there have been Hereticks or deserters of Tradition but he saith it sufficeth that the Causes to preserve Faith intire are as efficacious as those laid for the Propagation of mankind the only subject of Faith and more particulars fail in propagating their kind than their Faith In answer to this I first observe that though it much destroyes the grounds laid by this Authour to observe that there have been Heresies and those much spread in the Church yet this is not the only prejudice against his Argument for if we had never heard of or could make no proof of any Heresies in the Christian Church yet from considering the very nature of Oral Tradition as hath been shewed in the former Discourse and from observing what great defects were in it both amongst Gentiles and Jews it is sufficiently manifest that it is not indefectible and hath not the certainty requisite to the Rule of Faith by which means if Heresies had not been they might begin But I further undertake to manifest that because it is certain that Heresies have spread in the Church from this consideration it is evidenceable that Oral Tradition is so defectible as that it cannot be a sure Rule of Faith His paralleling Tradition with the propagation of mankind is a meer piece of sophistry For if he indeed assert that the causes to preserve Faith intire in the way of Tradition are as sufficient as those to propagate mankind in the intire nature of man he must then either acknowledge that there have been oft Societies of persons of different natures both in themselves and from mankind who are brought up amongst men and call themselves men and propagate in their kind and cannot by the eye be distinguished from men and are capable of deceiving great multitudes by perswading them that they are the true men and that others are not or else he must deny that ever any such Hereticks have been in the Church who have declared themselves and have been owned by many others to be the true Christians and holders of the truth The case of Tradition and Propagation are wonderfully different also in that he who hath the nature of man in him by Propagation cannot alter this nature and make himself of another nature at his own pleasure whereas it is very possible for such as have imbraced the true Christian Doctrine to forsake it and fall aside into Heresies as hath been oft evidenced in the World and also in that those particular persons in mankind who do not propagate their kind are not capable at their pleasure of propagating any thing different from man but in the way of Christian Faith they who do not propagate the true Faith may and many of them do propagate error and that so subtilly that very many are oft deluded by it Yea this Discourser himself § 2. acknowledgeth that he knows the multitudes of Hereticks which have from time to time risen makes this his Position seem incredible and therefore I infer that unless his Reader can be assured that this Position is more true than it seems to be he must from his own words conclude it really incredible § 2. He comes to consider how an Heresie is bred where he tells us The Church is to be considered as a Common-wealth under Discipline having Officers to take care that all Motives be actually applied and because it is impossible the perfection of Discipline should extend it self to every particular some by pride ambition lust and itching desire of followers may propose new tenets which by their plausibleness and licentiousness if Governours be not watchful may suit with the humour of divers and draw them into the same faction Thus a body is made inconsiderable in respect of the whole The Church stands upon the uninterrupted succession of her Doctrine They cry the Church hath erred in Faith and disgrace Tradition A new Rule is sought for either by private inspiration or waxen natured words They study wordish Learning and Criticisms and whilst the Traditionary Christian hath the
appellation of Catholick they must be content with other names as Lutherans Zuinglians Protestants c. He who observes the former part of this Paragraph will find it to be an acknowledging all his former Discourse ineffectual for if the formerly mentioned Motives may want application if Discipline be neglected and false tenets may be taking if Governours be not vigilant than all the pretended security of truth being preserved in the way of Oral Tradition must depend upon the supposed goodness and care of such persons as are to administer the Discipline of the Church and since there have been many bad Councils it is certain there have been bad and careless Church Governours and there cannot any security be given that these Governours might not sometimes cherish the false Doctrines and oppose the true and thereby the more effectually destroy the way of Oral Tradition But though there may be defection from truth this Discourser here seems to venture to find a way how the deliverers of Tradition may be known I will now examine all his Characters above recited First They who forsake truth are not alwaies an inconsiderable number in respect of the other When the ten Tribes served the Calves in Dan and Bethel they were a greater number than those who remained to Worship at Jerusalem In Elijah's time it was in Israel but a small number in comparison of the whole that did not bow their knees to Baal In the time when Christ was first manifested in the flesh the Dissenters from the Scribes and Pharisees in their pernicious Doctrines were not the greater number and when Arianism most prevailed the greater part of the Christian Church did acknowledge and own it for truth so that if the greater number have oft imbraced false Doctrine in points of Faith there can be no evidence from such numbers which is the true Doctrine Secondly Nor can the Professors of the true Doctrine be known by standing upon an uninterrupted succession of Doctrine publickly attested if by this he understands as he must the Oral and not the Scriptural way of attesting though even in the latter some may stand upon having what they have not and so likewise in the former for by this Rule the Scribes and Phasees and Talmudists who stand upon a constant succession of their Doctrine from Moses and Ezra must be acknowledged to hold truth where they differ from and contradict the Apostles and Christians nor can there be any reason why standing upon Tradition from Christ should be a security for truth when standing upon Tradition from Moses who was a faithful deliverer was no security yea by this Rule as hath been before observed Paganism would be defended for a true Religion and the Jews worshipping of Baalim and in the Christian state the Heresie of Artemon denying the Divinity of Christ since all these pretended a right to the most publick and open way of Oral Tradition Thirdly Nor are they to be accounted for Hereticks who make use of Criticisms for though nothing more than common reason and capacity is necessary to understand the main Doctrines of Christian Faith yet if all the users of Critical Learning in matters of Religion or points of Faith were to be condemned for Hereticks then not only Learned Protestants but all the most eminent writers among the Papists must be accounted Hereticks yea and even all the Fathers who have left any Books to us of considerable bigness must be taken into the number Yea the blessed Apostle S. Paul made use of Critical observation against the leven of the false Apostles in the Churches of Galatia Gal. 3.16 To Abraham and his Seed were the promises made he saith not unto Seeds as of many but as of one And to thy Seed that is Christ Yet I suppose this Discourser will not dare to say that S. Paul was in the error or Heresie because he made use of Criticisms and his opposers in the truth who pleaded a successively delivered Doctrine amongst the Jews Fourthly Nor can the true receivers of Christian Doctrine be known by being called Catholicks for first though the name of a Catholick be deservedly honoured by Christians and the persons who truly answer that name yet it was not the name whereby the Apostles did first call them who held the true Christian Faith but they were called Christians yea some both of the Ancients and of the Learned Moderns assert that this name of Catholick was not at all in use in the Apostles daies however that which then was not the chief name commonly applied to them who hold the truth can by no shew of reason be proved to be now the Character to know which hold the true Faith Secondly is it necessary they must be called Catholicks by all men or only by themselves and men of their own way if it be sufficient that they of their own way call them Catholicks then even the Arians must be acknowledged to have held the truth who published their Confession in the presence of Constantius under the name of the Catholick Faith as is asserted by Athanasius De Synodis Arim. and Seleucia and by this Rule Papists indeed will come in but if this was enough who sees not that it would be in the power of any party of men to evidence to the world that their Heresies are truths by their declaring themselves by the name of Catholicks But if it be necessary that they must be generally called Catholicks by them who differ from them then it would likewise follow that it is in the power of the Adversaries of the truth to take away from the holders of truth that certain Character whereby they may be known to hold truth if they refuse to call these holders of truth by the name of Catholick and it will likewise follow that their holding of truth must be judged of by the opinions or words of opposers and not from their own Doctrines and Positions And yet by this Rule the Papists must not be owned for holders of the truth for Protestants do not generally give them the name of Catholicks nor acknowledge them to be truly such but to be Schismaticks We indeed oft call them by the name of Roman Catholicks or Pseudocatholicks and when ever any Protestants call them Catholicks they mean those who call themselves so and would be so owned in the same manner as our Saviour called the Scribes and Pharisees Builders saying he was the stone which the builders refused Thirdly Nor is it possible there should be any such latent virtue in the name Catholick to shew who hold the truth more than was in the Old Testament in being called the Children of the Prophets and the Covenant which God made with Abraham the followers of Moses and the Keepers of the Law which were terms applied to the unbelieving Jews in and after the times of Christ Fifthly Nor is it the mark of an Heretick to be called by some other appellation than that of Catholick for if
of this Principle of making Scripture our Rule that if any Christians should live under such a Power as this Author speaks of should be a self-condemning tyranny over mens consciences if in this case Subjects make Scripture their Rule they must live in patience meekness peace humility and subjection to the Higher Powers and it must be from pride wrath passion malice and refusing to be subject all which are directly contrary to the Scriptures that all Rebellion against Government must proceed Whence amongst the Primitive Christians where the Laws of their Persecutors commanded them the worship of a Deity and yet punished them for worshipping the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and Christ his Son with the holy Spirit which is the only God and the Christians knew there was none else and punished them for not worshipping as Gods them whom they knew were no gods yet in this case the Christian Principles which the Scripture delivers kept them in all loyal subjection to their Governours If this Principle of making Scripture every where our Rule both as to Faith and Life be prevalent as it will guide us aright into the truth so it will end all quarrels silence all animosities and contentions and would reduce the world to such a perfect state of quiet peace friendship and love as never yet flourished upon the face of the Earth § 5. He tells us The use of this Discourse is to conclude the deserters of the way of Tradition to be very few to which he hath received our answer § 3. and the Cause laid to preserve Traditionary Christians is far more steady than that laid to preserve mankind I have answered his comparison of Tradition and Propagation § 1. But if he will be so confident as to tell his Reader that the way of Tradition is as surely supported as the Propagation of mankind I would only advise him to be so ingenuous as to speak plainly out his meaning and say that as in mankind the causes for keeping intire the nature of man are such that no company in the World ever pretended themselves to be of the nature of man who really were not so the way to preserve Tradition is such that no Society of men ever did pretend to have received and held this truth when indeed they had it not and if he would thus do he might amuse his Reader but would never deceive him having before told him that there have been many Hereticks in the World and that even amongst these the way of continuing Heresie is the propagating of it by the way of Tradition An Answer to his eighth Discourse shewing that uninterruptedness of Tradition is not proved à posteriori § 1. HE declares That he will trie to conclude the indeficiency of Tradition from such an effect as can only spring from Traditions indeficiency of its Cause § 2. he saith this seems needless against Protestants who yield the points of Faith we agree in to have come down by this way of Tradition He presseth therefore from Protestants a candid Answer to these Queries 1. Was not the Trinity Incarnation and all other Points in which we agree held in all Ages since Christ by Gods Church 2. Whether seeing those points were held ever of Faith Fathers did not actually teach Children so or the former Age the latter if so they came down by Tradition 3. By what virtue did Tradition perform this and whether the same virtue was not as powerful to bring down other things had any such been 4. Is there not a necessary connexion between such a constant cause and its formal effect so that if its formal effect be those Points received as delivered ever the proper Cause must be an ever-delivery But because he fears the Protestant will flie off here he will follow his designed method Sure he rather supposed the Protestant could easily baffle these fancies than that he would flie from such shadows To the 1. Qu. I answer That if we indeed understand by Gods Church that number of Christians who have intirely and constantly held all the Principles of Christian Religion they must needs have held these great truths likewise But many have pretended to be Gods Church who held them not Nor hath this belief been alwaies preserved in the Churches who once imbraced it since the Eastern Churches who before received the true Doctrine of Christ were drawn aside by the Arian infection and denied those points which shews Tradition not certainly enough to preserve these points in any particular Church To the 2. Qu. I answer That in the Church of God which ever held these points Fathers did teach their Children these Doctrines yet were they not only nor chiefly continued by the way of Oral Tradition For the Primitive Christians made Scripture their Rule as shall be after shewed from their Writings and Fathers taught Children chiefly then by what they read and received by the writings of the Scriptures And the Children of these Parents had not only their Parents teaching but they had also the Scriptures read among them and perused by them and by this means in the Primitive times were these Doctrines continued That the Apostolical Doctrine was continued in the Church chiefly from the Scriptures Irenaeus testifies even of those Primitive times Adversus Haeres lib. 4. c. 63. The Doctrine of the Apostles is the true knowledge which is come even unto us being kept without fiction by the most full handling of the Scriptures That Christians then received their instruction in the Church chiefly from Scriptures he likewise sheweth lib. 5. c. 20. where he exhorts to flie from the Opinion of the Hereticks and flie unto the Church and be brought up in its bosom and be nourished by the Lord's Scriptures For saith he the Paradise of the Church is planted in this World therefore the Spirit of God saith Ye shall eat food of every tree of the Paradise that is eat ye of every Scripture of the Lord. For very many more testimonies and those very clear I refer to what shall be purposely discoursed in answer to his consent of Authority Yea such was the esteem of the use of Scripture that in the Primitive times before their Children were taught matters of human literature they were instructed in the holy Scriptures Thus was Origen brought up Eus Hist Eccl. lib. 6. c. 3. and Eusebius Emissenus according to the common custom of their Country in like manner first learned the Scriptures Sozom. Hist Eccl. lib. 3. cap. 5. To his 3. Qu. Were it certain that these truths had been preserved by the way of Oral Tradition only in the true Church of God as indeed they have not been yet this is not by any such virtue in the way of Tradition as would secure the right delivery of all other things For this is wholly contingent in respect of Tradition depending upon this supposal that in such a Society it hath alwaies been rightly delivered and rightly received which
is a contingency and notwithstanding the virtue of Tradition might have been otherwise as appeared in the Eastern Churches under Arianism Yea the reason why these Doctrines are preserved intire among the Romanists is probably this that as they have been and are delivered by them from the Scriptures they are also delivered in certain forms of words and in those Creeds which were received from those Ancient Churches and Councils who were not erroneous but agreed to the Scripture Now whereas their Tradition directs to receive what hath been delivered and the things delivered have been some by Councils truly Catholick and other things by erroneous Councils it may well be that Tradition may in some things deliver rightly and yet either omit the delivery of other things or deliver them amiss And if there had been nothing more to have preserved these Doctrines in the Western Church but what was in the necessary virtue of Tradition the Romish Church not here to mention any thing of Arian Popes might have lost these points as well as the Eastern long since did where Tradition lost this virtue of preserving them Now that it may appear how vainly this Discourser would conclude the certainty of Tradition from the things propounded in these Queries I shall mention some parallel Cases to which the substance of what is here questioned may be applied As 1. Concerning Gentilism To follow this Authour I would ask was not the Belief of a God and what things we agree in constantly preserved by Tradition among them now by what virtue did Tradition perform this may we not by the same virtue of Tradition receive what they delivered concerning the way of Gods Worship and would not this Tradition as well have continued all other things if any such had been delivered Thus it would plead for Gentilism 2. How would this plead for Judaism Did not Tradition amongst them continue till Christs time the Doctrine of Circumcision of the Sabbath of Sacrifices and of a Messias and must they not needs be in the right in all other matters of delivery though they were condemned by Christ and his Apostles 3. See how these Queries would plead against all possibility of forgetfulness When I have read a Book over and am certain I rightly remember some clauses in it may I thence conclude that by the same virtue of memory I remember these I should have remembred all other clauses if there had been any and therefore certainly there was no more in the Book than I can remember Or if I should conclude that because I am certain that I remember some passages which happened when I was a Child therefore by the same virtue that these things were delivered to my memory I also remember aright all things then done who would not see that this is a meer vain piece of Sophistry since some things may be more fully understood than others and more heedfully observed the impression upon many occasions more deeply imprinted and the remembrance of them more frequently repeated whence some things may be remembered and others not and the same causes may be assigned in matters of Religion To his 4. Qu. I answer Things may be received as delivered ever when yet there was no ever-delivery which I will manifest in answer to the following § where he would prove the contrary § 3. He layes down this effect The present perswasion of Catholicks that their Faith hath descended from Christ and his Apostles uninterruptedly which must for its Cause have Traditions Ever-Indeficiency § 4. To prove this he layes his first Principle That Age which holds Faith so delivered cannot change nor know any change of it because no man much less a whole Age can hold contrary to knowledge nor here change without knowledge To this I answer That supposing the abovementioned perswasion this may rise from other causes besides Traditions indeficiency Yea this his first Principle to prove the contrary is very weak For first it is very easie to conceive that mistaken Explications of Points of Faith may be held by a present Generation as having been matters of Faith ever delivered and yet may be really different from the things delivered and so include a change This is the more apt to take place if such explicated points seem plausibly declared and are either abetted by men of great fame or serve an interest and this is as possible as it is for men to be deceived in their conceptions about things not in express terms delivered since it is certain that many points now owned as matters of Faith in the Romish Church were not expresly and in such terms delivered of old yea this Authour acknowledgeth as much p. 206 207. Many such explicated points have in Councils been declared to be de fide though not only against the minds of many who before asserted the contrary but of others who in the said Councils opposed it Secondly to deliver a Doctrine as from Christ where they change or know some change of it is much more probable in the Roman Church than in others if any ignorance possess the Leaders or any interest and private designs take place upon some few of them For since the Tradition which particular persons have received must submit to the determination of a Council◠or else must they be anathematized how easie is it for some point de fide to be innovated if the Bishop of Rome and some few other men of note and fame through mistaken zeal or out of design should indeavour the having such a Point declared as a matter of Faith when he can send what Bishops he please or create new ones and many others may for want of circumspection comply in order to peace as some well disposed Bishops did unadvisedly with some of the Arian devices And in this case though there may be some withstanders yet may they not be numerous and therefore must sit still being overpowerred and will think they ought in the end to consent if they have received this Principle which many Papists imbrace That the determinations of such a Council are to determine their private judgments what is the Doctrine of the Church § 5. His second Principle is No Age could innovate any thing and deliver that thing as received by constant succession For the end of delivering it as so received must be to make the following Generation believe it Now if a whole Age should conspire to tell such a lie yet it is impossible it should be believed since they cannot blot out all Monuments which might undeceive and therefore the following Generation cannot believe unless they will believe what they know to be otherwise This Second Principle is unsound upon the same grounds with the other For as hath been now shewed there may happen such an innovation by the mistake or non-attendance of a considerable number especially in Councils who sometimes are too readily guided by some few eminent leading men who may act either out of mistake or some of
being delivered For if any one of these be false as doubtless they are his demonstration falls with them But that we may further see the virtue of this demonstration it may be observed that he who will suffer-himself to be perswaded by these vain reasonings may with as much reason be a Jew or a Pagan as a Papist The Jewish Doctrine held forth by their Talmud as also the former Doctrines of the Scribes and Pharisees were believed by that people to be delivered ever from Moses and Ezra here is an effect like this of the Papists perswasion therefore in no Age could it be changed but was ever delivered and therefore true if the Romish Tradition be upon these grounds sufficiently proved indefectible Amongst the Gentiles the Opinions of Jupiter Juno Mars c. being gods was believed to have been ever delivered to them from some Divine Revelation of its Original for else they could never have believed them to have been gods Now since it is certain the Gentiles received this by Tradition from their Fathers and the first Generations of mankind after Noah were undoubtedly instructed in the truth concerning God of which Noah was a Preacher of long continuance amongst them since according to this Discourser no Age could deceive them in delivering what it knew false or in delivering for certain what it knew was not certain Yea since the Tradition of Gentile Polytheism was more general than the Popish Tradition that is it was received and delivered amongst more Nations and contradicted by fewer persons than the Romish Doctrines were and therefore if Tradition be demonstrated to be indefectible by this Argument for the Papists it must be also for the Gentiles Yet this belief amongst the Gentiles of Polytheism necessarily supposed a failing of Tradition in this great point that there is one only God So far is it from proving that their Tradition could not fail I shall now in the close of this Discourse as I promised n. 8. give an instance of a Point in which there is an Innovation in the present Oral and Practical Tradition of the Roman Church which is in denying the Cup in the Eucharist to the Communicants The present Tradition and practice of the Church of Rome is that the Laity and the Clergy who do not consecrate do receive only in one species to wit that of Bread and this they declare to be lawful and the contrary not to be necessary or commanded of God and to be ordered upon just causes to be a true receiving the Sacrament and to be the way whereby they may receive whole Christ and they condemn yea and Anathematize any who shall speak the contrary as may be seen Concil Constanc Ses 13. and Conc. Trid. Ses 5. Now both those Councils do acknowledge that Christ did institute and the ancient Church administred this Sacrament under both kinds and therefore by their own acknowledgement they keep not in practice to what was delivered But the Question is Whether their present practice and Doctrinal delivery opposeth any former delivery of Doctrine Now that I may lay a good foundatipn and such as no Romanist will reject to know what was once the received and delivered Doctrine in the Church of Rome I shall apply my self not to any private Father though approved which possibly he will except against as not a sufficient testifier of Tradition but to such a constitution of the Bishop of Rome as is still acknowledged to have been an approved Canon and therefore the Doctrine of the Roman Church which is this of Gelasius the First We have found that some having received only a portion of the holy Body do abstain from the Cup of the consecrated Blood who because I know not by what superstition they are taught to be bound up must without doubt either receive the whole Sacrament or be kept back from the whole because the division of one and the same Mystery cannot come without great Sacriledge This is delivered for an approved Canon by all Papists Ivo placed it in the beginning of his Decretum Gratian inserted it De Consecratione Dist 2. c. comperimus It is owned by Bellarmine de Eucharistia lib. 4. c. 26. by Baronius ad Ann. 496. n. 20. and Binnius in Vit. Gelasii Nor is it denied by any that I know And whereas the present Tradition asserts that it is not necessary the Laity and Clergy not Consecrating should receive in both kinds this old Tradition saies plainly that they who receive not both kinds must receive neither it being one and the same Mystery or Sacrament And though there are some Causes now declared just and rational to order that the Communion shall be only in one kind and the Council of Constance ubi supra condemn those who call this practice Sacrilegious yet it is possible the same reasons might move some in Gelasius his time to receive only in that one kind but what ever the reason was he declared it could never be approved and its Principle was Superstition and in practice there could never be a division in this one and the same Sacrament without great Sacriledge Now though these words are very plain yet there are two waies the Papists make use of to pervert the sense of them which I shall discover to be vain and frivolous answers and so vindicate this testimony The first answer is that this Canon refers to the Priests not the Laity This is the interpretation in the Rubrick of Gratian and is mentioned as probable by Bellarmine But 1. These words of the Canon are generally spoken by Gelasius so as to include the Laity and with no colour of reason can they be restrained to the Clergy and speaking of them whom he would have driven back or kept back from the Sacraments and of them who are taught the ordinary receivers are plainly included if not chiefly intended and finding fault with this that some abstained reason will evince that all are faulted who did so abstain 2. The restraining this to the Clergy is contrary to the History and general practice of those times it being certain and confessed that even in the Western Church not only till that time but for some hundreds of years after this Sacrament was administred to all in both kinds In this case to conclude that when some were found to abstain from one kind they must be supposed to be of the Clergy would be a vain surmise 3. This answer accordeth not with the Doctrine of those ancient times which owned the Laity to have the same right to receive in both kinds with the Clergy Thus Chrysostome who was owned as Saint and Father at Rome Hom. 18. in 2. Ep. Corinth There is saith he something wherein there is no difference betwixt the Priests and the People to wit as to the receiving the dreadful Mysteries for we have all alike right to partake of them Not as it was under the Old Testament the Priest did eat some things and the people other
