these passages so plainly proving their so superlative esteem of the Holy Scriptures do infer their most exact diligence and watchfulness for their conservation and safety And this is sufficient for my purpose in this Section But withal too I have gain'd an Argument for my main design viz. The Testimony of the Fathers forasmuch as between Holy Scriptures being the safest Conveyance of Divine Truths throughout all Ages and Scriptures being the sole Rule of Faith there is so necessary a Connexion And because the Romanists likewise allege the Fathers to give Countenance to Oral Tradition therefore the Testimony of the Fathers in our case shall be farther considered of And 1. I will appeal to any ingenious Reader of them whether the passages which the Romanists cite out of the Fathers on the behalf of Tradition and seemingly the most diminutive of Scripture do in any measure come near to such a course Character of it as that it is a Black Gospel an Ink Theology (a) Sure Footing p. 194. dead Characters Waxen-natur'd and pliable to the Daedalean Fancies of the ingenious Moulders of new Opinions If Mens thoughts may be judg'd of by their words sure the Fathers and Romanists Sentiments of the Scriptures were very divers 2ly Seeing there is a seeming contradiction of the Fathers to themselves because they are urg'd by both the disagreeing Parties it will be fitting to enquire whether there may not be a reconciliation of them to each other and of some of them to themselves For this end I suppose a good means would be 1. Seeing the Fathers sometimes speak of Scripture without mention of Tradion at other times speak of Tradition not mentioning Scripture to examine how they deliver their Sense when they express themselves of Scripture and Tradition jointly and comparatively of one with the other 2ly To see whether their appearingly most favourable expressions of Tradition may not be very well construed in a subordination of Tradition to Scripture very consistently with Scriptures Precedence to it 1. Of the Fathers speaking of Scripture and Tradition conjointly I will begin with St. Cyprian in his Epistle to Pompey Being prest with Tradition he answers Whence is this Tradition Descends it from our Lord's and his Gospel's Authority or comes it from the Commands of the Apostles and their Epistles God declares that those things should be done which are written saying to Joshua The Book of the Law shall not depart from thy Mouâ—h but thou shalt meditate in it day and night that thou mayest observe to do all things written in it Likewise our Lord sending his Apostles Commands all Nations to be Baptized and to be taught that they observe all things whatsoever he had Commanded What obstinacy what presumption is it to prefer humane Tradition to the Divine Dispose or Command and not to consider that God is angry and in wrath when humane Tradition disregards and dissolves Divine Commands As God warns and speaks by the Prophet Isaiah c. And toward the end of the Epistle And this it behoves God's Priests to do at this time keeping the Divine Commands that if Truth have declin'd and fail'd in any respect we go back to the source of the Evangelical and Apostolical Tradition and let the manner of our Actings take their rise thence whence their Order and Origin rose The preference of Scripture to Tradition by this antient Father is so plain and undeniable that it is reply'd St. Cyprian's Testimony was writ by him to defend an Error and therefore no wonder if as Bellarmine says more errantium ratiocinetur he discours'd after the rate of those that err that is assumes false grounds to build his Error on Letter of Thanks p. 124. But this is a mean Evasion For tho' Cyprian was indeed in an Error and did mistake in his discourse yet it can't be affirm'd with probability or Charity to such a Saint and Martyr that to gratifie a private Opinion he would affront so Sacred and Catholick a Principle as the Rule of Christian Faith and degrade Tradition from being such if he had indeed believed it to be so Yet if this should be granted to our Adversaries the consequence would be their inconvenience For why might not more do the same which St. Cyprian did and if some Fathers might desert Tradition and flye to Scripture meerly to serve a Turn for defence of an Opinion which they could not maintain otherwise why may it not be as well said that other Fathers might baulk Scripture and advance Tradition and for the same end viz. to support some Doctrine or Doctrines which else must have fallen And upon this it would follow beside the imputation of inconstancy and shifting to the Fathers that we must be at much uncertainty what truly was the Judgment of the Fathers concerning the Rule of Faith and that therefore the quotations out of them must in a great part be insignificant for this purpose St. Basil in his Tract call'd Questions compendiously unfolded or answered says It is necessary and consonant to Reason that every Man learn that which is needful out of the Holy Scripture both for the fulness of godliness and lest they accustom themselves to humane Traditions 'T is acknowledged by (a) De amissi gratiae L. 1. C. 13. Bellarmine that this Author admits not Traditions unwritten but then he says it is not certainly manifest whether these Questions were the great Basil's or rather Eustathius's of Sebastia Yet the same (b) De Paenit L. 3. C. 8. Bellarmine confidently quotes them as St. Basils for Auricular Confession So that it may seem that the Questions were before scrupled at only because they spoke in behalf of Scripture against Tradition and against venial sins which is manifest Partiality But I shall bring a Testimony of St. Basil which Bellarmine himself would own to be St. Basils who in his Book of the true Faith thus Discourses If God be faithful in all his sayings his Words and Works they remaining for ever and being done in Truth and Equity it must be an evident signe of Infidelity and Pride if any one shall reject what is written and introduce what is not written This is a manifest Prelation of what is written i. e. Holy Scriptures to what is unwritten i. e. Tradition which Bellarm. calls the unwritten word of God in the Title to his 4th Book De verbo Dei When St. (a) Quid inquam Omousion nisi Ego Pater unum sumus Sed nunc nec ego Nicaenam synodum tibi nec tu Arimineusem mihi debes tâ—nquam praejudicaturus cbiitere Scripturarum Authoritatibus res cum re causa cum causâ ratio cum ratione concertet Contra Maxt Lib. 3. Cap. 14. August was willing to wave the Council of Nice to Maximinus and to retire to a Decision of the Catholick Cause by Scripture certainly that great Person judg'd Scripture without Tradion to be sufficient to prove an Article of Faith or
(a) Ioh. 20. uit written that we might believe and believing have life and which were (b) Rom. 15.4 written for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope but how could they attain those ends if they should perish if this light were extinguish'd how much in the dark and forlorne would Man be This peculiar watchfulness of God over the Scriptures is acknowledged by the Romanists (c) Ita velente Deo ut verae lectionis â—ntegrâ—tas quam hominum velmalitia vel negligentia corâ—uperent in partibus in totâ saltem Ecclesiasticorum codi um universitate servâ—retur ne Ecclesia Christi per aliquod tempus divinarum Scripturaâ—um integritate careret Bibl. Sanct. p. 727. Sixtus Senensis attributes the preserved incorruptness of the sacred Text to the Will of God And Bellarmine (d) De verbo Dei L. 2. C. 2. Quintum ultimum argumentum argues from the Divine Providence for the preservation of the Old Testament from any injury by the Jews Indeed he entitles Tradition likewise to Gods special care as the (a) Cura ista non incumbit praecipue hominibus sed Deo Praeter-providentiam Dei quae est praecipua causa De verbo Dei non Scripto Lib. 4. C. 12. principal cause of its pretended safety And this is a Confession that God is in a particular manner the Guardian of that by which he communicates his Mind and Pleasure to Man for such a thing i. e. The unwritten word of God he held Tradition to be But certainly Tradition can't lay a just claim to such an interest in Divine Providence as the Scripture 1. For first besides what I have before prov'd to the just diminution of Oral Tradition there was a providential dismission of it and choice of Scripture to be the Conveyance of Gods revealed Will to his Church through successive Ages For whenas Oral Tradition had been in use for that purpose before the Flood and some while after it and great had been the untrustiness of it at the length God writ his Law Himself and commanded what was written to be kept with a great religious care Afterwards as Moses the Prophets and Hagiographers were inspir'd their Revelations were written so far as was necessary to the Church's Edification And when the People were in danger of seduction and it behoved them to seek to their God for instruction they were sent not Children to their Traditioning Fathers Is S. 19 20. but to the Law and to the Testimony and they were told that those who spoke not according to that word it was because there was no light in them Yes and when the Church was generally corrupted and therefore Tradition had not done its Duty the Churches relief was not from the living voice of testifying Fathers but from the Scripture according to whose Canon abuses were reformed And for this Reformation and because in it he perform'd the words of the Law which were written in the Book that Hilkiah the Priest found in the house of the Lord Josiah stands renowned in Sacred Story with this Character Like unto him there was no King before him that turned to the Lord with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his might 2 Kin. 23 24 25. according to all the Law of Moses c. This way of securing Revelations by writing was continued under the Gospel as we have them in the Evangelists the Epistles the Acts and the Revelation And this course was as needful under the Gospel as under the legal Oeconomy if not more For it being intended by God that the Gospel should be propagated beyond the narrow Confines of Judaea where the Scriptures of the Old Testament had lodg'd for hundreds of years throughout the World and among so many Nations of such different Complexions Customs and Interests there was the more danger it should be disguis'd if it had been committed to the frailty of an Oral Tradition as we know that the more Mouths Relations pass through the more subject they are to alterations from their primitive truth through the ignorance mistakes prejudices prepossessions or wilfulness of the Relators Whereas a Writing being preserved is a perpetual standard by which to correct any such changes for in these Truth would be most likely still to appear in its first Integrity Thus I have shew'd how that after an experienc'd unsuccessfulness of Oral Conveyance God appointed another way and so ordered it that Law and Gospel should be written Now if after and notwithstanding such a Provision yet it should be God's intent that Oral Tradition only should have the prerogative to sense Scripture and that Faith should be lastly resolved into Oral Tradition and therefore that This not Scripture should be the only Rule of Faith it must needs seem strange and unaccountable to a-any rational Christian how it should come to pass that in the Sacred Scriptures there should be so many and such high (a) Ps 19.7 8 9 10 11. Ps 119. passim 2 Pet. 1.19 20 21. Eph. 6.17 Heb. 4.12 Encomiums of them that our Saviour should bid the Jews (b) Ioh. 5.39 search the Scriptures should tell them they (c) Matth. 22.29 err'd not knowing the Scriptures (d) Matth. 22.42 Ioh. 10.34 35 36. should dispute with and baffle them out of the Scriptures and by them (e) Luke 24.25 26 27. confirm his Disciples in the Truth that his Apostles should proceed in the same manner with the Jews That the (f) Act. 17.11 12. Beraeans should be commended for searching the Scriptures daily whereupon many of them believed that St. Paul should mention it to Timothy (g) 2 Tim. 3.15 16 17. as an encouragement or engagement of him to continue in the things he had learned that he from a Child had known the holy Scriptures and that he should presently add a description of Scripture than which a more full one sure can't be us'd of the Rule of Faith viz. That it is able to make wise unto Salvation through the Faith which is in Christ Jesus that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness that the Man of God may be perfect throughly furnish'd unto all good works I say it is mighty strange that Scripture should be thus magnified and yet none of all this should be said there of Tradition Nay that either Tradition should be mentioned with disgrace as when our Saviour (a) Matth. 15.2 3. condemns the Jew's Traditions of their Elders and St. Paul (b) Col. 2.8 warns the Colossians to beware lest any Man spoile them after the Tradition of Men or where the word is found yet that the sense of it should not be useful to our Adversaries purpose which that it might be it must be sufficient to prove that there was more delivered by the Apostles than was written and that
