|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 22, 2023 7:29:19 GMT -5
THE LIVELY ORACLES GIVEN TO US, OR THE CHRISTIANS BIRTH-RIGHT AND DUTY IN THECUSTODY AND USE OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE.
SECT. I.
The several Methods of God's communicating the knowledge of himself.
1. God, as he is invisible to human eyes, so is he unfathomable by
human understandings; the perfection of his nature, and the
impotency of ours, setting us at too great a distance to have any clear
perception of him. Nay, so far are we from a full comprehension, that
we can discern nothing at all of him, but by his own light; those
discoveries he hath been pleased to make of himself.
2. Those have been of several sorts; The first was by infusion in
man's creation, when God interwove into Mans very constitution and
being the notions and apprehensions of a Deity: and at the same
instant when he breathed into him a living soul, imprest on it that
native religion, which taught him to know and reverence his Creator,
which we may call the instinct of humanity. Nor were those
principles dark and confused, but clear and evident, proportionable
to the ends they were designed to, which were not only to
contemplate the nature, but to do the will of God; practice being even
in the state of innocence preferrable before an unactive speculation.
3. But this Light being soon eclipsed by Adams disobedience, there
remained to his benighted posterity, only some faint glimmerings,
which were utterly insufficient to guide them to their end, without
fresh aids, and renewed manifestations of God to them. It pleased
God therefore to repair this ruin, and by frequent revelations to
communicate himself to the Patriarchs in the first Ages of the World;
afterwards to Prophets, and other holy men; till at last he revealed
himself yet more illustriously in the face of Jesus Christ, 2 Cor. 4.6.
4. This is the one great comprehensive Revelation wherein all the
former were involved, and to which they pointed; the whole mystery
of Godliness being comprised in this of God's being manifested in the
flesh, and the consequents thereof. 1 Tim. 3.16. whereby our Savior
as he effected our reconciliation with God by the sacrifice of his
death; so he declared both that, and all things else that it concerned
man to know in order to bliss, in his doctrine and holy life. And this
Teacher being not only sent from God, Jo. 3. but being himself God
blessed forever; it cannot be that his instructions can want any
supplement. Yet that they might not want attestation neither, to the
incredulous world; he confirmed them by the repeated miracles of
his life, and by the testimony of those who saw the more irrefragable
conviction of his Resurrection and Ascension. And that they also
might not want credit and enticement, the Holy Spirit set to his seal,
and by his miraculous descent upon the Apostles, both asserted their
commission, and enabled them for the discharge of it; by all gifts
necessary for the propagating the Faith of Christ over the whole
World.
5. These were the ways by which God was pleased to reveal himself to
the Forefathers of our Faith, and that not only for their sakes, but
ours also, to whom they were to derive those divine dictates they had
received. Saint Stephen tells us, those under the Law received the
lively Oracles to deliver down to their posterity, Acts 7.38. And those
under the Gospel, who received yet more lively Oracles, from him
who was both the Word and the Life, did it for the like purpose; to
transmit it to us upon whom the ends of the world are come. By this
all need of repeated Revelations is superseded, the faithful deriving
of the former, being sufficient to us for all things that pertain to life
and godliness, 2 Pet. 1.3.
6. And for this, God (whose care is equal for all successions of men)
hath graciously provided, by causing Holy Scriptures to be writ; by
which he hath derived on every succeeding Age the illuminations of
the former. And for that purpose endowed the Writers not only with
that moral fidelity requisite to the truth of History, but with a divine
Spirit, proportionable to the great design of fixing an immutable rule
for faith and manners. And to give us the fuller security herein, he
has chosen no other penmen of the New Testament, then those who
were the first oral promulgers of our Christian Religion; so that they
have left to us the very same doctrine they taught the Primitive
Christians; and he that acknowledges them divinely inspired in what
they preached, cannot doubt them to be so in what they writ. So that
we all may enjoy virtually and effectively that wish of the devout
Father, who desired to be Saint Paul's Auditor: for he that hears any
of his Epistles read, is as really spoke to by Saint Paul, as those who
were within the sound of his voice. Thus God who in times past spake
at sundry times, and in diverse manners to our Fathers by the
Prophets, and in the latter days by his son, Heb. 1.1, 2. continues still
to speak to us by these inspired Writers, and what Christ once said to
his Disciples in relation to their preaching, is no less true of their
writings: He that despiseth you, despiseth me, Luke 10.16. All the
contempt that is at any time flung on these sacred Writings,
rebounds higher, and finally devolves on the first Author of those
doctrines, whereof these are the registers and transcripts.
7. But this is a guilt which one would think peculiar to Infidels and
Pagans, and not incident to any who had in their Baptism listed
themselves under Christ's banner: yet I fear I may say, of the two
parties, the Scripture has met with the worst treatment from the
later. For if we measure by the frequency and variety of injuries, I
fear Christians will appear to have outvied Heathens: These bluntly
disbelieve them, neglect, nay perhaps scornfully deride them. Alas
Christians do this and more; they not only put contempt's, but tricks
upon the Scripture, wrest and distort it to justify all their wild
fancies, or secular designs; and suborn its Patronage to those things
it forbids, and tells us that God abhors.
8. Indeed so many are the abuses we offer it, that he that considers
them would scarce think we owned it for the words of a sensible
man, much less of the great omniscient God. And I believe 'twere
hard to assign any one so comprehensive and efficacious cause of the
universal depravation of manners, as the disvaluing of this divine
Book, which was designed to regulate them. It were therefore a work
worthy another inspired writing, to attempt the rescue of this, and
recover it to its just estimate. Yet alas, could we hope for that, we
have scoffers who would as well despise the New as the Old; and like
the Husbandmen in the Gospel, Mat. 21.36. would answer such a
succession of messages by repeating the same injuries.
9. To such as these 'tis I confess vain for man to address; nay 'twere
insolence to expect that human Oratory should succeed where the
divine fails; yet the spreading infection of these renders it necessary
to administer antidotes to others; And besides, though (God be blest)
all are not of this form, yet there are many who, though not arrived
to this contempt, yet want some degrees of that just reverence they
owe the sacred Scripture, who give a confused general assent to them
as the word of God, but afford them not a consideration and respect
answerable to such an acknowledgment. To such as these, I shall
hope it may not be utterly vain to attempt the exciting of those
drowsy notions that lie unactive in them, by presenting to them some
considerations concerning the excellence and use of the Scripture:
which being all but necessary consequences of that principle they are
supposed to own, viz. that they are God's word, I cannot much
question their assent to the speculative part: I wish I could as
probably assure myself of the practice.
10. Indeed were there nothing else to be said in behalf of holy Writ,
but that it is God's word, that were enough to command the most
awful regard to it. And therefore it is but just we make that the first
and principal consideration in our present discourse. But then 'tis
impossible that that can want others to attend it; since whatsoever
God says is in all respects completely good. I shall therefore to that of
its divine original add secondly the consideration of its subject
matter; thirdly, of its excellent and no less diffusive end and design;
and fourthly, of its exact propriety and fitness to that design, which
are all such qualifications, that where they concur, nothing more can
be required to commend a writing to the esteem of rational men. And
upon all these tests, notwithstanding the cavil of the Romanists and
others, whose force we shall examine with the unhappy issue of
contrary counsels, this law of God will be found to answer the
Psalmists character of it, Ps. 19.7. The Law of God is perfect: and will
appear that the custody and use thereof, is the birth-right and duty of
every Christian. All which severals being faithfully deduced; it will
only remain that I add such cautions as will be necessary to the due
performance of the aforesaid duty; and our being in some degree
rendered perfect, as this Law of God, and the Author thereof himself
is perfect, Mat. 5.48.
|
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 22, 2023 7:35:44 GMT -5
SECT. II.
The divine Original, Endearments, and Authority of the Holy/Scripture.
1. Mens judgments are so apt to be bias by their affections, that we
often find them readier to consider who speaks, then what is spoken:
a temper very unsafe, and the principle of great injustice in our
inferior transactions with men; yet here there are very few of us that
can wholly divest ourselves of it, whereas, when we deal with God (in
whom alone an implicit faith may securely be reposed) we are nice
and wary, bring our scales and measures; will take nothing upon his
word which holds not weight in our own balance. 'It is true, he needs
not our partiality to be justified in his sayings, Psal. 51.4. His words
are pure, even as the silver tried seven times in the fire, Psal. 12.6.
able to pass the strictest test that right reason (truly so called) can
put them to. Yet it shows a great perverseness in our nature, that we
who so easily resign our understandings to fallible men, stand thus
upon our guard against God; make him dispute for every inch he
gains on us; nor will afford him what we daily grant to any credible
man; to receive an affirmation upon trust of his veracity.
2. I am far from contradicting our Saviors Precept, of Search the
Scriptures, Jo. 7. or Saint Paul's, of proving all things, 1 Thes. 5.21.
we cannot be too industrious in our inquest after truth, provided we
still reserve to God the decisive vote, and humbly acquiesce in his
sense, how distant soever from our own; so that when we consult
Scripture (I may add reason either) 'tis not to resolve us whether God
be to be believed or no in what he has said, but whether he hath said
such and such things; for if we are convinced he have; reason as well
as religion commands our assent.
3. Whatever therefore God has said, we are to pay it a reverence
merely upon the account of its Author; over and above what the
excellence of the matter exacts: and to this we have all inducements
as well as obligation: there being no motives to render the words of
men estimable to us, which are not eminently and transcendently
appliable to those of God.
4. Those motives we may reduce to four: first, the Authority of the
Speaker; secondly, his kindness; thirdly, his wisdom; and fourthly,
his truth. First, for that of Authority; that may be either native, or
acquired; the native is that of a parent, which is such a charm of
observance, that we see Solomon, when he would impress his
counsels, assumes the person of a Father; Hear O my children the
instructions of a Father, Prov. 4.1. And generally through that whole
Book he uses the compellation of my Son, as the greatest endearment
to engage attention and reverence. Nay so indispensable was the
obligation of children in this respect, that we see the contumacious
child that would not hearken to the advice of his Parents, was by God
himself adjudged to death. Deut. 21.20.
5. Nor have only God's, but men's Laws exacted that filial reverence
to the dictates of Parents. But certainly no Parent can pretend such a
title to it as God, who is not only the immediate Father of our
persons, but the original Father of our very nature; not only of our
flesh, but of our spirits also, Heb. 12.9. So that the Apostles
Antithesis in that place is as properly applied to counsels as
corrections; and we may as rightly infer, that if we give reverence to
the advices of our earthly Parents, much more ought we subject
ourselves to this Father of our spirits. And we have the very same
reason wherewith to enforce it: for the Fathers of our flesh do as
often dictate, as correct according to their own pleasures; prescribe
to their children not according to the exact measures of right and
wrong, but after that humor which most predominates in
themselves. But God always directs his admonitions to our profit,
that we may be partakers of his holiness, Heb. 12.11. So that we are as
unkind to ourselves, as irreverent towards him, whenever we let any
of his words fall to the ground; whose claim to this part of our
reverence is much more irrefragable then that of our natural Parents.
6. But besides this native Authority there is also an acquired; and
that we may distinguish into two sorts; the one of dominion, the
other of reputation; To the first kind belongs that of Princes,
Magistrates, Masters, or any that have coercive power over us. And
our own interest teaches us not to slight the words of any of these,
who can so much to our cost second them with deeds. Now God has
all these titles of jurisdiction; He is the great King, Ps. 48.2. Nor was
it only a complement of the Psalmists; for himself owns the style, I
am a great King, Mal. 1. He is the Judge of all the World; Gen. 18.
yea, that Ancient of days, before whom the Books were opened, Dan.
7.10. He is our Lord and Master by right, both of creation and
redemption; and this Christ owns even in his state of inanition; yea,
when he was about the most servile employment; the washing his
Disciples feet: when he was most literally in the form of a servant; yet
he scruples not to assert his right to that opposite title; You call me
Master, and Lord; and ye say well, for so I am; Jo. 13. Nor are these
empty names, but effectively attended with all the power they
denote. Yet so stupid are we, that whilst we awfully receive the
dictates of our earthly Superiors, we slight and neglect the Oracles of
that God who is King of Kings, and Lord of Lord's. When a Prince
speaks, we are apt to cry out with Herod's Flatterers, the voice of a
God, and not of a man, Act. 12. Yet when it is indeed the voice of
God, we choose to listen to anything else rather then it. But let us
sadly remember, that notwithstanding our contempt's, this word
shall (as our Savior tells us) judge us at the last day, Jo. 12.48.
7. A second sort of acquired Authority is that of reputation. When a
man is famed for some extraordinary excellencies, whether moral or
intellectual, men come with appetite to his discourses, greedily suck
them in, nor need such a one bespeak attention; his very name has
done it for him, and prepossessed him of his Auditors regard. Thus
the Rabbis among the Jews, the Philosophers among the Greeks,
were listened to as Oracles, and to cite them was (by their admiring
Disciples) thought a concluding argument. Nay, under Christianity
this admiration of men's persons has been so inordinate, that it has
crumbled Religion away in little insignificant parties; whilst not only
Paul, Apollo, or Cephas, but names infinitely inferior, have become
the distinctive characters of Sects and separate Communions. So
easily alas are we charmed by our prepossessions, and with itching
ears run in quest of those doctrines which the fame of their Authors,
rather then the evidence of truth commend to us.
8. And hath God don nothing to get him a repute among us? has he
no excellencies to deserve our esteem? Is he not worthy to prescribe
to his own creatures? if we think yes, why is he the only person to be
disregarded? or why do we so unseasonably depart from our own
humor, as not to give his Word a reverence proportionable to that we
pretend for him; nay, which we actually pay to men of like passions
with ourselves? A contempt so absurd as well as impious, that we
have not the example of any the most barbarous people to
countenance us. For though some of them have made very wild
mistakes in the choice of their Deities, yet they have all agreed in this
common principle, that whatever those Deities said, was to be
received with all possible veneration; yea, such a deference gave they
to all significations of the divine will, that as they would undertake
no great enterprise without consulting their Auguries; so upon any
inauspicious signs they relinquished their attempts. And certainly if
we had the same reverence for the true God which they had for the
false, we should as frequently consult him. We may do it with much
more ease and certainty: we need not trust to the entrails of Beasts,
or motion of Birds: we need not go to Delphi, or the Lybian Hammon
for the resolving our doubts; but what Moses said to Israel is very
applicable to us, the Word is nigh thee, Deut. 30.14. That Word
which David made his Counselor, Psal. 119.24. his Comforter, ver.
50. his Tresure, ver. 72. his Study, ver. 99. And had we those awful
apprehensions of God which he had, we should pay the like
reverence to his Word. Did we well ponder how many titles of
Authority he has over us, we should surely be ashamed to deny that
respect to him in whom they all conspire; which we dare not deny to
them separately in human Superiors.
9. A second motive to esteem men's words, is the kindness of the
speaker. This has such a fascinating power, as nothing but extreme ill
nature can resist. When a man is assured of the kindness of him that
speaks, whatever is spoken is taken in good part. This is it that
distinguishes the admonitions of a friend from the reproaches of an
enemy; and we daily in common conversation receive those things
with contentment and applause from an intimate and familiar, which
if spoken by a stranger or enemy would be despised or stomached. So
insinuating a thing is kindness, that where it has once got itself
believed, nothing it says after is disputed; it supples the mind, and
makes it ductile and pliant to any impressions.
10. But what human kindness is there that can come in any
competition with the Divine? it surpasses that of the nearest and
dearest relations; Mothers may forget, yet will not I forget thee, Isa.
49.15. And the Psalmist found it experimentally true, When my
Father and my Mother forsake me, the Lord taketh me up, Ps. 27.10.
the tenderest bowels compared to his are adamant and flint: so that
'tis a most proper epithet the Wise man gives him; O Lord, thou lover
of souls; Wis. 11.26. Nor is this affection merely mental, but it attests
itself by innumerable effects. The effects of love are all reducible to
two heads, doing and suffering; and by both these God has most
eminently attested his love to us.
11. For the first, we cannot look either on our bodies or our souls, on
the whole Universe about us, or that better World above us; but we
shall in each see the Lord hath don great things for us, Psal. 114. Nay,
not only our enjoyments, but even the capacity to enjoy, is his
bounty. Had not he drawn mankind out of his original clay, what had
we been concerned in all the other works of his Creation. So that if
we put any value either upon what we have or what we are, we
cannot but account ourselves so much indebted to this his active
love. And though the passive was not practicable by the divine
Nature simply and apart, yet that we might not want all imaginable
evidences of his love, he who was God blessed forever, linked his
impassible to our passable nature; assumed our humanity, that he
might espouse our sorrows, and was born on purpose that he might
die for us. So that sure we may say in his own words, greater love
then this hath no man; Io. 15.13.
12. And now tis very hard, if such an unparalleled love in God, may
not as much affect us, as the slight benefactions of every ordinary
friend: if it cannot so much recommend him to our regard, as to
rescue his word from contempt, and dispose us to receive
impressions from it; (especially when his very speaking is a new act
of his kindness, and designed to our greatest advantage.)
13. But if all he has don and suffered for us cannot obtain him so
much from us, we must surely confess, our disingenuity is as
superlative as his love. For in this instance we have no plea for
ourselves. The discourses of men 'tis true may sometime be so weak
and irrational, that though kindness may suggest pity, it cannot
reverence; But this can never happen in God, whose wisdom is as
infinite as his love. He talks not at our vain rate who often talk only
for talking's sake; but his words are directed to the most important
ends and addressed in such a manner as befits him in whom are all
the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, Col. 2. And this is our third
consideration, the wisdom of the Speaker.
14. How attractive a thing Wisdom is, we may observe in the instance
of the Queen of Sheba, who came from the utmost parts of the earth,
as Christ says Mat. 12.42. to hear the Wisdom of Solomon. And the
like is noted of the Greek Sages, that they were addressed to from all
parts, by persons of all ranks and qualities, to hear their Lectures.
And indeed the rational nature of man do's by a kind of sympathetic
motion close with whatever hath the stamp of reason upon it. But
alas, what is the profoundest wisdom of men, compared with that of
God? He is the essential reason; and all that man can pretend to is
but an emanation from him; a ray of his Sun, a drop of his Ocean:
which as he gives, so he can also take away. He can infatuate the
most subtle designers; And (as he says of himself) makes the diviners
mad; turns the wise men back, and makes their wisdom foolishness,
Isaiah 44.25.
15. How impious a folly is it then in us, to Idolize human Wisdom
with all its imperfections, and despise the divine? yet this every man
is guilty of, who is not attracted to the study of sacred Writ by the
supereminent wisdom of its Author. For such men must either affirm
that God has not such a supereminency, or that, though he have in
himself, he hath not exerted it in this writing: The former is downright blasphemy; and truly the later is the same, a little varied. For
that anything, but what is exactly wise can proceed from infinite
wisdom, is too absurd for any man to imagine. And therefore he that
charges God's Word with defect of wisdom, must interpretively
charge God so too, For though 'tis true, a wise man may sometimes
speak foolishly; yet that happens through that mixture of ignorance,
or passion which is in the most knowing of mortals: but in God, who
is a pure act, and essential wisdom, that is an impossible
supposition.
16. Nay, indeed it were to tax him of folly beyond what is incident to
any sensible man; who will still proportion his instruments to the
work he designs. Should we not conclude him mad, that should
attempt to fell a mighty Oak with a Pen-knife, or stop a Torrent with
a wisp of Straw? And sure their conceptions are not much more
reverend of God, who can suppose that a writing designed by him for
such important ends, as the making men wise unto salvation, 2 Tim.
3.15. the cast down [of] all that exalts itself against the obedience of
Christ, 2 Cor. 10.5. should itself be foolish and weak: or that he
should give it those great attributes of being sharper then a twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing a sunder of soul and
spirit, of the joints and marrow, Heb. 4.14. if its discourses were so
flat and insipid as some in this profane Age would represent them.
17. 'Tis true indeed, 'tis not, as the Apostle speaks the wisdom of this
world, 1 Cor. 2.6. The Scripture teaches us not the arts of
undermining governments, defrauding and circumventing our
brethren; but it teaches us that which would tend much more even to
our temporal felicity; and as reason prompts us to aspire to
happiness, so it must acknowledge that is the highest wisdom which
teaches us to attain it.
18. And as the Holy Scripture is thus recommended to us by the
wisdom of its Author; so in the last place is it by his truth, without
which the other might rather raise our jealousy then our reverence.
For wisdom without sincerity degenerates into serpentine guile; and
we rather fear to be ensnared then hope to be advantaged by it. The
most subtle addresses, and most cogent arguments prevail not upon
us, where we suspect some insidious design. But where wisdom and
fidelity meet in the same person, we do not only attend, but confide
in his counsels. And this qualification is most eminently in God. The
children of men are deceitful upon the weights, Psal. 62.9. Much
guile often lurks indiscernibly under the fairest appearances: but
God's veracity is as essentially himself, as his wisdom, and he can no
more deceive us, then he can be deceived himself. He is not man that
he should lie, Num. 23.19. He designs not (as men often do) to sport
himself with our credulity; and raise hopes which he never means to
satisfy: he says not to the seed of Jacob, seek ye me in vain, Ex. 45.19.
but all his promises are yea and Amen, 2 Cor. 1.20. He is perfectly
sincere in all the proposals he makes in his Word: which is a most
rational motive for us to advert to it, not only with reverence but
love.