the case of many great and famous actions in the world which are now buried in oblivion or upon misinformation condemned but would have been honourably esteemed if they had been truly known And here the Tradition of the Turks concerning the precepts of Mahomet which were liable to mistake would probably have been lost if they had not been preserved in a written Alcoran And the Traditional evidence of this very Alcoran containing his Doctrine is much inferior to the Tradition of Christians for the Scriptures containing the Doctrine of Christ for even from the beginning of the reception of the Turkish Alcoran their Tradition hath not procured it so full approbation but that the Persians who profess themselves Mahometans deliver another Alcoran different from that of the Turks which they declare to contain the true precepts of Mahomet whereas Primitive Christians have as with one mouth all acknowledged that the Scriptures of the Prophets Apostles and Evangelists contain the Doctrine of Jesus Christ written by Divine inspiration Now to apply all this to the Doctrine of Christ It is certain 1. that many things delivered by him are capable of misunderstanding and not so easily intelligible as Mahomets existence is which is evidenced by the many mistakes in all Ages and disputes amongst true Catholick Christians as well as Papists about Doctrines of Religion 2. The Doctrine of Christ is likewise lyable to be perverted thus as in the time of the Old Testament the precepts of God were much corrupted by the Scribes and Pharisees who made void the Commandments of God by their Traditions so under the New Testament have many Hereticks grossly perverted this truth and many extravagant Opinionists have strangely blended it with their own misconceptions whence many errors are gone forth into the world 3. Nor can it be proved that in the way of Oral Tradition considered without Scripture all things delivered by Christ are continued in the Church for since in the multitude of Christs words not written by the Apostles or Evangelists the Romish Church cannot say that her Tradition hath preserved any how can the certainty of this Tradition be reasonably imagined so great as to secure a preservation of every Doctrine Now let us again observe that all these Considerations have the greater advantage against the certainty of Tradition by considering with them the many successions of Generations for matters of Faith if but once a little mistaken in one Generation since they must with these mistakes be delivered to the next Generation they may then be more mistaken and so by degrees very considerable mistakes and great corruptions may come in in points of Faith and as to omission of delivery of some truth if it be continued in several Generations yet if it be not impossible that any one Generation as to any truth should neglect the delivery it will in so many successions be very probable that some one hath failed But in the way of Scripture evidence the words are the same which were then delivered and the same words are no more capable of mistakes and corruptions in Doctrine than they were at the first nor are they less delivered to us now than they then were I may now infer from what is abovesaid that the belief of Mahomets existence may be continued by Tradition and yet it may not preserve the whole Body of Christs Doctrine § 4. He observes That humane authority or testimony is such that none are so mad as to doubt them but he that considers Joh. 3.16 1 Cor. 3.9 Mat. 6.26 will be convinced that the wayes of Providence to bring about mans salvation are so much above all others that others in comparison scarce deserve the name of a Providence We own Christianity much more certain than other Histories and things but that the preserving its certainty depends much more on Scripture than on Tradition is evident partly from reason because in a set form of written words a change cannot be so easily made without plain discovery as it may be where there is no such set form of words and partly from considering matters of fact whereby it may appear that Hereticks and opposers of the truth have more corrupted and spread corruptions of Christian Doctrine by their false delivery than ever they could corrupt and spread any corruptions of the Scripture-writing § 5 6. We will touch of the advantages superadded to nature It is natural for every man to speak truth unless some design hinder but true Christian hearts are much more fixt to Veracity § 7. Original corruption leads men to violate Veracity by an undue love of Creatures but Christianity working an overpowering love of Spiritual good leaves mans disposition to truth free § 8. The hopes and fears of Christianity as much exceed others as eternity doth a moment and are so held by all yet other Motives bring down matters of fact truly as the Reigns of Kings Wars Eclipses c. but that Christian Motives are more prevalent than all others appears by considering the Martyrs and Persecutions In answer to this I first observe that what he hath here laid down as a high security to the Churches Tradition makes nothing at all so much as seemingly for the securing all or any of its members from mistakes and misapprehensions nor for the preserving the weak from being deluded by others subtilty All it seems to plead against is intentional deceiving without which there may be much error But yet even this design of deceiving may with many in the Church much prevail notwithstanding all indeavoured to the contrary by this Discourser Where Christianity takes full possession in the power of it it will ingage such men to truth and the love of Heavenly good and the minding of Spiritual hopes and fears but how many are there who profess Christianity who oft speak falshood and are tempted to sin by undue love of Creatures and do not guide their lives according to the hopes and fears Religion sets before them Therefore these things cannot assure us of preserving men from perverting truth or neglect of delivering it much less from ignorance and mistake And as in other matters of History many things are delivered amiss in the common fame but best in the allowed Records so it is also in Christianity § 9. The Ceremonies or Oaths tendered to Officers in a Commonwealth to ingage them to be true to their Trust have no proportion with the Sacraments of the Church applied to Christians that they may not prevaricate from the Faith of Christ These are indeed exceeding high obligations which lie upon Christians But besides that it is no waies credible that all Christians judged themselves hereby obliged to deliver in the way of Oral Tradition all matters of Faith directly as they received them by the same Tradition I say besides this its certain it obliges men as much to the purity of the Christian life as to hold fast the verity of the Christian Doctrine wherefore when it is certain
that with many it doth not work its effect in the former it may be much feared to want its effect in the latter especially since there have been many Hereticks § 10. They who do not to others what they would have done to themselves this is because they are swayed by some temporal good but this cannot be in the Church supposing sanctity in it because in virtue and glory we have not the less when others have the more but rather we have the more also so that here Fathers must do the greatest hurt to their Children without the least good to themselves if they should deceive them But alas Is this Discourser such a stranger to the world that when he hath proved as it is easie to do that it is highly irrational for any man to chuse any sin he would thence conclude for certain that there are no such sinners in the world How evident is it that there hath been so much want of Sanctity that many either to please their own fancies or to promote their own interests have depraved the true Religion or corrupted the Christian Doctrine But in these cases as in all acts of sin men do not aim at the evil and hurt that follows but at the seeming good and delight § 11. Christian Doctrine hath the advantage of the greatest universality wisdom and goodness of the recommenders § 12. Nature will teach all a care of their off spring but Christianity more and chiefly in matters of endless misery and happiness § 13. Consider credit he who will lie perniciously and to friends how ill is this esteemed Chiefly if this be against the highest Motives and with the greatest confidence and Oaths This is of all other cases most disgraceful in matters which concern Christs Doctrine chiefly if in a Pastor against his particular Oath to preach Christs Doctrine truly Nor can the world of Fore-Fathers all conspire to this villany Yet it is certain notwithstanding the recommendations of the Christian Doctrine it may be both mistaken and depraved Nor doth love of off-spring take place actually against all setting examples of sin nor against ignorance and mistakes nor in Jews and Hereticks did it take place against corrupting worship Nor have all men been so tender of their credit Many Hereticks have been self-condemned There were who said of Christ let us kill him and the inheritance shall be ours Simon knew and was Baptized into the Christian Doctrine and yet thoughts of credit did not keep him from perverting it Yea men gain credit at least with a party by their erring explications if they be plausible and take with the multitude and then alone can they become Traditions However some there are who value not esteem either with men or with God who knowing the judgement of God that they which do such things are worthy of death not only do them but take pleasure in them that do them And if by such weak considerations as these above mentioned though the truth of the contrary is generally known in the world this Authour would conclude that Pastors can never deliver amiss and therefore whatever any Histories say to the contrary there never were erroneous Bishops in the Eastern or Western Churches or any places whatever I doubt he would be put to wonderful puzzles to reconcile the present Doctrines in all Churches Yet if Protestants may not as men of reason judge that Pastors have erred because all Histories and the present differences in Religion manifest it they will still as Christians believe that S. Peters Spirit was more infallible than this Discoursers who hath assured us 2 Pet. 2.1 2. That there shall be false Teachers who privily shall bring in damnable Heresies and many shall follow their pernicious wayes § 14. He concludeth with a flourish That every virtue and Science would contribute to Traditions certainty which would require he saith a large Volume to shew But that we may judge what this large Volume would be he gives us a taste wherein is nothing else but empty and frothy words Arithmetick lends her numbring and multiplying faculty to scan the vast number of testifiers Geometry her proportion to shew the infinite strength of certainty in Tradition c. But if such words as these were considerable this Discourser may receive a return more truly Arithmetick cannot number and determine the many possible and probable wayes of erring in Tradition Geometrical proportions cannot discover how manifold and great defects appear in the receiving the Body of Christs Doctrine by Tradition more than in the acknowledgement of Mahomets existence nor how great a proportion of men there are in the Church who have delivered their own opinions and speculations to one who only testifieth what he received Logick will discover the Sophistry in the pretended Arguments for Tradition Nature will evidence the great possibility of mans mistake or neglect in the way of Tradition Morality will shew the great corruption of man whereby he is lyable every where to err and miscarry Historical prudence will shew the failing of Tradition both in Jews and Gentiles and many Christian Nations overspread with known and confessed errors and will thence conclude that it is possible for any Nation or particular Church by Oral Tradition to neglect the faithful preserving truth Political Principles will evidence according to the practice of all Civil Policies that writing is a more exact way to convey down Laws and Rules of Order than Tradition is Metaphysicks with its speculations will evidence the very notion of Oral Tradition of the whole Body of Christs Doctrine to this Age to be an aiery vanity Divinity will discover much of the great wisdom and goodness of God in giving us the Scriptures rather than in leaving us to the uncertain and dangerous way of Tradition Controversie will evidence the uncertainty of almost every thing in Faith if it had no other Basis than mere Oral Tradition without any written support So that after all the survey of his several Discourses where nothing is solidly spoken for Tradition I may well conclude that this way of Tradition is defectible ANSWER TO HIS COROLLARIES AFter these several Discourses he deduceth forty one Corollaries built upon them all which must needs fall with the ruine of their foundation Yet that they may not pass without due Censure I shall briefly deduce other opposite Corollaries and for the most part directly contrary to them from our Discourse Corol. 1. They may of right pretend to Faith who hold not to Tradition since they have a sufficient Rule of Scripture and Motives enough to believe Disc 2.3 4. But they have no sure-footing in the Faith who depend only on this Oral Tradition since it is both a fallible and actually a false guide Disc 5.6 8. Cor. 2. They may pretend to be a Church and a true Church who own not Oral Tradition because they may be a number of Faithful Cor. 1. but whoever followeth any way of such Tradition cannot
manifest themselves to be a Church unless by recourse to some other Rule or way of evidence Disc 5. because they may in this way err from the Faith and so not be faithful Cor. 3. They may be members of a Church who are not followers of Tradition because by ordinary and sure means they may have Faith Cor. 4. They who renounce Tradition for their guide and close with Scripture are not cut off from the Faith thereby because they imbrace hereby the most sure Rule of Faith Cor. 5. The followers of such Ancestors who so renounced Tradition have the same security that they may have Faith by relying on the Scripture as a Rule Cor. 6. The followers of them who renounce Oral Tradition may rightly claim to be a part of Christian Tradition or deliverers of the Faith because they receive the Scripture Doctrine in written Records and so deliver it to others Disc 2. So did the Apostles deliver Doctrines to the Jews from the Old Testament Cor. 7. They who pretend to reform what is delivered as matters of Faith in any Church guided by Oral Tradition may hold the true Christian Faith because such Churches may err in the Faith as did the Jewish But then such Reformers must come to what appears by Records to be the Faith at first delivered Cor. 8. The followers of this way of Tradition cannot evidence who are truly faithful and of the Church because their Tradition is no sure Rule Disc 5.6 8. And if any should hold the Faith intire after successions of Tradition this is by chance and not demonstrative in the way of Tradition Cor. 9. The disowners of Tradition who hold to Scripture can give certain account who are to be held as truly faithful because they have a sure Rule to try this by which is the Scripture Cor. 10. Such who hold not this Tradition can rationally punish them who revolt from their Faith because they can by Scripture Rule sufficiently evidence the certainty of their Faith and the guilt of such revolters Disc 7. Cor. 11. That company of men hang together like the Body of a Christian Church who close with the Scripture and adhere not to Tradition because they hold Christs Doctrine delivered to them by the Apostles and Evangelists Writings whence the Roman Church is highly Schismatical for disowning all others and accounting it self the Vniversal Church Cor. 12. Tradition may be argued against out of the letter of Scripture because while Oral Tradition is uncertain Scripture is preserved certain by the delivery of Records which is a more sure and excellent way of delivery of Christs Doctrine Cor. 13. The Authority of some Churches may in reason be opposed against Tradition viz. The Authority of the Ancient Church against the present Oral Tradition because since Tradition is defectible the Doctrine of the Ancient Church might both differ from the present Church and is most like to be in the truth What he pretends of Tradition being Antecedent to the Church and including the living voice of the whole Church essential concerning present Tradition is a vain surmise for how can the present Tradition of which we dispute be antecedent to the Church sixteen hundred Years since established and since it is defectible Disc 6.8 how can it include the voice of that Church Cor. 14. Fathers or Councils may rationally be alledged against present Tradition for if they be Fathers or Councils now owned as Catholick by the holders of Tradition they will shew the inconsistency of Tradition with it self If they have formerly been owned as Catholick they will shew the change of Doctrine in the way of Tradition Cor. 15. Disowners of Tradition in right of reason must be allowed to argue against Tradition out of Scriptures Fathers and Councils for this is no matter of courtesie nor any argument only ad hominem but ad rem since they have a certainty of these things from Traditional Records Disc 2 3 4. How little the testimony of Tertullian is to his purpose see in the next Discourse in inquiry into Tertullians opinion of the Rule of Faith Cor. 16. The Authority of History or Testimonial Writing may be alledged against Tradition because matters of fact past and the former state of things may run contrary to present Tradition And the credibility of the Historian may be evident by his impartial writings agreement with other Writers by the testimony of other faithful Writers or the present Tradition concerning him or if in Church-History by his having been formerly received as a Catholick Writer Cor. 17. Other Tradition may in right of reason be alledged against Romish Oral Tradition for though the sure Christian Tradition be the most firm of any yet since the Traditional Records of Ancient Churches Disc 5. n. 20. and the delivery of truth in Scripture Disc 5. n. 18. are much surer than Oral Tradition and the different delivery in other Churches may be as sure as in the Roman they may be alledged against it Cor. 18. Arguments from Reason may be urged against Oral Tradition for since this Tradition is weak and fallible it may be disproved by reasons which are strong and solid Cor. 19. Instances may be argued from against Traditions certainty for since Tradition is defectible instances may have that Historical certainty which Tradition hath not and may in the allowance of the Author be delivered by Tradition and so shew its inconsistency Cor. 20. The denying Oral Tradition doth not dispose to Fanatickness because Protestants deny it not by recourse to a Light within but to a Rule without and rational evidence Cor. 21. Fanatick Principles may be confuted without the help of Romish Oral Tradition but not by it in a rational way for such confutation is by evidence of the 〈…〉 the contrary Now we can evidence the 〈…〉 and its being contrary to Fanatick 〈…〉 they cannot evidence the certainty of 〈…〉 Cor. 22. We may argue against Tradition without questioning the constancy of any species in nature or of mans-nature Because it is not founded upon mans nature but upon a supposal of his actions free from possible ignorance mistake corruption forgetfulness speculations and working fancies about notions received For by any of these which ordinarily attend man may Traditions certainty be destroyed Cor. 23. There is great possibility of various rational waies of arguing against Oral Tradition by Scripture Councils Fathers History Reason Instances c. Cor. 24. Oral and practical Tradition is no first Principle by way of Authority for matters of fact but Scripture-Tradition or other sure Traditional Records is such a Principle because Scripture and such Records are certain Disc 4. and Tradition is not Cor. 25. Nor is this Tradition self evident in matter of fact long since past because it is fallible and defectible Cor. 26. The certainty of Tradition being disproved that Church which relies on it cannot thereby be certain that it holds Christs Doctrine because this Tradition may err in this
Doctrine Cor. 27. Traditions certainty being disproved general or Provincial Councils or Societies cannot be infallible by proceeding upon it because it may both mislead and be mistaken Cor. 28. The Roman See with its head cannot be infallible by Traditional certainty because Tradition is fallible Nor hath the Church of Rome any particular advantages to render it hereby more infallible than any other When he here saies That the joint indeavours Preaching Miracles and Martyrdom of the two chief Apostles at Rome were more vigorous causes to imprint Christs Doctrine than were found any where else He sure forgat Jerusalem where were the joint indeavours Preaching and Miracles of Christ Jesus himself and all his Apostles the Passion of Jesus and Martyrdom of other chief Apostles and Prophets and yet in that Church were professed by the Bishops both Arianism and Pelagianism and therefore Rome cannot be proved free from false Doctrine by such Arguments Nor will its constant visible profession make more for Romish Oral Tradition than for Jewish or Gentile Tradition Cor. 29. If this Tradition were established and put in practice according to this Discoursers mind the Romish Church could not be secure that they have any Copy of Scripture truly significative of Christs sense Because if as this Author here talks They should correct Scriptures Letter by the sense of mens hearts it would be wonderfully depraved because in this sense Tradition may and doth err But we know Sixtus and Clemens went not this way in correcting the vulgar Latin And themselves declare that ancient Copies and Writings were their Rule for correction And by these means Protestants have a Copy preserved significative of Christs sense by the several deliveries of Scripture Copies in several Ages and Churches Cor. 30. Tradition disproved Scripture can no waies be infallibly interpreted by this Oral Tradition because it is fallible and false But Protestants in all things necessary can infallibly understand the sense of Scripture since such things are delivered in clear and plain words Cor. 31. Tradition being disproved the Church which relies on it may receive as held ever what was not so held ever Cor. 32. Whence also errors opposing Faith may be received by the followers of Tradition as Faith because they may err in the Faith Cor. 33. Notwithstanding Tradition Erroneous opinions may generally and with publick Authority spread themselves in the Church because this defectible Tradition may deliver errors by the viciousness of some and the liableness to error in others Cor. 34. By the same reason may errors gain sure footing and abide in the Church in the way of Tradition because as many Opinators who deliver their conceptions of truth may both mistake themselves and be mistaken by others for testifiers of the sense of the former Generation and as many corrupters of truth may be mistaken by others for deliverers of truth as was the case in the prevalency of the Arian and other spreading Heresies so may the determination of a confirmed Council where error hath taken place give it sure footing among them who stand ingaged to own that Council which is the case of Papists Cor. 35. The ignorance or corruption of the Church-governours and the better part being overpowered may hinder many corrupt opinions from being ever declared against the way of Oral Tradition and cause many true opinions to be so declared against that without rejecting the way of such Oral Tradition they can never be received Because Tradition when once it errs can never return without denying it self Cor. 36. By the same reason Erroneous Opinions may constantly abide in the Traditionary Church What he here saith That following evil practices will necessarily shew them opposite to Faith is his erroneous opinion because practices though bad if grounded on opinions held for truth are judged lawful by such holders nor can they be convinced of such practices being evil till first they be perswaded that such opinions were evil Such was the case of the Gentiles gross Idolatry the Pharisaical breaking Gods Commands as in Corban c. and Papists worshipping Images and Saints c. Cor. 37. Erroneous opinions and practices may fully prevail in the judgements and practices of the most faithful who follow the way of Oral Tradition Because since their Rule may fail them they may do their best to follow this and yet may their judgements and practices both miscarry Cor. 38. Erroneous opinions may be charged upon that Church which follows Oral Tradition because they may follow from that Churches Rule necessarily since Tradition is a false guide and they may be generally owned by that Church in its publick profession and the determination of its Councils Cor. 39. Therefore it is no weakness to object against such a Church such opinions and practices Cor. 40. Oral Tradition can be no first principle in Controversial Divinity for since it could be no otherwise a principle than by declaring what God said and it may err and fail in that it is therefore no principle in Divinity Cor. 41. If as this Author here reasonably concludeth Christs promise to his Church can bear no part in the Rule of Faith nor be any first Principle to manifest the certainty of the Churches Tradition then have great and many followers of the Romish Tradition hitherto erred in that this promise hath been held and delivered by them for such a Principle An Inquiry after and Examination of the consent of Authority to the foregoing Discourse AT last this Discourser proceeds to Authorities and testimonies both of Scripture Councils and Fathers which is an inquiry of very great use in this matter For since Protestants own Scripture as an unerrable guide if it pronounce Tradition to be the Rule of Faith then will we acknowledge it to be such and its reasonable to expect from Papists who own the Scripture to contain Divine truth and with the Council of Trent own no Tradition with greater reverence than the Scriptures that if Scriptures declare themselves to be the Rule of Faith then this may be generally received Concerning Councils and Fathers if these could be generally produced from the Apostles times Protestants will grant That what is so declared to be the Rule of Faith is certainly such But if only some Councils and Fathers in some after Ages be produced if such plead for Tradition Protestants own it not a demonstration because they know they might be in some error Yet concerning the known Councils and Fathers of the Ancient Church we are so confident that they were not mistaken concerning the Rule of Faith that we will acknowledge that to be the true Rule of Faith which was by them declared to be such But if generally the Doctrine of the Ancients be on our side then Oral Tradition will further evidently appear to be no Rule of Faith yea not only to be fallible but false and self-inconsistent if that which is now delivered concerning it be contradicted by the consent of the Ancient Church
what ever was written of him brethren is accomplished and is true So far S. Austin there cited and approved So that we see they grounded all along upon the Scriptures and the necessary consequence of his having two wills from his having two Natures And when in this Council was read the Type of Paul Bishop of Constantinople wherein he prohibited all disputes about Christ's having or not having two wills the Council liked his intention to have all contention cease but declared their dislike of his dealing alike with the truth and the error yet they determined that if he could have and had shewed by the approbation of Scripture that both were equally subject to reproof or praise his Type had been well All this considered there is no more in the words cited by this Discourser to prove they made Oral Tradition their Rule than when the Church of England declares her consent with any Confessions of others or any Doctrines of the Fathers and shall say We agree to all there spoken it could be thence concluded that the Church of England hath Oral Tradition for her Rule of Faith SECT III. Of the Council of Sardica and what it owned as the Rule of Faith NExt he produceth the Council of Sardica which is the only Council by him produced within the first six hundred years after Christ Out of the Synodical Epistle of that Council sent to all Bishops he citeth these words We have received this Doctrine we have been taught so we hold this Catholick Tradition Faith and Confession Let us consider the place cited more largely This Council declared that the Hereticks contended that there were different and separate Hypostases by which word that Council tells us those Hereticks meant Substances of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost But we have received and been taught this and have this Catholick Tradition Faith and Confession that there is one Hypostasis or Substance of the Father Son and Holy Ghost But 1. How did these Fathers receive this They presently add That the Father cannot be named or be without the Son is the testimony of the Son himself saying I am in the Father and the Father in me and again I and my Father are one 2. This Council of Sardica was held not long after the first Council of Nice and received this faith from it and in this Council of Sardica the Catholick Bishops did establish the determination of faith in the Council of Nice Socr. lib. 2. c. 20. And after the end of this Council Hosius and Protogenes the leading men in the Council wrote to Julius Bishop of Rome testifying that all things in the Council of Nice were to be accounted ratified by them which they explained as they saw need Sozom. 3.11 Wherefore that which was the Rule of Faith in that first and famous Council of Nice is likewise owned to be the sufficient Rule by the Council of Sardica especially if this was any way declared by that Nicene Council in the same manner as if now any English Convocation should by publick writing declare their establishing and receiving the Doctrine of the Thirty Nine Articles it must needs be concluded that they own that to be the Rule of Faith which is there declared to be such Concerning the first Council of Nice I shall discourse after enquiry into the second Nicene Council which he next applyes himself to in his Discourse SECT IV. What was owned as the Rule of Faith by the second Council of Nice THe last Council he produceth is the second Council of Nice whose Authority if it was indeed on his side yet would it no way tend to determine this Controversie and he cannot but know that Protestants have no great esteem for that Council having these several things rationally to object against it 1. That it was a Council above eight hundred years after Christ not only celebrated in that time when the purity of Primitive Doctrine was much declined but even the matters therein declared concerning the worship of Images were innovations and not agreeable to the more ancient Church 2. That this Council cannot in reason be pretended to declare the general Tradition of the Church Catholick when it is certain that immediately before it a Council of 330 Bishops at Constantinople defined the contrary and the like was presently after it done by a German Council 3. They delivered that as the sense of the Church Catholick which was not such nor will the present Roman Church acknowledge it to be such in Act 5. of that Council when the Book of John of Thessalonica was read wherein it was asserted That the sense of the Catholick Church was that Angels and Souls of men were not wholly incorporeal but had Bodies and therefore were imitabiles picturâ as Binius hath it representable by Pictures Tharasius and the Synod approved of it Yet here Carranza in his Collection of the Councils adds a Note that this is not yet determined by the Church and observes that many of the Fathers asserted the Angels to be wholly incorporeal whom the first Synod of Lateran seems to follow Pamelius puts it among the Paradoxes of Tertullian Parad. 7. which S. Austin condemned to assert the Souls of men to have any effigies and colour and both Pamelius upon Tertul. and Baron ad an 173. n. 31. derive the original of this Opinion from the Montanists 4. It is evidenceable by many instances that they satisfied themselves with very weak proof both from Scriptures and from the Fathers as hath been by several Protestant Writers shewed Yet as bad as this Council was which was bad enough I assert That it was not of this Discoursers judgment that Oral Tradition is the Rule of Faith In order to the evidencing of which I shall first examine his citations His first citation is out of Act. 2. We imbued with the precepts of the Fathers have so confessed and do confess Which words I suppose he took out of Carranza where they are curtly delivered for sure had he read them as they are at large in the Council he would never have been so mistaken as to have applied them to Oral Tradition The words more at large are thus spoken by Tharasius Patriarch of Constantinople and approved by the Synod Adrian Primate of old Rome seems to me to have written clearly and truly both to our Emperours and to us and hath declared the ancient Tradition of the Church to be right Wherefore we also searching by the Scriptures by inquiring arguing and demonstrating and also being imbued with the precepts of the Fathers have so confessed and do confess and will confess and do confirm the force of the Letters read So that whatever is here spoken concerning a Rule of Faith must be this that that which upon inquiry may be made appear by Arguments and Demonstrations to be the Doctrine of the Scripture and accords with the ancient Fathers is delivered to us by the Rule of Faith And is this