what was so delivered was a necessary Point of Faith But when St. Paul praises the Corinthians that they (c) 1 Cor. 11.3.23 kept the Ordinances or Traditions as he delivered them when he tells them he had received that which also he delivered to them when he exhorts the Thessalonians (d) 2 Thes 2.15 to hold the Traditions which they had been taught whether by word or says he our Epistle when he commands them (a) 2 Thes 3.6 to withdraw themselves from every Brother that walks disorderly and not after the Tradition which he received from the Apostle there is nothing I say in these places which will necessarily infer that more was delivered by the Apostles than was or is written and that what was so delivered was a necessary Point of Faith through all Ages Why now it is a wonder that if God tho' he provided his Church with the Holy Scriptures yet pleas'd to enstate Oral humane Tradition in the great Office of sensing Scripture and of being the only Rule of Faith He did not so order it that Scripture should modestly acknowledge its Superior but rather let Scripture carry away all the honour from it 2ly A second reason why Oral Tradition can't plead so strong a Title to a protection by the Divine Providence as Scripture is this God's Providence does ordinarily co-operate with and prosper means answerably to their comportment with and likelihood to reach the end intended Now it has been before demonstrated how weak and uncertain Tradition is how fix'd and able Writings are to conserve Truths once delivered and therefore 't is rational to believe that the Divine Aid does much rather assist to the preservation of Divine Truths by the Holy Scriptures than by Oral Tradition the former being much more servicable to the promoting such an end than the latter Hitherto I have prov'd the continued preservation of Holy Scripture from proper Causes of such an Effect causes ministerial and supreme humane care and vigilancy and Divine special Providence SECT V. 4ly Scripture's Preservation is manifest from the Event Such have been the happy success of Divine Providence's watchfulness and of humane Care and Diligence that Christians do generally consent in this that the Holy Scriptures are de facto continued safe and pure to us in all things which are necessary to be believed and to be practised for the obtainment of Everlasting Happiness The Church of Rome professes to have the Scriptures and the Trent Council has defin'd the Vulgar Latin to be those Genuine Authentick Scriptures How true that Determination was for the Authentickness of the Vulgar Latin Bibles is not necessary for me to enquire 't is enough for me that they acknowledge a preserved Integrity of the present Scriptures So that there is not a Tenent which we have more strong inducement to believe upon the account even of Tradition than that the Divine Books the Scriptures which we have are indeed the Word of God and have been faithfully derived to us from the beginning there being no Tradition more universal for any Point than for this great important Truth tho' Christians may run wide from each other in other matters yet they close in this Center I conclude then seeing that the Holy Scriptures are much more fit to keep the Truths committed to them safe than Oral Tradition if they be preserved as has been prov'd and likewise that the Holy Scriptures are preserv'd as is generally confess'd and even by our Adversaries it must follow that not Oral Tradition but the sacred Scriptures are the surest and safest way of Conveyance of Divine Truths down from their Original delivery unto us which to demonstrate was the scope of this Undertaking CHAP. II. Objections answer'd SECT I. THere remain some things which perhaps may be apprehended to reflect on the Prelation I have given to Scripture above Oral Tradition in the point of preservation which next shall be considered Obj. 1. The (a) Almost innumerable variae lectiones in it still controverted Sure Foâ—ting p. 32. many variae lectiones divers Readings may seem to some a reason to question Scripture's descent to us in a sufficient Purity But Answ 1. 'T is a question whether all those which go under the name of Divers Readings do truly deserve that Title For I conceive that not every Translation of the Bible in whole or in part by whomsoever and from whencesoever as suppose by some very uncertain or justly suspected Author or not from the Originals but from some Versions of them no nor that every Copy of the Bible in the Original Languages found any where or whether of convenient Antiquity or not are sitting to Minister matter for various Readings of the Sacred Text i. e. are such as merit to be considered by Learned Men and may put them to the stand sometimes which is the truest Certainly none if any Translations at all but such as are immediately from the Originals have been perform'd by Authors of repute or if their Persons are not known who give in the work no jealousie of their Integrity none but Copies of sufficient Antiquity are considerable for such a purpose And if such a course and some other cations were us'd it may be a great part of the Army of almost innumerable variae Lectiones would be disbanded 2ly But let them stand as they are mustred by some they are not so formidable as to (a) Nay so many variae lectiones in the New Testament alone observed by one man my Lord Usher that he durst not print them for fear of bringing the whole Book into doubt Sure Footing Ibid. bring the whole Book into doubt and doubtless the excellent Lord Primate (b) Supposing he said so as the Author of Sâ—re Footing reports Vsher was more Good and Learned than to think so tho' perhaps he might judge the Printing of them to be less convenient not as if they were rationally conclusive of any thing really disadvantageous to Scripture but lest the Atheistical or the weak might take an occasion from them to disparage the Scripture which care to avoid the ministring occasion of scandal to others in Religious matters has ever been the wariness of the good and prudent But as for these divers Readings (c) Dr. Br. Walton late Lord B. of Ch. in Proleg 7. ad Biblia Polyglort Qui etiam citat in eundem sensum Lud. Capellum in Proleg 6. some of the most curious Collecters of them have not discern'd any alteration made by them in the Scripture which may wrong Faith or Manners (a) In quâ tamen tam longâ latâ a textu criginario discessione divinam tecum providentiam agnoscimus suspicimus quòd nulla extiterit tam damnosa inter utrosque textus differentia ut rectam fidem quae ad salutem est necessaria labefactaret aut laederet Jacobi Vsserii Armach ad Ludov. Cappellum Epist And the Reverend Arch-Bishop Vsher before named confesses and venerates
the least as to priviledge Oral Tradition to be the Rule of Faith For 1. Were their writings the Conservatories of Tradition written by persons mov'd by the Holy Ghost or not If not and I suppose our adversaries will not affirm they were then these writings have a great disadvantage of the Holy Scriptures which we profess to be the Canon of our Faith as great a disadvantage as must be between Books written by them who could not err and those written by them who might err from whence it would follow that what is contain'd in the one must be true that the Contents of the other may be true yet too they may be false there may be that reported in them as deliver'd by Christ and his Apostles which yet was not delivered by them But 2. Were there Ecclesiastical Monuments of unquestionable credit and which did from Christ and his Apostles through each age exacty and fully declare to us the consentient Doctrines and Practices of the universal Church it would be very material and we should much rejoice in it but the case is otherwise For some while there were very few if any writings save the Holy Scripture which come to our hands Justin Martyr is said to be the first Father About 150 years after Christ whose works have survived to this day There are some Books which pretend to an early date which yet are judg'd to be supposititious some of them judged to be so by the Romanists themselves others proved to be such by the (a) Cook in censu â quorundum Scriptorum D. James's Bastardie of false Fathers Daille Protestants For the first 300 years as there was no compleat Ecclesiastical History so the Fathers now extant were but few and their Works too being calculated for the times in which they lived reach not the controversies which for many years past and at this day exercise and trouble Christendom This paucity of the Records of the first ages (a) Id autem esse tempus quo quatuor prima Concilia Oecumenica includantur a Constantino Imp. ad Marcianum Atque hoc vel propterea aequissimum esse quia primorum seculorum paucissima extant monumenta illius vero temporis quo Ecclesia praecipuè florebat longe plurima ut facile ex ejus aetatis Patribus eorum scriptis fides ac disciplina veteris Catholicoe possit agnosci Ita Perron Sequitur Responsio Regis Hoc postulatum parùm illis aequum videbitur c. Apud Is Casaubonum in Responsione ad Cardinalis Perronii Epistolam pag. 38 39 40 41 42. Card. Perron acknowledges and does imply their insufficiency for setling Catholick Faith when as he would have recourse made for this purpose unto the 4th and 5th Centuries because then there were most writers Tho against this the learned Is Casaubon excepts and justly forasmuch as it must be presum'd that the stream of Tradition ran purest nearest to its Fountain The Fathers after the first 300 years did often mix their own private sentiments with the Doctrines of the Church Nor do the Fathers express themselves so as that we may clearly distinguish when they writ as Doctors and when as Witnesses when they deliver their own private Sense and when the Sense of the Church and if of the Church whether it be of the Church universal or of some particular Church some who have diligently perus'd their Writings judge it not easy to find any such constant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is confess'd by (a) Rushworth Dial 3d. Sect. 13. a Romanist that the Fathers speak sometimes as Witnesses of what the Church held in their days and sometimes as Doctors and so it is often hard to distinguish how they deliver their Opinions because sometimes they press Scripture or Reason as Doctors and sometimes to confirm a known Truth So that he who seeks Tradition in the Fathers and to convince it by their Testimony takes an hard task upon him if he go rigorously to work and have a cunning Critick to his Adversary So then Tradition must in a good measure be at a loss for succour from the Fathers Writings I conclude then that Books Writings have not given such advantages to Oral Tradition as to render it the safest and most certain Conveyance of Divine Truths but this Dignity and Trust is due to Holy Scriptures only which having been at the first penn'd by Persons assisted by the Divine infallible Spirit are stamp'd with an Authority transcendent to all humane Authority Oral or Written which have been witness'd to by the concurrent Testimony of the Church in each intermediate Age since the Primitive Times and which are at this day generally agreed upon as the true Word of God by Christians tho' in other things it may be some of their Heads may stand as oppositely as those of Sampson's Foxes SECT IV. There remains a Cavil or two rather than Objections which shall have a dispatch also 1. We are told that by desertion of Oral Tradition and adherence to Scripture we do cast our selves upon a remediless ignorance even of Scripture (a) Sure Footing P. 117. Tradition establish'd the Church is provided of a certain and infallible Rule to interpret Scripture's Letter by so as to arrive certainly at Christ's Sense c. And e contrà (b) Ibid. p. 98. without Tradition both Letter and Sense of Scripture is uncertain and subject to dispute Again (c) Ibid. p. 38. As for the certainty of the Scriptures signisicancy nothing is more evident than that this is quite lost to all in the uncertainty of the Letter 2ly It is suggested that the course we take is an Enemy to the Churches Peace (d) Ibid. p. 40. The many Sects into which our miserable Country is distracted issue from this Principle viz. The making Scriptures Letter the Rule of our Faith By these passages it is evident that this Author will have it that Protestants have nothing but the Letter of Scriptures dead Characters to live upon and that upon this he charges their utter uncertainty in the interpretation of Scriptures and their distractions Answ But Protestants when they affirm That Scripture is the safest and most certain Conveyance of Divine Truths and that consequently it is the only Rule of Faith do mean Scriptures Letter and Sense both or the Sense notified by the Words and Letter And therefore the Author might have spar'd his Proof of this conclusion i. e. That Scriptures Letter wants all the properties belonging to a Rule of Faith It was needless I say to prove this to Protestants Well but let Protestants mean and affirm what they will have only the Letter of Scripture and not the Sense of it because they admit not of Oral Tradition to Sense it Scripture it seems is such a Riddle that there is no understanding it except we plough with their Heifer and likewise without Tradition's caement we shall always be a pieces and at variance amongst our selves But 1.