19. And now when all these motives are thus combined; the
authority, the kindness, the wisdom, the veracity of the speaker,
what can be required more to render his words of weight with us? If
this four-fold cord will not draw us, we have sure the strength, not of
men, but of that Legion we read of in the Gospel, Mat. 5.1. For these
are so much the cords of a man, so adapted to our natures, nay to our
constant usage in other things, that we must put off much of our
humanity, disclaim the common measures of mankind, if we be not
attracted by them. For I dare appeal to the breast of any sober,
industrious man, whether in case a person, who he were sure had all
the fore-mentioned qualifications, should recommend to him some
rules as infallible for the certain doubling, or trebling his estate, he
would not think them worth the pursuing, nay, whether he would not
plod and study on them, till he comprehended the whole Art. And
shall we then when God in whom all those qualifications are united,
and that in their utmost transcendencies, shall we, I say, think him
below our regard, when he proposes the improving our interests, not
by the scanty proportions of two or three, but in such as he intimated
to Abraham, when he showed him the Stars, as the representative of
his numerous offspring, Gen. 15.5. when he teaches us that highest,
and yet most certain Alchemy, of refining and multiplying our
enjoyments, and then perpetuating them?
20. All this God do's in Scripture; and we must be stupidly
improvident, if we will take no advantage by it. It was once the
complaint of Christ to the Jews, I am come in my Fathers name and
ye receive me not, if another shall come in his own name, him ye will
receive. Jo. 5.43. And what was said by him the eternal essential
Word, is no less applicable to the written; which coming in the name,
and upon the message of God, is despised and slighted, and every the
lightest composure of men preferred before it. As if that signature of
Divinity it carries, served rather as a Brand to stigmatize and defame,
then adorn and recommend it. A contempt which strikes
immediately at God himself, whose resentments of it, though for the
present suppressed by his longsuffering, will at last break out upon
all who persevere so to affront him, in a judgment worthy of God.
Wis. 12.26.
21. But after all that has been said, I foresee some may say, that I
have all this while but beaten the air, have built upon a principle
which some flatly deny, others doubt of, and have run away with a
supposition that the Bible is of divine Original, without any attempt
of proof. To such as these I might justly enough object the extreme
hard measure they offer to Divinity above all other Sciences. For in
those, they still allow some fundamental maxims, which are
presupposed without proof; but in this they admit of no Postulata, no
granted principle on which to superstruct. If the same rigor should
be extended to secular cases, what a damp would it strike upon
commerce! For example, a man expects fair dealing from his
neighbor, upon the strength of those common notions of Justice he
presumes writ in all men's hearts: but according to this measure, he
must first prove to every man he deals with, that such notions there
are, and that they are obligatory: that the wares exposed to sale are
his own; that dominion is not founded in grace, or that he is in that
state, and so has a property to confer upon another; that the person
dealt with, pays a just price; do's it in good money; and that it is his
own; or that he is in the state of grace; or needs not be so, to justify
his purchase, and at this rate the Market will be as full of nice
questions as the Schools. But because complaints and retortions are
the common refuge of causes that want better Arguments, I shall not
insist here; but proceed to a defense of the questioned Assertion, that
the Bible is the Word of God.
22. In which I shall proceed by these degrees. First, I shall lay down
the plain grounds upon which Christians believe it. Secondly, I shall
compare those with those of less credibility which have generally
satisfied mankind in other things of the like nature. And thirdly, I
shall consider whether those who are dissatisfied with those grounds
would not be equally so with any other way of attestation.
23. Before I enter upon the first of these, I desire it may be
considered, that matters of fact are not capable of such rigorous
demonstrative evidences as mathematical propositions are. To
render a thing fit for rational belief, there is no more required, but
that the motives for it do over poise those against it; and in that
degree they do so, so is the belief stronger or weaker.
24. Now the motives of our belief in the present case, are such as are
extrinsic, or intrinsic to the Scriptures; of which the extrinsic are
first, and preparative to the other; and indeed all that can reasonably
be insisted on to a gainsayer, who must be supposed no competent
judge of the later. But as to the former I shall adventure to say, that
the divine Original of the Scripture hath as great grounds of
credibility as can be expected in anything of this kind. For whether
God inspired the pen-men of Holy Writ, is matter of fact, and being
so is capable of no other external evidence but that of testimony: and
that matter of fact being also in point of time so remote from us, can
be judged of only by a series of testimonies derived from that Age
wherein the Scriptures were written, to this: and the more credible
the testifiers, and the more universal the testimony; so much the
more convincing are they to all considering men.
25. And this attestation the Scripture hath in the highest
circumstances, it having been witnessed to in all Ages, and in those
Ages by all persons that could be presumed to know anything of it.
Thus the Old Testament was owned by the whole nation of the Jews,
as the writings of men inspired by God; & that with such evidence of
their mission, as abundantly satisfied those of that Age, of their being
so inspired; and they derived those Writings with that attestation to
their posterity. Now that those of the first Ages were not deceived, is
as morally certain as anything can be supposed. For in the first part
of the Bible is contained the history of those miracles wherewith God
rescued that people out of Egypt, and instated them in Canaan. Now
if they who lived at that time knew that such miracles were never
don, 'tis impossible they could receive an evident Fable as an
inspired truth. No single person, much less a whole Nation can be
supposed so stupid. But if indeed they were eye-witnesses of those
miracles, they might with very good reason conclude, that the same
Moses who was by God empowered to work them, was so also for the
relating them; as also all those precedent events from the Creation
down to that time, which are recorded by him.
26. So also for the preceptive parts of those Books, those that saw
those formidable solemnities, with which they were first published,
had sure little temptation to doubt that they were the dictates of God,
when written. Now if they could not be deceived themselves, 'tis yet
less imaginable that they should conspire to impose a cheat upon
their posterities; nor indeed were the Jews of so easy a credulity, that
'tis at all probable the succeeding Generations would have been so
imposed on: their humor was stubborn enough, and the precepts of
their Law severe and burdensome enough to have tempted them to
have cast off the yoke, had it not been bound upon them by
irresistible convictions of its coming from God. But besides this
Tradition of their Elders, they had the advantage of living under a
Theocracy, the immediate guidance of God; Prophets daily raised up
among them, to fore-tell events, to admonish them of their duty, and
reprove their backslidings: yet even these gave the deference to the
written Word; nay, made it the test by which to try true inspirations
from false: To the Law and to the Testimony; if they speak not
according to it, there is no light in them, Isaiah 8.20. So that the
veneration which they had before acquired, was still anew excited by
fresh inspirations, which both attested the old, and became new
parts of their Canon.
27. Nor could it be esteemed a small confirmation to the Scriptures,
to find in succeeding Ages the signal accomplishments of those
prophecies which were long before registered in those Books; for
nothing less than divine power and wisdom could foretell, and also
verify them. Upon these grounds the Jews universally through all
successions received the Books of the Old Testament as divine
Oracles, and looked upon them as the greatest trust that could be
committed to them: and accordingly were so scrupulously vigilant in
conserving them, that their Masorits numbered not only the sections,
but the very words, nay letters, that no fraud or inadvertency might
corrupt or defalked the least iota of what they esteemed so sacred. A
farther testimony and sepiment to which, were the Samaritan,
Chaldee, and Greek versions: which being made use of in the
Synagogues of Jews, in their dispersions, and the Samaritans at
Shechem could not at those distances receive a uniform alteration,
and any other would be of no effect. Add to this, that the Original
exemplar of the Law, was laid up in the Sanctuary, that the Prince
was to have a Copy of it always by him, and transcribe it with his own
hand; that every Jew was to make it his constant discourse and
meditation, teach it his children, and wear part of it upon his hands
and forehead. And now sure 'tis impossible to imagine any matter of
fact to be more carefully deduced, or irrefragably testified, nor
anything believed upon stronger evidence
28. That all this is true in reference to the Jews, that they did thus
own these Writings as divine, appears not only by the Records of past
Ages, but by the Jews of the present, who still own them, and cannot
be suspected of combination with the Christians. And if these were
reasonable grounds of conviction to the Jews, (as he must be most
absurdly skeptical that shall deny) they must be so to us Christians
also; who derive them from them: and that with this farther
advantage to our Faith, that we see the clear completion of those
Evangelical prophecies which remained dark to them, and
consequently have a farther Argument to confirm us, that the
Scriptures of the Old Testament are certainly divine.
29. The New has also the like means of probation: which as it is a
collection of the doctrine taught by Christ and his Apostles, must if
truly related be acknowledged no less divine than what they orally
delivered. So that they who doubt its being divine, must either deny
what Christ and his Apostles preached to be so; or else distrust the
fidelity of the relation: The former strikes at the whole Christian
Faith; which if only of men, must not only be fallible, but is actually a
deceit, whilst it pretends to be of God, and is not. To such Objectors
we have to oppose those stupendous miracles with which the Gospel
was attested; such as demonstrated a more then human efficacy. And
that God should lend his omnipotence to abet the false pretensions of
men, is a conceit too unworthy even for the worst of men to
entertain.
30. 'Tis true, there have been by God permitted lying miracles; as
well as true ones have been done by him: Such as were those of the
Magicians in Egypt, in opposition to the other of Moses; but then the
difference between both was so conspicuous, that he must be more
partial and disingenuous, then even those Magicians were, who
would not acknowledge the disparity, and confess in those which
were truly supernatural, the finger of God, Exod. 8.19. Therefore
both in the Old and New Testament it is predicted, that false
Prophets should arise, and do signs and wonders, Deut. 13.1. Mat.
24.11.24. as a trial of their fidelity who made profession of Religion;
whether they would prefer the few and trivial sleights which
recommended a deceiver, before those great and numberless
miracles which attested the sacred Oracles delivered to the sons of
men by the God of truth. Whether the trick of a Barchochebas to hold
fire in his mouth; that of Marcus the heretic, to make the Wine of the
Holy Sacrament appear blood; or that of Mahomet, to bring a
Pidgeon to his ear, ought to be put in balance against all the miracles
wrought by Moses, our Savior, or his Apostles. And in a word,
whether the silly stories which Iamblichus solemnly relates of
Pythagoras, or those Philostratus tells of Apollonius Tyaneus,
deserve to rival those of the Evangelists. It is a most just judgment,
and accordingly threatened by Almighty God, that they who would
not obey the truth, should believe a lie, 2 Thes. 2.11. But still the
Almighty, where any man or devil do's proudly, is evidently above
him, Exod. 18.11. will be justified in his sayings, and be clear when he
is judged, Rom. 3.4.
31. But if men will be Sceptics, and doubt everything, they are to
know that the matter called into question, is of a nature that admits
but two ways of solution; probability, and testimony. First for
probability, let it be considered, who were the first promulgers of
Christ's miracles. In his life time they were either the patients on
whom his miracles were wrought, or the common people, that were
spectators: the former, as they could not be deceived themselves, but
must needs know whether they were cured or no; so what imaginable
design could they have to deceive others? Many indeed have
pretended impotency as a motive of compassion; but what could they
gain by owning a cure they had not? As for the Spectators, as their
multitude adds to their credibility; (it being morally impossible that
so many should at once be deluded in a matter obvious to their
senses) so do's it also acquit them from fraud and combination.
Cheats and forgeries are always hatched in the dark, in close Cabals,
and private Juncto's. That five thousand men at one time, and four
thousand at another, should conspire to say, that they were
miraculously fed, when they were not; and all prove true to the
fiction, and not betray it: is a thing as irrational to be supposed, as
impossible to be paralleled.
|
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 22, 2023 7:36:24 GMT -5
32. Besides, admit it possible that so many could have joined in the
deceit, yet what imaginable end could they have in it? Had their lie
been subservient to the designs of some potent Prince that might
have rewarded it, there had been some temptation: but what could
they expect from the reputed son of a Carpenter, who had not
himself where to lay his head? Nay, who disclaimed all secular
power; conveyed himself away from their importunities, when they
would have forced him to be a King: And consequently, could not be
looked on as one that would head a Sedition, or attempt to raise
himself to a capacity of rewarding his Abettors. Upon all these
considerations, there appears not the least shadow of probability;
that either those particular persons who published the cures they had
received, or those multitudes who were witnesses and divulgers of
those, or his other miracles; could do it upon any sinister design, or
indeed upon any other motive but gratitude and admiration.
33. In the next place, if we come to those miracles which succeeded
Christ's death, those most important, and convincing, of his
Resurrection and Ascension, and observe who were the divulgers of
those, we shall find them very unlikely to be men of design; a set of
illiterate men, taken from the Fisher-boats, and other mean
occupations: and such as needed a miracle as great as any of those
they were to assert (the descent of the Holy Ghost) to fit them for
their office. What alas could they drive at, or how could they hope
that their testimony could be received, so much against the humor
and interest of the present rulers; unless they were assured not only
of the truth of the things, but also of some supernatural aids to back
and fortify them? Accordingly we find, that till they had received
those; till by the descent of the Holy Ghost they were endued with
power from on high, Luk. 24.49. they never attempted the discovery
of what they had seen: but rather hid themselves, kept all their
assemblies in privacy and concealment for fear of the Jews, Jo.
20.19. and so were far enough from projecting anything besides their
own safety. Afterwards, when they began to preach, they had early
essays, what their secular advantages would be by it; threatening's
and reviling's, scourging's and imprisonments, Act. 4.20.5.18.40.
And can it be imagined, that men who a little before had showed
themselves so little in love with suffering, that none of them durst
stick to their Master at his apprehension, but one forswore, and all
forsook him; can it, I say, be imagined that these men should be so
much in love with their own Fable, as to venture all sorts of
persecution for the propagating it? Or if they could, let us in the next
place consider what probability there could be of success.
34. Their preaching amounted to no less than the Deifying of one,
whom both their Roman and Jewish Rulers, nay, the generality of
the people had executed as a malefactor: so that they were all
engaged, in defense of their own Act, to sift their testimony with all
the rigor that conscious jealousy could suggest. And where were so
many concerned inquisitors, there was very little hope for a forgery
to pass. Besides the avowed displeasure of their Governors made it a
hazardous thing to own a belief of what they asserted. Those that
adhered to them could not but know, that at the same time they must
espouse their dangers and sufferings. And men use not to incur
certain mischiefs, upon doubtful and suspicious grounds.
35. Yet farther, their doctrine was designed to an end to which their
Auditors could not but have the greatest reluctancy: they were to
struggle with that rooted prepossession which the Jews had for the
Mosaical Law, which their Gospel outdated; and the Gentiles for the
Rites and Religion of their Ancestors; and, which was harder then
either, with the corruptions and vices of both: to plant humility and
internal sanctity, so contrary to that ceremonial holiness, upon which
the Jews so valued themselves, and despised others: and
Temperance, Justice, and Purity, so contrary to the practice, nay,
even the religion of the Heathen: and to attempt all this with no
other allurement, no other promise of recompense but what they
must attend in another world, and pass too through reproaches and
afflictions, torments and death. These were all such invincible
prejudices, as they could never hope to break thorough with a lie,
nay, which they could not have encountered even with every
common truth, but only with that, which being divine, brought its
aids with it; without which 'twas utterly impossible for all the skill or
oratory of men to overcome such disadvantages.
36. And yet with all these did these rude inartificial men contest, and
that with signal success: no less than three thousand Proselytes made
by Saint Peters first Sermon; and that in Jerusalem, the Scene where
all was acted, and consequently where 'twas the most impossible to
impose a forgery. And at the like miraculous rate they went on, till as
the Pharisees themselves complain, they had filled Jerusalem with
their doctrine, Acts 5.28. nor did Judea set bounds to them; their
sound went out into all Nations, Rom. 10.18. and their doctrine
spread itself through all the Gentile world.
37. And sure so wonderful an event, so contrary to all human
measures, do's sufficiently evince there was more than man in it.
Nothing but the same creative Power that produced light out of
darkness, could bring forth effects so much above the proportion of
the cause. Had these weak instruments acted only by their natural
powers, nothing of this had been achieved. Alas, could these poor
rude men learn all Languages within the space of fifty days, which
would take up almost as many years of the most industrious Student,
and yet had they not been able to speak them, they could never have
divulged the Gospel to the several Nations, nor so effectually have
convinced the by-standers, Act. 2. that they acted by a higher
impulse. And to convince the world they did so, they repeated their
Masters miracles as well as his doctrine; healed the sick, cast out
devils, raised the dead; And where God communicated so much of
his power, we may reasonably conclude he did it to promote his own
work, not the work of the devil, as it must have been if this whole
Scene were a lie.
38. When all this is weighed, I presume there will remain little
ground to suspect, that the first planters of Christian Faith had any
other design then what they avowed, viz. the bringing men to
holiness here, and salvation hereafter. The suspicion therefore, if
any, must rest upon later times; and accordingly some are willing to
persuade themselves and others, that the whole Scheme of our
Religion, is but a lately devised Fable to keep the world in awe;
whereof Princes have made some use, but Clergy-men more; and
that Christ and his Apostles are only actors whom themselves have
conjured up upon the stage to pursue their plot.
39. In answer to this bold, this blasphemous suggestion, I should
first desire these surmisers to point out the time when, and the
persons who began this design; to tell us exactly whence they date
this politic Religion, as they are pleased to suppose it. If they cannot,
they are manifestly unjust to reject our account of it when they can
give none themselves; and fail very much of that rigid demonstration
they require from others. That there is such a profession as
Christianity in the world, is yet (God be blest) undeniable; (though at
the rate it has of late declined, God knows how long it will be so:) we
say it came by Christ, and his Apostles, and that it is attested by an
uninterrupted testimony of all the intervening Ages, the suffrage of
all Christian Churches from that day to this. And sure they who
embraced the doctrine, are the most competent witnesses from
whence they received it.
40. Yet lest they should be all thought parties to the design, and their
witness excepted against, it has pleased God to give us collateral
assurances, and made both Jewish and Gentile Writers give
testimony to the Antiquity of Christianity. Josephus do's this, lib. 20.
chap. 8. and lib. 18. chap. 4. where, after he has given an account of
the crucifixion of Christ exactly agreeing with the Evangelists; he
concludes, And to this day the Christian people, who of him borrow
their name cease not to increase. I add not the personal eulogium
which he gives of our Savior; because some are so hardy to control it:
also I pass what Philo mentions of the religious in Egypt, because
several Learned men refer it to the Essens, a Sect among the Jews, or
some other. There is no doubt of what Tacitus and other Roman
Historians speak of Christ as the Author of the Christian doctrine;
which it had been impossible for him to have don, if there had then
been no such doctrine, or if Christ had not been known as the
Founder of it. So afterward Pliny gives the Emperor Trajan an
account both of the manners, and multitude of the Christians; and
makes the innocence of the one, and the greatness of the other, an
Argument to slacken the persecution against them. Nay, the very
bloody Edicts of the persecuting Emperors, & the scoffs and
reproaches of Celsus, Porphyri, Lucian, and other profane opposers
of this Doctrine, do undeniably assert its being. By all which it
appears, that Christianity had in those Ages not only a being, but had
also obtained mightily in the world, and drawn in vast numbers to its
profession; and vast indeed they must needs be, to furnish out that
whole Army of Martyrs, of which profane, as well as Ecclesiastic
writers speak. And if all this be not sufficient to evince that
Christianity stole not clancularly into the world, but took its rise
from those times and persons it pretends, we must renounce all faith
of testimony, and not believe an inch farther then we see.
41. I suppose I need say no more to show that the Gospel, and all
those portentous miracles which attested it, were no forgeries, or
stratagems of men. I come now to that doubt which more
immediately concerns the Holy Scripture, viz. whether all those
transactions be so faithfully related there, that we may believe them
to have been dictated by the spirit of God. Now for this, the process
need be but short, if we consider who were the penmen of the New
Testament; even for the most part the Apostles themselves: Matthew,
and John who wrote two of the Gospels were certainly so: and Mark,
as all the Ancients aver, was but the Amanuensis to Saint Peter, who
dictated that Gospel. Saint Luke indeed comes not under this first
rank of Apostles; yet is by some affirmed to be one of the seventy
Disciples: however an Apostolical person 'tis certain he was, and it
was no wonder for such to be inspired. For in those first Ages of the
Church men acted more by immediate inflation of the Spirit then
since. And accordingly we find Stephen, though but a Deacon, had
the power of miracles; and preached as divinely as the prime
Apostles, Act. 7. And the gift of the Holy Ghost was then a usual
concomitant of conversion, as appears in the Story of Cornelius, Acts
10.45, 46. Besides, Saint Luke was a constant attendant on Saint Paul
(who derived the Faith not from man, but by the immediate
revelation of Jesus Christ, as himself professes, Gal. 1.12.) and is by
some said to have wrote by dictate from him, as Mark did from Saint
Peter. Then as to the Epistles they all bear the names of Apostles,
except that to the Hebrews, which yet is upon very good grounds,
presumed to be Saint Paul's. Now these were the persons
commissionated by Christ to preach the Christian doctrine, and were
signally assisted in the discharge of that office; so that as he tells
them, it was not they, who spake, but the spirit of the Father that
spake in them, Mat. 13.11. And if they spake by divine inspiration,
there can be no question that they wrote so also. Nay, indeed of the
two, it seems more necessary they should do the later. For had they
erred in anything they orally delivered, they might have retracted
and cured the mischief: but these Books being designed as a standing
immutable rule of Faith and manners to all successions, any error in
them would have been irreparable, and have entailed itself upon
posterity: which agreed neither with the truth, nor goodness of God
to permit.