the Doctrine delivered by this Discourser or by Protestants Yet further these words of Tharasius confirming the Letters of Adrian then read we may observe how those Letters also as they were recorded by that Council agree with the Protestant Doctrine Now Adrian in that Epistle to Constantine and Irene which Tharasius refers to exhorts them to acquiesce in the Tradition of the Orthodox Faith in the Church of Blessed Peter and Paul the chief of the Apostles and to imbrace it as it hath been done by other Emperours honouring their Vicar with all their heart For these chief of the Apostles who did begin the Catholick Orthodox Faith did command their Faith to be preserved by writing as by Laws enacted even to all them who should succeed them in their Seats and so saith he our Church doth keep it Yea as to the Question in hand then about Images Adrian there urgeth Arguments from Scripture with such expressions as this As the holy Scripture hath it so let us have it and after his arguments from Scripture adds wherefore it is not to be doubted and then indeavours to shew the consent of Fathers Whence it is evident Adrian urged the Emperors to close with the delivery of the Church of Rome because then that Church did keep to the written Laws of the Apostles and by this means preserved their Faith and Scripture he follows to put things out of doubt this was then as appears the Doctrine of the Church of Rome and if that be it which will please this Discourser let him take it and follow it In Act. 3. of this Council this Discourser cites these words We receive and venerate the Apostolical Traditions of the Church But is this enough for this Authors purpose 1. Is every thing that is received and venerated made a Rule of Faith 2. Must these Apostolical Traditions needs be Oral Tradition Or did the Apostles deliver nothing in Writing These words are in an Epistle of Theodore of Jerusalem to that Council which was by it approved but in that Epistle as throughout this Council they pretended to the Scriptures and Doctrine of the Fathers cited from their Writings to ascertain them of the Doctrine of the Apostles as to the then disputed point concerning Images Yea that we may know what in that Epistle was meant by Apostolical Tradition it is more plain in the end of that Epistle in these words Whereas therefore it is sufficiently plain that the Scripture receiveth them wherefore it is lawful Whence though this Council was erroneous in the decision of the Controversie then in the World for ought hath been yet produced it doth not appear to have been in the same error with this Discourser concerning the Rule of Faith His next testimony from this Council is Act. 7. where the Council have these words We walking in the Kings High-way and insisting upon the Doctrine of our holy and Divine Fathers and observing the Tradition of the Catholick Church in which the holy Spirit dwells do define But what if the Doctrine of the Fathers and Tradition of the Church meant by them was not Oral but written As for the Fathers testimonies its plain they were not received by Oral Tradition but were such as were found in their Writings and were thence cited both in the Letter of Adrian in the second action of that Council and in the testimonies produced Act. 4. As for Tradition it is observable that in the definition of this Council in which are the forecited words they declare that they receive the Churches Traditions whether in Custome or in Writing but then they declare things so received by them to agree to the Gospel and all such customs of the Church if truly such will Protestants as heartily receive as this Council These things they might observe though they did not make them a Rule of Faith And that the Tradition they relied on as the ground of their Faith was chiefly the holy Scriptures may appear probably because in the beginning of the fourth Action where they produce the grounds of their Tradition they first urge several Scriptures Exod. 25. Numb 7. Ezek. 41. Heb. 9. and others and after them the Fathers Writings but it appears more certainly in the seventh Action where is their Synodical Epistle to Constantine and Irene in which they urge many Scriptures to prove the truth of what this Council defined and then say These to wit Scriptures being so confessedly and without all doubt we believe these things to be acceptable and pleasing to God Whence it appears that the Rule by which they did without all doubting believe was the holy Scriptures and what else is a Rule of Faith So that they principally relied on the Scriptures and in consent with them on the written Doctrine of the ancient Fathers and the customs of the Catholick Church And this is that Protestants will not disclaim but allow as a Rule though they will keep better to it than this seventh General Council as it is called did Lastly From the first Action of this Council he cites these words which were spoken by Basilius of Ancyra as part of a recantation of his former opinions and seem to be allowed by that Council They who contemn the Writings of the holy Fathers and the Tradition of the Catholick Church and bring for their excuse and inculcate the words of Arius Nestorius Eutyches and Dioscorus saying unless we were sufficiently instructed out of the Old and New Testament we would follow the Doctrines of the Fathers and of the six holy Synods and the Traditions of the Catholick Church let him be accursed And so will Protestants say They who contemn the preaching of the holy Fathers and the Tradition of the Catholick Church against Arius and those other Hereticks which preaching and Tradition did declare it self grounded and was truly grounded upon Scripture imbracing and venting the words of these Hereticks which we know were against Scripture though these persons pretend Scripture to be on their side which we know is not let him be accursed Nor from these words will it follow as he would have it that it was ever the pretence of most execrable Hereticks to decline Tradition and pretend sufficient light from Scripture the contrary to this hath been by me shewed and will be further manifested These words do not speak it the constant practice of Hereticks to pretend to Scripture but only speak of some certain Hereticks whose time is defined to be betwixt the sixth and seventh General Councils for if they had not lived after the sixth Council they could not have declared why they did not follow the six General Councils and if they had not lived before the seventh General Council their words could not have been there produced But such words as these of those Hereticks which decline the true Tradition of the Church founded in Scripture and satisfie themselves with empty pretences of Scripture Protestants will condemn Yet lest the gloss upon these words
partake of our flesh and blood and made our Body his and became Man of a Woman Wherein he plainly enough makes use of the holy Scriptures to decide the Controversie concerning that point of Faith or rather to confirm that matter of Faith against its opposers SECT IX Of the Rule of Faith acknowledged by the Fathers and first of Coelestine AS it was easie to shew the general consent of the ancient Fathers to the Protestant Doctrine in this particular I shall now indeavour to do it in all those our Discourser pretends to be on his side and to avoid over great prolixity I will confine my self to them only His first citation is from Coelestine in his Epistle to the Ephesine Council where his words somewhat mis cited by the Discourser are to this purpose We must by all means indeavour that we may retain the Doctrines of Faith delivered to us and hitherto preserved by the Apostolical Doctrine But what is here for Oral Tradition Doth Coelestine tell us that that was the way of delivering and preserving truth till his time No such matter yea in the beginning of this Epistle he saith That is certain which is delivered in the Evangelical Letters But that we may better understand Coelestine whose Letter to the Council of Ephesus was written against Nestorius consider first his Letter to Cyril who confuted Nestorius in which are these words This truly is the great triumph of our Faith that thou hast so strongly proved our assertions and so mightily vanquished those that are contrary by the testimony of Divine Scriptures Yea in his Epistle to Nestorius he calls that Heresie of Nestorius a perfidious novelty which indeavours to pull asunder those things which the holy Scripture conjoins And in another Epistle to the Clergy and people of Constantinople he hath these words of Nestorius He fights against the Apostles and explodes the Prophets and despiseth the words of Christ himself speaking of himself of what Religion or of what Law doth he profess himself a Bishop who doth so foully abuse both the Old and the New Testament And in the end of that Epistle thus directs those Constantinopolitans You having the Apostolical words before your eyes be perfect in the same sense and the same meaning These words of Coelestine seem plainly to shew that in the Romish Church Scripture was then the way whereby to try Doctrines But if this be not the sense of these words of this Roman Bishop which seem so plain I may well conclude that the words by which the Roman Church of old delivered truth were not generally intelligible and so their Tradition must be uncertain SECT X. What was the Rule of Faith owned by Irenaeus THe next Father he cites is Irenaeus from whom he cites three testimonies From Irenaeus lib. 3. c. 4. though the naming the Book was omitted by him he would prove that the Apostles gave charge to the Bishops to observe Tradition and that it is a sufficient Rule of Faith without Scripture in which he abuseth Irenaeus From Irenaeus lib. 1. c. 3. he to the same end cites this as his testimony Though there be divers tongues in the world yet the vertue of Tradition is one and the same the preaching of the Church is true and firm in which one and the same way of salvation is shown over the whole world Of which words only the first clause is in the place cited in Irenaeus but these words The preaching of the Church is true and firm c. though glossed upon by this Discourser as considerable are not to be there found in Irenaeus and if they were they would not serve his purpose as may by and by appear And from Irenaeus lib. 3. c. 3. though he mis-cites it lib. 1. c. 3. he cites words p. 138. to prove that the Doctrine of the present Church is the Doctrine of the Apostles Now that I may give a true account of the meaning of the words cited and also of the judgment of Irenaeus I shall first observe from Irenaeus himself what kind of Hereticks those in the Primitive times were who occasioned these words and how he confutes them and next which was his own judgement of the Rule of Faith Concerning the former Irenaeus lib. 3. c. 2. tells us That those Hereticks when they were convinced out of the Scriptures were turned into the accusing of the Scriptures themselves that they were not right nor of authority that they were variously spoken and that the truth could not be found out of them by those who have not Tradition and that the truth was given in a living voice which was the wisdom in a Mystery which every one of these Hereticks pleaded themselves had in Valentinus or Marcion Cerinthus or Basilides And when they were challenged to hold to the Tradition of the Apostles and their Successors in the Church they said they were wiser than the Apostles and so would neither hold to Scripture nor Tradition since they are slippery as Serpents indeavouring every way to evade he saith they must be every way resisted After this c. 3. he contends with them concerning Tradition and shews that the Churches Tradition is much more considerable than these Hereticks and hath the words which our Discourser cites p. 138. All they who will hear truth may discern in the Church the Tradition of the Apostles manifest in the whole world after which he adds We can mention the Bishops which were by the Apostles instituted in the Churches and were their Successors and if they had known any Mysteries to teach them who are perfect they would not have concealed them from them Further to manifest what was this Tradition he refers to Clemens his Epistle saying from thence they who will may know the Apostolical Tradition of the Church That there is one God c. Then that Polycarp who conversed with the Apostles whom Irenaeus had seen was a more faithful testifier than Valentinus or Marcion and he declared the same Doctrine and from his Epistle to the Philippians they who will may learn the preaching of truth and that John who lived to the time of Trajan was a true witness of the Apostles Tradition Cap. 4. He observes That the Church are the depository of truth and if any have any dispute of any question ought they not to have recourse to the ancient Churches in which the Apostles conversed and from them to receive what is certain concerning the present question And then he adds which our Discourser also cites p. 131. But what if the Apostles had not left us the Scriptures ought we not to follow the order of Tradition which they delivered to those to whom they committed the Churches To which Ordination assent many Nations of those Barbarians who believe in Christ having salvation written in their hearts by the Spirit without Paper and Ink and diligently keeping the ancient Tradition believing in one God c. And after saith They who believe this Faith without
letters are Barbarians as to our speech Cap. 5. He saith Tradition being thus in the Church let us come to that proof which is from Scripture and so spends several Chapters in shewing the Doctrine of Christ and the Apostles out of Scriptures From what hath been observed it is evident 1. That the Hereticks Irenaeus dealt with were in some thing of the Spirit of this Discourser that is only for their own Tradition and would neither be tryed by Scriptures nor any other Tradition but what was amongst themselves as our Discourser will disown tryal by Scriptures and by what was delivered in the Fathers Writings or Councils Cor. 14. and from all other Churches but the Roman Church Cor. 13 17. 2. That the reason why he so much insisted upon Tradition was because these Hereticks as they denied Scripture so they pretended to the best Tradition which way of his arguing speaks not Tradition the Rule of Faith but of considerable use in this case even as if we should dispute with a Pagan who owns not Christian Revelation concerning the truth of Christian Religion the using rational Arguments against him will shew that we count them very useful in this case but will not conclude that we own reason and not revelation for a Rule of Faith so if a Christian shall urge the Doctrine of the Old Testament as sufficient and certain against the Jew it would be a vain consequence to inferr that he makes this only and not the New Testament-Revelation the Rule of his Christian Faith 3. That Irenaeus did not think the urging the present Tradition of the Church sufficient against those Hereticks but thought it necessary to have recourse to the ancient Churches Tradition and this Doctrine of the ancient Church he evidenceth sufficiently from the writings as also from the verbal testimonies of them who were famous in the ancient Church and Protestants are as ready as any to appeal to the ancient Church and had we such a man as Polycarp who conversed with S. John we would receive his testimony as far as Irenaeus did But having only ancient Writings which Irenaeus thought sufficient in the case of Tradition we readily appeal to them 4. That when Irenaeus saies the Apostles Tradition is manifest in the whole World lib. 3. c. 3. or lib. 1. c. 3. though there be divers tongues in the World yet the vertue of Tradition is one and the same That is the Church in the whole World believes and delivers the same Faith He speaks this against those Hereticks about those great Articles of Faith That there is one God and one Jesus Christ c. as himself expresseth lib. 1. c. 2. and lib. 3. c. 3. for even in the time of Irenaeus there was not in all the World an agreement in all Doctrines since Victor Bishop of Rome and Irenaeus did not agree in this whether it was Lawful to Excommunicate the Asian Churches for their different observation of Easter Eus Hist Eccl. lib. 5. c. 6. Now is this any consequence That Doctrine which teacheth one God c. against those Hereticks was generally continued in the Church till Irenaeus his time which was not two hundred years after Christ therefore all Doctrine must certainly be preserved without corruption in the Churches Delivery above sixteen hundred Years after Christ though we certainly know that besides Protestants other Churches do not now deliver the same things 5. When he said Ought we not to have followed Tradition if the Apostles had not left us the Scriptures He saith not we ought to do so now they have left them but rather in these words intimates the contrary But now more directly to see his opinion of the Rule of Faith consider these words of his lib. 3. c. 1. The Gospel they then preached they after delivered to us by the Will of God in the Scriptures to be the foundation and pillar of our Faith And then shewing how the Evangelists have delivered to us by Writing saith If any man assent not to them he despiseth even Christ the Lord and the Father and is condemned of himself and resisteth his own salvation Lib. 2. c. 46. Wherefore since the holy Scriptures both Prophetical and Evangelical clearly and without ambiguity and as they may of all be heard declare c. they appear very dull who blind their eyes at such a clear discovery and will not see the light of preaching C. 41. Having therefore the truth it self for our Rule and the testimony of God being openly manifest we ought not to reject the firm and clear knowledge of God If we cannot find the solution of all things in Scripture we must believe God in these things knowing that the Scriptures are perfect being spoken by the word of God and his Spirit Lib. 4. c. 66. Read more diligently the Gospel which is given us by the Apostles and read more diligently the Prophets and you shall find every action and every Doctrine and every passion of our Lord set forth in them Lib. 3. c. 11. The Gospel is the pillar and firmament of the Church and the Spirit of life wherefore it is consequent that it hath four pillars he hath given us a fourfold Gospel which is contained in one Spirit If then according to Irenaeus men may believe by the Scripture and that is the pillar and foundation of Faith and they that seek may find all Doctrine in it which is there clear and manifest is not this enough to shew he makes it a Rule of Faith If not we have observed him calling it by the name of a Rule also and declaring that none but the Barbarous Nations did then receive the Faith in an unwritten way SECT XI What was owned by Origen as the Rule of Faith ANd first in his Books 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where in the begining of his Prooem having observed that some who profess themselves to believe in Christ differ in so great things as concerning God our Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost by which words he manifestly refers to such Hereticks as Irenaeus before him treated of Such were Montanists Valentinians Marcionists c. he begins to lay a Rule he will proceed by in the words referred to by this Author Let the Ecclesiastical Preaching delivered from the Apostles by order of succession and remaining in the Church to this time be preserved that only truth is to be believed which in nothing differs from the Ecclesiastical Tradition This is his Rule he will proceed by in these Books by which in opposition to those Hereticks he means the Churches delivery of truth which was chiefly contained in the Scriptures as I shall evidence first because he useth promiscuously the phrases of Ecclesiastical Preaching and Scripture frequently in this Prooem and excepts against the Book called The Doctrine of Peter as being no part of it and in the end of the same Prooem declares that therefore he who would treat of these things to know what is truth in
not to be allowed to argue from the Scriptures against the Church since they were not Christians and owned them not c. 15 16 17. And therefore it must first be inquired from whom the Scriptures were and by whom and to whom and when delivered all which would shew that they were for them who followed Christ and his Apostles in the Doctrine by them publickly delivered which these Hereticks pretended not to do Hence it appears that what Tertullian here writes is no way against the Doctrine of Protestants but in such a case as this was they would themselves assert the same Now though it is impossible the Scriptures should be either a directing Rule or a convincing to those persons who reject them yet in this Treatise Tertullian owns them as such to Christians who receive them and withal asserts them as necessary to the Faith as may appear from these particulars c. 22. He declares That they who receive not that Scripture the Acts of the Apostles cannot acknowledge that the Holy Ghost was sent to the Disciples nor can they prove how when and by what means the Body of Christs Church was instituted c. 33. He prescribes against the Hereticks from the Apostles Writings c. 36. He hath these words Run through the Churches of the Apostles amongst which their very Authentick Letters are recited sounding the voice and representing the face of every one of them What else is this but to equal the delivery by the Scriptures with that which was from the mouths of all the Apostles In the same Chapter he saith John the Apostle puts together the Law and the Prophets with the Evangelical and Apostolical Letters and thence tenders this Faith to us to drink in To add but one place more c. 38. He saith of the Hereticks As the corruption of the Doctrine could never succeed without the corruption of the instruments so we could not have the integrity of Doctrine without the integrity of those things by which the Doctrine is delivered then he adds What the Scriptures are we are we are from them from their beginning and then shews that the Church doth keep them perfect which the Hereticks do not Next he cites Tertullian de carne Christi where c. 2. He supposeth That upon this account Marcion did blot out so many original instruments that is Scriptures least the flesh of Christ should be proved By what Authority saith Tertullian I pray if thou be a Prophet foretel something if an Apostle preach it openly if an Apostolical man agree with the Apostles and then follow the words cited by this Author If thou be only a Christian believe what is delivered Where it is manifest these words referr not to recommend to us Oral Tradition but the Canon of Scripture Soon after he tells Marcion that he is not a Christian but once was and now hath rescinded what he then believed where follow the next words referred to by this Author By rescinding what thou hast believed thou provest that before thou didst rescind it that was otherwise which thou didst believe otherwise So it was delivered moreover what was delivered that was true as delivered by those whom it belonged to deliver c. which words are of the same nature with the former and further condemn his rescinding or cutting off from the Scriptures those things which he once believed and were faithfully delivered for rescindere is not here to renounce as this Discourser translates it but to cut off or mutilate which indeed proves that it was otherwise before and this is the same in sense with what he calls his rejecting some Scriptures c. 3. his blotting out ch 4. his taking them away c. 5. and the same with what in this 2. ch he a little before called his blotting out the instruments of Scripture where having propounded the question by what Authority he did it and continuing his Discourse on the same subject after these words of rescinding he gives this answer Thou hast done it by no right at all Yet further that in this Discourse de Carne Christi he intended the Scripture for his Rule of Faith may be proved from ch 6 where speaking of the Body which Angels appear in Whence it is saith he nothing is manifest concerning it because the Scripture doth not declare it c. 15. He urgeth against Valentinus seven Texts of Scripture all which declare Christ to be Man and saith these only ought to suffice for prescription to testifie his humane flesh and not spiritual c. c. 22. when he had used many other Scriptures he saith The Apostle determineth all this Controversie when he declares him to be Abrahams Seed and then cites Gal. 3. adding We who read and believe these things what kind of flesh may we or ought we to acknowledge in Christ surely none other than Abraham had In the last place this Discourser cites two passages of Tertullian against Marcion to prove that the present Church contains in it the true Doctrine of Christ Now if it did so in Tertullian's time it is no way consequent that any particular Church must do so now unless it be by delivery of the same Scriptures The first place he cites but names not the Book is lib. 4. cont Marc. l. 5. where Tertullian's design is to declare the Ecclesiastical Tradition in the Scriptures to be preferred before what Marcion tenders as his emending the Gospel and so confirms the Protestant Doctrine For having observed that Marcion rejects the other Evangelists and corrupteth Luke He saith in the end of the fourth ch From the times of Tiberius to Antonine we meet with Marcion as the first and only emender of the Gospel And he observes his emending confirms ours whilst he emends that which he found first then follow the words cited by this Authour In short If it be manifest that is the more true which was the former and that was the former which is from the beginning that from the beginning which is from the Apostles in like manner that will manifestly appear to be delivered from the Apostles which is accounted Sacred in the Churches of the Apostles In which words Tertullian designs to establish the Scripture-writings against the Heretical corruption Whence it follows Let us see what Milk the Corinthians drew from Paul to what Rule the Galatians were corrected What the Philippians Thessalonians and Ephesians read c. so that Tertullian sends to the Scriptures which may be read Another testimony he ventures at is lib. 1. cont Marc. and saith it is more express but indeed makes nothing at all for Oral Tradition For this first Book being written to prove one only God against Marcion who in a Treatise called his Antitheses endeavoured to shew that there was not the same God in the Old Testament and in the New He observes c. 20. that some said that Marcion did not innovate the Rule but set it right when it was corrupted c. 21. He sheweth the Apostles never delivered any such