As to the certainty of Scripture's Sense is Scripture in earnest so utterly obscure Will their Author say so of the Histories of Livie or Tacitus or of the Philosophical Writings of Plato and Aristotle or of Euclid's Elements Could not God speak clearly and intelligibly to Men as Men have done and that in matters of the greatest consequence to them or would he not do so The Assertion of the one would impeach his Wisdom of the other his mercy and kindness to Souls And if Scriptures leave us so quite in the dark why do they call themselves a Light a Lamp say Ps 119 105.13â— Ps 19.7 8. that they enlighten the Eyes and make wise the simple Were the Books of the Old Testament the Gospels Acts and Epistles of the New Testament in the respective times in which they were writ in themselves unintelligible by them to whom and for whose Souls health they were writ If they were so then they were useless and vain And Oral Tradition could not expound them which was not in Being when those Books were first written for That deals with the Ages following the first conveys what was at the first delivered unto Posterity Did God then write only to amaze his Church 'T is acknowledged that there are several 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 things hard to be understood which it might please God should be partly to win the greater veneration to the Scriptures for what is obvious and presently seen through is in the more danger of contempt partly for the exercise of Christian's Industry Humility and Charity towards each other on occasion of dissent But howsoever the Scriptures are not so lock'd up but that a compâ—tent diligence and a Beraean 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or readiness of mind may be a Key to them may open them in all Points necessary to Salvation And if in other things we remain ignorant or not so certain we may well bear with it while we are yet but in viâ and not comprehensores on our way unto but have not yet reach'd perfection That which makes the noise of Scriptur's obscurity the more loud is that Men are apt to look upon the many subtilties of the Schooles and Niceties of Polemick Writers as Articles of Faith and that men have more mind to fathom depths and to humour their curiosity for which end I believe the Scriptures were not intended and hence are ever racking the Scriptures and vexing the Sacred Text than to exercise themselves in a sober understanding of what is sufficiently plain and in a consciencious practise of the Holy Rules of Life which are evident enough If Christians would more seriously apply themselves to these two things they would find in the Scriptures employment enough and they would be more contented with their difficulties The Romanists have raised a cry of Scriptur's darkness upon another account and out of Policy For having embrac'd several Tenents and Practices which Scripture does condemn or not countenance either it is wholly silent of them or they are but meer appearances there which are snatch'd at and yet it is inconsistent with their grandeur or profit or the affected reputation of an infallibility to part with they are faine to press Tradition to serve in their Wars and for the defence of them Thus they have first made a necessity and then have invented a Remedy for it But when all is done the Remedy is more imaginary than real For how unsure a Conveyance and consequently how weak a Proof Oral Tradition is in matters of Christian Faith and Practice has been already evicted So that if we must be ignorant of Scriptures Sense unless Oral Tradition bless us with the Exposition of it and Scriptures no farther a Light than it is tinded at Tradition's Candle we must sit still in much ignorance or wander in great uncertainties for that cannot relieve us it is not that infallible Commentator it is pretended to be 2. To the upbraiding us with our Distractions I reply 1. Before the charge can be made good that the choice of Scripture for our Canon was the cause of our many Differences and that upon that pretence we should exchange Scripture for Oral Tradition it must be suppos'd that Oral Tradition is a sure and infallible clew to guide us out of the Labyrinth of Errors into the way of Truth and Peace the contrary to which has been sufficiently proved For otherwise to leave Scripture and to follow Tradition would be to relinquish a Guide or Rule which being indited by an unerring Spirit cannot mislead us and to chuse one which may and will carry us out of the way Nor will the pretence of Vnity make amends for this For true Christian Peace can't be otherwhere bottom'd than on Truth when and so far as it is a Cement of Men to the disservice of Truth it commences Faction Nor Reason nor Religion allow much less commend an Agreement of Persons to err together 2. They who have the most amorously espoused Tradition have also their many and great Differences as has been shew'd above only through Fear in some and Policy in the rest they are hush'd up more than amongst us and so do better escape the observation and talk of the World Nay that Church may be justly arraigned as the guilty cause of that which they call a great Schism viz. The Separation of so many Churches from them the Churches call'd Protestant by their imposition of unlawful and therefore impossible termes of Communion with them And (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nilus tells the World that their Imperiousness was the reason of the great Schism between the Greek and the Latin Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pag. 21. 22. Thus as the Church of Traditioners have no few Dissentions among themselves so they have given a beginning and continuance to the quarrels between them and a considerable part of Christendom 3. Ther 's no need of fetching our Distractions from the Rejection of Oral Tradition there are are other true manifest Causes of them assignable Our Church once flourish'd with Peace and that without the aid of an Oral Tradition whil'st the Reverend Bishops were suffered to govern it and the Royal was able to countenance the Ecclesiastical Authority But when the pious King and blessed Martyr was engag'd in and diverted by the turmoils of a Civil War when Episcopacy was chang'd for Anarchy when the Golden reins of Government in Church and State were broken then begun and increas'd our Divisions and Calamities Unto which it may be there were some assisting Causes from without some who helped to kindle and to blow our Fires And if the Roman Church should chance into the like afflicted State with ours it would be obnoxious to the like Confusions If the Mitre should be forsaken by the secular Crowned Heads and a mutinying multitude should pull their Holy Father out of his infallible Chair then 't is not altogether improbable but that Children would less heavken
AN ENQUIRY WHETHER Oral Tradition OR THE SACRED WRITINGS Be the Safest Conservatory and Conveyance OF Divine Truths Down from their Original Delivery through all Succeeding Ages In Two PARTS London Printed for Robert Clavel at the Sign of the Peacock in St. Paul's Church Yard 1685. THE PREFACE DOubtless it would more conduce to the honour of Christ the Peace of Christendom and the Welfare of Souls if Christians would agree at the least in this rather to live as becomes the Gospel we all believe than curiously dispute Why we believe For nice tamperings with and eager contests about the Foundation of Religion are apt rather to shake than to strengthen the Superstructures It may prove a Snare to the profane or unstable who when they shall see the Ground of their Belief and Eternal Hopes not to be agreed on after so many Ages perhaps may be tempted to doubt whether their whole Profession be not aery and have no Basis at all Yet notwithstanding if some will attempt to displace the true One and to justle in a false and ruinous Ground of Christian Faith and Practice a due regard to a matter of so great Importance may justifie an appearance against so dangerous a Commutation The Basis of Christian Belief suffers from more than one sort of Adversaries The injuries done to the Sacred Oracles of God by the impious Drollings and perverse Disputings of Profane and Atheistical Men are too notorious The Foundation of Faith has no part in the Value and Care of those Men who scorn Believing But this Crew is abhorr'd by all who have any ordinary sense of Religion or have not debauch'd even their Reason Indeed the danger is more sly and spreading from those who seem to be more serious and Friends to Religion Among such the Enthusiasts undermine the Holy Scriptures by pretence to an extraordinary illuminating Conduct and Incitations by the Holy Spirit of God But the Mode of this Sect commonly suites but with the more Melancholy and Muzing Natures and the Experience of their follies and risques within a while exposes the Vanity of their Pretences The Romanists way is the more generally plausible and winning They present the World with a Conveyance of Religious Truths and a Rule of Faith Whose (a) Sure Footing in Christiaty Or rational discourses of the Rule of Faith p. 54. Virtue they say is grounded on a far stronger Basis than all material Nature Such they affirm the virtue to be by which Tradition regulates her Followers to bring down Faith unerringly And whereas as seems by Cardinal (b) De verbo Dei non Scripto L. 4. C. 3. In initio 1. dem Ibid. C. 12. Sect. Dico secundò Bellarmine they formerly divided the honour of being the Foundation of Faith between Holy Scripture and Tradition of later years Oral Tradition has quite carried away the Credit and has been by some Zealous Asserters cry'd up for the infallible Conveyance (c) Sure Footing p. 98. 41 and only Rule of Faith That from which we are to receive the (d) Ibid. p. 117. Sense of Scripture which without This would be (e) Ibid. p. 38. quite lost to all in the uncertainty of the Letter That which is undertaken in the ensuing Papers is an Enquiry after the Nature of Oral Tradition and its best strength especially in Religious Affairs as also the full Force of Writings especially of the sacred Scriptures in point of Conservation and Conveyance of what is committed to them Vpon which Enquiry it will appear which of them is the most sufficient and sure for that purpose And that of the (a) There being only two grounds or Rules of Faith own'd viz. Delivery of it down by Writing or by Words and Practices Ibid. p. 52. two which after Examination shall be found to be so preserves to us and materially considered is the Rule of Christian Faith forasmuch as bringing down to succeeding Times the Christian Faith unvaried and entire which was primitively committed to the Church by the divinely inspir'd Planters of it it may satisfie and command our Belief secures us from assenting to any thing but what is true Whereas that which approves not it self to be such a faithful Depository and Convoy provides us not with a Rule of Faith deserves not that Authority over our Souls may betray us to believe a lie Hence therefore Oral Tradition's errability and defectiveness in Conveyance which shall be proved disables it for being the over-ruling Standard of Christians Belief and Practice in all Ages And on the other side the sureness and safety of Conservation and Transmission of Divine Truths by the Holy Scriptures which shall be prov'd likewise qualifies them for the Trust and Honour of being the Rule of Christian Faith through all Generations The Author is sensible that the Competition between Oral Tradition and Scripture has been already so excellently manag'd by Reverend and Learned Persons that this present Vndertaking by an obscure man may be judg'd Supernumerary or worse But he has observ'd that it was (a) Sancta Augustini sententia est nota multis digna quae ab omnibus cognoscatur optandum esse ubi Haereses vigent ut quicunque aliquâ scribendi facultate praediti sunt ii scribant omnes etsi non modo de rebus iisdem scriptur◠fint sed eadem etiam allis verbis fortasse scripturi Expedit enim c. Bellarm. in Praefatione ad Lectorem Tom. 1. Edit Ingolstadii 1588. Cardinal Bellarmine's Opinion and he quotes and commends St. Augustine wishing that in the Church's danger all who in some measure could should Write tho' they wrote not only of the same thing but also the same in other words Fas est ab hoste doceri It may be fit sometimes to take Advice from an Adversary especially when he has so great and pious a Second This the Author hopes may be an excuse of his Adventure into the Publick and that even his Gleanings after others plentiful Harvest their Learned Labours and Success may yet be not altogether unacceptable or useless to the Christian Church THE CONTENTS PART 1. CHAP. 1. Of Tradition in general Pag. 1. CHAP. 2. Of Oral Tradition and as apply'd to Religion what is allow'd and what denied to it Pag. 17. CHAP. 3. Reasons against the Certainty and Safety of Conveyance of Divine Truths by Oral Tradition Pag. 26. CHAP. 4. Experience against Oral Tradition's being a certain Conveyance of Divine Truths Pag. 46. CHAP. 5. The Arguments alleg'd for Oral Tradition answer'd Pag. 111. PART 2. CHAP. 1. Sacred Scriptures prov'd to be the safest and most certain Conservatory and Conveyance of Divine Truths Pag. 157. CHAP. 2. Objections answer'd Pag. 203. AN ENQUIRY Whether Oral Tradition or the Sacred Writings be the safest Conservatory and Conveyance of c. PART I. CHAP. I. Of Tradition in general SECT I. MAN is an active capacious Creature fitted for and desirous of knowledge and furnish'd