42. Now that these Books were indeed writ by them whose names
they bear, we have as much assurance as 'tis possible to have of
anything of that nature, and that distance of time from us. For
however some of them may have been controverted; yet the greatest
part have admitted no dispute, whose doctrines agreeing exactly with
the others, give testimony to them. And to the bulk of those writings,
it is notorious that the first Christians received them from the
Apostles, and so transmitted them to the ensuing Ages, which
received them with the like esteem and veneration. They cannot be
corrupted, says Saint Austin in the thirty second Book against
Faustus the Manich. c. 16. because they are and have been in the
hands of all Christians. And whosoever should first attempt an
alteration, he would be confuted by the inspection of other ancienter
Copies. Besides, the Scriptures are not in someone Language, but
translated into many: so that the faults of one Book would be
corrected by others more ancient, or in a different Tongue.
43. And how much the body of Christians were in earnest concerned
to take care in this matter, appears by very costly evidences;
multitudes of them choosing rather to part with their lives then their
Bibles. And indeed 'tis a sufficient proof, that their reverence of that
Book was very avowed and manifest; when their heathen Persecutors
made that one part of their persecution. So that as wherever the
Christian Faith was received, this Book was also, under the notion we
now plead for, viz. as the writings of men inspired by God: so it was
also contended for even unto death; and to part with the Bible was to
renounce the Faith. And now, after such a cloud of testimonies, we
may sure take up that (ill-applied) saying of the high Priest, Mat.
26.65. what farther need have we of witnesses.
44. Yet besides these, another sort of witnesses there are, I mean
those intrinsic evidences which arise out of the Scripture itself; but of
these I think not proper here to insist, partly because the subject will
be in a great degree coincident with that of the second general
consideration; and partly because these can be argumentative to
none who are not qualified to discern them. Let those who doubt the
divine Original of Scripture, well digest the former grounds which
are within the verge of reason; and when by those they are brought to
read it with due reverence, they will not want Arguments from the
Scripture itself to confirm their veneration of it.
45. In the meantime, to evince how proper the former discourse is to
found a rational belief that the Scripture is the word of God; I shall
compare it with those measures of credibility upon which all human
transactions move, and upon which men trust their greatest concerns
without diffidence or dispute.
46. That we must in many things trust the report of others is so
necessary, that without it human society cannot subsist. What a
multitude of subjects are there in the world, who never saw their
Prince, nor were at the making of any Law? if all these should deny
their obedience, because they have it only by hear-say, there is such a
man, and such Laws, what would become of government? So also for
property, if nothing of testimony may be admitted, how shall any
man prove his right to anything? All pleas must be decided by the
sword, and we shall fall into that state (which some have fancied the
primitive) of universal hostility. In like manner for traffic and
commerce; how should any Merchant first attempt a trade to any
foreign part of the world, if he did not believe that such a place there
was? and how could he believe that, but upon the credit of those who
have been there? Nay indeed how could any man first attempt to go
but to the next Market Town, if he did not from the report of others,
conclude that such a one there was? so that if this universal
diffidence should prevail, every man should be a kind of Plantagnus,
fixed to the soil he first sprung up in. The absurdities are indeed so
infinite, and so obvious, that I need not dilate upon them.
47. But it will perhaps be said, that in things that are told us by our
contemporaries, and that relate to our own time, men will be less apt
to deceive us, because they know 'tis in our power to examine and
discover the truth. To this I might say, that in many instances it
would scarce quit cost to do so; and the inconveniences of trial would
exceed those of belief. But I shall willingly admit this probable
Argument, and only desire it may be applied to our main question,
by considering whether the primitive Christians who received the
Scripture as divine, had not the same security of not being deceived,
who had as great opportunities of examining, and the greatest
concern of doing it thoroughly, since they were to engage not only
their future hopes in another world, but (that which to nature is
much more sensible) all their present enjoyments, and even life itself
upon the truth of it.
48. But because it must be confessed that we who are so many Ages
removed from them, have not their means of assurance, let us in the
next place consider, whether an assent to those testimonies they
have left behind them, be not warranted by the common practice of
mankind in other cases. Who is there that questions there was such a
man as William the Conqueror in this Island? or, to lay the Scene
farther; who doubts there was an Alexander, a Julius Caesar, an
Augustus? Now what have we to found this confidence on besides the
faith of History? And I presume even those who exact the severest
demonstrations for Ecclesiastic Story, would think him a very
impertinent Sceptic that should do the like in these. So also, as to the
Authors of Books; who disputes whether Homer writ the Iliads, or
Virgil the Aeneids, or Caesar the Commentaries, that pass under
their names? yet none of these have been attested in any degree like
the Scripture. 'It is said indeed, that Caesar ventured his own life to
save his Commentaries, employing one hand to hold that above the
water, when it should have assisted him in swimming. But whoever
laid down their lives in attestation of that, or any human composure,
as multitudes of men have don for the Bible?
49. But perhaps 'twill be said, that the small concern men have, who
wrote these, or other the like Books, inclines them to acquiesce in the
common opinion. To this I must say, that many things
inconsiderable to mankind have oft been very laboriously discussed,
as appears by many unedifying Volumes, both of Philosophers and
School-men. But whatever may be said in this instance, 'tis manifest
there are others, wherein men's real and greatest interests are
entrusted to the testimonies of former Ages. For example, a man
possesses an estate which was bought by his great Grand-father, or
perhaps elder Progenitor: he charily preserves that deed of purchase,
and never looks for farther security of his title: yet alas, at the rate
that men object against the Bible, what numberless Cavils might be
raised against such a deed? How shall it be known that there was
such a man as either Seller or Purchaser? if by the witnesses; they are
as liable to doubt as the other; it being as easy to forge the
Attestation as the main writing: and yet notwithstanding all these
possible deceits, nothing but a positive proof of forgery can
invalidate this deed. Let but the Scripture have the same measure, be
allowed to stand in force, to be what it pretends to be, till the
contrary be (not by surmises and possible conjectures) but by
evident proof evinced; and its greatest Advocates will ask no more.
50. A like instance may be given in public concerns: the immunities
and rights of any Nation, particularly here, of our Magna Charta,
granted many Ages since, and deposited among the public Records:
to make this signify anything, it must be taken for granted, that this
was without falsification preserved to our times; yet how easy were it
to suggest that in so long a succession of its keepers, some may have
been prevailed on by the influence of Princes to abridge and curtail
its concessions, others by a prevailing faction of the people to amplify
and extend it? Nay, if men were as great Sceptics in Law, as they are
in Divinity, they might exact demonstrations that the whole thing
were not a forgery. Yet, for all these possible surmises, we still build
upon it, and should think he argued very fallaciously, that should go
to evacuate it, upon the force of such remote suppositions.
51. Now I desire it may be considered whether our security
concerning the holy Scripture be not as great, nay, greater then it can
be of this. For first, this is a concern only of a particular Nation, and
so can expect no foreign attestation; and secondly, it has all along
rested on the fidelity of its keepers; which has either been a single
person, or at best some small number at a time; whereas the
Scriptures have been witnessed to by persons of all Nations, and
those not single, but collective Bodies and Societies, even as many as
there have been Christian Churches throughout the world. And the
same that are its Attestors have been its Guardians also, and by their
multitudes made it a very difficult, if not an impossible thing to
falsify it in any considerable degree; it being not imaginable, as I
showed before from St. Austin, all Churches should combine to do it:
and if they did not, the fraud could not pass undetected: and if no
eminent change could happen, much less could any new, any
counterfeit Gospel be obtruded, after innumerable Copies of the first
had been translated into almost all Languages, and dispersed
throughout the world.
52. The Imperial Law compiled by Justinian, was soon after his
death, by reason of the inroads of the Goths, and other barbarous
Nations, utterly lost in the Western world; and scarce once heard of
for the space of five hundred years, and then came casually to be
retrieved upon the taking of Amalsis by the Pisans; one single Copy
being found there at the plundering of the City. And the whole credit
of those Pandects, which have ever since governed the Western
world, depends in a manner on that single Book, formerly called the
Pisan; and now, after that Pisa was taken by the Florentines, the
Florentine Copy. But notwithstanding this; the body of the Civil Law
obtains; and no man thinks it reasonable to question its being really
what it pretends to be, notwithstanding its single, and so long
interrupted derivation. I might draw this parallel through many
other instances, but these may suffice to show, that if the Scriptures
might find but so much equity, as to be tried by the common
measures of other things, it would very well pass the test.
53. But men seem in this case (like our late Legislators) to set up new
extra regular Courts of Justice, to try those whom no ordinary rules
will cast, yet their designs require should be condemned: And we
may conclude, 'tis not the force of reason, but of prejudice; that
makes them so unequal to themselves as to reject the Scriptures,
when they receive everything else upon far weaker grounds. The
bottom of it is, they are resolved not to obey its precepts; and
therefore think it the shortest cut to disavow its authority: for should
they once own that, they would find themselves entangled in the
most inextricable dilemma; that of the Pharisees about John the
Baptist: If we say from heaven, he will say, why then did you not
believe him? Mat. 21.25. If they confess the Scriptures divine, they
must be self-condemned in not obeying them. And truly men that
have such pre-engagements to their lusts, that they must admit
nothing that will disturb them; do but prevaricate when they call for
greater evidences and demonstrations: for those bosom Sophisters
will elude the most manifest convictions; and like Jugglers, make
men disbelieve even their own senses. So that any other ways of
evidence will be as disputable with them, as those already offered:
which is the third thing I proposed to consider.
54. It has been sometimes seen in popular mutinies, that when
blanks have been sent them, they could not agree what to ask: and
were it imaginable that God should so far court the infidelity of men,
as to allow them to make their own demands, to set down what ways
of proof would persuade them; I doubt not there are many have
obstinacy enough, to defeat their own methods, as well as they now
do God's. 'It is sure there is no ordinary way of conviction left for
them to ask, God having already (as hath also been showed) afforded
that. They must therefore resort to immediate revelation, expect
instant assurances from heaven, that this book we call the Bible is
the word of God.
55. My first question then is, in what manner this revelation must be
made to appear credible to them. The best account we have of the
several ways of revelation is from the Jews, to whom God was
pleased upon new emergencies signally to reveal himself. These were
first dreams; secondly, visions; by both which the Prophets received
their inspirations. Thirdly, Urim and Thummim. Fourthly, the Bathcol (as they term it) Thunder and voice from Heaven. Let us consider
them distinctly, and see whether our Skeptical men may not
probably find somewhat to dispute in every one of these. And first for
dreams; it is among us so hard to distinguish between those that
arise from constitution, prepossession of fancy, diabolical or divine
infusion, that those that have the most critically considered them, do
rather difference them by their matter, then any certain
discriminating circumstances: and unless we had some infallible way
of discerning, our dependence on them may more probably betray
then direct us. 'It is unquestionable that usually fancy has the
greatest stroke in them. And if he that should commit himself to the
guidance of his waking fancy, is not like to be over-wisely governed,
what can we expect from his sleeping? All this and more may
doubtless be soberly enough objected against the validity of our
common dreams.
56. But admit there were now such divine dreams as brought their
evidence along with them; yet sure 'tis possible for prejudiced men,
to resist even the clearest convictions. For do we not see some that
have made a shift to extinguish that natural light, those notions
which are interwoven into the very frame and constitution of their
minds, that so they may sin more at ease, and without reluctancy?
and sure 'tis as possible for them to close their eyes against all rays
from without too, to resist revelation as well as instinct; and more
likely, by how much a transient cause is naturally less operative then
a permanent. An instance of this we have in Balaam; who being in
these nightly visitations prohibited by God to go to Balak; and
though he knew then, what he afterwards says, Num. 23.19. that God
was not a man that he should lie, nor the son of man that he should
repent: yet he would not take God at his first word, but upon a fresh
bait to his covetousness, tries again for an answer more indulgent to
his interest. Besides, if God should thus reveal himself to some
particular persons, yet 'tis beyond all president or imagination, that
he should do it to every man; and then how shall those who have
these dreams, be able to convince others that they are divine?
57. 'Tis easy to guess what reception a man that produces no other
authority, would have in this ludicrous Age: he would certainly be
thought rather to want sleep, then to have had revelations in it. And
if Jacob and the Patriarchs, who were themselves acquainted with
divine dreams, yet did not believe Josephs; any man that should now
pretend in that kind, would be sure to fall under the same irony that
he did, to be entertained with a behold this dreamer cometh, Gen.
37.19.
58. The second way of revelation by vision was, where the man was
wrapped into an ecstasy, his spirit for a while suspended from all
sensible communication with the body, and entertained with
supernatural light. In these the Prophets saw emblematical
representations of future events, received knowledge of divine
Mysteries, and commission and ability to discharge the whole
prophetic office. Now suppose God should now raise us Prophets,
and inspire them after this manner; what would the merry men of
this time say to it? Can we think that they who rally upon all that the
former Prophets have writ, would look with much reverence on what
the new ones should say? Som perhaps would construe their raptures
to be but like Muhammad's Epilepsy; others a fit of frenzy, others
perhaps a being drunk with new wine; Act. 2.13. but those that did
the most soberly consider it, would still need a new revelation to
attest the truth of this: there being far more convincing arguments to
prove the Scriptures divine, then any man can allege to prove his
inspiration to be so. And 'tis sure a very irrational method, to
attempt the clearing of a doubt, by somewhat which is itself more
doubtful.
59. A third way, was by Urim and Thummim, which Writers tell us
was an Oracle resulting from the Letters which were graven in the
High Priests Pectoral, to which in all important doubts the Jews of
those Ages resorted, and received responses; but whether it were by
the sudden prominency, or resplendency of the letters, or by any
other way, is not material in this place to inquire: one thing is
certain, that the Ephod, and consequently the Pectoral was in the
Priests custody, and that he had the administration of the whole
affair. Now I refer it to consideration, whether this one circumstance
would not (to those prejudiced men I speak of) utterly evacuate the
credit of the Oracle. They have taught themselves to look on Priesthood, whether Legal or Evangelical, only as a better name for
imposture and cozenage: and they that can accuse the Priests for
having kept up a cheat for so many Ages; must needs think them
such omnipotent Jugglers, that nothing can be fence against their
Legerdemain: and by consequence, this way of revelation would
rather foment their displeasure at the Ecclesiastics, then satisfy their
doubts of the Scripture.
60. Lastly, for the fourth way, that of thunder and voice from
Heaven, though that would be a signal way of conviction to
unprejudiced men, yet it would probably have as little effect as the
rest upon the others: men that pretend to such deep reasoning would
think it childish to be frighted out of their opinion by a clap of
Thunder; some philosophical reason shall be found out, to satisfy
them that 'tis the effect only of some natural cause, and any the most
improbable shall serve turn to supplant the fear of its being a divine
testimony to that, which they are so unwilling should be true. As for
the voice from Heaven, it must either be heard by others, and related
to them; or else immediately by themselves: if the former, 'twill lie
under the same prejudice which the Bible already do's; that they
have it but by hear-say, and reporters would fall under the reproach
either of design or frenzy; that they meant to deceive, or were
themselves deceived by their own distempered fancy. But if
themselves should be Auditors of it; 'tis odds but their bottomless
jealousies in divine Matters would suggest a possibility of fraud,
though they knew not how to trace it: nay 'tis more than possible that
they will rather disbelieve their own senses, then in this instance take
their testimony with all its consequences.
61. Nor is this a wild supposition: for we see it possible not only for
single men, but multitudes to disbelieve their senses, thro an excess
of credulity; witness the doctrine of Transubstantiation. Why may it
not then be as possible for others to do the like thro a greater excess
of incredulity? Besides, men's prepossessions and affections have a
strange influence on their Faith: men many times will not suffer
themselves to believe the most credible things, if they cross their
inclination. How often do we see irregular patients that will not
believe anything that their appetite craves will do them hurt, though
their Physicians, nay, their own even sensitive experience attest it to
them? And can we think that a diseased mind, gasping with a
Hydropic thirst after the pleasures of sin, will ever assent to those
premises, whose conclusion will engage to the renouncing them?
Will not a luxurious voluptuous person be willing rather to give his
ears the lie, to disbelieve what he hears, then permit them more
deeply to disoblige his other senses, by bringing in those restraints
and mortifications which the Scripture would impose upon them?
62. Thus we see how little probability there is, that any of these ways
of revelation would convince these incredulous men. And indeed,
those that will not believe upon such inducements as may satisfy
men of sober reason, will hardly submit to any other method,
according to that Assertion of Father Abraham; If they hear not
Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one
rose from the dead, Luk. 16.31. Now at this rate of infidelity, what
way will they leave God to manifest anything convincingly to the
world? which is to put him under an impotency greater then adheres
to humanity: for we men have power to communicate our minds to
others, to tell whether we own such or such a thing, to which we are
intitled; and we can satisfy our Auditors that it is indeed we that
speak to them: but if every method God uses, do's rather increase
then satisfy men's doubts, all intercourse between God and man is
intercepted; and he must do that of necessity, which Epicurus
fancied he did of choice; viz. keep himself unconcerned in the affairs
of mortals, as having no way of communicating with them. Nay
(what is yet, if possible, more absurd) he must be supposed to have
put the works of his Creation out of his own reach, to have given men
discoursive faculties, and left himself no way of address to them.
63. These inferences how horridly soever they sound, yet I see not
how they can be disclaimed by those, who are unsatisfied with all
those ways by which God hath hitherto reveled himself to the world.
For can it be imagined, that God who created man a reasonable
creature, that himself might be glorified in his free and rational
obedience; (when all other creatures obey upon impulse and instinct)
can it, I say, be imagined, that he should so remissly pursue his own
design, as to let so many Ages pass since the Creation, and never to
acquaint mankind with the particulars wherein that obedience was to
be exercised. This sure were so disagreeable to his wisdom and
goodness, that it cannot be charged upon his will: and consequently
they who own not that he has made any such revelation, must tacitly
tax him of impotence, that he could not do it. But if any man will say
he has, and yet reject all this which both Jews and Christians receive
as such, let him produce his testimonies for the others, or rather (to
retort his own measure) his demonstrations. And then let it appear
whether his Scheme of doctrine, or ours, will need the greater aid of
that easy credulity he reproaches us with.
64. I have now gone through the method I proposed for evincing the
Divine Original of the Scriptures, and shall not descend to examine
those more minute and particular Cavils which profane men make
against them; the proof of this, virtually superseding all those. For if
it be reasonable to believe it the Word of God, it must be reasonable
also to believe it of perfection proportionable to the Author; and then
certainly it must be advanced beyond all our objections. For to those
who except to the style, the incoherence, the contradictions, or
whatever else in Scripture; I shall only ask this one question, whether
it be not much more possible that they (who can pretend to be
nothing above fallible men) may misjudge, then that the infallible
God should dictate anything justly liable to those charges; I am sure
they must depart as much from Reason as Religion, to affirm the
contrary. But alas, instead of this implicit submission to God's Word,
men take up explicit prejudices against it; condemn it without ever
examining the truth of the Allegation. 'It is certain, that in a writing
of such Antiquity, whose original Language has Idioms and Phrases
so peculiar, whose Country had customs so differing from the rest of
the world; 'tis impossible to judge of it without reference to all those
circumstances. Add to this, that the Hebrew has been a dead
Language for well nigh two thousand years, nowhere in common use:
nor is there any other ancient Book now extant in it, besides those,
yet not all neither, of the Old Testament.
65. Now of those many who defame Holy Writ, how few are there
that have the industry to inquire into those particulars? And when
for want of knowledge, some passages seem improper, or perhaps
contradictory; the Scripture must bear the blame of their ignorance,
and be accused as absurd and unintelligible, because themselves are
stupid and negligent. It were therefore methinks but a reasonable
proposal, that no man should arraign it, till they have used all honest
diligence, taken in all probable helps for the understanding it: and if
this might be obtained, I believe most of its Accusers would like
those of the woman in the Gospel, Jo. 8.9. drop away, as conscious of
their own incompetency: the loudest out-cries that are made against
it, being commonly of those who fall upon it only as a fashionable
theme of discourse, and hope to acquire themselves the reputation of
wits by thus charging God foolishly. But he that would candidly and
uprightly endeavor to comprehend before he judges, and to that end
industriously use those means which the providence of God by the
labors of pious men hath afforded him, will certainly find cause to
acquit the Scripture of those imputations which our bold Critics have
cast upon it. I do not say that he shall have all the obscurities of it
perfectly cleared to him; but he shall have so many of them as is for
his real advantage, and shall discern such reasons why the rest
remain unfathomable, as may make him not only justify, but
celebrate the wisdom of the Author.