thing as this but fully asserted one and the same God Nor was there ever any question about this in their daies for as there were questions about things offered to Idols about Marriage and Divorce about veiling Women and the hope of the Resurrection in which he plainly refers to the Apostles writings so he saith if there had been any Question about this matter it would have been found as a most principal thing in the Apostle that is the Apostles writings and then adds the words cited by this Discourser And no other is to be acknowledged the Tradition of the Apostles than that which is this day published in their Churches In which words as Irenaeus and Tertullian elsewhere did against Heretical inventions in general so he here establisheth the Churches Tradition against Marcions innovation or he establisheth the Doctrine of Christ as his Church received it which principally included the Scriptures And that Tertullian chiefly designed against Marcion to establish the Scriptural Tradition may appear sufficiently from what hath been above observed To see yet more of Tertullians mind in this case observe that known place against Hermogenes who asserted matter co-eternal with God Advers Hermog c. 22. I adore the fulness of Scripture which manifests to me both the maker and his works But whether all things be made out of a subject matter I never yet read Let Hermogenes his shop shew it written If it be not written let him fear that woe that is denounced against them who add or take away What can be more full to shew the Scripture to be a Rule of Faith than to declare that nothing may safely be received but from it and that it is full and compleat SECT XIII What Clemens Alexandrinus held as the Rule of Faith FRom this Father he only cites one place and that so much contrary to the plain design which is obvious to any eye that it appears evidently he never took it from Clemens himself but hath in practice discovered what certainty there is in his Oral way or taking things upon hear-say For shewing which nothing more is needful than the setting down the words of Clemens more largely Strom. lib. 7. He saith In those who are indued with knowledge the holy Scriptures have conceived but the Hereticks who have not learned them have rejected them as if they did not conceive some indeed follow the truths saying and others wrest the Scriptures to their own lusts but if they had a Judgment of true and false they would have been perswaded by the Divine Scriptures Then follow the words cited If therefore any one of a man becomes a Beast like those inchanted by Circe so he hath lost his being a man of God and one remaining faithful to the Lord who kicks against Ecclesiastical Tradition and leaps into the opinions of humane Heresies Then his next words are but he who returning out of error obeys the Scriptures and commits his life to the truth of a man in a manner becomes as God We have the Lord the original of this Doctrine both by the Prophets and by the Gospel and by the Apostles He who is to be believed of himself is worthy of all belief when he speaks in the Lords voice and the Scriptures Doubtless the Scriptures we use as our Criterion to find out things And then he shews That we are not satisfied with what men say but inquire and believe what God saith which is the only demonstration according to which Science they who have tasted only of the Scriptures are faithful What can be more plain than that Clemens his design here is not to guide men to the Oral way this Discourser talks of but as Origen and Tertullulian do so also Clemens against the way of the ancient Hereticks who were opposers of the Scripture commendeth the Churches Tradition which was in the Scripture Much more might be observed to this purpose from this 7. Strom. of Clemens and several other places but that I think the very place this Author blindfoldly chose is sufficient against him SECT XIV What was owned as the Rule of Faith by Athanasius OUr Discourser wisheth Protestants would seriously weigh the Sayings of this Father and consider what sustained him who was a Pillar of Faith in his daies This we assure him we will do and likewise highly honor that Rule of Faith which Athanasius made use of which we know was not Oral Tradition but Scripture The first testimony he produceth from Athanasius is in his Epistle de Synodis Arim. Seleuc. where speaking of the Arians who were not satisfied in the Council of Nice but sought after some other Synodical determination where they might have the Faith and therefore procured another Council to be called he saith Now they have declared themselves to be unbelievers in seeking that which they have not which are part of the words cited by this Discourser his following words I think cannot be found either in that Book or elsewhere in Athanasius which are All therefore that are seekers of Faith are unbelievers They only to whom Faith comes down from their Ancestors that is from Christ by Fathers do not seek and therefore they only have Faith if thou comest to Faith by seeking thou wast before an Vnbeliever Thus far this Discourser I think frames Athanasius Against the Arians in this Epistle Athanasius further saies If they had believed they would not have sought it as if they had it not and if you have wrote these things as now beginning to believe you are not Clergy-men but begin to be Catechumens Which words he writes upon occasion that the Arians Confession began not So believes the Catholick Church but the Catholick Faith was in the presence of Constantius put forth such a day as Athanasius there declares But that we may understand Athanasius his mind where they who are Believers must have Faith and not elsewhere seek it which also is the way he must understand it to come from Ancestors if any such words be any where in Athanasius in this very Epistle he declares it thus It is a vain thing that they running about pretend to desire Synods for the Faith for the holy Scripture is more sufficient than all Synods And if for this there should be need of a Synod there are the Acts of the Holy Fathers they who came together in Nice wrote so well that whoever faithfully read their Writings may by them be remembred of that Religion towards Christ which is declared in the holy Scriptures So that these words of Athanasius as they design not the promoting Oral Tradition so they do advance Scripture The next testimony cited and vainly flourished over is from Athan. de Incarn against Paulus Samosatenus where he concerning this Subject of the Incarnation of the Word shews That such great things and difficult to be apprehended cannot be attained to but by Faith And they who have weak knowledge if they here reject not curious questions and keep to the
be sensed Truly if he be a man of reason he will easily see that when the Fathers urge Scriptures as manifestly declaring the truth against their opposers who as yet disown the sense or to Doubters who do not yet own it fully they must needs mean the Scriptures without any sense imposed upon them otherwise than as the words will of themselves discover the sense of him who wrote them For this would be a weak way to dispute from Scriptures as the Fathers generally did with them who owned them if they should say we will evidence it from Scriptures but you must then first suppose them to mean as we mean By this means the Scripture can give no evidence or light to any truth in question which is contrary to the whole current of our citations from the Fathers The third Note is That it is frequent with the Fathers to force Hereticks to accept the sense of Scripture from those who gave them the Letter of Scripture and frequent to sense the Letter even when dark by Tradition but never to bend Tradition to the outward shew of the Letter As to the first clause of urging upon Hereticks the sense which they own from whom they received the Letter The Fathers never urged this but in some special case when Hereticks such as Valentinian and some others who could scarce be called receivers of the Scripture-Letter disowned the known and common significations of words in Scriptures and introduced wonderful strange ones Here to preserve the Faithful confirm the Doubtful and reduce the wandring they urged the Churches Authority or Ecclesiastical Tradition of Doctrines and common delivery of significations of words as more considerable than such sensibly monstrous innovations yet this was in things where to men unprejudiced and willing to receive truth they would appear plainly from the very words of Scripture And this is consistent if there were the like cause with the Principles of Protestants as with any others In other cases the Fathers urged against the Hereticks evident arguments from the light of Scripture-Letter Nor did they sense Scripture by Tradition in hard Texts of Scripture otherwise than Protestants will do that is where any assertion is known to be a point of Faith and surely grounded upon Scripture neither they nor we will so interpret any dark Scripture as to oppose such a point of Faith and in many other things will allow Tradition its degree of authority But that they never bent Tradition to Scriptures Letter is very untrue When any truly Catholick Doctrine held by the Church was questioned or impugned was not Tradition bent to Scriptures Letter when they applyed themselves to it to declare and manifest such Doctrine Which was the general practice of the Ancients as hath been shewed But would they ever so bend Tradition to Scripture as to close with Scripture in rejecting Tradition If that which is delivered by Catholick Bishops be a Tradition S. Austin de Vnitate Eccles c. 10. sayes We must not consent with Catholick Bishops if they think any thing against the Scriptures of God But did ever any of the Ancient Fathers say that we must not agree with Scripture if it speaks against what the Bishops who are called Catholick do deliver His last Note is a very vain and empty one That they cannot hold Scripture thus interpretable the Rule of Faith because most Hereticks against whom they wrote held it theirs and therefore could not be Hereticks since they held the Rule But first those Hereticks who pretended to own Scripture who were not the most did not perfectly hold the same Rule with Catholicks who held to Scripture as their Rule The Catholicks Rule is Scripture as the words will naturally hold forth the true and genuine sense but the Rule of Hereticks who pretended to Scripture is Scripture as the words are wilfully perverted contrary to their natural and plain sense and meaning But again why may not they be Hereticks who profess to hold the Rule of Faith if they take no heed to be guided by that Rule and reject Doctrines declared by it cannot reason be a Rule in Philosophy because two parties both pretend to reason I have now dismissed his testimonies In the last place he undertakes to shew That the Council of Trent and the present Church of Rome own this way of Oral and Practical Tradition Now though I could shew that in the present Church of Rome where this Author pretends so great a clearness of Tradition they are not yet agreed upon the first principle of Traditionary Doctrine Yet since I have enough shewed the dissent of this his opinion from the truth and the Ancient Church and therefore if they all were of this Authors opinion it will neither make any thing for their own Doctrine nor against the Protestants I will for my part let him injoy the fruit of his labours in this particular fearing most that Papists will indeavour in this point to deal with Protestants as we above observed that the Arians did with the ancient Catholicks that is like Chamaelions change their shape and when they were confuted in one way they opposed the truth in another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 SERMONS PREACHED UPON Several Occasions BY WILLIAM FALKNER D.D. A SERMON Preached at Lyn-St Margaret's at the Bishop's VISITATION Octob. 15. 1677. 2 COR. 5.18 And hath given to us the Ministry of Reconciliation THAT the Christian Religion is of mighty Efficacy for the reforming the World is not only evinced from the Nature of the Doctrine it self but from that visible Difference which appeared between the Lives of the true Primitive Christians and other Men insomuch that Eusebius tells us Hist Eccles l. 2. c. 13. gr that Christianity became greatly fam'd every where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the Purity of Life in them who embraced it But as no sick Man can rationally expect any Relief against his Distemper by the Directions of the best Physicians unless he will observe them So it is not to be wondred if many who own the Name of Christianity without sincere submission thereto have Lives unsuitable to this Profession Hence some of them practise open Viciousness Looseness and Debauchery and others embrace Pride Uncharitableness and Disobedience all which are diametrically opposite to the Spirit of Christ Hence also many who pretend an high respect to the Holy Jesus do slight his peculiar Institution◠undervaluing the Use even of that Prayer which our Lord composed and enjoined the Communion of that Catholick Church which he founded and built upon a Rock the Attendance upon that Holy Sacrament which he appointed the Night he was betrayed and the Reverence for that Ministry which he hath established in his Church and the Benefit of which these Words in part declare in that God hath given to us the Ministry of Reconciliation In which Words I shall consider I. The Nature and Excellency of this Ministry in general without respect to the distinction of its
such circumstances as I forbear to mention And the consideration of this temper may give us some account of the great eagerness and restless earnestness of these erring Parties in propagating their particular Interests 3. Concerning the aiming to gain the applause and favour of Men in the neglect of Duty Our Church in its Rules of Doctrine lays the same stress upon all Duties to God or Man that the Gospel of our Saviour doth without yielding to the Humours of the Profane the Debauched or the Turbulent and Unruly The Romanists suit themselves to all Dispositions they have severe Rules in some of their Regular Societies for the more Serious but they take great care to gratify Wicked and Debauched Persons also with as much Liberty as they can well desire Their Casuists generally declare That an act of Attrition or such Sorrow for Sin as is not accompanied with hatred against it or the true Love of God is at last sufficient with Absolution to remove the guilt of Sin and secure them from Eternal Death But if temporal Punishment remains for them this can only bring them to Purgatory and here they may have considerable help from Indulgences and the Treasury of the Church which are dispensed for Ave-Maries and other Prayers visiting certain places having Masses said for their Souls and by other works without their becoming really holy and good And besides this their feigned Miracles and Revelations their pretended power of Transubstantiating of dispensing the Treasury of Merits in the Church and of justifying them who are not contrite by Absolution seem methods contrived to gain admiration from the People And other Sects make their Interests and seek Reputation by popular Arts and often by promoting or conniving at Uncharitableness Mens high Conceits of themselves and a Temper averse from Unity and Obedience which are things of a very evil Nature And some of their chief Teachers acknowledg that in some things they act against their own Judgments in compliance with their People 4. Concerning Superstitious urging those things as parts of Religion which are not such Our Church owneth no necessary Article of Faith but what is in our Creed nor any Doctrines of Christianity but what are deducible from the Holy Scriptures Our Constitutions for Decency and Rules of Order are established only as such and are withal innocent useful few and agreeing to Primitive Christianity But at Rome a great part of their Religion as they make it consists in acknowledging many things to be de Fide which are neither contained in the Scriptures agreeing with them nor acknowledged in the ancient Church in entertaining various false Doctrines and pretended Traditions with equal reverence to the Holy Scriptures and in using divers Rites as operative of Divine Aid and Grace which God never appointed to that end Our other dividing Parties are too nigh the Pharisaical Doctrine concerning the Obligation of their voluntary Vow against their Duty to Superiours And many of them lay a Doctrinal Necessity either upon disowning Episcopal Authority which hath so great a Testimony of Apostolical Appointment Or in being against Forms of Prayer at least such wherein the People vocally join or in condemning as sinful innocent Appointments decent Ceremonies and suitable Gestures And those who own not these Positions nor condemn our Worship as sinful and yet divide from us must assert other Positions for Doctrines which are equally erroneous and dangerous For if their Principles be agreeable to their Practice they must assert that Men may break the Churches Peace and expose it to the greatest hazards gratify its Enemies and disobey Authority which are great Sins to maintain an opposition to those things which themselves dare not charge with any Sin But this is to aver such Doctrine to be from God which is contrary to his Religion his Nature and his Will and are but the Precepts of Men and it is to strain at a Gnat but swallow a Camel Now if to counterfeit the Seal or Coin or falsely to pretend to the Authority of an Earthly Prince be greatly culpable can it be otherwise to stamp a Divine Impression on things which God disowns 5. Concerning Obedience and Submission to Superiors this Duty is regularly enjoined in our Church both with respect to Private Relations Spiritual Guides and Civil Rulers In the Romish Church there is strict Obedience required in their several Orders to the Superiors thereof in the Laiety to the Clergy and in all to the Pope But this is so irregular that thereby the natural Honour to Parents is much discharged and St. Peter's Precept of Honouring the King is under the name of his Vicar changed into such Positions as when occasion serves may encourage the Deposing and Murdering him And among other Dissenters their Divisions as they are circumstantiated are ipso facto such visible Testimonies of their want of Submission to their Ecclesiastical and Civil Governours that nothing need be added And it is known there were some of these Parties whose Principles allowed them to take Arms against their King and who exposed his Royal Person to Violence and Death 6. Concerning a loose and licentious Life Our Church requires a Sincere Holy Exercise and presseth all the Precepts of our Saviour and the Motives and Arguments of the Gospel and enjoineth the careful observation of our Baptismal Vow But in the Romish Church he that considers the immoral looseness of the Jesuits and other Casuists may wonder that such things should be owned by Men of any Religion much more of them who profess the Christian Religion For instance By our Saviour's Doctrine to love God with all the heart is the great and first Commandment But Azorius asserts Azor. Tom. 1. l. 9. c. 4. That it is hard to fix any time when this Precept of Loving God doth oblige to any exercise thereof with respect to it self but only when it is necessary to Repentance And he roundly saith We are not obliged to any exercise of Love to God when we attain to the use of Reason nor at the receiving any Sacrament not at Confession nor at the approach of Death Filiuc Tr. 22. c. 9. Filiucius thinks this Opinion probable and therefore safe by their Doctrine of Probability but prefers another Opinion which is but little better That we are bound to act Love to God at the time of Death and in some other extraordinary cases if they happen and that ordinarily Men ought to exercise an act of Love to God at least once in five years But I am amazed to think how sparing such Men were of inward Religious Devotion and what Strangers to it And for the practice of Repentance which is another great Duty of our Religion Though Contrition which includes an hating and forsaking Sin and turning to God be acknowledged of good use by them yet Filiucius saith Fil. Tr. 6 c 8. n. 196 197 and 208. Men are not obliged to acts of Contrition every year but once in
continuing his discourse upon the same subject concerning the Eucharist and in the three verses immediately following using the same expressions of the Bread and the Cup cannot from the order of his discourse be otherwise properly understood than to have respect to the same things though by consecration advanced to a more excellent mystery 2. When the Apostle declares the eating this Bread and drinking this Cup to shew forth the Lords death till he come He both declares this action to be commemorative of Christs death by somewhat which represents the death of him who can die no more and by those words till he come he shews the proper substantial presence of Christs Body not to be in that Bread But the (e) Catech. ad Par. p. 128. Roman Catechism says the Apostle after consecration calls the Eucharist Bread because it had the appearance of bread and a power to nourish the body Now to pass by the strangeness of the body being nourished by that which is no substance it may be considered 1. That if the Romish Doctrine had been true it cannot be conceived that the Apostle purposely discoursing of the Eucharist and laying down the Christian Doctrine concerning it should so often call it what it was not and not what it was 2. Especially when this must have been a truth greatly necessary to be known And 3. Since it still continued in appearance Bread the Apostle would not have complied with those errors which the reason and senses of men were apt to lead them to if these had been truly errors but would have been the more forward to have acquainted them with the truth 25. Sixthly and is not favoured by some Traditions of the Romish Church I shall add though I lay no further stress on this than as it may speak something ad homines that if we may give credit to the approved Ritualists of the Romish Church there are ancient usages in that Church which bear some opposition to Transubstantiation It was a custom received and constantly observed in the Roman Church that the Eucharist must never be consecrated on Good Friday (u) Div. Offic. Explic. c. 97. Johannes Beleth an ancient Ritualist undertaking to give an account of this saith there are four reasons hereof his first is because Christ on this day was in reality and truth sacrificed for us and when the truth cometh the figure ought to cease and give place unto it And his other three reasons have all respect to this first And (w) Rational l. 6. c. 77. n. 34 Durandus in his Rationale undertaking to give an account of the same custom makes the same thing to be his second reason thereof and useth these very words also that the truth coming the figure ought to cease The intent of which is to declare that the Eucharist is a figurative representation of Christs Passion and therefore on Good Friday when the Church had their thoughts of Christ and eye to him as upon that day really suffering they thought fit to forbear the representation of his Passion in the Eucharist But this notion of the Eucharist is not consonant to Transubstantiation 26. What guilt there may be in worshipping what is not God though the belief of the true God be retained Having now discharged Transubstantiation as being neither founded in the Scripture nor consonant thereto as being opposite to the Doctrine and usages of the Primitive Church and as contradictory to sense and the principles of reason I shall upon this foundation proceed to add something concerning the dishonour done to God in giving Divine Worship to that which is not God and the great guilt thereby derived upon man Now it is confessed generally that the giving Divine honour intentionally to a Creature is Idolatry and an heinous transgression But it may be worthy our enquiry to consider how far guilt can be charged upon such persons who profess the only true God to be God and that there is none other but he and design to give the proper and peculiar Divine honour to him a-alone for such we may suppose the case of the Romanists in this Controversie waving here their exorbitant adoration of Saints the relative Divine Worship to Images and somewhat higher yet to the Cross but actually through mistake and delusion do conferr this Divine honour upon that which in truth is not God in confidence and presumption that it is what it is not and that it is an object to which Divine honour is due when in truth it is not so Now in what I shall discourse of this case in general the instances I shall first mention of some bad men are only proposed to give some light to the general resolution of this enquiry and therefore are by no means mentioned to any such purpose as if I intended to write or think any thing dishonourably of the Holy Sacrament which I would not think of but with a pious Christian reverence and due veneration 27. Wherefore I shall here lay down three Assertions Assert 1. The misplacing Divine Worship upon an undue object may be a very gross and heinous sin of Idolatry Assert 1. There may be an Idolatrous misplacing Divine worship consistent with believing one only and the true God though the profession of one only God and of him who is the true God be still retained with an acknowledgement that none other ought to be worshipped This with respect to outward acts of worship was the case of divers lapsed Christians who being prevailed upon by the terrors of persecution did sometimes either offer Sacrifice or incense to Pagan Deities or otherwise communicated in their Worship or did swear by them or the Genius of Caesar or did make profession of such things being God which they were sufficiently convinced were not God And the like miscarriages concerning outward acts of worship may arise from an evil compliance with others or from the great vanity and evil dispositions of mens own minds And concerning inward worship it is easie to apprehend that such acts as proceed from the heart and affections as the highest practical esteem love reverence and fear may be misplaced upon that which men in their judgements do not esteem to be God whilst they either do not consider these things to be acts of worship or else are more governed by their affections than their judgments But concerning such inward acts of worship as proceed from the mind and understanding such as to acknowledge in ones mind such a Being to be God and that Divine honour is due unto it and all Divine excellencies are inherent in it these cannot be performed to any Being but to that only which is thought judged and believed to be God But notwithstanding this even these acts may by delusions be Idolatrously misplaced whilst there is still continued this general acknowledgement and profession of one only God who is the true God 28. Simon Magus as (x) de Praescrip c. 46. Tertullian declares
here we enquire not for rational evidence to prove them true Here then we can be no more said to build our faith on the Rule of Tradition than publick Justice can be said to be administred by the Rule of Tradition when Cases are decided by Acts of Parliament which have been successively delivered from one Age to another But as he hath hitherto builded on a mistake to imagine that we have no way to prove Scripture the Word of God but only by considering the Letter of Scripture in it self so in the end of § 3. he supposeth that we must be able to satisfie all seeming contradictions in Scripture before we can own it to be Gods Word But cannot every ordinary Christian both humbly and truly acknowledge that in things delivered by God there may be many things above his understanding to comprehend and above his apprehension to reconcile which yet may be in themselves both true and good In this doing we have the same ground to believe Scripture to be Gods Word which S. Austin had in his forsaking Manicheism who makes this Confession to God Confes lib. 6. c. 5. Thou didst perswade me that they were to be blamed not who believed thy Books which almost in all Nations thou hast established on so great authority but who believed them not Therefore when we were unable by evident reason to find out truth and for this cause had need of the authority of the holy Scriptures I now began to believe that thou wouldst by no means have given to that Scripture so excellent authority throughout all Lands unless thou wouldst that thou shouldst be believed by it and that thou shouldest be sought by it Now the absurdities which used to offend me I referred to the height of the Mysteries Ad § 4. To the second Objection concerning the number of the Books of holy Scripture I shall first enquire What ground the Vulgar have to own all the Books received by Protestants and particularly by the Church of England as Canonical to be the divinely inspired Scriptures or the Word of God Now they may safely and with good ground receive all these Books because they are so owned by the same above-mentioned Tradition or delivery of all Churches as they received them from the beginning nor was there ever in the Church any doubt of the Books we receive of the Old Testament or of any of the Evangelists or of the most of the Epistles And though there was some doubt at some time in some places concerning some few Books yet these doubts were never general nor did they in any place continue but were check'd by known consent in the beginning of Christianity of which S. Hierom speaks ad Dardanum Ep. 129. We receive them following the authority of ancient Writers Now that all these Books have been alwayes thus delivered by the Catholick Church as the Word of God the Vulgar hath sufficient reason to acknowledge since it hath the same certainty with the way of delivering so many preserved Records by the agreement of such multitudes of Societies which is a much more certain way than Oral Tradition of Christs Doctrine as was shewed n. 6. This delivery of these Books is commonly asserted by the present Age and by men of greatest knowledge amongst the Protestants nor at this time doth the Roman Church reject any of them Though indeed S. Hierom tells us That in his time the Latin Custom did not receive the Epistle to the Hebrews amongst Canonical Scriptures in his Commentaries upon Isa 6. and Isa 8. and elsewhere Which Eusebius also takes notice of Eccl. Hist lib. 3. c. 3. lib. 6. c. 21. So that the Roman Church was not then the most faithful preserver of what was delivered in the Church Catholick which did acknowledge this and the other Scriptures by which they are sufficiently delivered to us and by which S. Hierom did receive even this Epistle as he particularly writes in the above-mentioned Epistle ad Dardanum Now being secure of these Books we are sure that we have safe delivery of all necessary truth required to salvation for as it is observable that concerning the Doctrine of Jesus Christ no other Church nor the present Roman Church doth pretend to any other Book of Scripture in the New Testament so S. Luke chap. 1. hath assured us that in his Gospel are written what things are necessary to be believed as the Christian Faith So that hitherto it appears how common Christians may know enough for their salvation and yet further they knowing all these Books to be of God can thence conclude that whatever is declared in them is true and what ever is condemned there is false or evil and by this means they may attain much knowledge And though these vulgar Christians may safely be unacquainted with the Controversie concerning the Apocryphal Books as is evident from what is above said and men of greater learning and knowledge for whom the tryal of all Controversies is a more proper work are and may be fully certain concerning it by their fully perceiving what was the Jewish and Christian Churches Tradition in this point yet the vulgar may possibly be sufficiently satisfied that none of those Books are part of the Scriptures divinely inspired For since they can understand from men of knowledge and learning that none of those Books were received in the Jewish Church to whom the Oracles of God were committed Nor were they any of them generally received as of divine inspiration and for proof of Doctrines by the Catholick Christian Church they may thence conclude that it is as safe for them not to own them as such as it was for the Catholick Christian Church and the Jewish Church whom neither Christ nor his Apostles charged with any sin and corruption in this particular And likewise they may see that they have as little reason to be guided by the particular Romish Church in opposition to the Church Catholick concerning these Books as S. Hierom had concerning the Epistle to the Hebrews especially since they of Rome have not fixedly kept and declared the same Books at all times for Scripture Thus we have a certainty of the Canon of Scripture which Protestants own for their Rule but this Discourser cannot but know that concerning Traditions which he makes his Rule neither the vulgar Papists nor yet the learned can certainly know in all points how many and which are truly such which hath occasioned great disputes and high contests amongst them of the Romish Church Ad § 5. To the third Objection concerning the preserving of the Originals I answer That it is not necessary for the vulgar either to know or enquire concerning the Originals it is enough for him to have evidence that the Scriptures remain entire though he know not what Language was their Original But if it be enquired how every one may know that these Scriptures are preserved entire and how they who have any apprehensions of the Original may