Vntrustiness I shall proceed next to consider Tradition Oral Tradition more particularly and distinctly and as apply'd to Religion CHAP. II. Of Oral Tradition as it is apply'd to Religion and there what is allow'd to it what deny'd SECT I. I Come now nearer to the Question which being mov'd both of Oral Traditions and of the Sacred Writings Trustiness and Certainty of Conveyance of Divine Truths c. I shall give them a distinct Consideration And first I shall enquire How sure and safe an immediate Conservatory and Conveyance Oral Tradition is of Divine Truths more speculative or more immediately practical fundamental or others down from their first delivery to the Church through succeeding Ages And before further procedure it is granted that Oral Tradition is of use in Religion yet not so much solitary and by it self as in conjunction with Tradition Written 1. It is yielded that tho' there be many (a) Dr. Cosins the late Reverend Lord Bishop of Duresme in his Scholast History of the Canon of Scripture pag. 4 5. Ecclesia Testis est custos sacrarum Literarum Ecclesiae Officium est ut ver as germanas ac genuinas Scripturas a falsis supposititiis ac adulterinis dijudicet ac discernat D. Whitak de S. Script Controv. 1. Quest 3. Cap. 2. Article of Religion 20. internal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Arguments clear in the Scriptures themselves whereby we may be sufficiently assur'd that they were breath'd from a Divine Spirit and are truly the Word of God Yet as to the particular and just number of those Sacred Books every Verse and Sentence in them whether they be more or fewer we have no better External and Ministerial assurance than the Constant and Recorded Testimony of the Catholick Church from one Generation to another which is a Witness and Keeper of Holy Writ 2ly It is confess'd that there are many particular Truths which have had the universal continued Profession and Oral Attestation of the Christian Church from the Primitive to the present Times 3ly It is not deny'd but that if there had been no Scriptures yet Oral Tradition might have derived some Truths to Posterity 4ly Let any Points be recommended to us by so large an Approbation and Certificate from Tradition as Sacred Scriptures have and we shall receive them with all beseeming regard But then 1. We deny that Oral Tradition is sufficient to preserve to us and to ascertain us of the several particular Truths which concern Christian Belief and Practice together with the Sense of the Sacred Books 2ly Tho' there are several Divine Truths which have had the universal and continued Profession of the Church yet we deny it would have been so happy if there had been no Scriptures 3ly Though there had been no Scriptures Oral Tradition might have sent down some Truths to Posterity But they would have been but few and those too blinded with erroneous Appendages most would have been lost as in Hurricanes and among Rocks and Sands some Vessels may weather it out yet shatter'd but how many Perish 4ly As to the last thing sure our Adversaries can't justly charge us with the contrary there being no Point maintained by them and deny'd by us which has so ample a Recommendation But I shall resume the first Concession and the annex'd Denyal and shall add That there is a great difference between Tradition's Testification concerning the Scriptures and Tradition's conserving the many Divine Truths and Sense of them and the safe transmitting them to all succeeding times We may rely upon Tradition for the former which is a more general thing and in which Tradition was less obnoxious to Error and yet not trust it for the latter which abounds in such a variety of Particulars in which there is the greater liableness to mistake and failance The difference I urge may be illustrated thus Suppose one informs me of a Guide in my Journey I credit and accept of that Information and thank the Informant But I rest no farther on him but follow the Guide in the several Stages of my Journey Or suppose one directs me to a very Honest Man and a very knowing Witness in my Cause When he has done so it is not He but the Witness on whom I must depend for a success in my Suit Nay if the Witness should chance to depose against him I may rationally believe him and he can't refuse the Evidence because he himself recommended him to me as a very credible Deponent The Application is obvious The Church's Tradition testifies 2 Tim. 3.15 16 17. Isa 8.20 that the Scriptures are the Oracles of God These Oracles of God are a Guide a Witness in the things of God and which belong to Man's Salvation They affirm so much of themselves and because they are Divine Oracles and testified by the Church so to be they must be believed by us in that Claim Why now tho' we owe and pay Thanks to the Church's Tradition for the Preservation of Holy Scriptures and Direction of Us to Them yet we are not therefore bound to resign our Faith universally to the Tradition of the Church but we may trust our selves with Scriptures Guidance and Testimony in all particular Matters of Faith and Practice Yes and if these Scriptures Witness against the Church's Tradition against some Opinions and Practices of it for which Tradition is pretended we ought to believe the Scriptures and Tradition can't fairly decline the Testimony tho' against it self SECT II. But against this it is urg'd That there can be no Arguing against Tradition out of Scripture The reason is Sure Footing in Christianity p. 10◠because there can be no certainty of Scripture without Tradition This must first be supposed certain before the Scripture can be held such Therefore to argue against Tradition out of Scripture is to discourse from what is Tradition being disallow'd uncertain which can't be a solid way of Argumentation To this I reply Omiting that Tradition is not the only means of our Certitude about Scripture That the Exception does not invalidate what I have said for thus it is We do confess to receive the Scriptures upon the Church's universal Tradition and we allow this Testimony to be in it's kind very useful and sufficiently certain and this certainty of Tradition quoad hoc for the Intelligencing us concerning Scripture is supposed by us But then we do and may argue from Scripture thus supposed certain against Tradition i. e. against what is uncertain or false in it viz. Any such Points of Faith or Practice or such Senses of Scripture as it would obtrude upon us when as yet they are perhaps contrary to Scripture and the Tradition is far short of being Vniversal it may be is very narrow or feigned rather than real So that we do not proceed upon an Vncertainty but upon what is certain by Vniversal Tradition i.e. That the Books of the Old and New Testament in the Number that we have them
are the Holy Scriptures and Oracles of God against what is affirm'd and can be prov'd by us to be uncertain or false in Tradition As in a like case Scholars argue from what is true and clear in Reason against what is false or dubious tho' it have Reason pretended for it Thus discoursing from Reason against Reason i. e. from what is really such against what is such but in name and appearance The sum and result of the Premises is this That as we do not take Tradition's Word for all the Doctrines or Practices and Senses of Scripture it would impose on us though we accept of Tradition's Evidence concerning the Scriptures as was in the beginning of this Chapter acknowledg'd So nor are we oblig'd to the former by acknowledgment of the latter Having stated what may be allow'd and what is denyed to Oral Tradition Next it shall be examin'd what Reason and Experience suggest against its sureness and safety of Conveyance and likewise after that what either can pretend on it's behalf CHAP. III. Reasons against the Certainty and Safety of Conveyance of Divine Truths by Oral Tradition SECT I. IT is asserted That the Body of the Faithful from Age to Age are the Traditioners of Divine Truths Sure Footing p. 60.100 101. that in reality Tradition rightly understood is the same thing materially with the living Voice and Practice of the whole Church essential consisting of Pastors and Laiety Now before Reason can acquiesce in a Tradition by Pastors and Laiety it must according to what has been premis'd be well satisfied in the fitness of the Testifiers The Qualifications of Persons for a due Testification especially in so weighty a matter as Religion are 1. Good knowingness of Fathers and Ancestors in Religion as also due care and diligence of Fathers in teaching their Children together with good Apprehensions Memory and Tractableness in the Children and Posterity 2ly Such a measure of Integrity through all descents as may secure the successive Testifiers against all temptations unto swerving from what they received from Fathers Let these Qualifications be farther considered of 1. The first Requisites are good Knowingness of Fathers together with Care and Diligence as also Apprehension Memory and Tractableness in Children let us examine how far these may be found in the Laiety I believe that the value and zeal for Religion in the first and golden Age of the Church made Fathers diligent to teach and Youth to learn But I doubt that this Temper as is incident to Religious Fervors might cool afterwards and that when Emperors became Christians Ease and Prosperity might beget a restiveness and neglect both in Ancestors and Posterity How well Fathers of Families did perform their part and how docile Children have been throughout the many hundred years before us is out of our Ken. But if we may guess at times past as there is often a likeness in some measure of the ways of Men in one Age to those in another by the times present and nearer to us it is to be wished I fear rather than it will be found that all or most Fathers and Governors of Families were such as Abraham Gen. 18.19 Josh 24.15 and Joshua Religion is too little minded in too many Families The use of a Catechisme is too rare and That when us'd is often little understood and less remembred Commonly Parents teach their Children the Lords Prayer Creed and Ten Commandments and that is well But these Rudiments are too slender a stock for Children to set up with as qualified Conveyers of the Body of the Christian Faith And if even these should pass down long by word of Mouth and not be Written they would be in danger of Maims or Corruptions But it may be thought Dr. James in his Manuduction to Divinity p. 108. Ex. Jo. Avent Conc. Bas M. S. that Spiritual Fathers instruct Young and Old both and capacitate them better for being Oral Traditioners Yet when the Priests were Fools Stocks and slothful Beasts when they had neither Scientiam nor Conscientiam neither Knowledge nor Conscience as it was complain'd in Old time it is not likely that then the Clergy were very careful to instruct the Laiety or that the Laiety should learn much from such a Clergy When of far later years some in Ireland (a) The reverend Arch-Bishop Usher in a Sermon Preached before the King June 20. 1624. on Eph. 4.13 who would be accounted Members of the Roman Church being demanded what they thought of the Doctrine of Transubstantiation not only rejected it with indignation but wondred also that it should be imagin'd any of their side should be so foolish as to give Credit to such a senseless thing When throughout a County in England (b) Dr. J. White in his Preface to The way to the true Church the Vulgar Papists were unable to render an account of their Faith or to understand the Points of the Catechism and utter'd their Creed in a Gibberish ridiculous to others and unintelligible by themselves Then the Priests fail'd in teaching the People or the People in teachableness But perhaps it has been otherwise since and was then in those Countries where the Publick and Authoriz'd Profession of the Roman Religion gave their Clergy more freedom of Access to and of Conversation with the Laiety Yet there 's an Opinion of the Romanists which will not much forward the diligent instructing of the Laiety in the Religion of Forefathers viz. That (a) The Author of Charity mistaken c. In Dr. Potter 's Answer to it pag. 183. 200 201. it suffices the Vulgar to believe implicitely what the Church teaches And that by virtue of such an implicite Faith a Cardinal Bellarmine and a Catholick Collier are of the same Belief This implicite Faith makes quick work and supersedes a distinct knowledge of Divine Truths and then what much need is there of a careful Teaching them They who speak not so broadly yet (a) Azor Instit Mor. Part 1. Lib. 8. Cap. 6. Sect. Tertiò quaeritur Et Sect. Sed mihi probabilius verius say it is the common Opinion of Divines that it is necessary to believe explicitely no more than the Apostles Creed or the fourteen Articles as they speak Nay some hold too that if this explicite Belief be only of the substance of the Articles confusedly and generally it is sufficient But by leave of these Authors such an explicite Belief of the Apostles Creed only much less a confus'd and general Belief cannot be sufficient howsoever sufficient it may be for other purposes to qualifie the Laiety for that great Purpose which in these Papers I am treating of But let the utmost be suppos'd viz. That the Clergy now do and formerly did discharge their Pastoral Duty as amply and faithfully as is requisite yet the Peoples usual immersion in secular business and distractions their oscitancy in Religious matters slowness of Understanding frailty of Memory in the