66. Yet this is to be expected only upon the fore-mentioned
condition, viz. that he come with sincere and honest intentions; for
as for him that comes to the Scripture with design, and wishes to find
matter of cavil, and accusations; there is little doubt but that spirit of
impiety and profaneness which sent him thither, will meet him there
as a spirit of delusion and occecation. That Prince of the Air will cast
such mists, raise such black vapors; that as the Apostle speaks, the
light of the glorious Gospel of Christ shall not shine unto him, 2 Cor.
4.5. Indeed were such a man left only to the natural efficacy of
prejudice, that is of itself so blinding, so infatuating a thing, as
commonly fortifies against all conviction. We see it in all the
common instances of life; men's very senses are often enslaved by it:
the prepossession of a strong fancy will make the objects of sight or
hearing appear quite different from what they are. But in the present
case, when this shall be added to Satanical illusions, and both left to
their operations by God's with-drawing his illuminating grace, the
case of such a man answers that description of the Scripture. They
have eyes and see not, ears have they and hear not, Rom. 11.8. And
that God will so withdraw his grace, we have all reason to believe; he
having promised it only to the meek; to those who come with
malleable ductile spirits, to learn, not to deride or cavil. Saint Peter
tells us, that the unlearned and unstable wrest the Scripture to their
own destruction, 2 Pet. 3.15. And if God permit such to do so, much
more will he the proud and malicious.
67. I say not this, to deter any from the study of Holy Scripture, but
only to caution them to bring a due preparation of mind along with
them; God's Word being like a generous sovereign medicament;
which if simply and regularly taken, is of the greatest benefit; but if
mixed with poison, serves only to make that more fatally operative.
To conclude, he that would have his doubts solved concerning
Scripture, let him follow the method our blessed Lord has
prescribed: Let him do the will of God, and then he shall know of the
doctrine, whether it be of God, Jo. 7.17 Let him bring with him a
probity of mind, a willingness to assent to all convictions he shall
there meet with: and then he will find grounds sufficient to assure
him that it is God's Word and consequently to be received with all
the submission and reverence, that its being so exacts.
|
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 22, 2023 7:48:57 GMT -5
SECT. III.
The subject matter treated of in the Holy Scripture is excellent, as is
also its end and design.
1. We have hitherto considered the holy Scripture only under one
notion, as it is the Word of God; we come now to view it in the
subject matter of it, the several parts whereof it consists; which are
so various and comprehensive, as shows the whole is derived from
him who is all in all, 1 Cor. 19.28. But that we may not speak only
loosely, and at rovers, we will take this excellent frame in pieces, and
consider its most eminent parts distinctly. Now the parts of Holy
Writ seem to branch themselves into these severals. First, the
Historical; secondly, the Prophetic; thirdly, the Doctrinal; fourthly,
the Preceptive; fifthly, the Minatory, sixthly, the Promissory. These
are the several veins in this rich Mine, in which he who industriously
labors, will find the Psalmist was not out in his estimate, when he
pronounces them more to be desired then gold, yea, then much fine
gold, Psal. 19.10.
2. To speak first of the Historical part; the things which chiefly
recommend a History are the dignity of the subject, the truth of the
relation, and those pleasant or profitable observations which are
interwoven with it. And first, for the dignity of the subject, the
History of the Bible must be acknowledged to excel all others: those
show the rise and progress of someone people or Empire; this shows
us the original of the whole Universe; and particularly of man, for
whose use and benefit the whole Creation was designed. By this
mankind is brought into acquaintance with itself; made to know the
elements of its constitution, and taught to put a differing value upon
that Spirit which was breathed into it by God, Gen. 2.7. and the flesh
whose foundation is in the dust, Job 4.19. And when this Historical
part of Scripture contracts and draws into a narrow channel, when it
records the concerns but of one Nation, yet it was that which God
had dignified above all the rest of the world, marked it out for his
own peculiar; made it the repository of his truth, and the visible
stock from whence the Messias should come, in whom all the
Nations of the earth were to be blessed, Gen. 18.18. so that in this
one people of the Jews, was virtually enfolded the highest and most
important interests of the whole world; and it must be
acknowledged, no Story could have a nobler subject to treat of.
3. Secondly, as to the truth of the relation, though to those who own
it God's Word there needs no other proof; yet it wants not human
Arguments to confirm it. The most undoubted symptom of sincerity
in an Historian is impartiality. Now this is very eminent in Scripture
writers: they do not record others faults, and baulk their own; but
indifferently accuse themselves as well as others. Moses mentions his
own diffidence and unwillingness to go on God's message, Ex. 4.13.
his provocation of God at the waters of Meribah, Num. 20. Jonah
records his own sullen behavior towards God, with as great
aggravations as any of his enemies could have done. Peter in his
dictating Saint Marks Gospel, neither omits nor extenuates his sin;
all he seems to speak short in, is his repentance. Saint Paul registers
himself as the greatest of sinners.
4. And as they were not indulgent to their own personal faults, so
neither did any nearness of relation, any respect of quality bribe
them to a concealment: Moses relates the offense of his sister Miriam
in mutinying. Num. 12.1. of his brother Aaron in the matter of the
Calf, Ex. 32.4. with as little disguise as that of Korah and his
company. David though a King, hath his adultery and murder
displayed in the blackest characters; and King Hezekiah's little vanity
of showing his treasures, do's not escape a remark. Nay, even the
reputation of their Nation could not bias the sacred Writers; but they
freely tax their crimes: the Israelites murmurings in the wilderness;
their Idolatries in Canaan, are set down without any palliation or
excuse. And they are as frequently branded for their stubbornness
and ingratitude, as the Canaanites are for their abominations. So that
certainly no History in the world do's better attest its truth by this
evidence of impartiality.
5. In the last place it commends itself both by the pleasure and profit
it yields. The rarity of those events it records surprises the mind with
a delightful admiration; and that mixture of sage Discourses, and
well-couched Parables wherewith it abounds, do's at once please and
instruct. How ingenuously apt was Nathan's Apologue to David,
whereby with holy artifice he ensnared him into repentance? And it
remains still matter of instruction to us, to show us with what
unequal scales we are apt to weigh the same crime in others and
ourselves. So also that long train of smart calamities which
succeeded his sin, is set out with such particularity, that it seems to
be exactly the crime reversed. His own lust with Bathsheba, was
answered with Amnons towards Tamar; his murder of Uriah with
that of Amnon; his treacherous contrivance of that murder, with
Absolom's traitorous conspiracy against him. So that every
circumstance of his punishment, was the very echo and reverberation
of his guilt. A multitude of the like instances might be produced out
of holy Writ; all concurring to admonish us, that God exactly marks,
and will repay our crimes; and that commonly with such propriety,
that we need no other clue to guide us to the cause of our sufferings,
then the very sufferings themselves. Indeed innumerable are the
profitable observations arising from the historical part of Scripture,
that flow so easily and unconstrained; that nothing but a stupid
inadvertence in the reader can make him baulk them: therefore
'twould be impertinent here to multiply instances.
6. Let us next consider the prophetic part of Scripture, and we shall
find it no less excellent in its kind. The prophetic Books are for the
most part made up (as the prophetic Office was) of two parts;
prediction and instruction. When God raised up Prophets, 'twas not
only to acquaint men with future events, but to reform their present
manners: and therefore as they are called Seers in one respect, so
they are Watch-men and Shepherds in another. Nay, indeed the
former was often subservient to the other as to the nobler end: their
gift of foretelling was to gain them authority; to be as it were the seal
of their commission; to convince men that they were sent from God:
and so to render them the more pliant to their reproofs and
admonitions. And the very matter of their prophecies was usually
adapted to this end: the denouncing of judgments being the most
frequent theme, and that designed to bring men to repentances; as
appears experimentally in the case of Nineveh. And in this latter part
of their office, the Prophets acted with the greatest incitation and
vehemence.
7. With what liberty and zeal do's Elijah arraign Ahab of Naboth's
murder, and foretell the fatal event of it, without any fear of his
power, or reverence of his greatness? And Samuel when he delivers
Saul the fatal message of his rejection, do's passionately and
convincingly expostulate with him concerning his sin, 1 Sam. 15.17.
Now the very same Spirit still breaths in all the prophetic Writings:
the same truth of prediction, and the same zeal against vice.
8. First, for the predictions what signal completions do we find? How
exactly are all the denunciations of judgments fulfilled, where
repentance has not intervened? He that reads the 28. chap. of Deut.
and compares it with the Jews calamities, both under the Assyrians
and Babylonians, and especially under the Romans, would think
their oppressors had consulted it, and transcribed their severities
thence. And even these Nations, who were the instruments of
accomplishing those dismal presages, had their own ruins foretold,
and as punctually executed. And as in Kingdoms and Nations, so to
private persons none of the prophetic threatening's ever returned
empty. The sentence pronounced against Ahab, Jezebel, and their
posterity, was fulfilled even to the most minute circumstances of
place and manner; as is evident by comparing the denunciation of
Elijah, 1 Kings. 21.19.23. with their tragical ends recorded in the
following chapters. And as for Jehu, whose service God was pleased
to use in that execution, though he rewarded it with entailing the
crown of Israel on him for four descents; yet he foretold those should
be the limits; and accordingly we find Zachariah, the fourth
descendent of his line, was the last of it that sat on that throne, 2
Kings 15.10. So also the destruction of Achitophel and Judas, the one
immediate, the other many hundred years remote, are fore-told by
David, Psal. 109. and we find exactly answered in the event.
9. Nor was this exactness confined only to the severe predictions, but
as eminent in the more gracious. All the blessings which God by
himself, or the Ministry of his Prophets promised, were still infallibly
made good. At the time of life God returned and visited Sarah with
conception; notwithstanding those natural improbabilities which
made her not only distrust, but even deride and laugh at the promise,
Gen. 18. The posterity of that Son of Promise; the whole race of
Abraham was delivered from the Egyptian bondage, and possessed of
Canaan, at the precise time which God had long before signified to
Abraham, Gen. 15. So likewise the return of the Jews from the
Babylonish captivity, was fore-told many years before their
deportation, and Cyrus named for their restorer, before he had either
name or being save only in God's prescience, Is. 44.28. But I need
not multiply instances of national or personal promises. The earliest,
and most comprehensive promise of all was that of the Messiah, in
whom all persons and Nations of the world were to be blest, Gen.
22.11. that seed of the woman that should bruise the Serpents head,
Gen. 3.15. To him give all the Prophets witness, as Saint Peter
observes, Acts 10. And he who was the subject, made himself also the
expounder of those prophecies in his walk to Emmaus with the two
Disciples, Lu. 24.13. beginning at Moses, and all the Prophets, he
expounded to them in all the Scriptures, the things concerning
himself.
10. This as it was infinitely the greatest blessing afforded mankind,
so was it the most frequently and eminently predicted; and that with
the most exact particularity as to all the circumstances. His
immaculate conception, the union of his two natures implied in his
name Immanuel; Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and
shall call his name Immanuel; is most plainly foretold by Is. Chap.
7.14. Nay the very place of his birth so punctually fore-told; that the
Priests and Scribes could readily resolve Herod's question upon the
strength of the prophecy, and assure him Christ must be born in
Bethlehem, Mat. 2.5. As for the whole business and design of his life,
we find it so described by Isaiah chap. 61. as Christ himself owns it,
Luk. 4.18. The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath
anointed me to preach good tidings to the meek; he hath sent me to
bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and
recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are
bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.
11. If we look farther to his death, the greatest part of the Old
Testament has a direct aspect on it. All the Levitical economy of
Sacrifices and Ablutions were but prophetic Rites, and ocular
Predictions of that one expiatory Oblation. Nay, most of God's
providential dispensations to the Jews, carried in them types and
prefiguration's of this. Their rescue from Egypt, the sprinkling of
blood to secure from the destroying Angel; the Manna with which
they were fed, the Rock which supplied them water: these and many
more referred to Christ, as their final and highest signification.
12. But besides these darker adumbrations, we have (as the Apostle
speaks) a more sure word of prophecy. Saint Peter in his calculation
begins with Moses, takes in Samuel and the whole succession of
Prophets after him, as bearing witness to this great event of Christ's
passion, Acts 4.22.24. And indeed he that reads the Prophets
consideringly, shall find it so punctually described, that the
Evangelists do not much more fully instruct him in the
circumstances of it. Daniel tells us, his death, as to the kind of it, was
to be violent: The Messiah shall be cut off; and as to the design of it,
'twas not for himself, Dan. 9.26. But the Prophet Isaiah gives us
more then a bare negative account of it; and expressly says, he was
wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities;
the chastisement of our peace was on him, and by his stripes we were
healed, chap. 53.5. And again, ver. 10. Thou shalt make his soul an
offering for sin; and ver. 11. my righteous Servant shall justify many,
for he shall bear their iniquities. Nor is Job an Idumean much short
of even this Evangelical Prophet, in that short Creed of his, wherein
he owns him as his Redeemer, I know that my Redeemer liveth, &c.
Job. 19.25.
13. And as the end, so the circumstances of his sufferings are most of
them under prediction: His extension upon the Cross is mentioned
by the Psalmist: They pierced my hands, and my feet; I may tell all
my bones, Psal. 22.16.17. As for his inward dolor's, they are in that
Psalm so pathetically described, that Christ chose that very form to
breath them out in: My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
ver. 1. So his revilers did also transcribe part of their reproaches from
ver. 8. He trusted in God; let him deliver him now if he will have
him, Mat. 27.43. That vinegar which was offered him on the cross,
was a completion of a prophecy; In my thirst they gave me vinegar to
drink, Ps 69.21. the piercing of his side was expressly fore-told by
Zacharias; they shall look on him whom they have pierced, Zach.
10.12. The company in which he suffered, and the interment he had,
are also intimated by Isaiah, he made his grave with the wicked, and
with the rich in his death, Isai. 53.9. Nay even the disposal of his
garments was not without a prophecy: they parted my garments
among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots, Ps. 22.18. Here
are a cloud of witnesses, which as they serve eminently to attest the
truth of Christian Religion; so do they to evince the excellency of
sacred Scripture; as to the verity of the prophetic part.
14. As to the admonitory part of the prophetic Writings, they are in
their kind no way inferior to the other. The reproofs are authoritative
and convincing. What piercing exprobrations do we find of Israel's
ingratitude? How often are they upbraided with the better examples
of the brute creatures? with the Ox and the Ass by Isaiah, chap. 1.3.
with the Stork, and the Crane, and the Swallow, by Jeremiah, chap.
8.7. Nay the constancy of the Heathen to their false gods is instanced
to reproach their revolt from the true. Hath a Nation changed their
gods which yet are no gods? but my people have changed their glory
for that which doth not profit, Jer. 2.11. What awful, what majestic
representations do we find of God's power, to awake their dread!
Fear ye not me saith the Lord? will ye not tremble at my presence;
who have placed the sand for the bounds of the sea by a perpetual
decree, that it cannot pass over; and though the waves thereof toss
themselves, yet can they not prevail; though they roar, yet can they
not pass over it, Jer. 22. And again, Thus saith the high and lofty one
that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is holy: I dwell in the high and
holy place, Is. 57.15. So we find him described as a God glorious in
holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders, Ex. 15.11. These and
many other the like heights of divine eloquence we meet with in the
prophetic Writings: which cannot but strike us with an awful
reverence of the divine Power.
15. Nor are they less pathetic in the gentler strains. What instance is
there of the greatest tenderness and love which God has not adopted
to express his by? He personates all the nearest and most endearing
relations; that of a Husband; I will marry thee to myself, Hos. 2.19. of
a Father; I am a Father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first born: nay,
he vies bowels with the tender sex; and makes it more possible for a
mother to renounce her compassions towards the son of her womb,
then for him to withdraw his, Isa. 49.15. By all these endearments,
these cords of a man, these bands of love, as himself stiles them, Hos.
11.4. endeavoring to draw his people to their duty, and their
happiness. And when their perverseness frustrates all this his holy
Artifice; how passionately do's he expostulate with them? how
solemnly protest his averseness to their ruin? Why will ye die O
house of Israel? for I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth,
saith the Lord God, Ezek. 18.31, 32. with what regrets and relenting's
do's he think of abandoning them? How shall I give thee up
Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee Israel? how shall I make thee as
Admah! how shall I set thee as Zeboim? my heart is turned within
me, my repenting's are kindled together; Hos. 11.8. In short, 'twere
endless to cite the places in these prophetic Books, wherein God do's
thus condescend to solicit even the sensitive part of man; and that
with such moving Rhetoric, that I cannot but wonder at the
exception some of our late Critics make against the Bible, for its
defect in that particular: for Oratory is nothing but a dexterous
application to the affections and passions of men. And certainly we
find not that don with greater advantage anywhere then in sacred
Writ.
16. Yet it was not the design of the Prophets (no more than of the
Apostle) to take men with guile; 2 Cor. 12.16. to inveigle their
affections unawares to their understandings; but they address as well
to their reasons, make solemn appeals to their judicative faculties.
And now judge I pray between me and my vineyard, says Isa. 5.3.
Nay, God by the Prophet Ezekiel solemnly pleads his own cause
before them, vindicates the equity of his proceedings from the
aspersions they had cast on them; and by most irrefragable
Arguments refutes that injurious proverb which went currant among
them; and in the close appeals to themselves, O house of Israel are
not my ways equal, are not your ways unequal? Ezek. 18. the
evidences were so clear that he remits the matter to their own
determination. And generally we shall find that among all the Topics
of dissuasion from sin, there is none more closely pressed, then that
of the folly of it. Idolatry was a sin to which Israel had a great
propension, and against which most of the Prophets admonitions
were directed. And certainly it can never be more exposed, and the
sottish unreasonableness of it better displayed, then we find it in the
44. chap. of Isaiah. In like manner we may read the Prophet Jeremy
dissuading from the same sin by Arguments of the most irrefragable
conviction, Jer. 10.
17. And as the Prophets omitted nothing as to the manner of their
address, to render their exhortations effectual, the matter of them
was likewise so considerable as to command attention; It was
commonly either the recalling them from their revolts and
Apostacies from God by Idolatry, or else to convince them of the
insignificancy of all those legal ceremonial performances they so
much confided in; when taken up as a supersedeas to moral duties.
Upon this account it is, that they often depreciate, and in a manner
prohibit the solemnest of their worships. To what purpose are the
multitude of your sacrifices unto me? bring no more vain oblations;
incense is an abomination to me; the new moons and sabbaths, the
calling of assemblies I cannot away with: it is iniquity even your
solemn meetings, &c. Is. 1.11.13. Not that these things were in
themselves reprovable; for they were all commanded by God; but
because the Jews depended so much on these external observances,
that they thought by them to commute for the weightier matters of
the Law (as our Savior after stiles them) judgment, mercy and faith,
Mat. 23.23. looked on these rites which discriminated them from
other Nations, as dispensations from the universal obligations of
nature and common justice
|
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 22, 2023 7:53:28 GMT -5
18. This deceit of theirs is sharply upbraided to them by the Prophet
Jeremy; where he calls their boasts of the Temple of the Lord, the
Temple of the Lord, lying words; and on the contrary, lays the whole
stress of their obedience, and expectation of their happiness on the
justice and innocence of their conversation, ch. 7.4. And after do's
smartly reproach their insolence in boldly resorting to that house,
which by bringing their sins along with them, they made but an
Asylum, and Sanctuary for those crimes. Will ye steal, murder and
commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense to Baal, and
walk after other gods whom ye know not, and come and stand before
me in this house? Is this house which is called by my name become a
den of robbers in your eyes? chap. 7.9, 10, 11. Indeed all the Prophets
seem to conspire in this one design, of making them look through
shadows and ceremonies, to that inward purity, Justice and Honesty,
which they were designed to inculcate, not to supplant. And this
design as it is in itself most excellent, most worthy the command of
God, and the nature of man; so we have seen that it has been
pursued by all the most apt, and most powerful mediums, that the
thing or persons addressed to were capable of; and so that the
Prophets are no less eminent for the discharge of this exhortatory
part of their office, then they were in the former, of the predicting.
19. The next part of Scripture we are to consider, is the Doctrinal; by
which I shall not in this place understand the whole complex of Faith
and Manners together; but restrain it only to those Revelations
which are the object of our Belief: and these are so sublime, as shows
flesh and blood never reveled them. Those great mysteries of our
Faith, the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Hypostatical union, the
Redemption of the world by making the offended party the sacrifice
for the offense; are things of so high and abstruse speculation, as no
finite understanding can fully fathom. I know their being so, is by
some made an Argument for disbelief; but doubtless, very unjustly:
for (not to insist upon the different natures of Faith and Science, by
which that becomes a proper object of the one which is not of the
other) our non-comprehension is rather an indication that they have
a higher rise; and renders it infinitely improbable that they could
spring from man's invention. For 'twere to suppose too great a
disproportion between human faculties to think men could invent
what themselves could not understand. Indeed these things lie so
much out of the road of human imagination, that I dare appeal to the
breasts of the most perverse gain-sayers, whether ever they could
have fallen into their thoughts without suggestion from without. And
therefore 'tis a malicious contradiction to reject these truths because
of their dissonancy from human reason, and yet at the same time to
ascribe their original to man. But certainly there can be nothing
more inconsistent with mere natural reason, then to think God can
be or do no more than man can comprehend. Never any Nation or
person that owned a Deity, did ever attempt so to circumscribe him:
and it is proportionable only to the licentious profaneness of these
later days, thus to measure immensity and omnipotence by our
narrow scantling.