and that they had the right sense Now he who thinks not this a Rule sure enough to reject the then contrary Traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees as that he must be a great Temporal Prince and such like must own the Pharisees to be rather in the right than our Saviour and his Apostles And yet all these Arguments of our Discourser would here take place even those which concern Translations for at that time the Jews who after the Captivity did not commonly understand the Hebrew did make use of some the Syriack or Chaldee Translations which though of Hebrew Original as much differs from it as our English from the Saxon and others and those very many of the Greek Version which is as much different from the Hebrew as our English is from either of them His § 9 10 11. contain what he would perswade his Reader a Protestant would say against his Discourse which he undertakes to answer These things concern not us who have already returned our own Answer otherwise than to let him know that sober Protestants do not speak so weakly and absurdly as in some things he there represents them § 12. He sayes Some will reply fundamentals are clear in Scripture True indeed some do reply to this purpose and not only Protestants but the ancient Fathers upon the like occasion Thus Origen when Celsus in opposing Christianity urged the obscurity and uncertain sense of Scriptures Orig. lib. 7. cont Cels answers That whatever was useful for their hearers to understand and might confer any thing to the amending of their lives these things the Prophets spake without all covertness according to the will of God But such things as were mystical and matters of higher enquiry and speculation than the vulgar were capable of these things they declared by allegories and dark sayings Austin de Doct. Christiana lib. 2. c. 9. saith Among those things which are plainly set down in Scripture are found all those things which contain faith and manners And Athanasius with his Council of Egypt in their Synodical Epistle to Jovian the Emperour tell him That the true and religious faith in our Lord Jesus Christ is plain to all being both known and read out of the divine Scriptures and all these sayings include fundamentals being clear in Scripture Against such Answers or Replies he who should first have considered whether his Church had ever given a Catalogue of Traditions in Points de fide or can yet agree to do it which he knows they cannot against himself as well as against reason tells us That a perfect Catalogue of fundamentals was never yet agreed upon and without this all goes to wrack and then he enquires Whether this be a fundamental that Christ is God and Whether this be clearer in Scripture than that God hath hands feet nostrills and passions like ours Concerning the Catalogue of Fundamentals though as to matters of meer belief Protestants have oft asserted that the Creed contains them all yet the requiring such a Catalogue in this case from Protestants as it is needless so to a sober Enquirer will seem ridiculous and the only true way to disprove this Assertion is to shew something to be fundamental which is not plain enough in Scripture to be thence believed To put a like case If I should assert That in England may be had all things which are necessary for the convenient subsistence of man would it not be a thing ridiculous to say that till I could distinguish all things necessary for this subsistence from things unnecessary and produce a Catalogue of them this cannot be truly asserted For suppose such an enumeration of things necessary attempted if any thing be omitted which to another seems necessary and is in England or if some thing be inserted which seems not necessary and yet is in England still this assertion of all things necessary for subsistence being here may stand good and can no way be disproved but by shewing that there is somewhat necessary for mans subsistence which cannot be had in England This I suppose this Author did discern and therefore will here venture to instance in a Fundamental not clear in Scripture but I think he will come off with very bad success It is concerning the Divinity of Christ which we own a fundamental and if this Author shall say it is not so plain in Scripture as thence to be believed he must contradict S. John who tells us he wrote for this purpose that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God John 20.31 So that he must either grant that this is so plain in Scripture that there is sufficient evidence there for our believing it or else he must say that when the Evangelist wrote that we should believe him to be the Son of God he had no eye to our believing his Divinity or his being God and he who will so assert will deny this to be a fundamental or else he must say that the Evangelist and the Holy Ghost who inspired him mistook in supposing enough written to declare his Divinity But he here seems to object and elsewhere that some who seem to follow the letter of the Scripture deny this as the Socinians What then This is not for want of evidence in Scripture but from making or devising wayes to avoid this evidence Will this Author say that there was no evidence of there being Angels and Spirits amongst the Jews because the Sadducees who had opportunity of observing all such evidence believed neither Angel nor Spirit And will he say that there was no clear evidence from the Word of Christ and his Miracles that they were from God because the Pharisees and other unbelieving Jews who conversed with him and saw his Miracles and heard his Word yet did not acknowledge them from God Now if this be so clear from Scripture as thence to be believed and that God hath hands feet and passions like ours be not so delivered as I shall shew in answer to his next Discourse where he urgeth this again then I may safely and truly conclude that the Divinity of Christ is much more clear in Scripture than the other Indeed that God hath hands c. like ours I know not of the least intimation of any such thing in the letter of Scripture though it should not be allowed the common and usual Figures of Speech which are intelligible enough to men of Reason since when it speaks of Gods Hand or Arm or the like it plainly shews them not like ours as God said to Job Job 40.9 Hast thou an arm like God and canst thou thunder with a voice like him These two properties therefore of the Rule of Faith are agreeable to Scripture notwithstanding all this Author hath jointly objected against it An Answer to his third Discourse shewing that the three next Properties of the Rule of Faith are agreeable to Scripture IN § 1. and 2. he layes down his third Property of the Rule
what this Authour calls his deep consideration as it hath no rational foundation so it hath not the advantage to be one of his own Church Traditions and shews there may be something delivered for truth which was not so received And of the same nature are almost all his Arguments against Scriptures being the Rule of Faith § 3. He further adds That the material causes to conserve these Characters are lyable to innumerable contingencies but mans mind by its immateriality is in part freed from Physical mutability and here we may with reason hope for an unalterableness and an unerrableness if there be a due proposal which must necessarily effect the sense These words are more monstrous than rational it is as much as in plain English to tell his Reader that having an immaterial soul he can never forget any thing that he either saw or heard distinctly and that when he hath read a Book observingly all the words and letters may be more exactly known from him by the impressions upon his mind than by viewing the Printed or Written Copy it self And yet all this will not serve his turn unless it be supposed that these immaterial souls must alwaies continue in the World or that what was by them received must thence necessarily in the same manner be continued on others Who sees not that this is as much against common sense as if he had said That because man hath an immaterial soul he may flie up to the Sun and Moon and fixed Stars at his pleasure Was Man of the nature of Angels without his gross Body its beyond the skill of this Authour to prove that nothing could be forgotten or blotted out of his mind that is once known especially considering that he is a sinner and even the Writers of his own Church do conceive that sinning Angels lost much knowledge by their sin But man is a Creature of another mold and letters and words and things are preserved in his memory by material impressions and every man knows they may be forgiven yea this Authour in this Book oft forgets and contradicts himself Do not all mankind appear sufficiently convinced that words or characters are more surely preserved in paper or writing than in mens memories in that what they would have faithfully kept they commit to writing and enter it upon Record Had the Jews been of this Authours opinion they would not have desired Ezra to have read the Law of Moses out of a Book Neh. 8.1 but to have spoken it out of the impressions of his own mind yet he would have been a more safe deliverer of Moses than the Church of Rome can shew for other Scripture Yea it is plain and self-evident that the Church of Rome agree with the rest of mankind to acknowledge writing upon some material subject a more sure way of preservation of things than the minds of men for they write the Acts of their Councils and Statutes of their Societies and yet these things are as much or more spoken of amongst them as the Scriptures are and so more like to be preserved in their immaterial minds yea they write or print their Creed Prayers Lessons and their whole Liturgy and have them read in their Churches when by this Authors Argument the best way to have these things preserved intire is to have them uttered from the memories of the Priests and others in the Church and not to mind the Writing or Printing at all as not being in it self certain The Roman Church know that mens minds are slippery and apt to forget something in their Liturgy if it were not written and that others would take the boldness to alter it and vary from it if they had no written Rule and shall writing be the best preservative for all other things and not for the words of the Scriptures and the truths therein contained I remember Salmeron tho' a Jesuit hath among the rest of his prolegemena one which is Proleg 25. Why the Scriptures were written and he declares as every one who designs to speak truth would do that it was that thence men may most surely know truth whereas the memories of men are very slippery and uncertain and S. Austin assigns a like cause of the Original of Letters de Doctr. Christiana lib. 2. c. 4. Nor can I imagine for what end the Church of Rome prints Copies of the Bible if they did not think that by those printed Copies the Scriptures might be known and preserved And as if it was not sufficient absurdity without any colour of solid reason to contradict the experience of all civiliz'd Nations he at once opposeth even the wisdom of God himself also who commanded the King of Israel to write him a Copy of the Law in a Book and read therein all the daies of his life that he may learn to fear the Lord his God Deut. 17.19 20. Yea he commands Moses to write for a memorial in a Book Exod. 17.14 Yea Isaiah is commanded Isai 30.8 Write it before them in a Table and note it in a Book that it may be for the time to come for ever and ever And though God himself declares this the way of keeping the memorial of things this Authour rejects this way and closeth with the uncertain way of mans frail memory § 4. He tells us That as there are some simple vulgar actions unmistakeable yet there are compound actions as the transcribing of a whole Book consisting of myriads of words single letters and stopps and the several actions over each of these are so short and cursory that humane diligence cannot attend to every of them Yet he grants that this may be done with care enough if there be diligent Examiners This Objection speaks against the common sense of every one who can write for it tells him that no man can possibly keep to the sense or words he intends in writing a Letter or such like though he hath a Copy before him For he who can write a page with due care may by the continuance of the same diligence write a sheet and if he want nothing else but what concerns his writing he may with the same care write a Book What extraordinary art hath this Discourser that he could write his Book intelligibly and the Printers print it so can none do the like He cannot be ignorant that these things may be done by common diligence and all men who understand writing acknowledge that Deeds and all Records may be exemplified and faithfully transcribed if there be had due care about it That there hath been such care about Scripture I shall shew in answer to his next Paragraph And I suppose he is not so self-conceited as to think that other men may not use as much care in writing Letters or Words as himself doth or can But if this little Argument of many little actions not being capable of due attention was considerable it would concern this Authour to find a way how the Papists may
know the definitions of the Council of Trent especially such a way as he intimates p. 211. it is not hard for Protestants to find For to run to the Printed Books which contain the Acts and Canons of that Council here presently appears the multitude of little actions both in the Printing and first Copying If he shall tell us they receive the Canons of that Council or any other not as they are in Books but by Oral Tradition I shall then examine whether there be not the same and greater difficulty about such Tradition For it is certain that there are as many mistakeable little actions in speaking a word as in writing it every tittle requiring the pause in the voice and every letter pronounced being a distinct framing of the Organs of Speech and both experience and reason will tell a man that he may more frequently mistake in speaking a word than in more leisurely writing it by a Copy since speech is more quick and admits not of so long consideration for every little action as writing doth and every man knows that where there are many phrases and sentences there may be somewhat sooner omitted in speaking where he hath no outward help for his memory than in transcribing where the memory is perfectly relieved by the Copy before him So that in the way of Oral Tradition besides the several little actions of the Organs of Speech there are other little actions of the Memory more lyable to the error than the eye is in viewing a Copy Hence it will appear that this Authors perswading men in this § 4. to account Scripture not to be certain in it self is built upon this foundation That God hath not indowed man with so much wisdom and discretion as to guide his speech or hand so as to speak or write intelligibly or according to his meaning or intention And this is as much as to say That men cannot converse with one another and that no truth can be delivered from one to another no nor falshood neither and he who will be perswaded to this will not be a Protestant nor a Papist neither a man of any Religion nor of any Reason § 5. He tells us If it were certain that there was care taken for the faithful transcribing the Scripture much might be said thence for its certainty but as it is capable of many mistakes so especially in the New Testament experience testifies there hath been no such diligence by the divers readings of the several Copies and thousands of corrections of the Vulgar edition His Objection to disprove the use of care especially in the New Testament must be first answered and then we shall evidence that there hath been abundant care What he speaks of the Vulgar Latin which is the Translation in request in the Romish Church and made use of by many others the thousands of corrections he mentions speaks that Church none of the best preservers of Records But after all these corrections was there any point of Faith or Manners wherein after the corrections it differed from what it was before the corrections if it differed in none then such various readings do not declare the Scriptures even in that Translation in any thing to misguide in discovering whatever concerns Faith or holy life though such various readings should remain But if the Vulgar edition did differ in any such matter of Faith or holy life this would condemn the Roman Churches Tradition which hath professed to own and receive what ever was in the Vulgar both before its correction and since and so must differ from what it was in that point of Faith or Manners Touching various readings in the Original Copies and almost all if not all Translations it is evident there is no difference in any point of Doctrine nor considerable in words and phrases And though it be impossible to prove concerning every single Copy that it was faithfully transcribed by giving an account of the manner how it was done yet there remains an abundant rational proof that the Copies of the Scripture and particularly of the New Testament have been generally written with much fidelity because the several Copies which may yet be seen written in several Countries and in divers Ages shew such an agreement in them all and in the Ancients citations of them that they speak one thing the same truth and with so very little variation of any word that to a diligent attender this speaks much of care attention and diligence in transcribing To all this I add that it is certain that the Ancients were very industriously accurate in their transcribing Books and made it a great point of conscience to be attentive in it even in other Books and no doubt more especially about the holy Scriptures and did to their Copies subscribe their Names that it might be known by whom they were written What exact diligence the Ancients used in transcribing Books may be observed from an instance related by Eusebius Eccles Hist lib. 5. c. 20. concerning a Book of Irenaeus at the end of which Irenaeus wrote thus I adjure thee who shalt transcribe this Book by our Lord Jesus Christ and by his glorious presence when he cometh to judge the quick and the dead that thou compare what thou shalt transcribe and amend it diligently according to this Copy whence thou shalt transcribe it and that thou shalt likewise transcribe this Oath and put it in thy Copy And this he saith he thought profitable to put in his History that in this thing they might have example of the care and diligence of those ancient and truly holy men If such care was to be taken of Irenaeus's Works surely no less of the holy and Divine Writings § 6. He goes about to shew That Scripture cannot be certain as to its sense especially to the Vulgar where he repeats that Arts and Sciences are necessary to understand the Letter which was before said by him and is above answered Disc 3. § 7. and need not here be repeated He further tells us That an acute Scholar can blunder the conceptions of the Vulgar concerning Scripture and give them a seeming clearer interpretation of his own In many points of Controversie and difficult Texts we acknowledge a Scholar may do so but it is no way necessary that the Vulgar should be able to determine them and be firmly setled in the knowledge of them but in matters of Faith more plainly discovered it is otherwise If he thinks they may be perswaded by a Scholar to think any other sense more clear than that which offers it self and is obvious in such phrases as these That Jesus is the Christ that he was born of the Virgin and died for us and such like he must find men of much lower capacities than Protestants are and indeed such as cannot understand the meaning of what that Scholar shall speak since he cannot speak plainer words and then I know not how they can be perverted by him yea such
New Testament writing and Eusebius relates that S. Mark carried his written Gospel and preached it in Egypt Hist Eccles lib. 2. c. 11. and S. Peter himself made use of S. Paul's Writings and commended them 2 Pet. 3.15 16. and so did all the Ancient Fathers of Apostolical Writings He is bold to say That the Revolters from Primitive method closed with Scripture as the Rule But in truth when the World erred by vain Tradition it was none other than God himself who wrote the ten Commandments and gave the Law of Moses and the Prophets to guide the Israelites And when Pharisaism that great Heresie was maintained by Tradition they who laid Scripture as the Rule against it were none other than Christ and his Apostles who referred to the Scriptures of the Old Testament and gave forth the Scriptures of the New Testament But he saith Scripture as it is made the Rule of Faith is brought to the vilest degree of contempt and every upstart Heresie fathers it self upon it But who contemns it not Protestants who make it their Rule and they who do will be highly guilty as were the despisers of Jesus who was also contemned and despised of men But is this a cause of contempt if all Heresies pretend to it do they not all pretend to the right worshipping the true God the true following of Christ and owning Christian Religion as well as to the Scriptures and are these excellent things the more contemptible because they pretend to them yet it is false that all Heresies have pretended to Scripture For as some have denied Scripture as it is witnessed by Irenaeus and Tertullian as some have gone to revelation and secret wayes of delivery of Doctrine as the same Authors shew and the History of Simon Magus Basilides Marcion Manes and others evidence so others have pretended to the publick Church-Tradition continued to their time Thus did the Heresie of Artemon in Eus Hist Eccles lib. 5. c. 27. who declared That Christ was only man and their Ancestors they said had declared this unto them to be not only that which the Apostles received from the Lord but that which they generally taught and was continued until the times of Victor and that Zephyrinus who succeeded Victor at Rome and in whose time these Hereticks lived corrupted this teaching It seems this Heresie had numerous followers or Attestors in that it is there said in Eusebius it might have had much probability if it had not been contradicted by the Scriptures and the Writings of the Ancient Brethren Yea these very Hereticks did indeavour to alter and corrupt the Scriptures so far they were from making them a Rule He further sayes The many Sects in England flow from this Principle of Scripture being a Rule of Faith and it is a wonder this doth not oblige men to renounce that Principle which is the necessary Parent of such disorders This hath been answered Disc 3. n. 3 4. so far as concerns difference of opinions But that all the Sects in England do arise from this opinion of the Scriptures being the Rule of Faith is very far from truth for First it is certain that some of these Sects do not profess it to be their Rule I suppose he knows there are some of his perswasion that make Tradition their Rule and he knows there are others who pretend to be guided by the Light within them and the way of redressing these Sects is by receiving this general truth Secondly other Sects or Parties of men there are who indeed profess to follow these Scriptures as their Rule but it is not their owning but their not right using them which is the occasion of their error it is their over rashly entertaining their own conceptions without sufficient and unprejudiced inquiry as if they were plain in Scripture and necessary Doctrines when indeed they are not and the true way for healing these distempers is by laying aside such rashness and prejudice resolving to close with that only as necessary Doctrine which upon impartial inquiry appears plain in Scriptures and to use serious diligence in such inquiry and this is to act according to Protestant Principles yea according to the Doctrine of Christ who did not give such direction to the Sadduces who strictly professed to own the Law but denied the Resurrection that the way to be free from their error was to reject that Rule but blamed them as not knowing the Scriptures and declared that therefore they did err and if this was truly heeded all disorderly Sects would be at an end But on the contrary should we reject these excellent discoveries of God because they have been abused by the sin of man to the promoting many Sects where should we leave when Christians imbraced the Doctrine of Jesus and what was delivered by the Apostles many Sects hence took occasion all to pretend to this Doctrine must Christianity therefore be also disclaimed and with much greater reason must not all Controversial Enquiries and speculations in Theology be abandoned because they are the Parents of many Sects and Divisions even amongst the Papists and must not all reasonings and apprehensions be disclaimed because they are the original of so many disputes and different Sects both in Philosophy and Divinity This would be the way to renounce being men and being Christians Thus the rejecting the Scriptures would be taking Poyson instead of Cure yea it would be as if the food used amongst civilized Nations should be prohibited and their civil rights disclaimed because many abuse the former by intemperance to surfeits and Diseases and the latter is the occasion of War Strife and Contention and therefore that men should live only on Acorns and such other Fruits of the Field and without any Possessions as Wild men that they may be thereby out of these dangers Who sees not that temperance and a peaceable spirit would be the best preservatives from these dangers and would make the state of man and of the World excellent and though there might then remain some infirmities in the Constitution either of the Body Natural or Politick yet none so great as would be occasioned by rejecting the course of a civilized life so if the abovementioned Protestant Principles were put in practice there might remain some different apprehensions and opinions yet none such as would be either dangerous or disturbing but as the persons might have Faith and Salvation so both Church and State might injoy their peace and quiet An Answer to the fifth Discourse inquiring into Tradition and shewing that none of the Properties of the Rule of Faith agree to it BEfore I come to disprove what is delivered by this Author on the behalf of his way of Tradition it will be requisite first to state the Question concerning Oral and Practical Tradition and to shew what we grant concerning it and what we deny that so it may after appear how far we have cleared the truth of the Protestants Assertion We assert the