else he betrayed the Cause by appealing to a Medium which could not evince it For either the Nicene Council decreed the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father by Scripture without Tradition and then we have above three hundred venerable Fathers on our side or if they defin'd it in the strength of Tradition without Scripture or by Tradition sensing Scripture then St. August parting with the Council of Nice proceeding upon Tradition only or upon Tradition sensing Scripture left himself nothing or but the Letter of Scripture which according to our Adversaries wants all the properties of a Rule of Faith Sure Footing p. 29 to manage his Cause with By these Testimonies it is plain it cannot be that the Fathers should express themselves (a) Tho' some Fathers speak highly of Scripture as that it contains all Faith c. It is first to be mark'd whether they speak of Scripture sens'd or as yet to be sens'd and if the latter by whom c. Sure Footing p. 140. so highly of Scripture only so far as help'd and sens'd by Tradidition because as to the Being a Rule of Faith the Fathers separate Tradition from Scripture and set Scripture by it self Much more it is far from being (a) 'T is impossible they i. e. the Fathers should bâ—ld Scripture thus interpretable i. e. by other means thâ—n by Tradition the Rulâ— of Faith it being notorious that mâ—st Hereticks against whom they writ held it theirs And so had they held Scripture thus interpreted the Rule of Faith They could not have hâ—ld the Hereticks since they adbered stifly to that Root or Rule of Faith however they might err in many particular Tenents Ibid. p. 141. impossible that the Fathers should hold Scripture not interpreted by Tradition to be the Rule of Faith which yet is affirm'd And the Reason given is as weak as the Affirmation is untrue For if the Scripture not interpreted by Tradition could not be held to be the Rule of Faith because Hereticks adhering stifly to it as the Rule or Root of Faith could not be held as Hereticks then nor could Tradition be held to be the Rule of Faith because Hereticks as the (b) See Irenaeus quoted a little after Gnosticks and others sticking to Tradition as their Rule could not be held as Hereticks There 's a manifest parity of these Discourses and the latter is as concluding as the former But it is to accumulate injuries upon Scripture because the mistakes and perversness of Men abuse it by false glosses and compell'd deductions therefore to judge it fit it should forfeit its Authority Our blessed Lord who so condemn'd the Jewish Traditions held the Scripture of the Old Testament to be the Jew's Rule of Faith and the Sadduces who denied the Resurrection sure were held by him to be Hereticks and yet they disclam'd Tradition and adher'd stifly to Scripture only as the Root or Rule of Faith Certainly it is the impress and appointment from God which constitute a Rule of Faith make it to be such and Men prove Hereticks when they wilfully wrong pervert and wrest it but 't is wonderful that Hereticks acknowledging it to be the Rule of Faith i. e. paying to it what is due to it or a pretence that it favours their Errors which is a slander of it should unmake it a Rule of Faith render it impossible to be held to be such 2ly In enquiry about the second thing propos'd it must be consider'd that the word Tradition has more acceptions than one And that Tradition may be used to different Persons at different times in a divers manner and to several ends 1. Tradition is taken sometimes both in Scripture and Ecclesiastical Writers not for Oral delivery of Opinions and Practices to Posterity but for what is deliver'd by Writing and even in the Sacred Scriptures The Jew's Law and Rites are said to be such (a) Act. 6.14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Moses Tradition'd and yet they were a part of the Old Testament St. Paul (b) 1 Cor. 15.3 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 delivered to the Christians which he had also received that Christ dyed for our Sins which was but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the Scriptures (c) De Spiritu Sto. St. Basil says that our Baptisme in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost is according to the very Tradition of our Lord and yet this is (a) Matth. 28.19 written with St. (b) Si ergo aut in Evangelio praecipitur aut in Apostelorum Epistolis aut Actibus continetur observetur etiam haec sancta Traditio In Ep. ad Pompeium Cyprian that is an holy Tradition which is either commanded in the Gospel or is contained in the Epistles and Acts of the Apostles 2ly It is observed that some of the Fathers had to do with such Hereticks as denied the Scriptures some part of them at the least and set up other writings in stead of them In dealing with such those Fathers were forc'd to have recourse to Tradition that so they might dispute with their Advesaries on such a Principle as they would allow and this in way of condescention 'T was thus with (c) Cum enim ex Scripturis arguuntur in accusationem convertuntur ipsarum Scripturarum quasi non rectà habeant neque sint ex autoritate quia variè sint dictae quia non possit ex his inveniri veritas ab his qui nesciant Traditioneâ— Non enim per literas traditam illam sed per vivam vocem ob quam causam c. Adversus baereses Lib. 3. Cap. 2. Irenaeus in his Contest with the Gnosticks Who says he when they are argued against out of the Scriptures accuse the very Scriptures themselves as if they were not right nor were of Authority sufficient and because their Sense is various and uncertain and because the Truth cannot be found in them by those who are ignorant of Tradition This made Irenaeus in opposition to their fictitious Tradition and pretended living Voice express himself the more respectfully of such Tradition as had brought down the Orthodox Doctrine from the Apostles in the several Churches Not that he preferr'd Tradition to Scripture for what his Judgment was of Scripture we have seen before and 't is the observation of (a) In Epist nuncupatoriâ Irenaeo praefixâ Erasmus that he fights against the Hereticks solis scripturarum praesidiis by the sole aid of Scriptures i. e. Scriptures were his chief Weapons and that if he took up Tradition 't was but occasionally upon the froward impudence of his Adversaries 3. We must distinguish of Times The Gospel was Preached before it was Written It was written too one part after another And when the whole was written the Copies could not presently be many and dispersed to all Christians especially the more new and remoto Converts Nay and had the Gospel never been written then the Church
must have been satisfied if such the pleasure of God had been with an Oral Tradition Hence (a) Quid antem si neque Apostolâ— quidem Scripturas reliquissent nobis nonne oportebat c. Adversus haer L. 3. C. 4. Irenaeus might say what if the Apostles had not indeed left the Scriptures to us would it not have behoov'd us to follow the Order of Tradition which they had delivered to them to whom they committed the Churches to which Ordination do assent many Nations of Barbarians which believe in Christ having Salvation written in their hearts without Characters or Ink by the Spirit and diligently keeping antient Tradition This I say Irenaeus might with reason write especially against those (b) Evenititaque neque Scripturis jam neque traditioni consentire eos Idem L. 3. C. 2. who consented neither to Scriptures nor Tradition i. e. such as descended from the Apostles But when as the whole Scriptures were long since written and plentifully Communicated to the Christian world the Case is quite alter'd Besides the nearer things are to their Origin they are the more genuine and sincere but at the farther remove they are from it the more they are in danger of changes and decays Tradition must be conceiv'd to have been much more pure at the distance of an hundred or an hundred and fifty or two or three hundred years from the Apostles and therefore then might be more rationally argued from in some cases than after 7 8 or 9 hundred years in which revolution of so many more Ages and after intercurrencies of many more accidents Tradition may be more suspected of that consumptiveness and of those changes which Time brings upon all things and therefore an Argument from it would be much more infirm Farther yet besides Oral the Fathers of the more Primitive Times might have written Traditions such Records to prove that such a Doctrine or Doctrines were profess'd by Apostolical Men by Holy Martyrs and Confessors successively to that present Age as were then extant but are perish'd since (a) Age jam qui voles curiositatem melius exercere in negotlo Salutis tuae percurre Ecclesias Apostolicas apud quas ipsae adhuc cathedrae Apostolorum suis locis praesidentur apud quas ipsae Authenticae eorum literae recitantur sonantes vocem repraesentantes faciem uniuscujusque Tertul. de Praescrip Tertullian speaks of the very Authentick Letters of the Apostles which were even then preserved in the Churches So that the Fathers might with the more safety trust and allege Tradition's suffrage than we can who live so incomparably farther off from the Apostles Days than they did it being very likely that in such a far longer space of time the more contingencies have interpos'd to disturb the clearness of Commerce between them and us 4ly Proofs may be brought in a divers manner and for different uses St. Paul quoted Heathenish Poets as well as the Law and the Prophets 'T is usual where the Subject is properly manageable upon the stock of Reason yet to argue likewise from Testimony to call in the concurring Judgment of others In Religion Protestants do not believe the Fathers to be infallible and yet it has been usual with them to cite them both in Homiletique Discourses and in Polemique Writings Testimony tho' it be not apodictical yet it is plausible Example in point of Opinion as well as of Practice is much gaining upon many is not alone commonly better understood but more prevalent too than Reason with many Capacities And when 't is the Testimony of many as Tradition is it causes those of an opposite Opinion to appear the more singular in their Persuasion and singularity is not of the best Credit So then the Fathers might on some occasions use Tradition's Authority the general consent of Christians in some Truth for one or more Ages yet not demonstratively but topically somewhat the more to repress or to disparage in other's Opinion the importunity of a petulant Adversary to shame a contumacious Heretick not as is said Sure Footing p. 140 to declare that the rejecting Tradition and adhering to Scripture made him an Heretick or they might urge it to the more tractable as a probable motive to assent tho' not as a Rule of Faith yet as such a persuasive as might be an occasion of Belief and the better dispose the Soul toward Faith and Assurance Yet still supposing Holy Scriptures to be the proper and ultimate basis of Christian Faith and that such Traditions were consonant to them and not over-ruling of them I believe that these considerations may be useful for the construction of the Fathers in such passages wherein they make the most honourable mention of Tradition and to shew that notwithstanding such a mention of Tradition yet they might yield to Scripture the Supremacy in the regulation of Christian Faith especially whenas they speak so reverently of Scripture in other places of their Works nay and give them the Precedence when they compare the one with the other And thus if after a digression yet I think not an impertinent one I have proved the Father's unquestionable Care and Diligence in preservation of the Holy Scriptures by their Religious and unparallell'd esteem and veneration for them SECT IV. 3ly The Holy Scriptures are secur'd by God's especial Protection of them Reason suggests that as there is a God a Supreme and first Cause who made the world and also provides for the welfare of his great Workmanship so that the Divine Providence does mainly watch over those Creatures on which God has imprinted the fairest Characters of his Power Wisdom and Goodness Such a Creature is Man And this Divine Providence is the Catholick Sanctuary of Mankind After all Mens own projectings and labours here is their last and surest repose They can't with a rational comfort Trade Travel Eat Sleep but with a sober hope of the Divine help and benediction For if Divine Providence smile not all Mens wisest Counsels and stoutest Endeavours will be successless They may go forth and never return home their Table may be a Snare and their Sleep Death more than in a Metaphor Next Religion tells us that God has designed and prepar'd for Man an everlasting Blessedness and determin'd of the due Qualifications of Man for that Blessedness and it is agreed that in the Sacred Scriptures God has revealed Himself concerning both These Scriptures are the lively Image of God the faire Copy of his Will a bright Express of his Truth and Holiness a Perspective into his Mind and into many of his secret Counsels authentick Records of the many and glorious manifestations of the Divine Wisdom Power Goodness Mercy and Justice in making governing all things and in the Salvation of Sinners From the dictates of Reason then and much more of Religion it is consequent that God has an especial Care that the Scriptures be safe on which he has impressed so much of himself which were