20. The more genuine and proper effect of these supernatural truths
is, to raise our admiration of that divine Wisdom, whose ways are so
past finding out; and to give us a just sense of that infinite distance
which is between it, and the highest of that reason wherein we so
pride ourselves. And the great propriety these doctrines have to that
end, may well be reckoned as one part of their excellency.
21. Indeed there is no part of our holy Faith, but is naturally
productive of some peculiar virtue; as the whole Scheme together
engages us to be universally holy in all manner of conversation, 1 Pet.
1.15. And it is the supereminent advantage true Religion hath over all
false ones; that it tends to so laudable an end.
22. The Theology of the Heathens was in many instances an extract
and quintessence of vice. Their most solemn Rites, and sacredest
Mysteries were of such a nature, that instead of refining and
elevating, they corrupted and debased their Votaries; immersed
them in all those abominable pollutions which sober nature
abhorred. Whereas the principles of our Faith serve to spiritualize
and rectify us, to raise us as much above mere manhood as theirs
cast them below it.
23. And as they are of this vast advantage to us, so also are they just
to God, in giving us right notions of him. What vile unworthy
apprehensions had the Heathen of their Deities; in titling them not
only to the passions, but even to the crimes of men: making Jupiter
an adulterer, Mercury a thief, Bacchus a drunkard, &c.
proportionably of the rest? Whereas our God is represented to us as
an essence, so spiritual, and incorporeal, that we must be unbodied
ourselves before we can perfectly conceive what he is: so far from the
impotent affections and inclinations of men, that he has neither
parts, nor passions; and is fain to veil himself under that disguise, to
speak sometimes as if he had, merely in condescension to our grosser
faculties. And again, so far from being an example, a patron of vice,
that his eyes are too pure to behold iniquity, Hab. 1.13. Holiness is an
essential part of his nature, and he must deny himself to put it off.
24. The greatest descent that ever he made to humanity, was in the
incarnation of the second person: yet even in that though he linked
with a sinful nature, yet he preserved the person immaculate; and
while he had all the sins of the world upon him by imputation,
suffered not any one to be inherent in him.
25. To conclude, the Scripture describes our God to us by all those
glorious Attributes of infinity, Power and Justice, which may render
him the proper object of our Adorations and Reverence: and it
describes him also in those gentler Attributes of Goodness, Mercy
and Truth, which may excite our love of, and dependence on him.
These are representations something worthy of God, and such as
impress upon our mind great thoughts of him.
26. But never did the divine Attributes so concur to exert themselves
as in the mystery of our Redemption: where his Justice was satisfied
without diminution to his Mercy; and his Mercy without entrenching
on his Justice: his Holiness most eminent in his indignation against
sin, and yet his love no less so in sparing sinners: these
contradictions being reconciled, this discord composed into harmony
by his infinite Wisdom. This is that stupendous Mystery into which
the Angels desired to look, 1 Pet. 1.12. And this is it which by the
Gospel is preached unto us; as it follows, ver. 25.
27. And as the Scripture gives us this knowledge of God, so it do's
also of ourselves; in which two all profitable knowledge is comprised.
It teaches us how vile we were in our original dust; and how much
viler yet in our fall: which would have sunk us below our first
principles; sent us not only to earth, but hell. It shows the impotence
of our lapsed estate; that we are not able of ourselves so much as to
think a good thought: and it shows us also the dignity of our
renovated estate, that we are heirs of God, and fellow-heirs with
Christ, Ro. 8.17. yet lest this might puff us up with mistaken hopes; it
plainly acquaints us with the condition on which this depends; that it
must be our obedience both active and passive, which is to entitle us
to it: that we must be faithful to death if we mean to inherit a crown
of life, Rev. 2.10. and that we must suffer with Christ, if we will be
glorified with him, Ro. 8.17. And upon supposition that we perform
our parts of the condition, it gives us the most certain assurance,
engages God's veracity that he will not fail on his. By this it gives us
support against all the adversities of life; assuring us the sufferings of
it are not worthy to be compared with the glory we expect, Rom.
8.18. yea, and against the terrors of death too; by assuring us that
what we look on as a dissolution, is but a temporary parting; and we
only put off our bodies, that they may put off corruption, and he
clothed with immortality.
28. These and the like are the doctrines the holy Scripture offers to
us: and, we may certainly say, they are faithful sayings, and worthy of
all acceptation, 1 Tim. 4.15. The notions it gives us of God are so
sublime and great, that they cannot but affect us with reverence, and
admiration: and yet withal, so amiable and endearing that they
cannot but raise love and gratitude, affiance and delight.
29. And, which is yet more, these milder Attributes are apt to inspirit
us with a generous ambition of assimilation; excite us to transcribe
all his imitable excellencies: in which the very Heathens could
discern consisted the accomplishment of human felicity.
30. And then the knowledge it gives us of ourselves, do's us the
kindest office imaginable: keeps us from those swelling thoughts we
are too apt to entertain, and shows us the necessity of bottoming our
hopes upon a firmer foundation: and then again keeps us from being
lazy or secure, by showing us the necessity of our own endeavors. In
a word, it teaches us to be humble and industrious; and whoever is so
ballasted can hardly be shipwrecked.
31. These are the excellencies of the doctrinal part of Scripture, which
also renders them most aptly preparative for the preceptive. And
indeed, so they were designed: the Credenda, and the Agenda being
such inseparable relations, that whoever parts them, forfeits the
advantage of both. The most solemn profession of Christ, the most
importunate invocations, Lord, Lord, will signify nothing to them
which do not the things which he says, Mat. 7. And how excellent,
how rational those precepts are which the Scripture proposes to us
from him, is our next point of consideration.
32. The first Law which God gave to mankind was that of nature. And
though the impressions of it upon the mind be by Adams fall
exceedingly dimmed and defaced; yet that derogates nothing from
the dignity and worth of that Law; which God has been so far from
cancelling, that he seems to have made it the rule and square of his
subsequent Laws: so that nothing is enjoined in those, but what is
consonant and agreeable to that. The Moral Law given in the
Decalogue to the Jews, the Evangelical Law given in the Gospel to
Christians, have this natural Law for their basis and foundation.
They license nothing which that prohibits, and very rarely prohibit
anything which it licenses.
33. 'Tis true, Christ in his Sermon on the Mount, raises Christians to
a greater strictness then the Jews thought themselves obliged to; but
that was not by contradicting either the natural, or moral Law, but by
rescuing the later from those corruptions which the false glosses of
the Scribes and Pharisees had mixed with it; and reducing it to its
primitive integrity, and extent. In a word, as the Decalogue was given
to repair the defacing's, and renew the impressions of the natural
Law; so the precepts of the Gospel were designed to revive and
illustrate both. And accordingly we find Christ in the matter of
divorce calls them back to this natural Law; In the beginning it was
not so, Mat. 19.8. I say not but that even these natural notions are in
some instances refined and elevated by Christ; the second Adam
being to repair the fall of the first with advantage: but yet he still
builds upon that ground-work, introduces nothing that is
inconsistent with it.
34. And this accordance between these several Laws is a
circumstance that highly recommends Scripture precepts to us. We
cannot imagine but that God who made man for no other end but to
be an instrument of his glory, and a recipient of all communicable
parts of his happiness, would assign him such rules and measures as
were most conducive to those ends. And therefore since the Scripture
injunctions are of the same mold, we must conclude them to be such
as tend to the perfection of our being; the making us what God
originally intended us: and he that would not be that, will certainly
choose much worse for himself.
35. I know there have been prejudices taken up against the precepts
of Christ, as if they imposed unreasonable, unsupportable strictness's
upon men, and some have assumed liberty to argue mutinously
against them; nay, against God too for putting such natural appetites
into men, and then forbidding them to satisfy them
|
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 22, 2023 7:54:20 GMT -5
36. But the ground of this cavil is the not rightly distinguishing of
natural appetites, which are to be differenced according to the two
states of rectitude and depravation: those of the first rank are the
appetites God put into man; and those were all regular and innocent;
such as tended to the preservation of his being: nature in its first
integrity measuring its desires by its needs. Now Christ's
prohibitions are not directed against these: he forbids no one kind of
these desires. And though the precept of self-denial may sometimes
restrain us in some particular acts; yet that is but proportionable to
that restraint Adam was under in relation to the forbidden tree, a
particular instance of his obedience and fence of his safety. So that if
men would consider nature under this its first and best notion; they
cannot accuse Christ of being severe to it.
37. But 'tis manifest they take it in another acception, and mean that
corruption of nature which inordinately inclines to sensitive things;
and on this account they call their riots, their luxuries, appetites put
into them by God: whereas 'tis manifest this was super-induced from
another coast: The wise man gives us its true pedigree in what he
says of death, which is its twin-sister: By the envy of the devil came
death into the world, Wis. 2.24. And can they expect that Christ who
came to destroy the works of the devil 1 Joh. 3.8. should frame Laws
in their favor, make Acts of toleration and indulgence for them? This
were to annul the whole design of his coming into the world, which
was to restore us from our lapsed estate, and elevate us to those
higher degrees of purity which he came not only to prescribe but to
exemplify to us.
38. But in this affair men often take nature in a yet wider and worse
notion; and under natural desires comprehend whatever upon any
sort of motive they have a mind to do. The awe of a superior, the
importunity of a companion, custom, and example make men do
many ill things, to which their nature would never prompt them; nay,
many times such as their nature relucts to, and abhors. 'It is certainly
thus in all debauchery and excess. 'It is evident, it gratifies no man's
nature to be drunk, or to lie under undigested loads of meats: these
are out-rages and violences upon nature; take it only in the most
sensitive notion; such as she struggles to avert: and yet men make
her bear not only the oppression, but the blame too.
39. But besides 'tis to be considered, that the nature of a man
includes reason as well as sense, and to this all sorts of luxury are yet
more repugnant: as that which clouds the mind, and degrades the
man (who in his constitution is a rational being) and sets him in the
rank of mere animals: and certainly these can be no appetites of
nature, which thus subvert it.
40. The like may be said concerning revenge, particularly that
absurdest sort of it duels; which certainly are as great contradictions
to nature as can be imagined, the unravelling and cancelling its very
first principle of self-preservation, (which in other instances men
bring in bar against duty.) And yet men will say the generosity of
their natures compels them to it; so making their natures a kind of
felo de se; to prompt the destroying itself: when alas 'tis only the
false notion they have got of honor that so engages them. And if men
would but soberly consider, they must be convinced that there is
nothing more agreeable to reason then that precept of Christ of not
retaliating injuries; which is in effect but to bid us to choose a single
inconvenience before a long train of mischiefs. And certainly if
nature even in its depraved estate were left to determine, it would
resolve it a better bargain to go off with a reproachful word, then to
lose a limb, perhaps a life in the revenge of it. There being no maxim
more indisputable, then that of evils the least is to be chosen. And
the innate principle of self-love do's more strongly bias nature to
preserve itself, then any external thing can to destroy it.
41. I know 'twill be said to this, that revenge is a natural appetite: but
I say still, self-preservation is more so; and would prevail against as
much of revenge as is natural, were it not heightened and fortified by
fancy, and that Chimera of point of honor, which, as it is now stated,
is certainly one of the most empty nothings that ever was brought in
balance with solid interests. And indeed 'tis to belie nature, and
suppose it to have forfeited all degrees of reason, as well as virtue, to
fasten so absurd a choice upon her. But admit revenge to be never so
much the dictate of corrupt nature; 'tis certain 'tis not of primitive
regular nature. Revenge is but a relative to injury: and he that will
say God put the appetite of revenge into man, must say he put the
appetite of injury into him also: which is such an account of the sixth
days creation, as is hardly consistent with God's own testimony of its
being very good, Gen. 1.
42. Besides 'tis certain all the desires God infused into human
nature, were such as tended to its preservation; but this of revenge is
of all other the most destructive, as is too sadly attested by the daily
tragical effects of it. In short, the wiseman gives a good summary of
the whole matter: God made man upright, but he sought out many
inventions. Eccl. 7.29.
43. Now if man have by his own voluntary act depraved himself, it
would be neither just nor kind in God to warp his Laws to man's now
distorted frame; but it is both, to keep up the perfect rectitude of
those, and call upon man to reduce himself to a conformity with
them: and when to this is added such a supply of grace as may
silence the plea of disability, there can nothing be imagined more
worthy of God, or more indulgent to man.
44. And all this Christ do's in the Gospel, in those precepts which the
blind world makes the subject of their cavil or scorn. It were an easy
task to evince this in every particular precept of the Gospel; but I
shall content myself with the instances already given, and not swell
this Tract by insisting upon what has already been the subject of so
many pious and excellent discourses, as must already have convinced
all but the obstinate.
45. We proceed therefore to a view of the promissory parts of
Scripture; in which we are first in general to observe the great
goodness of God, in making any promises at all to us; and next to
examine of what nature and excellence these promises are. And first
if we consider how many titles God has to our obedience, we must
acknowledge he may challenge it as his undoubted right. We are the
work of his hands; and if the Potter have power over the clay (the
materials whereof are not of his making) much more has God over
his creatures, whose matter as well as form is wholly owing to him.
We are the price of his blood. And if men account purchase an
indefeasible title, God must have absolute dominion over what he
has bought, and at so dear a price too as his own blood. Lastly we
depend upon him for the support of that being he has given us: we
live merely upon his bounty, spend upon his stock. And what Patron
will not expect observance from one who thus subsists by him?
46. Yet as if God had none of these claims, these pre-engagements
upon us, he descends to treat with us as free-men; by way of Article
and compact; buys his own of us, and engages to reward that
obedience, which he might upon the utmost penalties exact: which is
such an astonishing indulgence as our highest gratitude cannot
reach: and of this the sacred Scriptures are the evidences and
records; and therefore upon that account deserve at once our
reverence, and our joy.
47. But this will yet farther appear, if we look in the second place into
the promises themselves; which are so extensive as to take in both
our present and future state: according to that of the Apostle;
Godliness hath the promise of this life, and of that which is to come,
Tim. 4.8. For the present they are proportioned to the several parts
of our composition; the body, and the mind: the outward and the
inward man, so stretching themselves to all we can really be
concerned for in this world.
48. And first for the body, the Old Testament abounds in promises of
this sort. The first part of the 28 of Deut. contains a full catalogue of
all temporal blessings; and those irreversibly entailed upon the
Israelites obedience, ver. 1. The Psalmist tells us, they that fear the
Lord shall lack nothing, Ps. 34.9. that they shall not be confounded
in the perilous time, and in the days of dearth they shall have
enough, Psa. 37.19. And Solomon, that the Lord will not suffer the
righteous to famish, Pro. 10.3. And though under the Gospel, the
promises of temporal affluence seem not so large; (its design being to
spiritualize us, and raise our minds to higher enjoyments;) yet it
gives us ample security of so much as is really good for us. It
supersedes our care for ourselves by assuring us all these things shall
be added to us; Mat. 6.33. that is, all those things which our heavenly
Father knows we have need of, ver. 32. which is all the limitation the
context gives. And certainly we have little temptation to fear want,
who have him for our provider; whose are all the beasts of the Forest,
and the cattle upon a thousand hills, Psal. 50.10.
49. And when we are thus secured of all things necessary, it may
perhaps be an equal mercy to secure us from great abundance; which
at the best, is but a lading ones self with thick clay, in the Prophets
phrase, Hab. 2.6. but is often a snare as well as a burden.
50. Besides, the Gospel by its precepts of temperance and self-denial,
do's so contract our appetites, that a competence is a more adequate
promise to them than that of superfluity would have been: and 'tis
also the measure wherein all the true satisfaction of the senses
consist; which are gratified with moderate pleasures, but suffocated
and overwhelmed with excessive. The temperate man tastes and
relishes his portion; whilst the voluptuous may rather be said to
wallow in his plenty then enjoy it.
51. And as the necessaries of life, so life itself, and the continuance of
that, is a Scripture promise. The fifth Commandment affixes it to one
particular duty: but it is in a multitude of places in the Old
Testament annexed to general obedience. Thus it is, Deut. 11.9. and
again, ver. 21. And Solomon proposes this practical wisdom as the
multiplier of days: By me thy days shall be multiplied, and the years
of thy life shall be increased, Pro. 9.11. and chap. 3. Length of days is
in her right hand, ver. 16. And though we find not this promise
repeated in the New Testament, yet neither is it retracted: 'tis true,
the Gospel bids us be ready to lay down our lives for Christ's sake;
but it tells us withal, that he that will lose his life, shall save it: which
though it be universally true only in the spiritual sense, yet it often
proves so in a literal. It did so eminently in the destruction of
Jerusalem, where the most resolute Christians escaped, while the
base compliers perished together with those they sought to endear.
This is certain, that if the New Testament do not expressly promise
long life, yet it do's by its rules of temperance and sobriety,
contentedness and cheerfulness, very much promote it: and so do's
virtually and efficaciously ratify those the Old Testament made.
52. The next outward blessing is reputation: and this also is a
Scripture promise. The wise shall inherit glory, Prov. 3.38. And the
virtuous woman Solomon describes is not only blessed by her
children and husband, but, she is praised in the gate, Pro. 31. ult.
Nay, this blessing is extended even beyond life: The memory of the
just shall be blessed, Pro. 10.7. Nor do's the Gospel evacuate this
promise; but rather prompts us to the ways of having it made good to
us: by advising us to abstain from all appearance of evil, 1 Thes. 5.22.
to provide for honest things, not only in the sight of God, but also in
the sight of men, 2 Cor. 8.21.
53. 'Tis true indeed, Christ fore-warns his Disciples that they shall be
reviled, and have all manner of evil spoken against them falsely, for
his names sake: but then the cause transformed the sufferings, and
made it so honorable, that they were to count it matter of joy, Mat.
5.11.12. Neither was this any paradox even in relation to their
reputation; which though sullied by a few ill men of that Age, yet has
been most illustrious among all Ages since. Their sufferings and
indignities gave them a new title of honor, and added the Martyr to
the Apostle. And the event has been proportionable in all successions
since. Those holy men that filled up the Pagan prisons, filled up the
Churches Diptics also, and have been had as the Psalmist speaks, in
everlasting remembrance, Ps. 112.6.
54. And as Scripture promises thus take in all the concerns of the
outward man, so do they also of the inward. The fundamental
promise of this kind, is that of sending Christ into the world, and in
him establishing the new Covenant; which we find, Jer. 31.31. and is
referred to by the Author to the Hebrews, I will put my Laws in their
hearts, and write them in their minds; and their sins and iniquities
will I remember no more, Heb. 10.16.
55. And this is so comprehensive a promise as includes all the
concerns of the inward man. The evils incident to the mind of man
may be reduced to two; impurity, and inquietude: and here is a cure
to both. The divine Law written in the heart, drives thence all those
swarms of noisesome lusts, which like the Egyptian Frogs over-run
and putrefy the soul. Where that is seated and enshrined, those can
no more stand before it, then Dagon before the Ark. This repairs the
divine Image in us (in which consists the perfection of our nature)
renews us in the spirits of our minds, Eph. 4.22. and purges our
consciences from dead works, Heb. 9.4. which all the Cathartics and
Lustrations among the Heathen, all the sacrifices and ceremonies of
the Law were not able to do.
56. Secondly, this promise secures the mind from that restlessness
and unquietness, which attends both the dominion and guilt of sin.
To be subject to a man's lusts and corrupt appetites is of all others
the vilest vassalage: they are the cruelest task-masters, and allow
their slaves no rest, no intermission of their drudgery. And then
again, the guilt that tortures and racks the mind with dreadful
expectations, keeps it in perpetual agitation and tumult; which is
excellently described by the Prophet Isaiah, The wicked is like the
troubled sea, when it cannot rest; whose waters cast out mire and
dirt: there is no peace saith my God to the wicked, Is. 48.22. How
prosperous soever vice may seem to be in the world, yet there are
such secret pangs and horrors that dog it, that as Solomon says, even
in laughter the heart is sorrowful, Prov. 14.13.
57. But this Evangelical promise of being merciful to our iniquities,
and remembering our sins no more, calms this tempest, introduces
peace and serenity into the mind, and reconciles us at once to God
and ourselves. And sure we may well say with the Apostle, these are
great and precious promises, 2. Pet. 1.4.
58. There are besides many other which spring from these principal,
as suckers from the root: such are the promises of fresh supplies of
grace upon a good employment of the former. To him that hath shall
be given, Mat. 25.29. Nay, even of the source and fountain of all
grace. He shall give the holy spirit to them that ask him, Mat. 7.11.