alwaies preserved from alteration and change yea even at Rome notwithstanding this way of delivery wherein the following Generation have received their Language from their Fathers yet if they who conversed there in the Apostles times were now alive they would discern such alteration of speech and even in speaking mens names that they would not be able to understand their present language and if they can shew no greater security for the delivery of their Doctrine than of their Language that also may be as much changed notwithstanding their help of Tradition And it may be further observed that those Languages which in this way of Traditional Learning are grosly corrupted and even lost such as Hebrew Greek and Latin yet in Books and Writings they are faithfully preserved which shews Writings more sure keepers or preservers of words and civil things than this way of Tradition is It would be needless to shew that in Writings and civil behaviour there is as great variation in some few successions of Generations for this is sufficiently known to all observing men § 3 4. He applies this to Christianity and saith So Children get by degrees notions of God Christ Saviour Hell Virtue and Vice and are shewn how to say Grace and Prayers afterwards they become acquainted with the Ten Commandments Creed Sacraments forms of Prayer and other practices of Christianity the actions and carriages of the elder guiding the younger to frame their lives to several virtues by the Doctrine delivered in words as Faith Hope Charity Prayer c To this I answer That Children do indeed by degrees learn the Notions of God c. But this Tradition alone is not that which guides them here but also the Scriptures and Ancient Writers are of great use as they inable the Teachers of the foregoing Generation to guide them more faithfully Indeed in the way of this Tradition alone some general signification of words which concern matters of Faith may probably be delivered as that God signifies him whom we are to worship reverence serve and obey and such like But more particular notions of these matters of Religion as they may be sometimes preserved aright so where is no other way of preservation than this Tradition they may be very corruptly and dangerously delivered It is certain that Noah knew the true God and taught his Children concerning him and in his daies and since their Posterity increased to great multitudes and yet having only this way of Tradition they were so far corrupted in their knowledge of God that they owned Creatures yea the lowest of Creatures for God and thereby lost the knowledge of the true God and yet even the Gentiles who worshipped other things instead of God pretended that this they received by this way of Tradition and this was their great Argument why they should not receive Christianity because their Ancestors had delivered to them that way of Worship they then used in Heathenism Clemens Alexand. in his Admonition to the Gentiles brings them in speaking thus We must not reject those things which were delivered to us from our Fathers and almost all the Fathers who write against Gentilism industriously shew the vanity of this their plea. The saying of Prayers and Grace aright depends much upon the preservation of the true Notions of God and Christ and the knowledge of Duties and Promises and therefore if there be any corruption in the delivery of those things it is like to be also in the performance of these actions of Prayer and saying Grace in which case will the carriages and practices of the elder Christians be corrupted But he sayes they learn the Creed ten Commandments and forms of Prayer The Creed is indeed a good preservative of the chief Articles of our Belief Had it not been for this Form and some other like it received in the Church which because written and in stinted words is more of kin to the way of Scripture delivery than to other delivery by Oral Tradition it is like these points of Faith might have been rejected or lost among them who only hold unto the way of that Tradition The ten Commandments are likewise a sure preservative of that which God requires in them from man but these are the words of Scripture Neither the Creed nor the ten Commandments concern the Controversie of Tradition as it is disowned by Protestants otherwise than to observe the way whereby the certainty of them is conveyed unto us and thus we do assert that we are more certain of the Creed by its being committed to Writing and comprized in a fixed form of words and being every way agreeable to Scripture than any can be by way of delivery from Father to Son only by word of mouth in all successions of Generations and the same certainty we have of the ten Commandments by their being in the Scripture Records and being likewise delivered in writing which is the way which even Papists make use of as well as others What he adds of Sacraments and forms of Prayer these are like to guide men aright where the notions of Religion concerning them are preserved intire but if there be a corruption in Religion these things as soon as others may be depraved as indeed they are in the Romish Church where though the Creed and the Commandments do deliver much truth yet are they somewhat perverted by Traditional Expositions nor can they secure from the delivery of many other corruptions In § 5. He desires us to consider How the Primitive Faithful were inured to Christianity e're the Books of Scripture were written or communicated We know this then was by the preaching of the Apostles among them who had the inspiration of God to guide them and were unerrable deliverers and yet even they in this preaching made very great use of the Books of the Old Testament to prevail with men to receive the Doctrines of Jesus But I shall further mind him that the Christians at Rome in the Primitive state of that Church before they had any written Scripture of the New Testament thought it requisite for the inuring themselves to Christianity to obtain some Writings Apostolical concerning whom Eusebius writes thus At Rome the light of Religion did so shine upon the minds of these hearers of Peter that they thought it not sufficient to content themselves with once hearing him nor with the unwritten Doctrine of the Divine preaching but with all manner of perswasions they did earnestly desire Mark who followed Peter that by writing he would leave them a memorial of that Doctrine which was then delivered to them by words nor did they desist until he did perform it and this was the cause of the writing that which is called The Gospel according to Mark. He likewise relates That when the Apostle knew what was done by the revelation of the Spirit he was pleased with the forwardness of the men and by his Authority confirmed the Writing that it might be read in the Churches
it be followed it can convey Christs Doctrine down to the Worlds end as will appear if any consider that if Protestants have Children who believe and practise as their Fathers brought them up they will be Protestants too and so forward from Generation to Generation I answer Tradition framed according to a notion which would free it from all the above said imperfections would be indeed evidenceable as to its ruling power to every capacity but this is not such a Tradition as can be expected to be found in the World But if any man consider of such a Tradition as is in the World in case he be confident of the true delivery of the sense of the foregoing Generation yet it will not be evidenceable as to its ruling Power unless he can be satisfied that the foregoing Generation did certainly hold the truth in all points Persons who have little knowledge may possibly believe this without supposing it at all doubtful But they who know how uncertain the way of Tradition is and what corruption of Doctrine was in the Jewish Church what Prophecies of Apostasie under the New Testament and what great defections were reproved in many particular Churches in the Apostles times as the Churches of Galatia and the Church of Sardis and others will see that they can have no other certainty of the former Generation where their Fore-Fathers lived being in the right unless they make use of some other trial besides a knowledge that they professed Christianity than an over-weening esteem of their own Relations which may be an affectionate but not a rational ground of perswasion and by this means the perswading virtue of Tradition may be prevalent but its ruling Power cannot be evidenced Indeed where there is no better help than Tradition it may lead to error in one place if it lead to truth in another and so is no where certain thus it did perswade the Heathen to refuse Christianity because their Fathers delivered other wayes of Gentile Worship which I suppose is part of that vain conversation received by Tradition from their Fathers mentioned by Saint Peter 1 Pet. 1.18 Yea God himself complains Jer. 9.13 14. They have forsaken my Law which I set before them and have walked after the imagination of their own heart and after Baalim which their Fathers taught them Protestants acknowledge the practice or belief of Fore-Fathers to be a considerable Motive to perswade either to judge or do as they judged and did until by inquiring into the Rule it shall discover any error therein and then it is to be declined Yet withal he who understands that his Fore-Fathers did keep to a fixed Rule in preserved Records hath thereby the more reason to rely on their judgment as a strong Motive to perswade him and this is the case of Protestants § 9. He proceeds to shew That the third condition of the Rule of Faith agrees to Tradition that is it is apt to justifie unreflecting persons that they proceed rationally while they rely on it because it is a madness not to believe a multitude of knowers in things they were taught and practised all their lives Nor can any deceit be suspected in such multitudes who all agree in a matter of fact appear to speak seriously and practise as they speak especially since Parents will be apt to teach their Children things good and true I answer Where there are many testifiers capable of giving testimonies surely it would be a madness not to believe a multitude of knowers but where what evidence they give supposeth such innumerable contingencies which though possibly they may all have happened right yet it is a thousand times more like they have not this testimony is far from any tolerable satisfaction But in the present case none can give testimony but only concerning the last Age nor concerning that with absolute certainty They cannot testifie what is necessary here to be known to wit that all Ages were free in every Succession from unfaithfulness of memory that they forgat no truth that they all had right understanding to err in none and a liking of it to imbrace all truth and a sufficient care not to add any explications which might vary from the truth nor to deliver any thing upon opinion which they did not certainly know to be truth and withal that every Age did commit the whole truth to the next Generation If any one of these fail in any one succession all security of their knowledge is gone and a former Generation proceeding upon Tradition cannot testifie all this and therefore cannot be a multitude of knowers This way of Tradition must therefore suppose all things right in the Roman Church but will not prove them so Can there be any likelihood now of the certainty of Oral and practical Traditions bringing down truth since before the Flood where the Successions of Generations were not many and many of them lived together and had an Adam cast out of Paradise as a visible token of Gods vengeance against them who were negligent in Religion yet it is certain there was great corruption at that time And after the Flood they worshipped other gods though they had the argument of the deluge to make them more careful both to deliver and receive the true Religion after Moses's time they had the Motive of the terrible presence upon Mount Sinai and many wonderful judgments and after Ezra's time the Argument of the Captivity to make them careful in Religion and yet in all these times they miscarried But he tells us no deceit can be suspected here I answer if there be so many waies of failing otherwise what if there be no design of deceiving but indeed it is not a thing impossible that there should be a designed forsaking the truth in the Church which in the way of Oral Tradition will eventually include deceiving Is it not possible that men who profess Religion may so far gratifie the Devil and their own vain imaginations as to forsake the truth they know in great matters of Faith and to practise and live contrary to it and to promote that which they know is contrary to truth Else what mean such complaints as these Jer. 11.9 10. A conspiracy is found amongst the men of Judah and among the Inhabitants of Jerusalem They are turned back to the iniquity of their fore-fathers which refused to hear my words and they went after other Gods to serve them Is not a conspiring to refuse Gods Word and to serve other Gods a designed rejecting the truth Yea I further demand what account can possibly be given of the high corruptions among the Jews all along from Moses to Christ unless a designed rejecting the truth especially in such cases as these That they who had seen Gods wonders in Egypt and had heard the commandments delivered on Mount Sinai should say to Aaron Arise make us Gods Exod. 32.1 If this was not done wilfully and against sufficient knowledge then we must imagine
that they who did see the Law given on Mount Sinai yet knew not the first or second Commandment Yea after many severe judgments to shew how necessary the observation of Gods Commandments were yet when they served Peor in the Wilderness and joined themselves to other Gods frequently in the times of the Judges and of many of the Kings of Israel could this be for want of knowledge when the Law of God was among them which would teach them otherwise Yet if this Authour shall think it was of great ignorance this will as much destroy his way of Tradition since it will then follow that there was not sufficient delivery of truth from hand to hand to make it knowable And yet many of these defections were very general in all the people and Priests and their serving Baalim which their Fathers taught them was of long continuance § 10. He asserts by way of Answer to an Objection That men cannot be as much justified for believing Scripture because setting aside Traditions help this only depends on skills judgements and fancies and not on certain sense either for the meaning or letter of Scripture Touching the letter of Scripture we set not aside the help of Tradition but have a very sure way of Traditional Record to relie on and I have in former Discourses shewed that we have a certain knowledge of Scripture both as to letter and sense Yea the sense of Scripture is more easily discovered in many concerning truths than the sense of Tradition can be because though the words be supposed equally intelligible whether written or spoken it is more evident that the words found in Scripture are such as contain the sense of Scripture than that such and such words do contain the sense of the Church Tradition Because it is certain that in many concerning points there are many things delivered by several in the Church which yet are not by the Papists themselves owned for Church Traditions so that it will be hard if not beyond the reach of the Vulgar to understand what words in many points he may doubt of do truly express the sense of the Church unless he can hear it plainly expressed in some approved and received Writings such as either Scriptures Canons of Catholick Councils or Liturgies or the like the former as this Authour too much rejects so all or almost all his Arguments will as much plead against the other which the Vulgar are not capable of searching Yet that we may compare the evidence to the common apprehensions of men given by Scripture or by Oral and practical Tradition let us follow him in observing which evidence a Jury would soonest close with The case is by him in this § very unfaithfully propounded Whether they would condemn a man upon the testimony of six Witnesses upon sight or upon the judgment or opinion of a thousand men for as we have shewed it is not only skill and opinion that Protestants do ground upon but delivery of Records and therefore the case in truth should be thus propounded Whether if any matter of Fact be inquired of they would be the more swayed by the appearance of several persons who assert that they have heard many say that they heard many others say that they received from others and they from others by hearsaies at the fortieth or fiftieth hand or by others who shall produce plain Records and those preserved safe in several Courts which all agree in testifying it was otherwise Or if the Question be about any Legacy if the one party brings such hearsaies abovementioned and the other brings a Copy of the Will preserved in the Court and evidence that in the same manner it was inrolled in several other Courts is it not plain the latter will appear the better Evidence to the common sense of mankind But in this § 10. he further adds The Vulgar have reason to believe there was such an one as King James or Queen Elizabeth of which they are no otherwise ascertained but by Tradition but if you pump their common reason about the Authority of the Statute Book you shall find them at a loss Concerning King James or Queen Elizabeth they may indeed own them by the common received Tradition because they know this is actually delivered by those who knew it and that it is not capable of a mistake nor could any interest be supposed to devise this nor can mens conceptions of this vary from what is intended to be delivered but in none of these things can men have security in the delivery of many truths by Oral Tradition as was observed in Answer to § 7. But to put the case more like this of discovering which is more justifiable of believing Scripture or Tradition I demand whether as to all considerable actions atchievements or constitutions under these Princes it be more rational to relie on what appears in common fame concluding that nothing is considerable which was not there preserved or to apply our selves to some good Historians especially if we could be certain we could find such as had a certain knowledge of all such things and had a faithful design to commit the truth and nothing else to Writing concerning all these things This security we have concerning the Scriptures since it is certain the Apostles and Evangelists did fully know all points of Faith delivered to the World by Jesus Christ and did declare them in their Writings with like faithfulness Concerning the Vulgars knowledge of the Authority of the Statute Book it is evident that if they hear the Statute Book to be published by such a man or the Statutes by him collected they can thence conclude that as far as they can be assured that it was his Work and that he was certainly able to collect these Statutes and did in this act according to his utmost knowledge so far they are assured of this Books Authority as also as far as they are assured of the faithfulness and ability of judgment in them who own it as such But in all these things we have certainty of Scripture that it was written by the Apostles and Evangelists by the general Tradition of it as such by all Churches that they were able and faithful and their Books faithfully written both from our Saviours approving them to dispense his Gospel and his Church receiving them as such dispensers even in these Writings and God himself bearing them Witness both with Signs and Wonders and manifold gifts of the Holy Ghost So that we are as sure concerning Scripture as a man could be of the Authority of a Statute Book if he knew there was a collection of our Common Law as was done by Justinian's order in the Civil made approved and confirmed by order of the Supreme Power and thereby Enacted that this Collection should be owned as the Statutes of England Here it would be a madness to doubt So that this third Property of the Rule of Faith is agreeable to Scripture but not to Oral
be proved Yea evident it is that among the most eminent Fathers who lived not long after the Apostles daies there are acknowledged some errors and they were not alone in them but had many partakers and followers Cyprian erred about re-baptizing Justin Martyr Papias Irenaeus Lactantius and others were in the error of the Chiliasts and many other erroneous opinions were in some of the forementioned Authors and in Clemens Alexandrinus and much more in Tertullian and Origen So that though this ground if the others all hold may help us to know the great points of Religion yet it can be no security to all the truths of God from the multitude of Believers The second ground is of the time nature with the former which concerns only the chief truths of Religion in the generality of Christians For the faithful could not while free from error believe this which is an error that the want of understanding any truth of God was the way to damnation for S. Paul saith expresly that they must receive the weak in the faith and God hath received him and God is able to make him stand Rom. 14.1 3 4. So that though they did know the great truths of Christian Faith necessary to Salvation and therefore would diligently learn them and teach them and though they did know that the denial or rejecting of any truth which they had evidence was of God was likewise dreadfully dangerous which would ingage them to hold fast all the truth they had received upon account of the highest hopes and fears fet before them yet would not the same inforcements lie upon them to shew the necessity either of their own knowing or of their Children being instructed in all manner of truths since there were Mysteries and strong meat for the perfect and milk for the weak Yet I also assert that as there were many persons of eminent knowledge in the mysteries of the Gospel in the Apostles daies who had great gifts of knowledge and interpretation by the teaching of these men if it was diligently heeded all Divine truth might possibly be received by some others in the next Generation who had capacities of understanding them but I have no reason to judge that these were multitudes And the love of God and his truth would excite all the faithful as they had opportunity both to indeavour to know all truth of God and also firmly to receive and declare it but this will not free them from all ignorance or capacity of erring The third ground is many waies imperfect and reacheth not to the proof of the case in hand for first it is not enough to prove Tradition indefectible to know that fears and hopes when strongly applied will have this effect but we must know that in all Ages they were thus strongly applied to the generality of testifiers or to the greatest number of the Church visible but alas how evident is it that in all Ages the causes of hope and fear have not been so applied by very great numbers in the Church that they should take due care of their souls by a holy life And since the Devil oft designs the perverting the Doctrine of Christ as well as corrupting the practice of Christians and they who reject a good Conscience are in a ready way to make shipwrack of the Faith what possible security can be given that those Motives hopes and fears are a firm security to preserve Doctrine Secondly though it is not to be doubted but that many pious men would be affected with such hopes and fears who had this Doctrine delivered to them yet considering that such pious men if considered as Fore-Fathers might have careless and wicked Children or as Priests and Teachers might have careless and irreligious Successors there must needs appear very great danger that in any family or place this Tradition will not be in every Age faithfully continued by the prevalency of such hopes and fears Nor is this only a Notion since it is certain that a very great part of the Christian Church did in the Primitive times entertain the Arian Heresie and promoted it and taught it to their Children And since it is evident that gross ignorance and sensuality hath reigned in some Ages more late among the generality both of Clergy and People in the Romish Church there can be from this ground no rational security given that any great part of the deliverers were conscientiously careful to deliver faithfully according to what they had received because it appears they did not act as men prevailed upon by such hopes and fears would do His last ground likewise is unsound for in the way of Tradition all Divine truth cannot be evidenced to be knowable not only because as is abovesaid much may be undelivered by the truly faithful and much perversely delivered by the corrupt and much mistaken but even that also which in the way of Oral Tradition is delivered by the best deliverers cannot in all things be clearly discovered to be a sufficient Tradition For first we cannot know whether the best deliverers now in the World in this Oral way do deliver sufficiently that which was by the former Generation to them declared for this must either be in a form of words received from the Apostles or without such a form if they deliver the Apostles very words it cannot be doubted but then the sense intended by the Apostles is as fully delivered as the Apostles themselves delivered it since the same words must needs signifie the same things But they who reject the way of Scripture-delivery as the Rule of Faith pretend not to any such form of words which should contain all truth But a delivery without a form of words is only a delivery of what is conceived judged or apprehended to be the sense of the former Generation and this is a way liable to error because it relies on the skill of every Generation or the way of framing thoughts and conceptions of all these truths and likewise upon a skill of fully expressing such conceptions in words after they are rightly framed in the mind and both these parts of art must be secured in the most exact manner to every succession of deliverers Now as it is not certain that in all Ages there hath been a readiness of full expression of what they conceived to be truth so for certain Controversies and Disputes they shew in many things that mens apprehensions are not unerrable Secondly if it had been certain that some in the late past Generations did deliver all truths fully yet in the way of Oral Tradition it cannot be known evidently who they are and which is that true Tradition for all men acquainted with Church History know that when there have been differences amongst great Doctors of the Church in their delivery this hath sometimes occasioned the calling of Councils to determine them and declare which is the Doctrine to be held in the Church as about the Religious use of Images in the
eighth Century and many other cases Now before the determination of such a Council it is not evident which are the true deliverers from the way of Tradition since both parties contend for their own delivery and no other Rule of Trial must be admitted according to this Discourser but delivery or Tradition and upon the former considerations it appears that the best deliverers may be the fewest And this may be as uncertain after a Council since there is nothing else to ascertain us but the vote of a major part which in many Councils hath certainly been the worser part and maintained Heresie and therefore so it may be in others where there can be no evidence given to the contrary And by Determinations of Councils the lesser part and their Adherents are determined to reject their way of delivery and receive the other and by this means the lesser number which may be in the truth must disclaim their own sense and judgment to submit to the judgment of others which may be in the wrong and so the true Tradition may be lost Yet that it may appear more evident how vain the pretence to demonstration in this Discourse is I shall applie his way of demonstrating to some other cases which it will fit as well as Romish Tradition It is certain that after Moses the true Doctrine was dispersed among the Jews and after Noah who was a Preacher of righteousness amongst his Sons they had the greatest hopes and fears to ingage them to this truth and these are the causes of actual will and the truths are knowable therefore both Gentile Tradition from Noah and Jewish from Moses were indefectible according to this Discourser's Principles and so the true Religion may at this time be found either among Gentiles or Jews Yea it was certain that Gods will was declared to Adam and Eve in Paradise and to the Angels that fell before their fall and they had the greatest hopes and fears to perswade them to keep to this will of God knowing that obeying it was their happiness and deserting it their ruine these hopes and fears are the causes of actual will and the duties themselves both knowable and practicable and they had no corrupt inclinations to sway them therefore according to this demonstrator Adam and Eve and all the Angels did continue in their obedience The same way of demonstration would prove that never any Heresies could either be broached or by many be received in the Christian Church But in these cases who sees not that it will be answered that either the truths of God declared were not sufficiently heeded or else the causes of hope and fear were not sufficiently applied and at all times acknowledged and observed and that in such cases there was a corruption either in belief or in practice but then every eye will see that this might as well be imagined in the Romish Church as in any other company of men So that he hath made it as clear that the Romish Tradition is indefectible as that the Gentile and Jewish Traditions were and are and as certain as it is that there is no Devil or fallen Angel and no fall of man and consequently no sin in the World and no Heresie ever in the Christian Church But here it is needful to do this Authour that right as to observe his unusual modesty that he intitles this Discourse not a demonstration but an indeavouring to demonstrate § 6. He speaketh to this purpose If any shall object Original Corruption indisposeth Parents wills since Christs Doctrine was intended to be an Antidote for that Original malice to say it is universally applied and preserves none good is to question Christs wisdom and many thousands Martyrs and Confessors did hereby overcome the declivity of their wills Again nature cannot incline all to this sort of sin to teach their Children what they think will damn them but most strongly carries them to the contrary To this I may in the first place observe that neglects of duty might be if there had been no Original corruption as was in Adam in Paradise and in the Angels where was no antecedent sinful inclination but they were only capable of sinning Yet I assert there is more danger by Original corruption and its prevalency both as to the Will and Understanding Now Christs Doctrine is indeed a poise or Antidote against this yet this is first where this Doctrine is carefully entertained and retained but not so that there should be no fear of its being retained in any Church S. Paul did not nourish needless fears for his Corinthians who had this Doctrine lest their minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ nor were they untrue complaints of his Galatians Chap. 3.1 Who hath bewitched you that you should not obey the truth And we Protestants can discern nothing to shew that this Doctrine must needs be otherwise a poise in the Romish Church than in the Corinthian or Galatian Secondly where this Doctrine is retained it is a poise against Original corruption in a considerable degree yet not so as to remove all imperfections proceeding from Original sin which may hinder right delivery of all truth for though in some excellent persons there be a willingness to deliver truth yet there may be some mistake even in holy Martyrs and Confessors The Church of Rome as well as we own Cyprian as a Saint and Martyr and yet acknowledge him to have erred and most Africans then with him in delivering that they who were Baptized by Hereticks ought to be rebaptized so that in following good men there may be mistake but they are more like to err if they be bad as many certainly are But concerning his last clauses it is no way necessary to suppose that to invalidate Tradition Parents must design to teach Children what they think will damn them we suppose very many may design truth and good who yet may be in error yet there may be others who through prevalency of corruption in themselves may design to corrupt the truth and may teach their Children so and all this out of that Principle that prevails with men to wicked lives which is not a design to damn themselves but a design to gratifie their evil affections S. Paul 2. Cor. 2.17 speaks of many who corrupt the word of God and S. Peter foretells of others who shall bring in damnable Heresies and we know the Jews did teach their Children to worship Baalim most probably this was not out of design to damn them however we know no demonstrations to prove that Romanists have higher affections to their Children naturally than Jews had or that when there is danger of truth being corrupted in the Christian Church they of the Romish should be exempted from liableness to that danger § 7. He thus proceeds If any object the fickle nature of the will he answers Good is the object of the will Now infinite goods and harms sufficiently proposed are