was great enough but can lay no Obligation upon Christians The result of the Discourse foregoing concerning the Books of the Old and New Testament is this 1. Seeing the Books of the New Testament were never doubted of much less rejected by all were so early receiv'd by all 2ly Seeing the Jewish Church never for so many hundred years admitted more Books into the Canon than Protestants do likewise that the Christian Church did from the beginning distinguish between the Canonical and Apocryphal Books as has been the concurrent Testimony of the most considerable Members of it in its several Ages Forasmuch I say that so it is there can lie no rational Objection against the sufficient care of the Divine Providence or the Churches diligence in the preservation of the Holy Scriptures upon supposal of which it can justly be pretended that Christians must be uncertain about the Integrity of the Scripture Canon I might add that supposâ— there were a much more considerable uncertainty concerning the truly Canonical Books of Scripture both of the Old and New Testament than there is yet there would be a fair Salvo for the care of Divine Providence and for the security of Christians necessary Belief and Practice For I humbly conceive that if 1. The Books of the New Testament at the first not generally receiv'd were still as controversible yet we should not be at a loss for any Article of Faith there being in the Books never disputed of enough to establish it Or 2ly Were it so that it were altogether doubtful whether the Books call'd Apocryphal were not as truly the word of God as those styl'd Canonical perhaps yet there is no Doctrine which can be prov'd from those Apocryphal Books contrary to what we maintain against our Adversaries But this is Supernumerary After the Author had confuted by several Testimonies of the Antients the Canonicalness of the Books called Apocryphal he adds Etsi in hac re longè superior est causa nostra nullam tamen satis gravem causam video cur acriter de numero Canonicorum librorum cum Pontificiis digladiemur Apocryphos quos illi in Canonem referre volunt usque adeò aver semmr quasi Fides Religio Christiana propterea vacillatura sit si illi in Canonem admittantur Eisi enim non nego esse in iis quaedam quae vel contradictionem vel falsitatem vel absurditatem manifestariam prae se ferant difficulter aut cum iis quos Canonicos esse utrinque in confesse est conciliari aut cum historiae veritate aut cum recta ratione in gratiam reduci possunt tamen non modò nulla esse in t is credo per quae dogmatis alicujus ad salutem necessarii veritas labefactari possit sed non pauciora esse in iis mihi persuadeo quae convellendis Pontificiorum erroribus faciunt quam quae iis aut fulciendis aut stabiliendis servire possunt Sim. Episcopii Instit Theol. p. 227. Afterwards speaking of the Books of the New Testament antiently questioned says he Sive admittantur sive non admittantur Certissimum nihilominus manet caeteris qui extra controversiam omnem positi sunt abundè satis contineri universam doctrinam religionem istam quam Revelationem tertiam intelligit Religionem Christianam esse dicimus Nullus enim in istis omnibus controversiis est apiculus qui singulare aliquid habet inse quod in aliis indubitatis desideratur imò non abundè iis continetur ad Religionis doctrinae Jesu Christi tum perfectionem tum integritatem pertinens Idem Ibid. pag. 229. and might be untrue without any prejudice to what I have discours'd in this Section SECT III. Obj. 3. Whereas I have said that the safe descent of Divine Truths is so greatly provided for because they are treasur'd up in the Holy Writings it may be perhaps reply'd that Oral Tradition is not destitute of this 〈◊〉 Advantage also For one means which Bellarmine alledges of the preservation of Oral Traditions is Scriptura writing them in the antient Records of the Church Therefore he says that (a) De Verbo Dei non Scripto L. 4. C. 12. a Doctrine is called unwritten (b) Idâ—m Ibid Ch. 2. not because it is no where written because it was not written by the first Author but Ans 1. The Adversaries I have to deal with talk of Oral Tradition as a Plenipotent thing which is a support to itself and needs not the prop of a Pen is it self a spring of perpetuity to itself and therefore that the being written must be an accidental and no necessary Preservative of it This sure is the importance of several passages concerning it viz. (a) Sure Foot pag. 115. Christian Tradition rightly understood is nothing but the Living voice of the Catholick Church essential as Delivering (b) Ibid. pag 101. None can in reason oppose the Authority of Fathers or Councils against Tradition (c) Ibid. pag. 103. No Authority from any History or Testimonial writing is valid against the force of Tradition So that Oral Tradition is it seems so far from a want of assistance from any writings whatsoever that it is their strength and over-rules them There is yet more said (d) Ibid. pag. 56. Oral Tradition is a Rule not to the learned only but also to the unlearned to any vuloar enquirer therefore it must not rest on Books for its Authentickness for the unlearned and vulgar enquirers have not ability to read to examine to understand Books accordingly 't is said that the Tradition of the (a) Ibid. pag. 203 204. present Church is to be believ'd There is something to the same purpose in another (b) Enchirid of Faith pag. 14 15. Author who has form'd his Book Dialogue-wise After the Master had read his Scholar a Lecture about Tradition the Scholar asks him Sir It seems a matter of great study not easily to be overcome except by very learned men to know or to find out a constant Tradition as to read all the Fathers Liturgies or Councils Is it not therefore sufficient Testimony of this if the present Catholick Church universally witnesses it to be so To this the Master after some premises answers It must by necessary consequence be concluded the Testimony of any age he means any present age to be sufficient And after a while he closes thus This surely convinces the Testimony of any age to be sufficient Thus whatsoever just exception this Divinity is expos'd unto yet it appears by the Authors quoted that there are some such as I have to do with in this work who maintain a self-sufficiency in Oral Tradition and that though it may have yet it can sustain it self without the aid of Books 2. Let it be that Oral Tradition has help from Scripture from writing yet upon a Scrutiny it will be found that in the last issue this relief will be insufficient so far at
of the Understanding and any operose Discourse Now where is the more easiness of knowing things there is the less liableness to mistakes And a less liableness to and therefore a less probability of mistake in others is one reason why caeteris paribus to give credit to their Intelligence the more securely 2. Mankind is forc'd to content themselves with Information from Testimony in multitudes of Things which their Curiosity or the Exigency of their Affairs do engage them to be satisfied in and yet their own Sense or Reason can give no prospect of them Those many who never cross'd nor saw the Seas must trust others Relation that there are such places as Paris Rome Constantinople both the Indies where these places lye and what their circumstances are The reason why Men believe that they were born in such a year on or about such a day and therefore that they are of such an Age that they were Baptiz'd and that such is their Name is that they are told so 'T is not possible to come acquainted with Times past and with the divers Revolutions and Events of the numerous Ages before we were born otherwise than by Testimony from History If we would satisfie our selves whether the Books in our possession are indeed the Works of the Authors whose Names they bear that which we must have recourse to is that these Books have been and are witnessed to are generally reputed to be those Authors Works i. e. there 's a general Tradition for it For the two Reasons given it is plain that there is both a comparative safety and likewise a necessity in a considerable measure of reliance upon others Testimony and common Tradition in many things SECT III. Notwithstanding what has been said on the behalf of Testimony and Tradition yet they are not such an Oracle that their Responses must be receiv'd indiscriminately and without wary Examination Though where they well cannot mistake or deceive or there 's little or no temptation to misrepresent things they may be trusty yet both Written and Oral Tradition are often guilty of no small failures Of the two Oral Tradition is subject to the more shortness and uncertainty It is ordinary for Reports to pass from one to another to have a general Vogue and yet to be very false 'T is usual for Stories which might be true enough in the first Relation of them yet after they have travelled through many Mouths to be so much altered from what they were at the first that they look like one of Ovid's Metamorphoses There are Traditions from Fathers which yet the Posterity have not Faith enough or more Wisdom than to believe It will be found upon due Consideration that as when a Man hears others talking at a good distance from him only a noise and now and then a word or two come to his Ears the Articulation of the rest being lost by the way insomuch that little if any thing is understood of what is said So that from past and remote Ages there arrive down to us but meer generals confus'd and very short notices of things and the Credit of those too comes weakned with acknowledgedly fabulous or suspected intermixtures especially is this true of those Antiquities which meer Oral Tradition wafts to us Observe Families one would think that considering the love which Men have for their Native Soil the particular place of their Birth and Habitation for their Inheritance and for the Stock of which they are Branches Young Persons should be much inquisitive from their Fathers and Fathers should delight to Story to their Children the Circumstances pertaining to these things Yet often excepting some general Informations comparatively little News is brought of such concerns and of particulars which hapned but three or four Generations off further than they can be certified from Registries Deeds and the like Writings 'T is not unusual for Persons to enquire of the Church-Book how Old they are Books deserve care they are a relief of Mortality in them the Dead Authors do in some manner survive themselves and continue useful to the world after they have left it Yet what a multitude of these has Tradition suffered to perish to be buried as well as their Authors nothing to be left of them except as an Epitaph the Titles of them Of many there remains no more than some fragmenta some scatter'd Limbs as 't were of a mangled Body Several Books are father'd upon certain Authors of whom they have it may be no more than the Name Divers are more or less corrupted some so much depraved ut samnium in ipso samnio quaeratur that the Books may be search'd for in the very Books and scarce found Hence it follows that Tradition is not so careful a preserver of it's Deposita as it should be not so faithful a Relater of Things past as that it should be thought irrefragable and that Belief should be subjected to it promiscuously and without choice Therefore there must be something else and beyond it which may instruct us how to distinguish of Testimonies and Traditions which to mistrust or to reject and which to believe This Director is Reason which in it's Debate and Decision of the due Credibility of Testimonies and Traditions and of the deserv'd precedence of one to the other proceeds upon the Circumstances of the Testifiers and their qualifications These in general are 1. A sufficient knowledge of the things attested to 2ly Such Honesty and Integrity as may encline the Testifiers to relate things as they know them to be Some of the particular Rules or Cautions in the accepting Testimonies may be 1. The More the Testifiers are the stronger the Testimony is and the More are to be preferr'd to the Fewer supposing a Parity of Circumstances 2ly Forasmuch as generals and the substance of things are commonly more easily knowable and remembred than Particulars and minuter Circumstances therefore Testimony may be more safely credited in the former than in the latter 3ly Because Integrity is least to be suspected or question'd when not under temptation by Interest therefore the Testimony of clear and uninteressed Witnesses may be the more confidently admitted 4ly The nearer the Testifiers liv'd to the Times in which what is witnessed to was spoken or done the more valuable their Testimony is for the greater the remove is from what is Evidenced to the more accidents might intervene for the clouding and misrepresentation of it By this it appears that Reason's Court is the Soveraign Judicatory where lies the last Appeal here it being to be determin'd concerning the competency and validness of the Testimony or Tradition So much of Tradition in general whose so near alliance to Testimony at large makes them much to agree in their use and force what it is in what matter most properly useful and argumentative It 's Efficacy and yet it 's Failures into what it is lastly resolv'd where the relief lyes against a deception by it in it's