Such is that of supporting us in all difficulties and assaults: the not
suffering us to be tempted above that we are able, 1 Cor. 10.13. which
like God's bow set in the clouds, Gen. 9. is our security, that we shall
not be over-whelmed by any deluge of temptation: and (to instance
no more) such is that comprehensive promise of hearing our prayers,
Ask and it shall be given you, Mat. 7.7. This puts all good things
within our reach, gives us the key of God's Store-house, from whence
we may furnish ourselves with all that is really good for us. And if a
few full Barns could tempt the rich man in the Gospel, to pronounce
a Requiem to his soul; what notes of acquiescence may they sing,
who have the command of an inexhaustible store; that are supplied
by him whose is the earth, and the fullness thereof.
59. And certainly, all these promises together must be (to use the
Apostles phrase) strong consolation; such as may quiet and calm all
the fears and griefs, all the tumults and perturbations of the mind, in
relation to its present state. But then there are others relating to the
future of a much higher elevation: those glories and felicities of
another world, which are so far beyond our narrow conceptions, that
the comprehension and enjoyment must begin together. The
Scripture shadows it out to us by all the notions we have of
happiness: by glory, Rom. 8.18. by a kingdom, Mat. 25.14. by joy,
Mat. 25.21. and which comprehends all, by being with the Lord, 1
Thes. 4.17. seeing him face to face, 1 Cor. 13.12. being like to him, 1
Jo. 3.2. In a word 'tis bliss in the utmost extent: immense for
quantity, and eternal for duration.
60. And surely this promise is so excellent for kind, so liberal in its
degree, so transcendently great in all respects, that did it stand
single, stripped of all those that relate to this life, it alone would
justify the name of Gospel, and be the best tidings that ever came to
mankind. For alas, if we compare the hopes that other Religions
propose to their Votaries with these, how base, how ignoble are they!
The Heathens Elysium, the Muhammadan Paradise, were but higher
gratifications of the sensual part, and consequently were depressions
and debasements of the rational. So that in effect they provided a
heaven for the beast, and a hell for the man. We may therefore
confidently resume our conclusion; and pronounce the Scripture
promises to be so divine and excellent, that they could as little have
been made, as they can be performed by any but a holy and almighty
Author.
61. Nor is their being conditional any impeachment to their worth,
but an enhancement. Should God have made them (as some fancy he
has his decrees) absolute and irrespective; he had set his promises at
war with his precepts, and these should have superseded what those
enjoin. We are all very [ungenerous] towards God, and should have
been apt to have asked Judas 's question; to what purpose is this
waste? Mat. 26.8. What needs the labor of the course if the prize be
certain? And it must have been infinitely below the wisdom and
majesty of the supreme Legislator, to make Laws, and then evacuate
them by dispensing rewards without any aspect on their observance.
'It is the Sanction which inspirits the Law, without which the divine
as well as the human, would to most men be a dead letter.
62. But against this God has abundantly provided, not only by the
conditionality of the promises, but by the terror of his threats too;
which is the last part of Scripture which falls under consideration.
And these are of the most direful kinds; and cannot better be
illustrated then by the opposition they stand in to the promises: for
as those included all things that might make men happy either as to
this life or the next; so these do all that may make them miserable. If
we make our reflection on all the particulars of the promises, we
shall find the threats answering them as their reverse or dark
shadow.
63. And first as concerning the outward state, if we look but into the
28 of Deut. we shall find, that after all the gracious promises which
begun the chapter, it finally ends in thunder, in the most dreadful
denunciations imaginable; and those adapted by a most peculiar
opposition to the former promises: as the Reader may see at large in
that Chapter. And the whole tenor of the Scripture go's in the like
style. Thus, Psal. 140.11. A wicked person shall not prosper in the
earth, evil shall hunt the wicked man to overthrow him. The Lord
will not suffer the righteous to famish, but he casteth out the
substance of the wicked; Pro. 10.3. And again, the righteous eateth to
the satisfying of his soul, but the belly of the wicked shall want, Pro.
13.25. Multitudes of like general threatening's of temporal
improsperity there are everywhere scattered throughout the
Scripture; and many more applied to particular vices, as sloth,
unmercifulness, luxury, and the like; which would be here too long to
enumerate.
64. And although these threatening's may seem sometimes to be
literally confuted by the wealth and opulency of wicked men, yet they
never miss of being really and virtually verified. For either their
prosperities are very short, and only preparative to a more eminent
ruin, which was the Psalmists resolution of this doubt, Psal. 72. or
else if God leave them the matter of temporal happiness, yet he
substracts the virtue and spirit of them, renders them empty and
unsatisfying. This is well expressed by the Psalmist in the case of the
Israelites: He gave them their desire, and sent leanness withal into
their soul, Psa. 106.15. and by Zophar, Job 20.22. where speaking of
the wicked, he saith; In the fullness of his sufficiency shall he be in
straits. And to this Solomon seems to refer, when he saith, the
blessing of the Lord maketh rich, and be addeth no sorrow with it,
Pro. 10.22.
65. Neither is it only the comforts of life, but life itself that is
threatened to be taken from wicked men: untimely death is
throughout the Old Testament frequently mentioned as the guerdon
of impiety: 'tis often assigned judicially in particular cases: He shall
be cut off from his people, being the usual sentence upon most
offenders under the Levitical Law. But 'tis also menaced more
generally as an immediate judgment from God: The blood-thirsty
and deceitful men shall not live out half their days, Psal. 55.23.
Farther yet, their names shall putrefy as soon as their Carcasses: the
name of the wicked shall rot; Pro. 10.7. Nay both their infamy and
their ruin are entailed upon their posterity. The seed of evil doers
shall never be renowned. Prepare slaughter for his children, for the
iniquity of their fathers; Isa. 14.20.21.
66. If now we look on Scripture threatening's in relation to the mind
of man, we shall find them yet more severe: willful impenitent
sinners being cut off from the benefits of the new covenant; nor
barely so, but looked upon as despisers of it, and that blood of Christ
in which it was sealed; Heb. 10.29. nay as those murderous Wretches
that shed it: They crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh; Heb.
6.6. And this is the fatallest sentence that can fall on any man in this
life; to be thus disfranchised of all the privileges of the Gospel, and
ranked as well in punishment as guilt, with the most criminous of
mankind.
67. From hence 'tis consequent, that the mind remains not only in its
native impurity, but in a greater and more incurable one: whilst that
blood which alone could cleanse it, serves but to imbrue and pollute
it; and as it were flush, and excite it to all immanities and vilenesses:
and he that is thus filthy, 'tis the doom pronounced against him, that
he shall be filthy still, Rev. 22.11.
68. And then in the second place, what calm can there be to such a
mind? what remains to such a person, but that fearful expectation of
wrath and fiery indignation, which the Apostle mentions, Heb. 10.27.
Indeed, were there none but temporal mischiefs to fear; yet it were
very unpleasant to think ones self, like Cain, out-lawed from the
presence and protection of God; to be afraid that every man that
meets us should slay us, Gen. 4.14. Nay, those confused indistinct
fears of indefinite evils which attend guilt, are very unquiet uneasy
inmates in the mind. This is excellently described by Moses; The
Lord shall give thee a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow
of mind, and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee, and thou shalt
fear day and night; in the morning thou shalt say, would God it were
evening, and in the evening, would God it were morning, Deut.
28.65, 66, 67.
69. And what can be more wretched then to have a mind thus
agitated and tossed, racked and tortured; especially when thro all
these clouds it sees a glimpse of the eternal Tophet; and knows, that
from the billows of this uneasy state, it must be tossed into that Lake
of fire. And this is indeed the dregs of the cup of God's wrath, the
dread fullest and most astonishing of all Scripture denunciations.
This comprehends all that the nature of man is capable of suffering.
Divines distinguish it into the pain of sense, and of loss: that of sense
is represented to us in Scripture by fire; and that ascended, and
rendered noisesome as well as painful by brimstone, that afflicts the
smell as well as the touch: sometimes by outer darkness, wailing and
gnashing of teeth, to grate the ears, and consume the eyes; by
intolerable thirst, to torment the palate. Not that we are to think the
sensitive pains of Hell do not infinitely exceed all these; but because
these are the highest measures our present capacities can make, and
are adequate to those senses for whose carnal satisfactions we incur
them.
70. The pain of loss is yet more dismal; as being seated in the soul;
whose spiritual nature will then serve it only to render its torments
more refined, and acute. With what anguish will it then see itself
banished from the presence of God; and consequently from all that
may give satisfaction and bliss to the creature? But yet with how
much deeper anguish will it reflect on itself as the Author of that
deprivation? How will it recollect the many despised tenders of
grace, the easy terms on which salvation might have been had? And
how sadly will conscience then revenge all its stifled admonitions by
an unsilenceable clamor, that worm which never dies, Mar. 9.48.
How wounding will it then be to see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and
all the Saints in the kingdom of God, Luk. 13.28. (nay, that poor
Lazarus, whom here men turned over to the charity of their dogs;)
and itself in the company of the devil and his angels; who will then
upbraid what they once enticed to.
71. Nature abhors nothing more than to have our misery insulted
over by those who drew us into it: yet that no circumstance may be
lacking to their torment, this must be the perpetual entertainment of
damned souls. And to all this Eternity is the dismal adjunct; which is
of all other circumstances the most disconsolate; as leaving not so
much as a glimpse of hopes; which here uses still to be the reserve,
and last resort of the miserable.
72. This Eternity is that which gives an edge, infuses a new acrimony
into the torments: and is the highest strain, the vertical point of
misery. These are those terrors of the Lord, with which the Scripture
acquaints us: and sure we cannot say that these are flat contemptible
menaces; but such as suit the dreadful Majesty of that God who is a
consuming fire, Heb. 12.29. So that these are as aptly accommodated
for the exciting our dread, as the promises were of our love: both
jointly concur to awake our industry.
73. For God has been so good to mankind, as to make the threats
conditional as well as the promises: so that we as well know the way
to avoid the one, as we do to attain the other. Nor has he any other
intendment or end in proposing them, but that we may do so. See to
this purpose, with what solemnity he protests it by Moses; I call
heaven and earth to record against you this day, that I have set
before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life,
that both thou and thy seed may live, Deut. 30.19.
74. I have now run through the several parts of Scripture I proposed
to speak of. And though I have in each given rather short instances
and essays then an exact description, yet even in these contracted
lineaments the exquisite proportions may be discerned. And if the
Reader shall hence be encouraged to extend his contemplations, and
as he reads holy Scripture, observe it in all its graces, and full
dimensions; I doubt not he will pronounce from his experience, that
the matter of the divine Book is very correspondent to the Author:
which is the highest Eulogy imaginable.
75. In the next place we are to consider the holy Scripture in relation
to its end and design; in proportion to which everything is more or
less valuable. The most exquisite frame, and curious contrivance,
that has no determinate end or use, is but a piece of industrious folly,
a Spiders web, as the Prophet speaks, Isa, 59.5. Now those designs
have always been esteemed the most excellent that have had the
most worthy subjects, and been of the greatest extent. Accordingly
those who have projected the obliging and benefiting of other men
(though but within a private Sphere) have always been looked on as
men of generous and noble designs. Those who have taken their level
higher, and directed their aim to a more public good, though but of a
City or Nation, have proportionably acquired a greater esteem. But
those who have aspired to be universal benefactors, to do something
for the common benefit of the world, their fame has commonly
reached as far as their influence; men have reverenced, nay
sometimes (according to the common excesses of man's nature)
adored them. Many of the heathen deities (especially their demigods)
having been only those persons, who by introducing some useful Art,
or other part of knowledge, had obliged mankind. So we see what a
natural gratitude men are apt to pay to worthy and generous designs.
And if we will be content but to stand to this common award of our
nature, the Scripture will have the fairest claim imaginable to our
reverence and thankfulness, upon this very account, of the excellency
of its designs.
76. Nor need we borrow the balance of the Sanctuary to weigh them
in; we may do it in our own scales; for they exactly answer the two
properties above mentioned, of profit and diffusiveness: which in
secular concerns are the standard rules of good designs. For first, it is
the sole scope and aim of Scripture, the very end for which 'twas writ,
to benefit and advantage men; and that secondly, not only some
small select number, some little angle or corner of the world, but the
whole race of mankind; the entire Universe; and he that can imagine
a more diffusive design, must imagine more worlds also.
77. Now for the first of these, that it is the design of the Scripture to
benefit men; we need appeal but to Scripture itself; which surely can
give the best account to what ends 'tis directed; and that tells us, it is
to make us wise unto salvation, 2 Tim. 3.15. In which is
comprehended the greatest benefit that man's nature is capable of:
the making us wise while we live here, and the saving us eternally.
And this sure is the most generous, the most obliging design, that 'tis
possible even for the Creator to have upon the creature: and this is it
which the holy Scripture negotiates with us.
78. And first, the making us wise, is so inviting a proposal to
humanity, that we see when that was much wiser then now it is, it
caught at a fallacious tender of it; the very sound of it, though out of
the devils mouth, fascinated our first Parents, and hurried them to
the highest disobedience, and certainest ruin. And therefore now
God by the holy Scriptures makes us an offer as much more safe, as it
is more sincere; when he sends his Word thus to be a lamp to our
feet, and a light to our paths, Ps. 119.105. to teach us all that is good
for us to know, our affectation of ignorance will be more culpable
than theirs of knowledge, if we do not admire the kindness, &
embrace the bounty of such a tender.
79. Now the making us wise must be understood according to the
Scripture notion of wisdom, which is not the wisdom of this world,
nor of the Princes of this world, which come to naught, as the Apostle
speaks, 1 Cor. 2.5. but that wisdom which descends from above, Ja.
3.17. which he there describes to be first pure, then peaceable, gentle
and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without
partiality, and without hypocrisy. Indeed the Scripture usually
comprehends these and all other graces under Wisdom; for it makes
it synonymous to that which includes them all, viz. the fear of the
Lord. Thus we find throughout the whole Book of Proverbs these
used as terms convertible. In short, Wisdom is that practical
knowledge of God and ourselves which engages us to obedience and
duty; and this is agreeable to that definition the Wise man gives of it;
The wisdom of the prudent is to understand his way, Pro. 14.8.
Without this, all the most refined and aerial speculations, are but like
Thales 's star-gazing; which secured him not from falling in the
water; nay, betrayed him to it. In this is all solid wisdom comprised.
80. The utmost all the wise men in the world have pretended to, is
but to know what true happiness is, and what is the means of
attaining it: and what they sought with so much study, and so little
success, the Scripture presents us with in the greatest certainty, and
plainest characters, such as he that runs may read, Hab. 2.2. It
acquaints us with that supreme felicity, that chief good whereof
Philosophy could only give us a name; and it shows us the means,
marks us out a path which will infallibly lead us to it. Accordingly we
find that Solomon after all the accurate search he had made to find
what was that good for the sons of men; he shuts up his inquest in
this plain conclusion: Fear God and keep his commandments; for
God shall bring every work unto judgment, Eccles. 12.13, 14. The
regulating our lives so by the rules of Piety, as may acquit us at our
final account, is the most eligible thing that falls within human
cognizance; and that not only in relation to the superlative happiness
of the next world, but even to the quiet and tranquility of this. For
alas, we are impotent giddy creatures, swayed sometimes by one
passion, sometimes by another; nay often the inter fearing of our
appetites makes us irresolute which we are to gratify; whilst in the
interim their struggling agitates and turmoil's the mind. And what
can be more desirable in such a case, then to put ourselves under a
wiser conduct then our own; and as oppressed States use to defeat all
lesser pretenders by becoming homagers to some more potent: so for
us to deliver ourselves from the tyranny of our lusts, by giving up our
obedience to him whose service is perfect freedom.
81. Were there no other advantage of the exchange, but the bringing
us under fixed and determinate Laws, 'twere very considerable.
Every man would gladly know the terms of his subjection, and have
some standing rule to guide himself by; and God's Laws are so; we
may certainly know what he requires of us: but the mandates of our
passions are arbitrary and extemporary: what pleases them today
disgusts them tomorrow; and we must always be in readiness to do
we know not what, and of all the Arbitrary governments that men
either feel or fear, this is doubtless the most miserable. I wish our
apprehensions of it were but as sensible: and then we should think
the holy Scripture did us the office of a Patriot, in offering us a rescue
from so vile a slavery.
82. And that it do's make us this offer, is manifest by the whole tenor
of the Bible. For first it rouses and awakes us to a sense of our
condition, shows us that what we call liberty, is indeed the saddest
servitude; that he that committeth sin is the servant of sin; Jo. 8.34.
that those vices which pretend to serve and gratify us, do really
subdue and enslave us, and fetter when they seem to embrace: and
whereas the will in all other oppressions retains its liberty, this
tyranny brings that also into vassalage: renders our spirits so mean
and servile, that we choose bondage; are apt to say with the
Israelites, Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians, Ex. 14.12.
83. And what greater kindness can be done for people in this forlorn
abject condition, then to animate them to cast off this yoke, and
recover their freedom. And to this are most of the Scripture
exhortations addressed; as may be seen in a multitude of places,
particularly in the sixth chapter to the Romans, the whole scope
whereof is directly to this purpose.
84. Nor do's it only sound the alarm, put us upon the contest with
our enemies, but it assists us in it, furnishes us with that whole
armor of God which we find described, Eph. 6.13. Nay further it
excites our courage, by assuring us that if we will not basely
surrender ourselves, we can never be overpowered if we do but stand
our ground; resist our enemy, he will fly from us; Ja. 4.7. And to that
purpose it directs us under what banner we are to list ourselves; even
his who hath spoiled principalities and powers, Col. 2.15. to whose
conduct and discipline if we constantly adhere, we cannot miss of
victory.
85. And then lastly it sets before us the prize of this conquest; that we
shall not only recover our liberty, manumit ourselves from the vilest
bondage to the vilest and cruelest oppressors; but we shall be
crowned for it too, be rewarded for being kind to ourselves, and be
made happy eternally hereafter for being willing to be happy here.
85. And sure these are terms so apparently advantageous, that he
must be infinitely stupid (foolish to destruction) that will not be thus
made wise unto salvation, that despises or cavils at this divine Book,
which means him so much good, which designs to make him live
here generously and according to the dignity of his nature, and in the
next world to have that nature sublimated, and exalted, made more
capacious of those refined and immense felicities, which there await
all who will qualify themselves for them; who (as the Apostle speaks)
by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory, and honor, and
immortality, eternal life, Rom. 2.7.
87. But besides the greatest and principal advantages which concern
our spiritual interest, it takes in also the care of our secular, directs
us to such a managery of ourselves, as is naturally apt to promote a
quiet and happy life. Its injunction to live peaceable with all men,
keeps us out of the way of many misadventures, which turbulent
unruly spirits meet with, and so secures our peace. So also as to
wealth, it puts us into the fairest road to riches by prescribing
diligence in our callings: what is thus got being like sound flesh,
which will stick by us; whereas the hasty growth of ill-gotten wealth
is but a tumor and impostume, which the bigger it swells, the sooner
it bursts and leaves us lanker then before. In like manner it shows us
also how to guard our reputation, by providing honest things not
only in the sight of God, but also in the sight of men, Cor. 8.28. by
abstaining even from all appearance of evil, 1 Thes. 5.22. and making
our light shine before men, Mat. 5.16. It provides too for our ease and
tranquility, supersedes our anxious cares and solicitude's, by
directing us to cast our burden upon the Lord, Psal. 55.22. and by a
reliance on his providence how to secure to ourselves all we really
want. Finally it fixes us in all the changes; supports us under all the
pressures, comforts us amidst all the calamities of this life, by
assuring us they shall all work together for good to those that love
God; Ro. 8.28.
88. Nor do's the Scripture design to promote our interests
considered only singly and personally, but also in relation to
Societies and Communities; it gives us the best rules of distributive
and commutative Justice; teaches us to render to all their dues, Ro.
13.7. to keep our words, to observe inviolably all our pacts and
contracts; nay though they prove to our damage, Psa. 15.4. and to
preserve exact fidelity and truth; which are the sinews of human
commerce. It infuses into us noble and generous principles, to prefer
a common good before our private: and that highest flight of Ethnic
virtue, that of dying for ones Country, is no more than the Scripture
prescribes even for our common brethren, 1 Jo. 3.16.
89. But besides these generals, it descends to more minute directions
accommodated to our several circumstances; it gives us appropriate
rules in reference to our distinct relations, whether natural, civil,
ecclesiastical or economical. And if men would but universally
conform to them, to what a blessed harmony would it tune the
world? what order and peace would it introduce? There would then
be no oppressive Governors, nor mutinous Subjects; no unnatural
Parents, nor contumacious Children: no idle Shepherds, or straying
Flocks: none of those domestic jars which oft disquiet, and
sometimes subvert families: all would be calm and serene; and give
us in reality that golden Age, whereof the Poets did but dream.
90. This tendency of the Scripture is remarkably acknowledged in all
our public Judicatories, where before any testimony is admitted, we
cause the person that is to give his testimony, first to lay hold of with
his hands, then with his mouth to kiss the holy Scriptures: as if it
were impossible for those hands, which held the mysteries of Truth,
to be immediately employed in working falsehood; or that those lips
which had adored those holy Oracles, should be polluted with
perjuries and lies. And I fear, the civil Government is exceedingly
shaken at this day in its firmest foundation, by the little regard is
generally had of the holy Scriptures, and what is consequent thereto,
the oaths that are taken upon them.