to be called so by their opposers would prove them Hereticks then when ever the truth hath any foul mouthed Adversary who would nick-name its Professors the truth it self must be owned for an Heresie but must the true holders of Christianity be called Hereticks because the Jews called them Nazarens Edomites Epicureans and the like The Montanists as we may learn from Tertullian called the true Christians Psychicos or carnal ones the Arians called them who held the Faith of Nice Homoousiasts Athanas Dial. de Trin. and Julian by a Law commanded Christians to be called Galilaeans Naz. Orat. 3. cont Julian But if he mean that they who call themselves by other names are Hereticks this is as vain a way of Trial as the former for though he intends it against Protestants who own that name of Catholick and account themselves such it will conclude for Hereticks all who own themselves Papists Jesuits Romanists Dominicans Jansenists Molinists and such like as much as Protestants § 3. He saith After a while the pretended Rule of Scriptures Letters self-sufficiency is thrown by as useless Children are taught that they are to believe their Pastors and Fathers and to guide themselves by their sense in reading Scripture which is the very way Catholicks ever took If any follow their own judgement and differ from the Reformers these if they have power will oblige them to act which if conscientiously is to hold as they do else they will punish and persecute them which shews that it is not the letter of Gods word but these mens interpretations which is thought fit to guide to Faith whence he saith follow self-contradictions But is this the farther description of an Heretick to reject the pretended Rule of Scripture when most Hereticks never pretended it to be a Rule some went in this Discoursers way of Tradition as was shewed Disc 4. n. 15 and shall be further shewed in answer to his Authorities Almost all if not all Hereticks in the first Ages of the Church rejected Scripture Eusebius Hist Eccl. lib. 3. c. 28. notes that Cerinthus a notorius Heretick was an enemy to the Scriptures of God Origen in the end of lib. 5. contra Cels observes that the Ebionites of both sorts rejected the Epistles of S. Paul and Euseb Hist Eccl. 3. c. 27. saith they esteemed none of the Gospels but that which was called the Gospel according to the Hebrews they received Yea it was the Charge which the Catholick Christians laid against the Hereticks condemned by the four first General Councils that they would not hearken to the Scriptures nor reverence them as shall in due place appear This S. Austin oft condemns in the Manichees and chargeth some Donatists coâ—â—r Fulgentium Donatist with burning the Gospels as things to be rased out and Athanasius Epist ad Orthodox testifies that the Arians did burn the Books of the holy Scripture which they found in the Church But however he hath a design in this 3. § to shew that the followers of Hereticks under which name he chiefly intends Protestants do in practice disown the Scripture rule as insufficient and close with and build upon the way of Tradition whence he would make evident that by the common acknowledgement of all men no other way of receiving the Doctrine of Faith can be owned but this only I shall here shew in what he criminates Protestants to be false but before I come to answer on the behalf of Protestants to the things here charged on them and the self-contradictions pretended for though he talks of Heresie in this Discourse it is easie to observe his only aim is not at Hereticks but at Protestants that is at truly Catholick Christians I shall observe that what he hath declared in this Paragraph is a very effectual way to shew Oral Tradition no Rule of Faith nor so much as a probable way to discern truth for if they who desert Tradition or Doctrines delivered by it may require their Children to guide themselves by their sense if this be possible as indeed it is and this Discourser here asserts as much it can never be demonstrated that this hath not been the practice of the present Romish Church and that many things now delivered as truths in their way of Tradition were not Heresies or errors broached by some mens fancies in a former Generation who required their Children to follow their sense Yea besides this if it be the general way of Heresie as this Authour here asserts to promote their Heretical tenets in the way of Oral Tradition it will be beyond the skill of this Authour unless he shall retract this description of Heresie to give the least assurance to any reasonable men that the Roman Church which goes on in the way of Oral Tradition is not upon this account of Tradition to be much suspected of holding Heresies Yea it will hence also the more effectually follow that it is impossible that Hereticks should be discerned from the holders of the true Faith if there were no other Rule to discover this but Oral Tradition since this Discourser asserts that this very Rule Hereticks generally close with in the propagation of Heresie at a distance from its first original Yea and it will tend much to the justifying of the followers of Protestants if it shall appear that they go not in the way of Tradition which this Authour hath assured us is the constant way the followers of all Hereticks run into See both his § 3. and § 5. I answer now to this 3. § that Protestants do not at all throw aside the Scripture Letters Self-sufficiency as a Rule I suppose this Discourser cannot be ignorant that while we own Scripture a Rule of Faith we acknowledge the necessary and principal Doctrines thereof to be so clear and intelligible in Scripture that they may without actual error be comprized in some form of sound words such as are Creeds Confessions of Faith Articles Catechisms or the like and we do acknowledge and assert these truths even so many as are necessary to the Salvation of all the adult in the Church to be infallibly evident to the judgements and understandings of men from the fulness and plainness of their proposal in Scripture Protestants will require Children to receive such things as these as certain truths from the Pastors or Parents not because they are from their Fathers or Teachers but because they are things certainly by them discerned to be in Scripture and till these Children are able to search and discern the same themselves their Parents or Teachers knowledge is a very considerable Motive to them to own such truths as clear in Scripture And this is a knowledge as certain as they are capable of until they come themselves to peruse and understand the Scripture yea it is certain enough to them to command their assent as certain as other things are which credible persons attest upon their eye-sight For in what I plainly discern I as surely know that I
do we disallow to others the grounds our selves proceed upon for we allow to all and commend in all their practice upon clear and well grounded Scripture-evidence but we neither allow our selves nor others to practise upon ungrounded pretences of Scripture being on our side The Third pretended contradiction is To pretend first the Scriptures Letter clear of it self without needing the Church to interpret it and afterwards to judge the followers of it to their best power to go wrong that is to confess it obscure and to need their new Church's interpretation But Protestants do assert that in all necessary Doctrines the evidence of Scripture is so clear that it needs no interpretation nor can they be denied but by preferring interest passion or some other sond conceptions above evidence and this is to forsake Scripture but in many other things they who do not discern the evidence of Scripture may err though they follow it to their best power but notwithstanding this Scripture is sufficiently clear in the evidence it gives of all Divine revealed truth to them who do discern its evidence though men be confessed to be men and many of them not capable of full understanding many truths His Fourth contradiction charged on Hereticks but designed for Protestants is that they persecute others for taking that way which they held at least pretended meritorious in themselves in which charge as the thing intended is palpably false concerning Protestants so the language he useth agreeth not to them The Fifth pretended contradiction is to oblige others to relinquish the sole guidance of Scriptures Letter and to rule themselves by their Tradition and at the same time against Catholicks to impugn Tradition as unfit to sense it and abet only the self-sufficiency of Scriptures Letter The former clause here charged on Protestants is no way their practice for though in matters prudential they require inferiours to be ruled by the commands of their Superiours which both Scripture and the Government of all Societies in the World require yet in matters of Faith they require that men receive them only from Scripture as the Rule of Faith or the main ground of belief Nor are any Protestants in any case commanded to relinquish Scripture as a Rule of Faith and to rule themselves by Tradition more than if in a Corporation a member who cannot read hath his duty read to him by another out of the Charter or told him in words with great care collected out of the Charter to express its sense this should be called a commanding this man as a member of this Society to relinquish the sole guidance of the Charter as his Rule and to be ruled by others Tradition when he follows the Charter by the best evidence he hath concerning it and relies not on a delivery of continued hearsaies report and fame which is a way suitable to the Romish Oral Tradition As to the latter part of this pretended Contradiction which concerns the impugning Tradition as unfit to sense Scripture if this be understood of the present way of Romish Oral Tradition this indeed we do so impugn But if this be understood of the Ancient and Primitive Tradition Protestants do acknowledge this so far as it can be manifested to be general to be very fit to sense such Scriptures as are otherwise difficult and obscure and so far as we have any intimations of such Traditions by the Ancient Fathers we own them useful The last pretended contradiction is To impute that carriage as a fault to our Romish Church which themselves practice and which is most material our Church punishes none but those who desert our Rule but they punish for too close following their Rule All the clauses of this charge are guilty of deserting the Rule of Truth For Protestants who fault this Traditionary way do not practise this Tradition as hath been above shewed nor do Protestants punish any for following Scripture too close as hath been evidenced The middle clause is likewise untrue for if he mean that the Romish Church never punisheth any who pretend to hold to the Tradition they received according to the best of their knowledge how came it to pass that Victor excommunicated all the Asian Churches for not keeping Easter the same day with the Roman Church though these Asian Churches pleaded a certain Tradition not only from their famous Bishops but from Philip the Deacon and his Daughters which were Prophetesses and from S. John the Apostle and Evangelist Eus Hist Eccl. 5. c. 24. Yea how came Mr. White to be censured at Rome who thought he defended the Rule of Tradition yea how came Monsieur Arnold to be so troubled by the Jesuits in France even for the using those words which he received from S. Austin a famous and approved Father But if he only mean that the Church of Rome punisheth none but such as swerve some way from the Traditions she delivers this if true in it self is nothing that can truly be called most material it being neither pertinent to his charge against Protestants nor considerable in it self since it only speaks the Church of Rome commendable in not punishing those who believe every thing it saies and practise every thing it commands and was there ever any Society in the World that in this thing was not as commendable as the Church of Rome But when he here tells us their Church punisheth none but those who desert the Rule she recommends surely he much forgat himself § 5. where speaking of Hereticks he saith that the deserters of the natural way of Tradition have been but few and the Descendents of these Revolters followed Tradition for either he must say that their Church punisheth no Descendents of Revolters as he calls them that is allows all Heresies in any but the first Authours of them or else must acknowledge that it punisheth them whom himself accounts and there as he thinks proves that they are not deserters of Tradition § 4. He asks What can follow hence but that Subjects whom common sense cannot but make exceeding sensible of such unreasonable carriage in persecuting them purely for following Gods word which themselves had taught them they ought in conscience to follow should strive to wreak their malice against their Persecutors and to involve whole Nations in War and Blood but he after adds he intends not a justification of those revolting Sects But it cannot be that common sense nor any rational evidence should teach Subjects under Protestant Princes that they are persecuted purely for following Gods Word since there is no such thing in truth they can no otherwise think it is so but by evident mistakes or by such deluding perswasions as this Authour would deceive them with And indeed such pernicious incentives as these of this Discourser may possibly if they meet with fiery and malicious spirits inflame them into a Rebellion and withal shew what Principles may be instilled by pretenders to Tradition But such is the peaceableness
them out of design and by these men if in an allowed and confirmed Council both the present and future Generation must be determined But what he speaks of a future Generation easily discovering the innovation makes me think he forgets himself For how should the following Generation of Catholicks consistently with this Authours Principles discover it By former Monuments But he in this Book declares that they must not give heed to any former private mens Writings against the delivered Doctrine of the Church publickly attested And if any publick Writing though it be their own approved Canons seem contrary they must find such interpretation as will agree with this declared Doctrine and stick to it though it be wrested so that whatsoever can be shewed from History or Ancient Doctors as this Authour declares in his Corollaries is to such Papists of no account against present Tradition See Coroll 14.16 17. Yea if you shall produce a great number of opposers as may in many cases easily be done he will hold to the greater number in his present Council If you produce him a former Council against any now received Doctrine he must not rationally judge of the Tradition but from the present Tradition condemn that if it cannot be otherwise interpreted as Heretical If you produce the Eastern or Graecian or other Churches as delivering otherwise if this cannot by other means be evaded they must not be acknowledged by Romanists for true Deliverers But if we can produce an approved General Council have we not now such sufficient Monuments to discover thereby what was the Doctrine of the Church such Councils our Discourser calls the greatest Authority in the Catholick Church p. 129. Yet if the Council was approved and by the Roman Church acknowledged both for Catholick and General still they have a device to reject what ever dislikes them in such a Council by saying that it is ex parte approbatum and ex parte reprobatum or part of it rejected and part of it received by this device they reject part of the Second General Council at Constantinople and the Twenty eighth Canon of the Fourth General Council at Chalcedon which declares that their Fathers gave Priviledges to the See of old Rome because that was the Imperial City and therefore upon the same consideration they gave the same Priviledges to the See of Constantinople And thus they have rejected others of old as also part of the Council of Constance and the Council of Basil more lately concerning the Authority and Power of the General Councils over the Bishop of Rome Thus doth Binius and other Papists So that no way remains for a Papist thus principled to detect this Innovation where he hath contrary evidence much less in many cases where the matter now determined hath not been so distinctly of old treated of so that the Roman Church may innovate and yet expect to be believed that the Doctrine was ever delivered Provided they take care not so palpably to contradict their own publick and former delivery in such a way as no possible interpretation can make things consist one with the other If they do take this care there is room enough left for many innovations in Doctrine in points not clearly enough determined formerly in the publick Monuments of that Church and in those also by misinterpretations But though Papists consistently with their Principles can make no discovery of Innovations but must either make use of strained interpretations of former Writers or else must condemn those Writers yet Protestants can and do make this discovery And blessed be God that they of the Romish Church have not so blotted out the Writings of the Ancient Fathers though they have shewed some good will thereto nor have they been able so to correct the Letter of the Scripture according to their own sense as this Authour thinks convenient Cor. 29. but that we are able from them to discover the Error and Apostasie of the present Church of Rome of which in the close of this Discourse I will give him one instance § 6. From these Principles he concludes That since nothing new could be owned as not new in any Generation by the first nor a foregoing Age make it received as not new by Posterity by the second therefore since we hold it descended uninterruptedly it did descend as such To this I answer That if the former Principles had been both true as neither of them are yet would not this conclusion have followed from them because it supposeth besides these Principles many other things to be true which are either very improbable or certainly false First it supposeth that all points held as matters of Faith have in all Ages since Christ been delivered in such terms as ever delivered-points of Faith whereby they have been known distinctly from disputable opinions if this had been so the many Controversies whether such and such things were de fide shew the maintainers of them on the one side not capable of understanding plain words Secondly it supposeth that nothing can be received as ever delivered by a following Generation which was not delivered as ever received in a former Generation unless they declare something not to be new which they know is new For why may not that which is propounded as a probable opinion in one Generation be thought to be delivered as a truth in the next Generation and in some following Generations who cannot give an Historical account how far in every Age every Position was received it may be owned as a point of Faith by which means also Constitutions of expediency may be owned as Doctrines necessary In which case they now only hold as a matter of Faith what the former Generation held as a truth and so they hold no new thing differing in the substance from the former nor design they any thing new in the Mode of holding it Thirdly This supposeth that every Generation from the time of the Apostles have been of the opinion this Authour pretends to to design to hold all and nothing but what the immediately foregoing Generation held which is a point can never be proved For this would be indeed to assert that never any persons studied to understand any point more clearly than it was comprized in the words they received from their Fathers or else that when they had so studied they never declared their conceptions or opinions in such points or if they did declare them yet no number of men would ever entertain them And this is as much as to say that the Church never had any Doctors studied in the points of Faith or at least that such studies never were honoured in the Church and the fruits of them received and applauded by it which if it would not cast a great indignity upon the Church yet it is apparently contrary to the truth Fourthly It supposeth but proves not that all points of Faith have come down by the way of Tradition and none of them failed of
to be in many things blameable more than the Papists at this day as dissimulation infidelity and the like which were the faults by Leo charged on the Manichees but not by Gelasius charged on them he writes of but still in that fault for which Gelasius condemns them he writes against the Papists at this day are altogether guilty of it that is in dividing the Sacrament or not receiving both Bread and Wine which he saith cannot be without great Sacriledge Nor can any here make a third reply upon any rational ground that it then was Sacrilegious to have administred only in one kind because the known practice and Canons of the Roman Church required administration in both kinds But since it hath in after times declared this practice mutable and ordered the Communion to be given only in one kind it is not now sacrilegious For this answer will not agree with the intent of these words and the Doctrine formerly received in the Roman Church The reason why Gelasius declared it great sacriledge to take this Sacrament in one kind alone is intimated sufficiently in this Canon not to refer to the Churches Constitution but the Sacraments Institution in that he calls both species or kinds one and the same Mysterie and sayes this one and the same Mysterie cannot be divided without grand sacriledge which is to referr us to the nature of the thing it self and its Institution as being not mutable Yea further the ancient Tradition of the Roman Church held as a Point of Doctrine that the Elements in the Eucharist ought to be administred according to what Christ instituted that is the Bread and Wine to be given to the Laity distinctly and separately because Christ gave them so then cannot this third Reply reconcile the present Doctrine of the Roman Church with what was formerly delivered To shew this I could produce many testimonies but shall only instance in Julius a Roman Bishop in a Canonical Epistle to the Bishops of Egypt recorded also in Gratian de Consecrat Dist 2. Cum omne Where he declares that he had heard of some who contrary to the Divine Orders and Apostolical Institutions consecrated Milk instead of Wine others who deliver to the people the Eucharist dipped For it is read in the truth of the Gospel Jesus took Bread and the Cup and having blessed it gave it to his Disciples But for that they gave the Eucharist dipped to the people they have received no testimony produced out of the Gospel in which he commends to us his body and his blood for the commendation is rehearsed separately of the Bread and separately of the Cup. In which words he makes Christs Institution a Rule by which he condemns other practices different from it and from this Institution he requires that both the Bread and the Cup be separately given and this even with reference to the Laity or as he speaks to the people to whom it was delivered and by this Rule he condemned the giving the Bread dipped in Wine whereas both should be given asunder so doth Gelasius by the same condemn the receiving only in one kind when it should be received in both All this considered the former Tradition of the Roman Church may from this instance appear to condemn the late Tradition as sacrilegious and therefore I may conclude that the same Tradition hath not been alwayes kept to as may appear by preserved Monuments out of which instances may be easily multiplied An Answer to his ninth Discourse shewing that the way of Oral Tradition in the Church hath not so much strength as other matters of Humane Authority § 1. BVt saith he some may say all this is nature if the Objector means reason wrought upon by Motives laid by Gods special goodness to bring man to bliss I wonder what else is supernaturality But this point is out of my road otherwise than to shew how Christian Tradition is strengthened above the greatest humane testimony whatever by those Motives which we rightly call assistances of the Holy Ghost Not to examine his Notion of supernaturality and the assistances of the Holy Ghost because they concern not the Discourse in hand I shall only tell him what Protestants or any other men who are true to reason would say to this Discourse and that is that what he hath said hitherto is of so low natural evidence and so far from reason that in this way the Christian can have no more evidence of the truth of Christian Religion than an Heathen may have of the truth of Paganism nor is there any such certainty in Tradition concerning the main Body of Christs Doctrine as is comparable to many other matters of humane testimony § 2 3. He observes the Mahometans Tradition for Mahomets existence will convey the truth thereof to the Worlds end if followed and Protestants acknowledge it hath had the force hitherto to be followed And the Tradition in the Church for the main Body of Christs Doctrine far exceeds that of the Turks for Mahomets existence because supposing the quality of the testifiers equal much greater multitudes in divers Countreys were testifiers of Christs Doctrine being converted by powerful Miracles than the few witnesses of Mahomets existence it is easier for those few Syrians or Arabians to conspire to a lye than for these Christians nor can Christians be so easily mistaken concerning Christian Doctrine In answer to this I in the first place grant That there is an Historical Traditionary certainty amongst the Turks concerning the existence of Mahomet and it is very reasonable that rather more should be allowed to the Tradition of Christians than of Mahometans But that it may truly appear how far Tradition may be relyed on for the conveyance of truth we must distinctly consider the matters delivered Of which some things there are which are not probably capable of mistake nor liable to be perverted and to receive a mixture of much falshood and have this advantage that the delivery of them from one to another doth still continue and no interest perswades the generality of men to deny or indeavour the concealing of them Now all these properties agree to the assertion of Mahomets existence amongst the Turks to the delivery of the Being of a God among the Gentiles to Moses being the great Prophet among the Jews and to Jesus being the Christ and I may add S Peter and S. Paul c. being his Apostles among the Christians thus the fame of a good or true Writer may be continued amongst Historians and in these things and many other such like I will grant it is not only possible but probable that Tradition may convey a certainty But there are other things lyable to mistake whence in many matters of common fame sufficiently known to the first Relater by the misapprehension of them who hear the relation the ordinary report is oft-times false or else 2. They are subject to be perverted or are concealed and not delivered which hath been