suppos'd for private Interest to have dissembled their Religion either then or immediately before But if we look higher there is what is much more remarkable It is Famous there was a time when the (a) Tum haeresis Arrii prorupit totúmque Orbem invecto Errore turbaverat Etenim duobus Arriis acerrimishujus perfidiae Autoribus Imperator etiam depravatur Dúmque sibi Religionis Officium videtur implere vim persecutionis exercuit actique in Exilium Episcopi saevitum in Clericos animadversum in Laicos qui se ab Arrianorum communione secreverant Sulpic. Sev. Sac. Histor Lib. 2. World turn'd Arrian the Orthodox Profession being under Persecution After what has been said among such hazards such incident Biassings of the Affections and Judgment how unsafe must an Oral Tradition be i. e. the trusting of the great Concerns of Religion with Man's good Nature his Constancy and Faithfulness to Divine Truths through Ages But it may be it will be replyed to the mention of the Doctrines of Arrius and Pelagius and the bustle they made in the Christian world that yet the Catholick Doctrines did recover and pass to after-Ages And we are told that (a) Sure Footing p. 118 119. erroneous Opinions and absurd Practices tho' they may creep into the Church and spread there awhile yet can never gain any solid Footing in the Church Forasmuch as the Church is a Body of Men relying on Tradition or the Authority of Attesting Forefathers not on the Authority of Opinators c. In return to this 'T is confess'd that the Doctrines assaulted by Arrius and Pelagius were rescued and preserved But 1. In and about that time there was such a Constellation of Pious and Learned Lights of the Church as could scarce be parallell'd in the Ages before or afterwards This might be an especial Cause that those Truths out-liv'd their Opposition It may be questioned whether if the Errors of Arrius or Pelagius had been started and as vigorously manag'd in the Ignorant and Corrupt Ages which follow'd afterwards they might not have found as easy an Entertainment and have as generally prevailed as some other Errors did 2ly But how will it be prov'd that it was by the strength of Oral Tradition that these Truths were recovered and continued To speak only of the Divinity of Christ impugn'd by Arrius besides what has been said in the foregoing part 1. There was manifestly a Civil Cause interposing for the Restauration of a publick and free Profession of it For as the Frown of the Prince Constantius and his Party arm'd with force suppress'd the Orthodox Opinion So the contrary inclination and favour of succeeding Princes countenance from the secuâ—ular Power restor'd it So that this Resurrection of that Truth was not from Orel Traditions strength an impossibility of its sailure but was owed to Causes extrinsick and which might or might not have been For there was no necessity that the Emperers should be Orthodox or Favourers of the Orthodox Opinion and if they had continued still Arrian and Persecutors of the Orthodox and so there had been still the same Fears it is as likely that Arrianisme would still have been the general Profession as it is That the same Cause still existing and working after the same manner would produce the same Effect 2ly If we look after the Religious Cause why may we not ascribe the Revival of the Truth to Holy Scriptures For the Fathers had recourse to Them during it's Depression and after it (a) Vnum hoc ego per hanc dignationis tue sinceram audientiam rogo ut praesente Synodo quae nunc de fide litigat paucis me de Scripturis Evangelicis digneris audite Fidem Imperator quaeris audâ— eam non de novis chaâ—tulis sed de Dei libris Audi rogo ea quae de Christo sunt Scripta ne sub eis ea quae non Scripta sunt praediâ—entur Summitte ad ea quae de libris locuturus sum aures tuas In Libâ—o ad Constantium Augusâ—um propiùs â—â—em St. Hilary Truth 's great Champion against the Arrians is frequent in Citation of Scripture for it And in his Address to Constantius He entreats that Constantius would vouchsafe the Synod being present which debated about the Faith to hear him in a few words from the Evangelical Scriptures And soon afterwards Thou requirest my Faith O Emperor hear it not from new Papers but from the Books of God Where He opposes New Papers or Writings not to Antient Oral Tradition but to the Divine Books There is something more to the like Sense in the Margent After him (a) Nec ego Nicaenam Synodum tibi nec tu Arimenensem mihi debes tanquam praejudicaturus objicere Scripturarum authoritatibus res cum re causa cum causa ratio cum ratione concertet Contra Maxim Lib. 3 Cap. 14. St. Augustine tells the Arrian Maximinus He would not object to him the Synod of Nice nor should he urge to him that of Ariminum but he would have the dispute to be manag'd by Authority of Scriptures That which was thus us'd in Proof and Defence of this Article of Faith both under Persecution and after it why may not That deserve to have the honour of it's Preservation and Restitution viz. the Holy Scripture Especially when as Holy Scriptures being an unvaried and permanent Standard in all alterations of the Church's State have an aptitude for such a Purpose whereas Oral Tradition has no probable Energy for it For they of that Age when Arrianism was generally regnant either really changed their Judgment about the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father and then according to our Adversaries Principle they would teach their Children as they judg'd and believ'd themselves and so the Arrian Opinion would have continued Or they smother'd and dissembled their Opinion out of fear and profess'd contrarily to their Judgment And in this Hypocrisie either their Children discover'd them or not If not then much the same Effect would follow If they did know it then they would scruple to believe them even in other Truths as Witnesses and Traditioners are no more than such For Hypocrisie weakens the Credit of a Witness and gets him this disadvantage that he will be the more hardly believ'd even when he speaks truth And in this particular Truth Children would have been put at the least to the stand For tho' the Posterity might satisfie themselves that the Age before the last generally embrac'd the Tenent contrary to the Arrian yet they might be tempted to doubt whether as their immediate Fathers made shew of believing the Opinion they secretly condemn'd so in remoter Ages Forefathers might not publickly profess the Divinity of Christ rather out of compliance with the humour of the Times they liv'd in than from their Hearts and so the Tenent might have stoln down through following Ages the manner of it's old reception and Hypocritical Profession being lost For why might not
Deòrum cultu adversus Christianos Every People have their custome each their Rites Now if long time can give authority to Religions belief is to be given to so many ages and we ought to follow our Fathers who have happily follow'd Theirs Unto which the Christian Poet Prudentius replyes to this Sense If there be such a studiousness and care of Antique Custome and it pleases not to depart from old Rites There is extant in antient Books He means the Scriptures a Noble Instance that even in the time of the Deluge or before the Family or People who first inhabited the new Earth and dwelt in the empty World serv'd but one God whence our continued Race derives its pedigree and reforms the Laws of the Piety of the Native Country Si tantum sludium est cura vetusti Moris a prisco placet haud descedere ritu Extat in antiquis exemplum Nobile libris Jam tunc diluvii sub temporae vel priùs Vni Insâ—rvisse Deo gentem quae prima recentes Incoluit terras vacuoque habitavit in Orbe Vnde genus ducit nostrae porrecta propago Stirpis indigenae pietatis jura reformatis Aurel Prudentius contra Symmachum Lib. 2. SECT III. The State of Religion being so craz'd the world being so corrupt in Opinion and Practice God vouchsafed to reveal Himself to Abraham and the other Patriarchs and at the last singled out the posterity of Abraham for his peculiar People Ps 78.5.6.7 8. Deut. 6.6 17. and established a Testimony in Jacob appointed a Law in Israel which he commanded the Fathers that they should make them known to their Children That the Generation to come might know them even the Children which should be born who should arise and declare them to their Children that they might set c. Among these Laws God commanded the owning and Worship of himself exclusively of all pretended Deities whatsoever He prescribed in the greatest accuracy the Substance and very punctilio's of his worship And to fence these sacred Injunctions the better to preserve them from violation at the first delivery of them God strook an holy dread into the People by Thundrings and Lightnings and a thick Cloud so that all in the Camp trembled Exod. 19.16 nay so terrible was the sight that Moses himself said I exceedingly fear and quake Heb. 12.21 And to make all the more sure there was superadded an explicite and formal Covenant between God and the people solemniz'd with the sprinkling of Blood part of it on the Altar Exod. 24.3 4.5 and part on the People and all the People answered with one Voice and said All the words which the Lord hath said will we doe What a large and exact Provision was here made for the safe descending of what God had committed to the People unto all Generations and for the making them trusty Traditioners yet how strangely were they ever and anon declining from the purity of what had been delivered to them Fathers and Children prophaning the Divine Worship and dishonouring God by the mixtures of Heathenish Rites and Idolatrous Abominations In the Chain of Tradition the first Link broke That very People who had so lately trembled at Mount Sinai yet tho' still so near that Mount danced before a Golden Calf saying These be thy Gods Exod. 32.4 O Israel which brought thee out of the Land of Egypt If this fall out so early how much more likely was it that the conveyance of Religion in its purity to after Ages should fail And the event was answerable The Books of Judges Kings and Chronicles and of several of the Prophets so abound in examples of almost perpetual and general defections from the Ancient Faith and Practice that many quotations are needless two will be enough 1. In the Reign of Ahab Elijah mourn'd to God that he only was left of the true Worshippers in Israel at the least of the true Prophets 1 Kings 19.10.18 and that even his life was in danger And tho' the All-seeing God comforted him by the account of seven thousand who had not bow'd the knee to Baal Yet as it seems this was to Elijah an invisible Church so what were these seven thousand to the multitudes of the rest of Israel 2ly In Judah so great and criminous was the Falling off from what God had antiently ordain'd that good Josiah rent his Clothes when he heard the words of the Books of the Law read 2 Kings 22.11 and compar'd former and present Practice with what was there commanded Such were the Apostasies of the Jewish Church from Primitive Doctrine and instituted Worship and for a long time and without any relief and restitution from Oral Tradition the intervening Reformation in Josiah's Reign was ow'd to the Holy Scriptures 2 Kings 23.2 3. Till God reveng'd those miscarriages sharply but very righteously first upon the ten Tribes and afterwards upon the remaining two The two Tribes after seventy years Correction return'd home re-built their City and Temple But in time they split into several Sects which were so many degeneracies from the first Purity of their Religion Our Blessed Lord reprov'd them for their corrupt Traditions as being a vain Worship Math. 15.3.9 and Evacuations of the Commandments of God The Jews have amongst them an Oral Tradition expository of the Law Written and given as is said by them by God to Moses intrusted by Moses with Joshua and the seventy Elders and by them transmitted down from one Generation to another This that People have in (a) Video Hebraeos omnes Legem quae per os tradita est tanti facere ut eam non modò aequent Legi Scriptae sed longe anteferant tanquam animam corpori quò sine eâ impossibile sit ut ipsis videtur Legem Scriptam intelligere aut observare adeoque sine eâ Lex tota non sit nisi corpus â—ine Spiritu c. Episcopii Instit Theol. L. 3. C. 4. very high estimation preferring it to the very Scriptures and honouring it with room in their Creed of which one Article is (a) Leo Modena History of the present Jews c. Translated by Mr. Chilmead p. 248. I believe that the Law which was given by Moses was wholly dictated by God and that Moses put not in one Syllable of himself And so likewise that that which we have by Tradition by way of Explication of the Precepts of the other hath all of it proceeded from the Mouth of God delivering it to Moses Yet Learned Men judge this fardle of Traditions to be a very (b) Episcop Ibid. Cap. 6. per toâ— Figment and that in some Age or other Ancestors have impos'd on the Credulity of their Posterity that Tradition has recommended to them That as deriving from God which never had so sacred and infallible an Author After the foregoing Observation of the Church and how little agreeingly with it's first Model Tradition preserv'd it for two