91. Tis true, we are far removed from that state which Isaiah
prophesied of under the Gospel, though we have the Bible among us;
that when the Law should go forth of Zion, and the Word of the Lord
from Jerusalem; they should beat their swords into plow-shares, and
their spears into pruning hooks, Es. 2.4. but that is not from any
defect in it, but from our own perverseness: we have it, but (as the
Apostle speaks in another sense) as if we had it not, 1 Cor. 7.29. We
have it (that is, use it) to purposes widely different from what it
means. Som have it as a Supersedeas to all the duty it enjoins; and so
they can but cap texts, talk glibly of Scripture, are not all concerned
to practice it: some have it as their Arsenal, to furnish them with
weapons, not against their spiritual enemies, but their secular:
applying all the damnatory sentences they there find, to all those to
whose persons or opinions they have prejudice. And some have it as
a Scene of their mirth, a topic of raillery, dress their profane and
scurrilous jests in its language; and study it for no other end but to
abuse it. And whilst we treat it at this vile rate, no wonder we are
never the better for it. For alas, what will it avail us to have the most
sovereign Balsom in our possession, if instead of applying it to our
wounds, we trample it under our feet?
92. But though we may frustrate the use, we cannot alter the nature
of things. God's design in giving us the Scripture was to make us as
happy as our nature is capable of being; and the Scripture is
excellently adapted to this end: for as to our eternal felicity, all that
believe there is any such state, must acknowledge the Scripture
chalks us out the ready way to it: not only because 'tis dictated by
God who infallibly knows it, but also by its prescribing those things
which are in themselves best; and which a sober Heathen would
adjudge fittest to be rewarded. And as to our temporal happiness, I
dare appeal to any unprejudiced man, whether anything can
contribute more to the peace and real happiness of mankind, then
the universal practice of the Scripture rules would do. Would God we
would all conspire to make the experiment; and then doubtless, not
only our reason, but our sense too would be convinced of it.
93. And as the design is thus beneficial, so in the second place is it as
extensive also. Time was when the Jews had the enclosure of divine
Revelation; when the Oracles of God were their peculiar depositum,
and the Heathen had not the knowledge of his Laws, Ps. 147. ult. but
since that by the goodness of God the Gentiles are become fellowheirs, Eph. 3.6. he hath also delivered into their hands the deeds and
evidences of their future state, given them the holy Scriptures as the
exact and authentic registers of the covenant between God and man,
and these not to be like the heathen Oracles appropriated to
someone or two particular places; so that they cannot be consulted
but at the expense of a pilgrimage; but laid open to the view of all
that will believe themselves concerned.
94. It was a large commission our Savior gave his Disciples: go
preach the Gospel to every creature, Mar. 16.15. (which in the
narrowest acception must be the Gentile world) and yet their oral
Gospel did not reach farther then the written: for wherever the
Christian Faith was planted, the holy Scriptures were left as the
records of it; nay as the conservers of it too; the standing rule by
which all corruptions were to be detected. 'It is true, the entire Canon
of the New Testament, as we now have it, was not all at once
delivered to the Church; the Gospels and Epistles being successively
writ, as the needs of Christians, and the encroachments of Heretics
gave occasion; but at last they became all together the common
magazine of the Church, to furnish arms both defensive and
offensive. For as the Gospel puts in our hands the shield of Faith, so
the Epistles help us to hold it, that it may not be wrested out of our
hands again, either by the force of persecution, or the sly
insinuations of vice or heresy.
95. Thus the Apostles like prudent leaders have beat up the
Ambushes; discovered the snares that were laid for us; and by
discomfiting Satan's forlorn hope, that earliest Set of false teachers
and corrupt practices which then invaded the Church; have laid a
foundation of victory to the succeeding Ages, if they will but keep
close to their conduct, adhere to those sacred Writings they have left
behind them in every Church for that purpose.
96. Now what was there deposited, was designed for the benefit of
every particular member of that Church. The Bible was not
committed (like the Regalia, or rarities of a Nation) to be kept under
lock and key (and consequently to constitute a profitable office for
the keepers) but exposed like the Brazen Serpent for universal view
and benefit: that sacred Book (like the common air) being every
man's propriety, yet no man's enclosure: yet there are a generation of
men whose eyes have been evil, because God's have been good: who
have sealed up this spring, monopolized the word of Life; and will
allow none to partake of it but such persons, and in such proportions
as they please to retail it: an attempt very insolent in respect of God,
whose purpose they contradict; and very injurious in respect of man,
whose advantage they obstruct. The iniquity of it will be very
apparent if we consider what is offered in the following Section.
|
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 22, 2023 15:55:19 GMT -5
SECT. IV.
The Custody of the holy Scripture is a privilege and right of the
Christian Church, and every member of it; which cannot without
impiety to God, and injustice unto it and them, be taken away or
impeached.
1. Besides the keeping of the divine Law, which is obsequious, and
imports a due regard to all its Precepts, commonly expressed in
Scripture by keeping the commandments, hearkening to, and
obeying the voice of the Lord; walking in his ways, and observing and
doing his statutes and his judgments: there is a possessory keeping
it, in reference to ourselves and others; in respect whereof, Almighty
God, Deut. 6. and elsewhere frequently, having enjoined the people
of Israel, to love the Lord their God with all their heart, and with all
their soul, and with all their might, and that the words which he
commanded them should be in their heart, he adds, that they shall
teach them diligently to their children, and shall talk of them when
they sit down in their houses, and when they walk by the way, and
when they lie down, and when they rise up: and that they bind them
for a sign upon their hand, and that they shall be as frontlets between
their eyes, and that they shall write them upon the posts of their
house, and on their gates. So justly was the Law called the Scripture,
being written by them, and worn upon the several parts of the body,
inscribed upon the walls of their houses, the entrance of their doors,
and gates of their Cities; and in a word, placed before their eyes
wherever they conversed.
2. And this was granted to the Jews, as matter of privilege and favor.
To them, says Saint Paul, Rom. 9.4. pertaineth the adoption, and the
glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the Law. And the same
Saint Paul, at the 3. chap. 2. v. of that Epistle, unto the question,
what advantage hath the Jew, or what profit is there of circumcision,
answers that it is much every way, chiefly because unto them were
committed the Oracles of God. This depositum or trust was granted
to the Fathers, that it should be continued down unto their children.
He made a covenant, says David, Ps. 78. v. 5. with Jacob, and gave
Israel a Law, which he commanded our Fore-fathers to teach their
children, that their posterity might know it, and the children which
were yet unborn: to the intent that when they came up, they might
show their children the same. Which Scripture by a perpetual
succession was to be handed down unto the Christian Church; the
Apostles on all occasions appealing unto them, as being read in the
Synagogues every Sabbath day, Act. 13.27. and also privately, in their
hands; so that they might at pleasure search into them, Jo. 5.39. Act.
17.11. Hereupon the Jews are by Saint Austin called the Capsarii, or
servants that carried the Christians books. And Athanasius in his
Tract of the Incarnation, says, The Law was not for the Jews only,
nor were the Prophets sent for them alone; but that Nation was the
Divinity-School of the whole world; from whence they were to fetch
the knowledge of God, and the way of spiritual living: which amounts
to what the Apostle says, Galat. 3.24. That the Law was a Schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ.
3. And 'tis observable that the very same word, Rom. 3.2. in the Text
even now recited, which expresses the committing of the Oracles of
God to the Jews, is made use of constantly by Saint Paul, when he
declares the trust and duty incumbent on him in the preaching of the
Gospel: of which, see 1 Cor. 9.17. Gal. 2.7. 1 Thes. 2.4. 1 Tim. 1.11. Tit.
1.3. And therefore, as he says, 1 Cor. 9. Tho I preach the Gospel, I
have nothing to glory of; for necessity is laid upon me, yea, woe is
unto me if I preach not the Gospel, for if I do this thing willingly, I
have a reward; but if against my will, a dispensation of the Gospel is
committed unto me: So may all Christians say; if we ourselves keep
and transmit to our posterities the holy Scriptures, we have nothing
to glory of, for a necessity is laid upon us, and woe be unto us if we
do not ourselves keep, and transmit to our posterity the holy
Scriptures. If we do this thing willingly, we have a reward; but if
against our will, the custody of the Gospel, and at least that
dispensation of it, is committed to us. But if we are Traditors, and
give up our Bibles, or take them away from others; let us consider
how black an apostasy and sacrilege we shall incur.
4. The Mosaic Law was a temporary constitution, and only a shadow
of good things to come, Heb. 10.1. but the Gospel being in its
duration as well as its intendment, everlasting, Rev. 14.6. and to
remain when time shall be no more, Rev. 10.6. it is an infinitely more
precious depositum, and so with greater care and solemner
attestation to be preserved. Not only the Clergy, or the people of one
particular Church, nor the Clergy of the universal are entrusted with
this care, but 'tis the charge, the privilege and duty of every Christian
man, that either is, or was, or shall be in the world; even that
collective Church which above all competition, is the pillar and
ground of truth, 1 Tim. 3.15. against which the assaults of men and
devils, and even the gates of hell shall not prevail, Mat. 16.18.
5. The Gospels were not written by their holy Pen-men to instruct the
Apostles, but to the Christian Church, that they might believe Jesus
was the Christ, the son of God, and that believing they might have
life thro his name, Jo. 20.31. The Epistles were not addressed
peculiarly to the Bishops and Deacons, but all the holy brethren, to
the Churches of God that are sanctified in Jesus Christ, and to all
those that call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Rom. 1.7. 1
Cor. 1.2. 2 Cor. 1.1. Galat. 1.2. Eph. 1.1. Col. 4.16. 1 Thes. 5.27. Phil.
1.1. Jam. 1.1. 1 Pet. 1.1. 2 Pet. 1.1. Revel. 1.4. Or if by chance someone
or two of the Epistles were addressed to an Ecclesiastic person, as
those to Timothy and Titus, their purport plainly refers to the
community of Christians, and the depositum committed to their
trust; Tim. 6.20. And Saint John on the other side directs his Epistles
to those who were plainly secular; to fathers, young men, and little
children; and a Lady and her children, Epist. 1. chap. 2.12, 13, 14. and
Epist. 2.1.1.
6. But besides the interest which every Christian has in the custody
of the Scripture upon the account of its being a depositum entrusted
to him; he has also another no less forcible; that tis the Testament of
his Savior, by which he becomes a Son of God, no more a Servant but
a Son; and if he be a Son; it is the Apostles inference, that he is then
an heir, an heir of God thro Christ, Gal. 4.7. Now as he who is heir to
an estate, is also to the deeds and conveyances thereof; which
without injury cannot be detained, or if they be, there is a remedy at
Law for the recovery of them: So it fares in our Christian inheritance;
every believer by the privilege of faith, is made a son of Abraham,
and an heir of the promises made unto the fathers, whereby he has
an hereditary interest in the Old Testament; and also by the privilege
of the same Faith he has a firm right to the purchased possession,
Eph. 1.14. and the charter thereof, the New. Therefore the detention
of the Scriptures, which are made up of these two parts, is a manifest
injustice and sacrilegious invasion of right, which the person
wronged is empowered, nay is strictly obliged by all lawful means to
vindicate.
7. Which invasion of right; will appear more flagrant when the nature
and importance of it is considered; which relating to men's spiritual
interest, renders the violation infinitely more injurious than it could
be in any secular. I might mention several detriments consequent to
this detention of Scripture, even as many as there are benefits
appendant to the free use of it; but there is one of so fundamental
and comprehensive a nature, that I need name no more; and that is,
that it delivers men up to any delusion their teachers shall impose
upon them, by depriving them of means of detecting them. Where
there is no standard or measures, 'tis easy for men to falsify both;
and no less easy is it to adulterate doctrines, where no recourse can
be had to the primary rule. Now that there is a possibility that false
teachers may arise, we have all assurance; nay we have the word of
Christ, and his Apostles that it should be so: and all Ecclesiastic story
to attest it has been so. And if in the first and purest times (those
Ages of more immediate illumination) the God of this world found
instruments whereby to blind men's minds, 2 Cor. 4.4. it cannot be
supposed impossible or improbable he should do so now.
8. But to leave generals, and to speak to the case of that Church
which magisterially prohibits Scripture to the vulgar she manifestly
stands liable to that charge of our Savior, Luk. 11 52. Ye have taken
away the key of knowledge: and by allowing the common people no
more Scripture then what she affords them in their Sermons and
private Manuals, keeps it in her power to impose on them what she
pleases. For 'tis sure those portions she selects for them, shall be
none of those which clash with the doctrines she recommends: and
whenever she will use this power to the corrupting their faith, or
worship (yea, or their manners either) they must brutishly submit to
it, because they cannot bring her dictates to the test.
9. But 'twill be said, this danger she wards by her doctrine of
infallibility: that is, she enervates a probable supposition attested by
event, by an impossible one confuted by event. For 'tis certain, that
all particular Churches may err; and though the consciousness of
that, forces the Roman Church upon the absurd pretense of
universality, to assert her infallibility; yet alas, Tiber may as well call
itself the Ocean, or Italy the world, as the Roman Church may name
itself the universal; whilst 'tis so apparent that far the less part of
Christians are under her communion. And if she be but a particular
Church, she has no immunity from errors, nor those under her from
having those errors (how pernicious soever) imposed upon them. As
to her having actually erred, and in diverse particulars, the proof of
that has been the work of so many Volumes, that 'twould be
impertinent here to undertake it: I shall only instance in that of
Image-worship; a practice perfectly irreconcilable with the second
Commandment; and doubtless, clearly discerned by her to be so:
upon which account it is, that though by Translations and
Paraphrases she wrests and molds other Texts to comply with her
doctrines, yet she dares not trust to those arts for this: but takes a
more compendious course, and expunges the Commandment; as is
evident in her Catechisms and other Manuals. Now a Church that
can thus sacrilegiously purloin one Commandment (and such a one
as God has owned himself the most jealously concerned in) and to
delude her children split another to make up the number, may as her
needs require, subtract and divide what others she please: and then
whilst all resort to Scripture is obstructed; how fatal a hazard must
those poor souls run, who are obliged to follow these blind, or rather
these winking guides into the ditch?
10. But all these criminations she retorts, by objecting the dangers of
allowing the Scriptures to the vulgar; which she accuses as the spring
of all Sects, Schisms, and Heresies. To which I answer first, that
supposing this were true, 'twas certainly foreseen by God, who
notwithstanding laid no restraint; probably as fore-seeing, that the
dangers of implicit faith (to which such a restraint must subject men)
would be far greater: and if God saw fit to indulge the liberty, those
that shall oppose it, must certainly think they do not only partake,
but have transplanted infallibility from God to themselves.
11. But secondly, 'tis not generally true, that Sects, Schisms, and
Heresies are owing to this liberty: All Ecclesiastical Story shows us
that they were not the illiterate Lay-men, but the learned Clerks who
were usually the broachers of Heresies. And indeed many of them
were so subtle and aerial, as could never have been forged in grosser
brains; but were founded not on Scripture merely mistaken, but
racked and distorted with nice criticisms, and quirks of Logic, as
several of the Ancients complain: some again sprang from that
ambition of attaining, or impatience of missing Ecclesiastical
dignities: which appropriates them to the Clergy. So that if the abuse
infer a forfeiture of the use, the Learned have of all others the least
title to the Scriptures; and perhaps those who now engross them, the
least title of all the Learned.
12. On the other side, Church-story indeed mentions some lay propugners of Heresies; but those for the most part were either so
gross and bestial, as disparaged and confuted themselves and
Authors, and rose rather from the brutish inclination of the men,
then from their mistakes of Scripture: or else they were by the
immediate infusion of the devil, who backed his heretical suggestions
with sorceries and lying wonders, as in Simon Magus, Menander, &c.
And for later times, though sometimes there happens among the
vulgar a few pragmatic spirits, that love to tamper with the
obscurests Texts, and will undertake to expound before they
understand; yet that is not their common temper: the generality are
rather in the other extreme, stupid and unobservant even of the
plainest doctrines. And if to this be objected the multitude of
Quakers and Fanatics, who generally are of the ignorant sort; I
answer, that 'tis manifest the first propugners of those tenets in
Germany were not seduced into them by mistakes of Scripture, but
industriously formed them, at once to disguise and promote their
villainous designs of sedition and rapine: and as for those amongst
us, it is not at all certain that their first errors were their own
productions: there are vehement presumptions that the seeds were
sown by greater Artificers; whose first business was to unhinge them
from the Church, and then to fill their heads with strange Chimera's
of their privileges and perfections; and by that intoxication of
spiritual pride, dispose them for all delusions: and thereby render
them, like Samsons Foxes, fit instruments to set all in combustion.
13. But admit this were but a conjecture, and that they were the sole
Authors of their own frenzy; how appears it that the liberty of
reading the Scripture was the cause of it? Had these men been of the,
Romish communion, and so been interdicted private reading, yet
some broken parts of Scripture would have been in Sermons and
Books of devotion communicated to them; had it not been as
possible for them to have wrested what they heard as what they
read? In one respect it seems rather more likely: for in those loose
and incidental quotations the connection is sometimes not so
discernible: and many Texts there are whose sense is so interwoven
with the context, that without consulting that, there may be very
pernicious mistakes: on which account it is probably more safe that
the Auditors should have Bibles to consult. So that this restraint of
Scripture is a very fallible expedient of the infallible Church. And
indeed themselves have in event found it so; for if it were so
sovereign a prophylactic against error, how comes it to pass that so
many of their members who were under that discipline have revolted
from them into that which they call heresy? If they say, the defection
was made by some of the Learned to whom the Scripture was
allowed, why do they not (according to their way of arguing) take it
from them also upon that experiment of its mischief, and confine it
only to the infallible chair? but if they own them to have been
unlearned (as probably the Albigenses and Waldenses, &c. were)
they may see how insignificant a guard this restraint is against error:
and learn how little is got by that policy which controls the divine
Wisdom.
14. Nor can they take shelter in the example of the primitive
Christians, for they in the constant use of the holy Scriptures yielded
not unto the Jews. Whereas the Jews had the Scriptures read
publicly to them every Sabbath day; which Josephus against Appion
thus expresses: Moses propounded to the Jews the most excellent
and necessary learning of the Law; not by hearing it once or twice,
but every seventh day laying aside their works, he commanded them
to assemble for the hearing of the Law, and thoroughly and exactly to
learn it. Parallel to this was the practice of the primitive Church,
performed by the Lector, or Reader, of which Justin Martyr in his 2.
Apol. gives this account. On the day called Sunday, all that abide in
towns, or the countries about, meet in one place, and the writings of
the Apostles and Prophets are read, so far as there is place. So
Tertullian in his Apol. describing the offices in the public Assemblies:
We feed our faith with the sacred Words, we raise our hopes, and
establish our reliance.
15. And as the Jews thought it indecent for persons professing piety,
to let three days pass without the offices thereof in the congregation;
and therefore met in their Synagogues upon every Tuesday and
Thursday in the week, and there performed the duties of fasting,
prayer, and hearing the holy Scriptures; concerning which is the
boast of the Pharisee, Luk. 18.12. in conformity hereto the Christians
also, their Sabbath being brought forward from the Saturday to the
day following; that the like number of days might not pass them
without performing the aforesaid duties in the congregation; met
together on the Wednesdays and Fridays, which were the days of
Station, so frequently mentioned in Tertullian, and others, the first
writers of the Church. Tertullian expressly says, that the Christians
dedicated to the offices of Piety, the fourth and sixth day of the week:
and Clemens Alex. says of the Christians, that they understood the
secret reasons of their weekly fasts, to wit, those of the fourth day of
the week, and that of preparation before the Sabbath; commonly
called Wednesday and Friday. Where, by the way, we may take notice
what ground there is for the observation of the Wednesday and
Friday in our Church, and the Litanies then appointed, so much
neglected in this profligate Age.
16. But secondly, as the Jews were diligent in the private reading of
the Scripture; being taught it from their infancy: which custom Saint
Paul refers to 1 Tim. 3.15. whereof Josephus against Appion says,
That if a man ask any Jew concerning the Laws, he will tell
everything readier then his name: for learning them from the first
time they have sense of anything, they retain them imprinted in their
minds. So were the first Christians equally industrious in improving
their knowledge of divine Truth. The whole life of a Christian, says
Clem. Alex. Strom. l. 7. is a holy solemnity: there his sacrifices are
prayers and praises; before every meal he has the readings of the
holy Scriptures; and Psalms, and Hymns at the time of his meals.
Which Tertullian also describes in his Apol. and Saint Cyprian in the
end of the Epist. to Donatus.
17. And this is farther evidenced by the early and numerous versions
of the Scriptures into all vulgar Languages; concerning which
Theodoret speaks in his Book of the Cure of the Affections of the
Greeks, Serm. 5. We Christians (says he) are enabled to show the
power of Apostolic and prophetic doctrines, which have filled all
Countries under Heaven. For that which was formerly uttered in
Hebrew, is not only translated into the Language of the Grecians, but
also the Romans, Egyptians, Persians, Indians, Armenians,
Scythians, Samaritans; and in a word to all the Languages that are
used by any Nation. The same is said by Saint Chrysostom in his first
Homily upon Saint John.