SECT I. An Inquiry what is declared the Rule of Faith by the Scriptures HE first goeth about to prove by Scripture That the Rule of Faith is self-evident from Isai 35.8 This shall be to you a direct way so that fools cannot err in it Which words as cited by this Author shew only the knowledge of God under the Gospel to be so clear and evident that they who will seek after him and live to him though of low capacities may understand so much as is requisite for their right walking which Protestants assert also and own this evidence to be in Scripture But that Tradition may be proved this Rule of Faith by Scripture he alledgeth Isai 59.21 This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord my Spirit which is in thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart from thy mouth and from the mouth of thy seed and from the mouth of thy seeds seed from henceforth for ever But 1. to have Gods Word and Spirit in their mouth proves their delivery not a Rule of Faith or unerring then must the speeches of every private Christian who shall be saved be a Rule of Faith because the Scriptures assure us That every one who shall be saved hath both the Spirit of Christ and his word in their mouth see Rom. 8.9 Rom. 10.9 10. Mat. 10.32 2. Though all who are born of God shall have his word in their mouth this will not secure us that what is by any Society of men declared as truth upon Tradition is Gods Word no more than what the Psalmist saies Psal 37.30 The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom and his tongue talketh of judgement would assure that the Doctrines owned by the way of Tradition among the Jews were alwaies the true Doctrines since it might well be that those Jews were not such righteous men as it may also be that the generality of some visible Church are not Gods seed 3. Gods Word may be in the mouth where the holy Scriptures are the Rule We read Josh 1.8 This Book of the Law shall not depart out of thy mouth but thou shalt meditate therein day and night Where it is evident that when Joshua was to keep the Law in his mouth he had the Book of the Law for his Rule and had his acquaintance with the Law by meditating in it God saith Mal. 2.6 concerning Levi The Law of truth was in his mouth and Vers 7. they shall seek the Law at his mouth and when they did thus in Ezra's time he read the Law out of the Book of Moses and that Book did Hilkiah send to Josiah While S. Paul professed his Faith with his mouth he declared that he believed all things written in the Law and the Prophets When we read Deut. 31.21 22. This Song shall not be forgotten out of the mouths of their Seed vers 22. Moses therefore wrote this Song the same day and taught it the Children of Israel Is it not evident that it was from the writing of Moses that this Song was in their mouth and that writing by which they were taught surely was their Rule to know this Song by Next to this he urgeth as pithy and home but not to his purpose Jer. 31.33 I will give my Law in their bowels and in their hearts will I write it and notes that S. Paul contradistinguisheth the Law of Grace from Moses 's Law in that the latter was written in Tables of Stone and the former in fleshly tables of mens hearts But 1. What proof is here of Tradition being the Rule of Faith Had the Scripture said that under the Gospel Christians should receive the Law of God no otherwise than from one anothers hearts it might have seemed to serve his purpose S. Austin de Spiritu litera c. 21. having mentioned the place fore-cited of Jeremy and that of S. Paul to which this Discourser refers inquires what are the Laws of God written by God himself in their hearts but the very presence of the holy Spirit who is the finger of God by whom being present Charity which is the fulness of the Law and the end of the Commandment is poured forth in our hearts Now if God causeth his commands to be inwardly imbraced by a Spirit of love and piety this is far from conveying to them a Spirit of infallibility 2. Nor doth S. Paul contradistinguish the Law of Moses and the Gospel in those words but he contradistinguisheth the way of Gods inward writing in the heart from the way of his outward writing in those tables For even the Law of Moses was also written in the hearts of them who feared God as the Laws of Christ were more eminently in the hearts of Christians Hence such expressions as these Psal 119.11 Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee Psal 37.31 The Law of his God is in his heart none of his steps shall slide Yea Moses tells the Jews Deut. 30.11 This Commandment which I command thee this day it is not hidden from thee neither is it far of v. 14. but the word is nigh thee in thy mouth and in thy heart that thou maist do it Yet though Gods Law before the coming of Christ was in the hearts of his people yet was the Book of the Law then their Rule as now is the Old and New Testament 3. If that place of S. Paul be considered 2 Cor. 3.3 it will evidence that what the Holy Ghost going along with his Ministry had written in the fleshly tables of their hearts was enough to commend his Apostleship which is the scope and design of that place but it no ways signifies that these Corinthians even at this time were not capable of erring in any Doctrine of the Faith for he declares to them in this same Epistle chap. 11.3 that he fears lest as Satan beguiled Eve so their minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ 4. And if we could have been assured as we cannot that the delivery of truth in the Church of Corinth was a Rule of Faith this would plead much for the Tradition of the Greek Church rather than of the Roman which agreeth not with it and so would destroy Romish Tradition But as this Discoursers citations of Scripture Authority are very impertinent I shall in brief observe whether the Scripture do not evidently declare it self to be the Rule of Faith To the which purpose besides many other places observed in the foregoing part of this answer let these be considered S. Luke 1.4 5. It seemed good to me also having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first to write unto thee in order most excellent Theophilus that thou maist know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed Now that is a Rule of Faith which is the best way to ascertain us of Faith and from these words it is evident that even in the times
should not seem a sufficient answer without further proof of what is there intimated I shall undertake to evidence that the Doctrine of the Fathers and Tradition of the ancient Church against those Hereticks was such as was grounded upon Scripture as their Rule of Faith and that those Hereticks assertions were therefore rejected because they were contrary to these Scriptures Which I shall do in examining what were the grounds of Faith upon which the Catholick Fathers proceeded at the time of the four first General Councils in which were these Hereticks condemned as also Macedonius in the second Council SECT V. What were the grounds of the Catholick Faith asserted against Arianism in and at the time of the first Nicene Council ARius being a Presbyter of Alexandria was for his Heretical Doctrine denying the eternal Godhead of the Son opposed and rejected by Alexander Bishop of that place and deposed from his Office by an Alexandrian Council Socr. Hist Eccl. lib. 1. c. 6. upon which Alexander writes an Epistle to all his fellow Ministers wherein as he lays down many Scriptures which he declares to be full against the assertion of Arius so he there declares that the Arians when they had once determined to fight against Christ would not hear the words of our Lord. And he there likewise shews that whereas he had oftentimes overthrown them in unfolding the Divine Scriptures they as Chamaelions changed themselves The same Alexander of Alexandria in his Epistle to Alexander of Constantinople declares that the Arians assertion did tend to destroy the holy Scriptures and that in the Scriptures they pretended to urge they did offer violence to the holy Scriptures He likewise there urgeth the Scriptures against them with such expressions as these John is sufficient to instruct Paul doth declare manifestly But to leave this particular Bishop and come to the General Council When this famous Council of Nice was gathered together Constantine tells them Theodor. Hist Eccl. lib. 1. c. 7. that they had the Doctrine of the holy Spirit in writing for saith he the Evangelical and Apostolical Books and the Oracles of the ancient Prophets do evidently instruct us what we ought to think of Divine things wherefore rejecting all contentious strife let us receive a solution of such things as are questioned from the Divinely inspired speeches As this Council of Nice was put forth by Pisanus out of the Vatican Exemplar it is observable that they oft urge the same Scriptures which Alexander did urge against Arius and in the third Book of that Council The Bishops said by Eusebius In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God That was rejects was not and God takes away that he was not God believe the things that are written neither think nor inquire after things that are not written So that Council After the decision of this Council Socr. lib. 1. c. 5. shews that Eusebius writing of the Nicene Confession saies The form of Execration which is set after the Creed we thought fit to be received because it prohibits the using of words not written from whence almost all the confusion and disorder of the Churches do arise Wherefore when no Scripture of Divine inspiration useth these words concerning the Son that he was of things that were not and that it was once when he was not it is no way fit to speak or teach such things That this Council made Scripture their Rule of decision will yet further appear from the words of Constantine in his Epistle to the Church of Alexandria recorded Socr. lib. 1. c. 6. where he declared That the Council had diligently examined all things and writing of the Arians he adds some blasphemed speaking and professing to believe things contrary to the Divinely inspired Scriptures and the Faith And Athanasius ad Epictetum speaks how powerful the Faith of Nice might be expected to be against Heresies which was professed according to the holy Scriptures I shall hereafter observe somewhat more out of Athanasius which will further declare that at the time of this Nicene Council of which he was a Member Scripture was the Rule made use of against the Arians SECT VI. What was received as the Rule of Faith at the time of the second General Council at Constantinople THis Council not being called against Arius Nestorius Dioscorus or Eutyches which are mentioned by this Discourser but against Macedonius who denied the Divinity of the holy Spirit and other Hereticks I shall but briefly observe That Evagrius Hist Eccl. lib. 2. c. 4. declares the design of that Council to be to make manifest by Scripture-testimonies what they conceived about the Holy Ghost against them who adventured to reject his Lordship And if the testimony of Evagrius being a private Historian be not sufficient this very same thing was before him attested and declared concerning this second General Council in the definition of the General Council of Chalcedon Act. 5. And in the seventh Canon of this second Council where they declare how they will receive those that return from Heresie amongst other things concerning some of them are those words We receive them as Greeks and the first day we make them Christians and the second Catechumens and so we Catechize them and make them continue a long time in the Church and hear the holy Scriptures and then we Baptize them Doth it not hence appear that this Council owned the Scriptures as the way to the true Faith and establishment in it in that they would not receive Hereticks until they had been long hearers of it But I will not here neglect to mention that at the time of this Council Pope Damasus gathers a Council at Rome hearing of that at Constantinople where they declare That after all the Prophetical Apostolical and Evangelical Scriptures by which the Catholick Church by the grace of God is founded the Church of Rome is by some Synodical Decrees above other Churches And Christ himself said Thou art Peter Is not this testimony to be seen in their own Collectors of the Councils plain enough to shew what was in those daies owned by the Church of Rome as the main ground and foundation of Faith SECT VII What was owned as the Rule of Faith at the time of the third General Council at Ephesus THis Council was gathered against Nestorius when Coelestine was Bishop of Rome whose place was here supplied by Cyril of Alexandria That the Nestorians then did not pretend to Scripture for their Rule is probable in that Socr. lib. 7. c. 32. relates that they indeavoured to falsifie the Copies of the Scriptures as likewise in that an Epistle of the Nestorians to the people of Constantinople begins thus The Law is not delivered in writing but is placed in the minds of the Pastors which Epistle is extant in the Acts of the Ephesine Council Tom. 3. c. 7. And in the Epistle of Cyril to Comanus and Pontamion Act. Conc. Eph. Tom. 2.
c. 18. Cyril relates that when the Metropolitans and Bishops had disputed with Nestorius and had clearly shewed out of the Divine Scripture that he was God whom the Virgin bare according to the flesh and therefore evidently concluded him to err he was full of anger and exclaimed in his manner wretchedly against the truth So that it seems the Metropolitans and Bishops who opposed Nestorius made Scripture their Rule as the Protestants do but the Nestorians then were not for these written words as their Rule but for what is written in mens hearts in which the Nestorian assertion may claim some kindred with our Discourser To observe further what Rule of Faith was made use of against Nestorius we may understand it from the writings of Cyril of Alexandria who as he was the chief opposer of Nestorius so was he highly approved of by this Council of Ephesus for his appearing against Nestorius and also by Coelestine Bishop of Rome as appears in his Letters directed to him Tom. 1. Conc. Eph. c. 16. Cyril concerning the right Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ to the Empresses Eudocia and Pulcheria shews that his Book may be of use to reduce some from error and by various Arguments and demonstrations of the Divine Scriptures to strengthen them in the Faith who are nourished in the Doctrine of truth in that whole Book propounds Doctrines from the several Books of the New Testament against the Doctrine of Nestorius And I suppose it will be granted that that which in such a case of Heresie arising would stablish in the Faith and reduce to the Faith must be established upon and have evidence from the Rule of Faith In another Treatise of his to the same Empresses of the same subject he tells them The Scriptures are the Fountains which God spake of by his Prophet Isaiah saying Draw the waters out of the wells of salvation Wholesom Fountains we call the Prophets Apostles and Evangelists and a little after The speeches of the Holy Fathers and their Sanctions wisely stir us up that we should observe diligently what is most agreeing to the holy Scriptures and should with a quick sense contemplate the truth hidden in the Divine letters The same Cyril in an Epistle to the Clergy and people of Constantinople declared his expectation that Nestorius would have returned from his perverse opinions and would with reverence imbrace the Faith delivered by the holy Apostles and Evangelical Writers as also by the whole holy Scripture and sealed that it might receive no damage by the voices and oracles of the holy Prophets Is not this to make Scripture a Rule of Faith I might add much more from Cyril and what shall be spoken concerning Coelestine who wrote to the Ephesine Council and approved it will further shew the Rule of Faith at that time owned by the Roman Church Therefore I shall here only subjoin one testimony of the whole Council of Ephesus in their Epistle to Coelestine Bishop of Rome Tom. 4. Conc. Eph. c. 17. wherein they related That the Letter of Cyril to Nestorius had been read in the Council which the holy Synod did approve by its judgement because it was in the whole agreeable to the Divine Scriptures and the Exposition of Faith which the holy Fathers put forth in the great Synod of Nice We here meet with their being guided by Scripture and the former decisions founded upon it but the Rule of Oral Tradition or any other unwritten Rule was to this Age a perfect stranger SECT VIII What was owned as the Rule of Faith at the time of the fourth General Council at Chalcedon HAving sufficiently evidenced the Rule of Faith at the time of the first General Council against Arius who denied the Eternal Divinity of the Son of God and of the second against Macedonius who denied the Lordship of the holy Spirit and of the third against Nestorius who divided Christ into two Persons I now shall briefly inquire what was owned as this Rule at the time of the fourth General Council against Eutyches who denied that Christ had two natures wherein Dioscorus was also condemned Now Eutyches was opposed by many Catholick Bishops and more especially was opposed and condemned by Pope Leo. But the Rule by which these Bishops as well as this General Council did condemn him was the holy Scriptures Flavianus Bishop of Constantinople in an Epistle of his extant amongst Leo's Epistles Ep. 6. saies There were some who knew not the Divine readings dispraise the Fathers and desert the holy Scripture to their own perdition such an one saith he was Eutyches amongst us Amongst the Epistles of Leo Ep. 53. is extant an Epistle of Eusebius Bishop of Millain and the Council assembled with him wherein that Synod declares their assent to the Faith contained in Leo's Epistle sent to the East because the brightness of light and splendor of truth did shine in it by the assertions of the Prophets Evangelical Authorities and the testimonies of Apostolical Doctrine Leo himself by whose means the Council of Chalcedon was called in which the errors of Eutyches were more fully censured in his tenth Epistle writing of the Eutychians sayes That they fall into this folly because when they are hindred by any obscurity in attaining the knowledge of the truth they have not recourse to the Prophetical voices the Apostolical Letters and Evangelical Authorities but to themselves And a little after of Eutyches he speaketh thus That he knew not what he ought to think of the incarnation of the word of God nor was he willing to gain the light of understanding to labour in the holy Scriptures And in the same Epistle cites and urges many Scriptures against Eutyches with such expressions as these He might have subjected himself to the Evangelical Doctrine in Matthew speaking He might have desired instruction from the Apostolical Preaching reading in the Epistle to the Romans ch 1. He might have brought holy diligence to the Prophetical pages and have found the promise of God to Abraham c. with other Scriptures in the like manner produced These testimonies of Leo evidence that he owned the holy Scriptures to be the best way to come to Faith and be stablished in it and is not this to be a Rule of Faith Yea he further observes that the neglect of them were the cause of swerving from the Faith To come to the Council of Chalcedon it self In its second Action this tenth Epistle of Leo was read and they declared they all believed according to that Epistle At the same time was read the Epistle of Cyril to Nestorius which as it was read in and approved by the third General Council Conc. Eph. Tom. 2. ch 3. So being in Chalcedon read they declared They all believed as Cyril did in which Epistle he shews that we must not divide Christ into two Sons nor make an union of Persons for the Scripture saith The Word was made Flesh which is nothing else but he did
every one of them must effect it by taking such assertions as he findeth in the Holy Scriptures or such as are consequent from them Where in the end of the same Prooem he declares in other words the Rule laid down not many Periods before in the beginning of it which is quite opposite to the design of Oral Tradition I shall yet further confirm this by two other passages out of those Books 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The one lib. 1. c. 3. where when he had declared that some of the Greeks and Barbarians owned the Son of God he adds We according to the faith of his Doctrine which we have for certain divinely inspired do believe that it is no other wayes possible to expound the more eminent and more divine account of the Son of God and to bring this to the knowledge of men but only by that Scripture which was inspired by the Holy Ghost that is by the Evangelical and Apostolical as also that of the Law and the Prophets Now it is not conceivable that he who believed that without the Scriptures there could be no eminent Christian knowledge of Christ should lay any other Rule of Faith or exclude Scripture from being that Rule The other passage is lib. 4. c. 1. It is not enough he sayes for them who discourse of such and so great things to commit the matter to humane senses and the common understanding but we must take for the proof of the things we speak the testimonies also of the Divine Scriptures which testimonies that they may afford us certain and undoubted faith either in such things as are to be spoken by us or in those that are already spoken it seems necessary to show that they are the Divine Scriptures inspired by the Spirit of God which he there undertakes to prove What can be spoken more fully to make Scripture both the only Rule and a certain and undoubted Rule of Faith And if yet nothing will satisfie but the word Rule we shall find that also toward the end of his fourth Book immediately before his Anacephalaeosis where he saith our understanding is to be kept to the Rule of the Divine Letters Though enough hath been already observed to shew the great mistake of this Citation from Origen I shall yet farther take notice that the phrases which deceived this Author Ecclesiastica Traditio Ecclesiastica Praedicatio do both of them amongst the Fathers oft signifie the delivery in the Church by the holy Scriptures But to avoid multiplying instances concerning Ecclesiastical Tradition I shall refer to what shall be spoken concerning Clemens Alexandrinus whose Scholar Origen was and to what is hereafter cited from Athanasius against Samosatenus concerning the phrase of Ecclesiastical preaching we may observe a like phrase in Austin de Vnitate Ecclesiae c. 16. Let them shew their Church if they can in the prescript of the Law in the predictions of the Prophets in the Songs of the Psalms in the words of the Pastor himself in the preachings and labours of the Evangelists that is in all the Canonical Authorities of the holy Books Somewhat alike expression is above cited from Irenaeus lib. 2. c. 46. and from Leo Ep. 10. in Sect. 8. n. 2. His other testimony from Origen is at the end of his 29 Hom. in Matt. We ought not to believe otherwise than as the Churches of God have delivered us by Succession Which words he there speaks to the same purpose with the former to assert the way of the Churches Tradition and that Scriptural against the Hereticks To understand Origen herein it is not amiss to observe a little before these words he expounds the abomination of desolation to be a word which stands in the place of the holy Scriptures and perswades to depart from the Creator who is the only and true God and to believe another God we know not whom above him to whom none is like In which words he evidently refers to the ancient Hereticks and in the beginning of his 30. Hom. names Basilides Marcion Valentinus and Apelles to whom he referred every one of which as the Church-History informs us brought in another God from the true Concerning these Heresies Hom. 29. at the end he exhorts that though they should pretend some Scriptures they should not believe them but keep to the Churches Tradition Why they are not to be believed in pretending to some places of Scripture he sheweth Because the light of truth doth not appear from any place of Scripture but from all Scripture that is of the Law Prophets Evangelists and Apostles That the Churches Tradition he recommends is that only which is grounded upon and according to Scripture is evident in that a little before he saies The abomination of desolation doth alwaies superadd something to what is in the Scriptures and the shortning those daies he expounds that the good God will cut off all those additaments to Scripture by whom he pleaseth Origen here all along agrees with the Protestants Rule but no way with Oral Tradition nor with any thing else that differs from Scripture or adds to it but he accounts all such as the abomination of desolation It were easie to observe many other testimonies from Origen which I omit as supposing I have from these two places chosen by this Authour shewed enough that Origen owned the Rule of Scripture Protestants as well as Origen would not have men be deluded by the subtilty of any Hereticks who pretend to urge Scripture and yet they no more thereby disown its being a Rule of Doctrine than our Saviour did disown it as a Rule of Life when he would not be tempted by the Devils citing the words of Scripture to act against its commands SECT XII What was the Rule of Faith owned by Tertullian THree Discourses of Tertullian are referred to by this Discourser The first of which is de Praescriptione adversus Haereticos cited Corol. 15. where he will not allow Hereticks to argue out of Scripture The design of this Treatise of Tertullian is to evidence that the Doctrine professed in the Church of Christ was the true Christian Doctrine against such Hereticks which were of the same mold with them Irenaeus and Origen opposed who either would not admit the Scriptures cap. 17. or else changed the very proprieties of the words not allowing their known significations but imagining in them strange things which no way appear which was the way of the Valentinians c. 38. And these Hereticks were not satisfied with what was delivered by Christ and his Apostles but produced other things c. 8. Against these he pleads prescription as to the true Christian Doctrine as being from the Apostles and having Communion with them He shews there is no disputing with such Hereticks from Scripture since they will not stand to it c. 17 18. And since these Hereticks did not own the only God and Jesus Christ and the holy Spirit c. 7. and 13 14. He urgeth That they were
Donatists falsly charged one of the Ordainers of Caecilianus and pretended this as a ground of their Separation 2. Their Righteousness did much consist in such a Zeal as was disorderly fierce furious and censorious They were diligent in compassing Sea and Land to make Proselites but it was that they might be their Followers and Admirers Their professing a great Respect to the Prophets and their Pretence of Traditions was chiefly to gain Credit to their own Dictates Their Zeal was a violent espousing the Interest of their own Errors and was not so much for God and his Law as for themselves and their own Party like that of the Donatists Annal. Eccles an 306. n. 42. mentioned by Baronius who could with more patience hear Men speak lightly of Christ than of Donatuâ— And they were so censorious that they not only despised the Publicans but esteemed the People as not knowing the Law to be cursed and condemned the most holy Jesus for a Blasphemer an Enemy to Caesar and one who cast out Devils by the Prince of Devils Their violent Fierceness was evident by their bloody Cruelties under the Government of Alexandria and at other times Jos Antiq. l. 13. c. 2â—â— and especially in their being much concerned in prosecuting our Lord to the Death and treating him with so many Indignities and his Apostles after him with various Methods of Hatred and Cruelty and particularly murdering James the Just the first Bishop of Jerusalem But in the Religion of our Saviour the contrary Temper of pursuing true and sincere Piety Faith and the Fear and Love of God and of Mercifulness Meekness and Charity is made indispensably necessary to our eternal Happiness And to this end we are commanded to learn of Christ to be meek and lowly Mat. 11.29 that we may find Rest unto our Souls But if St. James and St. John be for calling for Fire from Heaven this is declared to be greatly opposite to the Spirit of the Gospel For tho it allows and establisheth just Rules of Government and the Use of the Power of the Sword therein yet it condemns all Cruelty and Fury And if St. Peter in his Zeal will unwarrantably draw his Sword he must receive a severe Check from our Lord and Master 3. They miscarried also by their unduly affecting the Vogue and Applause of Men in their Religious Performances To this purpose they made broad their Philacteries Exod. 13.2 5. Deut. 6.4 Ch. 11 13 14 15. that they might seem to Men to give great respect to those Precepts of the Law inscribed in them concerning the worshipping acknowledging and obeying God And for a pretence of extraordinary Sanctity they made use of long Prayers and put up their Devotions even in the Corners of the Streets And their Fasting Praying and giving Alms was done that they might be seen of Men while it might well have become such Actions to have been managed by a better Principle By this means they gained a great Interest among the People but made use of it to very ill purposes even to the opposing the Doctrine of our Saviour And Josephus tells us Antiq. Jud. l. 13. c. 18. they could 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by their Credit bring the People to be ill-affected either to the King or the High-Priest But our Saviour pronounceth frequent Woes against them for their Hypocrisy and lets them know that all this while they are out of God's Favour and that what is highly esteemed among Men is an Abomination in the sight of God Luke 16.15 Now both Reason and Religion will recommend a good Name as useful and desirable so far as it can be gained in doing our Duty and practising Sincerity But if the World be so degenerate that the faithful and upright Man must needs meet with Censures and Revilings here as Christ himself and his Apostles did so must all his Disciples take up the Cross and bear the Reproach In this case the Blessed Jesus declared Luke 6.26 Wo be to you when all Men shall speak well of you And whereas the Scribes and Pharisees are said to do all their Works to be seen of Men Mat. 23.5 St. Hierom there affirms that he who in this is like to them Hieronym in Mat. 23. Scriba Pharisaeus est is in the same condition with the Scribes and Pharisees When St. Peter against the Rule of his Duty would withdraw from the Gentiles to ingratiate himself with the Jews St. Paul thought it necessary to reprove him sharply as not walking uprightly and according to the Truth of the Gospel Indeed the inordinate Pursuit of Vain-Glory and the valuing the Esteem or Favour of any Men above the discharge of a good Conscience is so opposite to true Religion to a lively Sense of God and Faith in him that in this respect our Saviour said How can ye believe which receive Honour one of another 4. Their Righteousness superstitiously laid a great stress on little outside Things and such as were no parts of real Religion They were strict in washing those hands which remained polluted by evil Works and in washing Pots and Tables as if these and such other Things were of doctrinal necessity They were careful to tithe Mint and Anise and appeared hugely scrupulous about the Obligation of their unlawful Vow of Corban but with respect to that Vow could without regret dispense with the neglect of honouring superior Relations against the fifth Commandment They received the Traditions of their Scribes with a great and inordinate Veneration even above the Law it self and of these unwritten Traditions they had a great Number as the Scripture intimateth and Josephus expresly testifieth Ant. l. 13. c. 18 And out of a pretext of Purity they rejected all Converse with Publicans tho such as were justified rather than themselves But true Christian Righteousness must consist in minding and chiefly valuing the great Duties of true Piety and Holiness And by our Saviour's Doctrine a Wo is denounced against the Pharisees little Strictnesses while they neglected the weighty things of the Law And their observing and urging those things as greatly necessary which indeed were not truly good were so far from pleasing God that our Lord declared That in vain they worshipped him teaching for Doctrines the Commandments of Men Mat. 15.9 therein applying to them those Words of the Prophet Esay according to the Version of the Septuagint Isa 29.13 5. They were haughty and imperious but not submissive to Rulers and Governours They were forward to bind heavy Burdens on the Shoulders of others but were not themselves willing to stoop to the Duties of Obedience and Subjection They were so little Friends to Caesar that by them the Question was propounded Mat. 22.15 17. Whether it was lawful to give Tribute to Caesar or no and were so averse to Authority that as Josephus relates they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 make War and otherwise were injurious towards