in all Writings in the Margent Points of Faith in the Oral Tradition of them must have as pass'd from one Country to another so been clothed in variety of Languages the divers Accents in the pronuntiation of the words passing thro' multitudes of mouths the divers turnings of the Speakers Head or Body this way or that way the allusion to some precedent discourse or the like may change the Sense of words when spoken by one from what they were when spoken by another as well as make them different in writing from what they were in speaking and Equivocation too is incident to words spoken as well as written So that if for these reasons the Conveyance of the Faith antiently spoken or preach'd by Scripture will be uncertain as is said for the same reasons if they are truly reasons the sense and meaning of the Divine Planters of the Faith will as uncertainly descend to us by an Oral Tradition All this while I have mentioned only casualties and the more innocent infirmities as shortness in understanding inheedfulness in Memory incident to Testifiers on the score of which there may be a misrepresentation of things tho' there be no Conspiracy to deceive But then if the question be concerning the Soberness and Integrity of all the Testifiers what assurance can be given of them There is a proneness in Men not alone out of inadvertency and precipitancy but also out of capriciousness and ambition to be an Author to substract to to add to to alter Stories which meeting with Credulity in others as it often happens the Stories and their Errata pass currant and uncorrected Besides if there be not such a disinteressedness of the Position or thing testified which frequently falls out then the Honesty and Fairness of the Testifiers in their Relation may be the more questionable and others may be the more suspending in their Belief I suppose what I have said is enough to shew the descent of Testifications from Age to Age to be liable to great failures especially if it be applied to Religion where the Articles of Faith the Sacred Practices and Senses of Scripture which concern all these are so many and withal there are so many and so tempting Diversions of Men as has been above proved But here it is replyed that Religion is rather a Remedy of the failures attending on the descent of Testimonies And to prove a far greater steadiness of Oral Tradition in Religion's Affairs than in any other there are (a) Sure Footing p. 224 225 226 227 228. alleg'd the great Divine Author of Religion the superlative Interest of Mankind in it the publick miraculous Confirmation of it the Preaching and Reception of it in all even the remotest parts of the World the entertainment of it among the first Christians when they were at Age to judge of the Miracles and Motives to Christian Religion and among the after Christians when they were yet scarce able to speak much less to judge and taught by Nature to believe their Parents And from hence are inferr'd an incomparable recommendableness in Religion and an Obligation to believe and to practise it and likewise a most forcible Obligation on Children to believe Parents attesting to it Answ I acknowledge that to be true which is alleg'd in the just commendation of Religion and that it does deserve and bind to a zeal diligence and sincerity in the Treatment of it far above what Men bestow on any worldly thing whatsoever I question not also but that the incomparable remarkableness of Religion did fix deep and indeleble Impressions on the Christians of the first Age and on all afterwards who have known how to value love and tender it answerably to its true worth But this is that at which I stop i. e. Whether Christians have in all Ages so cherish'd the even now named virtues for Religion as to send it down to us without any disguises and in its genuine and first Integrity and this by virtue of an Oral Tradition and of Fathers long continued testifying to their immediate Descendents whether they have not been too cold and careless for it or too whether their zeal for want of a governing Prudence has not sometimes transported them from one Error to an opposite one Whether they have been so single and upright in the Maintenance of the Truths of Religion as the Simplicity of it does require especially may we doubt of this Candor and Ingenuity in those who hold the Doctrine of Equivocation I think that he who has considered the Genius of Mankind will see it probable enough that Christians may have given worldly Interests and corrupt Passions too great a Preference in their dealing with Religion the particular Truths and Practices of it And that were it not for some Leading Men Persons of Parts and Spirit who sometimes sway the Age in which they live and yet these too may be overborn by a dissenting Multitude the most would be too prone to turn almost with every wind that should blow and to steer their Course thither whence they might look for the greatest Temporal ease and advantage And this Men might do and yet (a) Sure Footing p. 230. not as a pack of impudent Knaves that conspir'd to abuse their Posterity purposely to damn them For Men may act contrarily to their Duty and to the wrong of themselves and of theirs eventually nay too often do so and yet not out of a desperate and form'd purpose to destroy either From what has been discours'd it follows that the incomparable recommendableness of Religion and its obligingness to be believed do not conclude a continued and necessary obligation upon Children to believe their Parents through all Ages And yet suppose that there were such an Obligation upon Children to believe their Fathers unless Children did believe such an obligation incumbent on them Oral Tradition would be still failable For then Children Posterity would take the liberty to judge for themselves and to vary from the Fathers as they should see reason for it Or if they should believe as Fathers did it would be casual Therefore to make all sure 't is (a) Sure Footing p. 215 216. own'd and undertaken to be proved That every Age in the Church and all Persons in it look'd upon themselves as obliged not to vary in any thing from the Doctrine and Practice of the precedent Age. Yet I cannot discern in all the following Pages of that Author any proof of this but only an attempt to prove an Obligation on those in every Age to believe those of the precedent Age. But as this Obligation has been sufficiently disprov'd so yet if it were true could it infer that they in every Age look'd upon thought themselves obliged to believe those of the Ages foregoing for 't is notorious that Men do not always think themselves oblig'd to believe and to do that which yet they are really obliged to believe and to do But I can't discover any Indication
to testifying Fathers but that there would be more Alumbrados and the like Freaks might be acted among our Adversaries which tore our Church But withal I think it seasonable to let my Reader know that those Men so call'd i. e. Alumbâ—ados in Spain were no other in most of their Tenents and Practises than these our Quakers are now in England â— câ—nfess I am very destitute of Books at this time to â—â—ve the Readeâ— so gâ—od an account of this bâ—â—ness as I could wâ—sh All I can say of thâ— at nâ—w is out of some Fâ—â—â—â—ch Books where I find a lâ—rge â—â—dict against them containing their several Tenents and â—â—rers whereâ—f c. 〈◊〉 â—lumbradoâ— of Sâ—ain 〈…〉 to be known and talk'd 〈◊〉 the year of our Lord 162â— Dr. Meric Caâ—aâ—bon Tâ—â—â—tise of Euthusiasme p. 17â— 174 175. and speaking in general Christians are too apt to fail in holy prudence meekness charity and such pacifique virtues thence arise too many breaches among them and a want of these virtues is incident to our Adversaries as well as to Protestants for they are Sons of Adam too only they are wiser in their Generation To conclude the Reply to the two last little Objections and the whole Treatise Eternal Blessedness is our end the means to attain to that great end are right Believing and holy Living That which gives the Regulation to Christian Belief and Life is the revealed will of God But because the Divine Revelations were delivered at the distance of many Ages from us therefore there is need of somthing which may conduct them safe and entire to us and that which is the safest and most certain Conveyance of them to us is that fixed Standard or Rule whence we are to take the measures of our Christian Faith and Practices Such a Conveyance and consequently such a Standard or Rule I have prov'd not Oral Tradition but Holy Scripture to be This being first establish'd there may then then be consider'd the Perspicuity of this Rule which is Scripture and the Agreement or Vnity of those who adhere to it Here 1. We may be sure that this Rule is very sufficiently intelligible and clear in all things necessary for our direction to our Blessedness But then it must be left to Gods Pleasure what difficulties and dubiousness he would mix with that sufficient plainness and we ought to be thankful for what is plain in it and not quarrel at the obscurities 2ly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arâ—â—t Eth. â— 1 C. 8. We may be certain that this Rule and Conveyance of Divine Truths to us there being so much Harmony in Truth must be very apt it must be its most genuine effect to harmonize Christian 's Judgments and Affections and to beget a peaceableness of mutual Conversation yet too it must be judg'd very possible or rather more that the folly and corruptions of Men may too much frustrate this its most natural issue So that now to conclude a thing this great Standard and Rule of Faith and Manners because it pretends to be the most plain and also to make meer Vnity a Demonstration of the Truth would be a crude way of Discourse For first a wrong way may be smooth and easy enough perhaps more plain than that which leads a Man to his Home Next not Truth only but likewise Interest may hold Men very fast together and the Conscience of its own guilt and feebleness may prompt to Error to strengthen it self by the closest Confederacies FINIS Some Books Printed for and Sold by Robert Clavel at the Sign of the Peacock in St. Paul's Church-yard THe Annals of King James and King Charles the First The Compleat Conformist Or seasonable Advice concerning strict Conformity and frequent Celebration of the Holy Communion In a Sermon Preached Jan. 7. Being the first Sunday after the Epiphany in the year 1682. At the Cathedral and in a Letter written to the Clergy of the Archdeaconry of Durham By Denis Grenville D. D. Arch-Deacon and Prebendary of Durham London Printed for Robert Clavel and are to be Sold by Hugh Hutchenson in Durham A Sermon Preached at Windsor before His Majesty the Second Sunday after Easter 1684. By John Arch-Bishop of Tuam Published by His Majesties special Command Both sold by Robert Clavel at the sign of the Peacock in St. Paul's Church-yard 1684. 3. King James not so much influenced by Gondamore as is related by Mr. Rushworth 4. The Three Estates in Parliament who they were in King James 's Speech in Parliament 1620. 5. An Authentick and Impartial Account of the beginning of the Troubles in Scotland and the Wars which ensued 6 The True State of our late Civil Wars their Beginnings Causes who the Aggressors c. The rest are too large to take notice here but may be seen in the Preface Varenius's Geography in Folio English Illustrated with many Copper Cuts Dr. Willis 's Works in Folio English The History of the Irish Rebellion traced from many precedings Acts to the grand Eruption the 23d of Octobers 1641. and thence pursued to the Act of Settlement 1662. Tracts Written by John Selden of the Inner-Temple Esq and Translated by the Eminent Dr. A. L. The 1st Jani Anglorum facies altera with large Notes thereupon 2ly Englands Epinomis 3ly Of the Original of Ecclesiastical Jurisdictions of Testaments The 4th of the Disposition or Administration of intestate Goods Mr. Scrivener 's Body of Divinity Dr. Cumber on the Liturgy in Folio Mr. Sam 's Britannia Ogleby's History of Africa Asia and America Bishop of St. Davids 's Vindication of the Bishops Rights to Vote in Capital Cases his seasonable Corrective The Compleat Catalogue to the end of Easter Term 1684. Newly Published Short Discourses upon the whole Common-Prayer designed to inform the Judgment and excite the Devotion of such as dayly use the same by Tho. Comber D. D. The Laver of Regeneration and the Cup of Salvation Two plain and profitable Discourses upon the two Sacraments The 1. laying open the Nature of Baptism and earnestly pressing the serious Consideration and Religious Observation of the Sacred Vow made by all Christians in their Baptism The other pressing as earnestly the frequent renewing of our Baptismal Vow at the Lords Holy Table Demonstrating the indispensible necessity of receiving and the great sin and danger of neglecting the Lords Supper with Answers to the chief Pretences whereby the Absenters would excuse themselves The General Catalogue of Books Printed in England since the Dreadfull Fire of 1666 to the end of Trinity Term 1684. To which are added a Catalogue of Latin Books Printed in Foreign Parts and in England since the year 1670. Printed for Rob. Clavel at the Peacock in St. Paul's Church-yard ERRATA PAg. 4. l. 1. r. is or involves in it Testimony l. ult for witnessed to r. tradition'd p. 5. l. 16. for the Application r. this Application p. 8. l. 7. for the use r. this use p. 9. l. 1. r. where there is p. 19. l. ult for blinded r. blended p. 35. in marg l. 21. for taxata r. laxata p. 40. l. 10. for part r. paragraph p. 49. l. 9. and 11. r. Methuselah l. 12. del very near p. 50. l. 23. for though r. through p. 53 p. 65. in marg l. ult del p. p. 67. l. 4. for Authors r. Others l. 7. after this way add or at least uncertainty which way p 94. in marg l. 12. 13. r. Cap. 10. Quaest 15. P. r. p. 96. in marg l. 5. for 82. r. 43. p. 105. l. 26. r. Christians are to yield p. 106. for or also r. else p. 107 l. 3. for Traditions r. Tradition p. 149. in marg l. 6 after p. 108. add Of this Cressy also may be seen During those worst times thereof i. e. the Church when ignorance worldliness pride tyranny c. reigned with so much scope I mean during the time of about six Ages before Luther Exom Cap. 68. p. 151. l. 2. del above l. 4. r. Pamphilius p. 154. l. 15. for all Protestants do declare r. I have the leave of all Protestants to declare p. 157. l. 15 for Writings about r. Writings above p. 162. l. 10. r. the holy Scriptures l. 24. r. Or 2ly p. 168. in marg l. 9. r. His igitur p. 172. in marg l. ult del Evangel nigrum Atram Thool p. 178. l. 5. del would r. owns p. 179. l. 19. for p. 29 r. 39. p. 211. l. 2. after semi-colon r. what was committed to them they did carefully preserve p. 218. l. 15. for their r. those p. 224 l. 20. r. they have only p. 225. l. 3. for their r. this p. 229. l. 3. r. is no farther