18. Nor was this don by the blind zeal of inconsiderable men, but the
most eminent Doctors of the Church were concerned herein: such as
Origen who with infinite labor contrived the Hexapla. Saint
Chrysostom, who translated the New Testament, Psalms, and some
part of the Old Testament into the Armenian Tongue, as witnesses
Geor. Alex. in the life of Chrysost. So Vlphilas the first Bishop of the
Goths translated the holy Scripture into the Gothic; as Socrat. Eccl.
Hist. l. 4. cap. 33. and others testify. Saint Jerome, who translated
them not only into Latin from the Hebrew, the Old Italic version
having been from the Greek; but also into his native vulgar Dalmatic:
which he says himself in his Epistle to Sophronius.
19. But the people's having them for their private and constant use
appears farther, by the Heathens making the extorting of them a part
of their persecution: and when diverse did faint in that trial, and
basely surrendered them, we find the Church leveled her severity
only against the offending persons, did not (according to the Romish
equity) punish the innocent, by depriving them of that sacred Book,
because the others had so unworthily prostituted it (though the
prevention of such a profanation for the future had been as fair a
plea for it as the Romanists do now make:) but on the contrary the
primitive Fathers are frequent, nay indeed importunate in their
exhortations to the private study of holy Scripture, which they
recommend to Christians of all Ranks, Ages, and Sexes.
20. As an instance hereof, let us hear Clemens of Alex. in his Exhort.
The Word, says he, is not hid from any; it is a common light that
shineth to all men; there is no obscurity in it; hear it you that be far
off, and hear it you that are nigh.
21. To this purpose St. Jerome speaks in his Epistle to Leta, whom he
directs in the education of her young daughter, and advises, that
instead of gems and silk, she be enamored with the holy Scripture;
wherein not gold, or skins, or Babylonian embroideries, but a correct
and beautiful variety producing faith, will recommend its self. Let
her first learn the Psalter, and be entertained with those songs; then
be instructed unto life by the Proverbs of Solomon: let her learn from
Ecclesiastes to despise worldly things; transcribe from Job the
practice of patience and virtue: let her pass then to the Gospels, and
never let them be out of her hands: and then imbibe with all the
faculties of the mind, the Acts of the Apostles, and Epistles. When
she has enriched the storehouse of her breast with these treasures,
let her learn the Prophets, the Heptateuch, or books of Moses,
Joshua and Judges, the books of Kings and Chronicles, the volumes
of Ezra and Esther; and lastly the Canticles. And indeed, this Father
is so concerned to have the unlettered female sex skillful in the
Scriptures, that though he sharply rebukes their pride and overwening; he not only frequently resolves their doubts concerning
difficult places in the said Scriptures, but dedicates several of his
Commentaries to them.
22. The same is to be said of Saint Austin, who in his Epistles to
unlettered Laics, encourages their enquiries concerning the
Scripture, assuring Volusianus Ep. 3. that it speaks those things that
are plain to the heart of the learned and unlearned, as a familiar
friend; in the mysterious, mounts not up into high phrases which
might deter a slow and unlearned mind, (as the poor are in their
addresses to the rich;) but invites all with lowly speech, feeding with
manifest truth, and exercising with secret. And Ep. 1.21. tells the
devout Proba, that in this world where we are absent from the Lord,
and walk by faith and not by sight, the soul is to think itself desolate,
and never cease from prayer, and the words of divine and holy
Scripture, &c.
23. Saint Chrysostom in his third Homily of Lazarus thus addresses
himself to married persons, house-holders, and people engaged in
trades and secular professions; telling them, that the reading of the
Scripture is a great defensative against sin; and on the other side, the
ignorance thereof is a deep and head-long precipice; that not to know
the Law of God, is the utter loss of salvation; that this has caused
heresies, and corruption of life, and has confounded the order of
things: for it cannot be by any means, that his labor should be
fruitless, who employs himself in a daily and attentive reading of the
Scripture.
24. I am not, says the same St. Chry. Hom. 9. on Colos. 3. a Monk, I
have wife and children, and the cares of a family. But 'tis a
destructive opinion, that the reading of the Scripture pertains only to
those who have addicted themselves to a monastic life; when the
reading of Scripture is much more necessary for secular persons: for
they who converse abroad, and receive frequent wounds, are in
greatest need of remedies and preservatives, so Hom. 2. on Mat.
Hearken all you that are secular, how you ought to order your wives
and children; and how you are particularly enjoined to read the
Scriptures, and that not perfunctorily, or by chance, but very
diligently.
25. Likewise Hom. 3. on Laz. What sayest thou, O man? it is not thy
business to turn over the Scripture, being distracted by innumerable
cares; no, thou hast therefore the greater obligation: others do not so
much stand in need of the aids of the Scripture, as they who are
conversant in much business. Farther, Hom. 8. on Heb. 5. I beseech
you neglect not the reading of the Scriptures; but whether we
comprehend the meaning of what is spoken or not, let us always be
conversant in them: for daily meditation strengthens the memory;
and it frequently happens, that what you now cannot find out, if you
attempt it again, you will the next day discover: for God of his
goodness will enlighten the mind. It were endless to transcribe all the
Exhortations of the ancient Doctors and Fathers of the Church; they
not only permitted, but earnestly pressed upon all Christians,
whatever their estate or condition were, the constant reading of the
holy Scripture. Nor indeed was their restraint ever heard of till the
Church of Rome had espoused such doctrines as would not bear the
test of Scripture: and then as those who deal in false wares are used
to do, they found it necessary to proportion their lights accordingly.
26. This Peter Sutor in his second Book cap. 22. of the Translation of
the Scripture honestly confesses, saying, that whereas many things
are enjoined which are not expressly in Scripture, the unlearned
observing this, will be apt to murmur and complain that so heavy
burdens are laid upon them, and their Christian liberty infringed.
They will easily be with-drawn from observing the Constitutions of
the Church, when they find that they are not contained in the Law of
Christ. And that this was not a frivolous suggestion, the desperate
attempt of the Romanists above mentioned, in leaving out the second
Commandment in their Primers and Catechisms which they
communicate to the people, may pass for an irrefragable evidence;
For what Lay-man would not be shocked, to find Almighty God
command, not to make any graven image, nor the likeness of
anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the
water under the earth; that no one should bow down to them, nor
worship them: when he sees the contrary is practiced and
commanded by the Church.
27. But would God none but the Romamanist were impeachable of
this detention of Scripture: there are too many among us that are
thus false and envious to themselves: and what the former do upon
policy and pretense of reverence, those do upon mere oscitancy and
avowed profaneness; which are much worse inducements. And for
such as these to declaim against detention of the Scripture, is like the
Law-suits of those who contend only about such little punctilio's as
themselves design no advantage from, but only the worsting their
Adversaries: and it would be much safer for them to lie under the
interdict of others, then thus to restrain themselves: even as much as
the errors of obedience are more excusable, then those of contempt
and profaneness.
28. And here I would have it seriously considered that the Edict of
Diocletian for the demolishing the Christian Churches, and the
burning their Bibles; became the character and particular
aggravation of his most bloody persecution. Now should Almighty
God call us to the like trial, should Antichristian violence, whether
heathen or other, take from us our Churches and our Bibles, what
comfort could we have in that calamity, if our contempt of those
blessings drove them from us; nay, prevented persecution, and bereft
us of them even whilst we had them in our power? He who neglects
to make his constant resort unto the Church, which by God's mercy
now stands open; or to read diligently the holy Scriptures, which by
the same divine Goodness are free for him to use, is his own
Diocletian; and without the terrors of death, or torments, has
renounced, if not the Faith, the great instruments of its conveyance,
and pledge of God Almighty's presence among the sons of men.
29. But what if men either upon the one motive or the other, will not
read; yet the Scriptures continue still most worthy to be read: they
retain still their propriety for all those excellent ends to which God
designed them: and as the Prophet tells the Jews, Ez. 2.5. whether
they will hear, or whether they will forbear, they shall know there has
been a Prophet among them; so whether we will take the benefit or
no, we shall one day find that the holy Scriptures would have made
us wise unto salvation. If through our fault alone they fail to do so,
they will one day assume a less grateful office; and from guides and
assistants, become accusers and witnesses against us.
|
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Oct 23, 2023 15:45:48 GMT -5
Necessary cautions to be used in the reading of the holy Scriptures.
1. It is a common observation, that the most generous and sprightly
Medicines; are the most unsafe, if not applied with due care and
regimen: And the remark holds as well in spiritual as corporal
remedies. The Apostle asserts it upon his own experience, that the
doctrine of the Gospel, which was to some the savor of life unto life,
was to others the savor of death, 2 Cor. 2.15. And the same effect that
the oral Word had then, the written Word may have now; not that
either the one or the other have anything in them that is of itself
mortiferous, but becomes so by the ill disposition of the persons who
so pervert it. It is therefore well worth our inquiry, what
qualifications on our part are necessary to make the Word be to us
what it is in itself, the power of God unto salvation, Rom. 1.16. Of
these some are previous before our reading, some are concomitant
with it, and some are subsequent and follow after it.
2. Of those that go before, sincerity is a most essential requisite: by
sincerity, I mean an upright intention, by which we direct our
reading to that proper end for which the holy Scriptures were
designed; viz. the knowing God's will in order to the practicing it.
This honest simplicity of heart is that which Christ represents by the
good ground, where alone it was that the seed could fructify, Mat.
13.8. And he that brings not this with him, brings only the shadow of
a Disciple. The word of God, is indeed, sharper than a two-edged
sword, Heb. 4.12. but what impression can a sword make on a body
of air; which still slips from, and eludes its thrusts? And as little can
all the practical discourses of holy Writ make on him, who brings
only his speculative faculties with him, and leaves his will and
affections behind him; which are the only proper subjects for it to
work on.
3. To this we may probably impute that strange inefficaciousness we
see of the Word. Alas, men rarely apply it to the right place: our most
inveterate diseases lie in our morals; and we suffer the Medicine to
reach no farther than our intellects. As if he that had an ulcer in his
bowels should apply all his balsams and sanatives only to his head.
'It is true, the holy Scriptures are the treasuries of divine Wisdom;
the Oracles to which we should resort for saving knowledge: but they
are also the rule and guide of holy Life: and he that covets to know
God's will for any purpose but to practice it, is only studious to
entitle himself to the greater number of stripes, Luk. 12.47.
4. Nay farther, he that affects only the bare knowledge, is oft
disappointed even of that. The Scripture, like the Pillar of fire and
cloud, enlightens the Israelites, those who sincerely resign
themselves to its guidance; but it darkens and confounds the
Egyptians, Ex. 14.20. And 'tis frequently seen, that those who read
only to become knowing, are tolled on by their curiosity into the
more abstruse and mysterious parts of Scripture, where they
entangle themselves in inextricable mazes and confusions; and
instead of acquiring a more superlative knowledge, loose those easy
and common notions which lie obvious to every plain well meaning
Reader. I fear this Age affords too many, and too frequent instances
of this; in men who have lost God in the midst of his Word, and
studied Scripture till they have renounced its Author.
5. And sure this infatuation is very just, and no more than God
himself has warned us of, who takes the wise in their own craftiness,
Job. 5.12. but appropriates his secrets only to them that fear him,
and has promised to teach the meek his way, Psal. 25.9.14. And this
was the method Christ observed in his preaching; unveiling those
truths to his Disciples, which to the Scribes and Pharisees, his
inquisitive, yet refractory hearers, he wrapped up in parables: not
that he disliked their desire of knowledge, but their want of sincerity:
which is so fatal a defect as blasts our pursuits, though of things in
themselves never so excellent. This we find exemplified in Simon
Magus, Acts 8. who though he coveted a thing in itself very desirable,
the power of conferring the holy Ghost, yet desiring it not only upon
undue conditions, but for sinister ends, he not only mist of that, but
was (after all his convincement by the Apostles miracles, and the
engagement of his Baptism) immersed in the gall of bitterness; and
at last advanced to that height of blasphemy, as to set up himself for
a God; so becoming a lasting memento, how unsafe it is to
prevaricate in holy things.
6. But as there is a sincerity of the Will in order to practice, so there
is also a sincerity of the understanding in order to belief; and this is
also no less requisite to the profitable reading of Scripture. I mean by
this, that we come with a preparation of mind, to embrace
indifferently, whatever God there reveals as the object of our Faith:
that we bring our own opinions, not as the clue by which to unfold
Scripture, but to be tried and regulated by it. The want of this has
been of very pernicious consequence in matters both of Faith and
speculation. Men are commonly prepossessed strongly with their
own notions, and their errand to Scripture is not to lend them light
to judge of them, but aids to back and defend them.
7. Of this there is no Book of controversy that do's not give notorious
proof. The Socinian can easily overlook the beginning of Saint John,
that says, The Word was God, Jo. 1.1. and all those other places
which plainly assert the Deity of our Savior; if he can but divert to
that other more agreeable Text, that the Father is greater than I.
Among the Romanists, Peters being said to be first among the
Apostles, Mat. 10.2, and that on that Rock Christ would build his
Church, Mat. 16.18. carries away all attention from those other places
where Saint Paul says he was not behind the very chiefest of the
Apostles, 2 Cor. 11.5. that upon him lay the care of all the Churches, 2
Cor. 11.28. and that the Church was not built upon the foundation of
someone, but all the twelve Apostles, Revel. 21.14. So it fares in the
business of the Eucharist: This is my body, Mat. 26.26. carries it
away clear for Transubstantiation, when our Saviors calling that
which he drunk the fruit of the vine, Mat. 26.29. and then Saint
Paul's naming the Elements in the Lord's Supper several times over
Bread and Wine; The Bread that we break, is it not the Communion
of the Body of Christ: the Cup that we bless, is it not the Communion,
&c. 1 Cor. 10.16. And again, He that eats this Bread, and drinks this
Cup unworthily, &c. 1 Cor. 11.29. can make no appearance of an
Argument.
8. Thus men once engaged ransack for Texts that carry some
correspondency to the opinions they have imbibed; and those how do
they rack and screw to bring to a perfect conformity; and improve
every little probability into a demonstration? On the other side, the
contrary Texts they look on as enemies, and consider them no farther
then to provide fences and guards against them: So they bring Texts
not into the scales to weigh, but into the field to skirmish, as
Partisans and Auxiliaries of such or such opinions.
9. By this force of prepossession it is, that that sacred Rule, which is
the measure and standard of all rectitude, is itself bowed and
distorted to countenance and abet the most contrary tenets: and like
a variable picture, represents differing shapes according to the light
in which you view it. And sure we cannot do it a worse office then to
represent it thus dissonant to itself. Yet thus it must still be till men
come unbiased to the reading of it. And certainly there is all the
reason in the world they should do so: the ultimate end of our faith is
but the salvation of our souls, 1 Pet. 1.9. and we may be sure the
Scripture can best direct us what Faith it is which will lead us to that
end.
10. Why should we not then have the same indifference which a
traveler hath, whether his way lie on this hand or that; so as it be the
direct road to his journeys end? For although it be infinitely material
that I embrace right principles, yet 'tis not so that this should be right
rather than the other: and our wishes that it should be so, proceed
only from our prepossessions and fondness of our own conceptions,
then which nothing is more apt to intercept the clear view of truth. It
therefore nearly concerns us to deposit them, and to give up
ourselves without reserve to the guidance of God's Word, and give it
equal credit when it thwarts, as when it complies with our own
notions.
11. Without this, though we may call Scripture the rule of Faith, and
judge of controversies; yet 'tis manifest we make it not so, but reserve
still the last appeal to our own prejudicate fancies: and then no
wonder, though we fall under the same occoecation which our Savior
upbraids to the Jews, that seeing we see not, neither do we
understand, Mat. 13.14. For he that will not be saved God's way, will
hardly be so by his own. He that resolves not impartially to embrace
all the Scriptures dictates, comes to them as unsincerely, as the
remnant of the Jews did to Jeremiah to inquire of the Lord for them,
which he no sooner had don, but they protest against his message,
Jer. 42.20. and may expect as fatal an event.
12. But there are a set of men who deal yet more insincerely with the
Word; that read it insidiously, on purpose to collect matter of
objection and cavil: that with a malicious diligence compare Texts in
hope to find contradictions; and read attentively, but to no other end
then to remark incoherences and defects in the style: which when
they think they have started, they have their design; and never will
use a quarter of the same diligence in considering how they may be
solved, or consulting with those who may assist them in it. For I
think I may appeal to the generality of those who have raised the
loudest clamors against the Scripture, whether they have endeavored
to render themselves competent judges of it by inquiring into the
Originals; or informing themselves of those local Customs, peculiar
Idioms, and many other circumstances, by which obscure Texts are
to be cleared. And though I do not affirm it necessary to salvation
that every man should do this; yet I may affirm it necessary to him
that will pretend to judge of the Bible: and he that without this
condemns it, do's it as manifest injury, as a Judge that should pass
sentence only upon the Indictment, without hearing the defense.
13. And certainly there cannot be anything more unmanly and
disingenuous, then for men to inveigh and condemn before they
inquire and examine. Yet this is the thing upon which so many value
themselves, assuming to be men of reason, for that for which the
Scripture pronounces them brute beasts, viz. the speaking evil of
those things they understand not, 2 Pet. 2.12. Would men use due
diligence, no doubt many of those seeming contradictions would be
reconciled, and the obscurities cleared: and if any should after all
remain, he might find twenty things fitter to charge it on, then want
of verity or discourse in the inspired writers.
14. Alas what human writing is there of near that Antiquity, wherein
there are not many passages unintelligible? And indeed, unless
modern times knew all those national customs, obsolete Laws,
particular Rites and Ceremonies, Phrases and proverbial Sayings, to
which such ancient Books refer, 'tis impossible but some passages
must still remain obscure. Yet in these we ordinarily have so much
candor, as to impute their unintelligibleness to our own ignorance of
those things which should clear them, the improprieties of style, to
the variation that times make in dialects, or to the errors of Scribes,
and do not presently exclaim against the Authors as false or
impertinent, or discard the whole Book for some such passages.
15. And sure what allowances we make to other Books, may with
more reason be made to the Bible; which having been writ so many
Ages since, past thro infinite variety of hands, and (which is above
all) having been the object of the Devils, and wicked men's malice,
lies under greater disadvantages then any human composure: And
doubtless men would be as equitable to that as they are to others,
were it not that they more wish to have that false or irrational than
any other Book. The plain parts of it, the precepts and threatening's
speak clearer then they desire, gall and fret them; and therefore they
will revenge themselves upon the obscurer: and seem angry that
there are some things they understand not, when indeed their real
displeasure is at those they do.
16. A second qualification preparatory to reading the Scripture is
reverence. When we take the Bible in our hands, we should do it with
other sentiments and apprehensions then when we take a common
Book; considering that it is the word of God, the instrument of our
salvation; or upon our abuse of it, a promoter of our ruin.
17. And sure this if duly apprehended, cannot but strike us with a
reverential awe, make us to say with Jacob, Gen. 28.17. surely God is
in this place; control all trifling fancies, and make us read, not for
custom or divertissement, but with those solemn and holy intentions
which become the dignity of its Author. Accordingly we find holy
men have in all Ages been affected with it; and some to the inward
reverence of the mind, have joined the outward of the body also, and
never read it but upon their knees: an example that may both
instruct and reproach our profaneness; who commonly read by
chance, and at a venture: If a Bible happen in our way, we take it up
as we would do a Romance, or Play-book; only herein we differ, that
we dismiss it much sooner, and retain less of its impressions.
18. It was a Law of Numa, that no man should meddle with divine
things, or worship the God's, in passing, or by accident, but make it a
set and solemn business. And everyone knows with how great
ceremony and solemnity the heathen Oracles were consulted. How
great a shame is it then for Christians to defalk that reverence from
the true God, which heathens allowed their false ones?
19. Now this proceeds sometimes from the want of that habitual
reverence we should always have to it as God's word, and sometimes
from want of actual exciting it, when we go to read: for if the habit lie
only dormant in us, and be not awaked by actual consideration, it
avails us as little in our reading, as the habitual strength of a man
do's towards labor, when he will not exert it for that end.
20. We ought therefore, as to make it our deliberate choice to read
God's word; so when we do it, to stir up ourselves to those solemn
apprehensions of its dignity and authority, as may render us
malleable, and apt to receive its impressions: for where there is no
reverence, 'tis not to be expected there should be any genuine or
lasting obedience.
21. Saint Austin in his Tract to Honoratus, of the advantage of
believing, makes the first requisite to the knowledge of the Scriptures
to be the love of them. Believe me, says he, everything in the
Scripture is sublime and divine, its truth and doctrine are most
accommodate to the refreshment, and building up of our minds: and
in all respects so ordered, that everyone may draw thence what is
sufficient for him; provided he approach it with devotion, piety, and
religion. The proof of this may require much reasoning and
discourse. But this I am first to persuade, that you do not hate the
Authors, and then that you love them. Had we an ill opinion of Virgil,
nay, if upon the account of the reputation he has gained with our
Predecessors, we did not greatly love before we understood him; we
should never patiently go thro all the difficult questions
Grammarians raise about him. Many employ themselves in
commenting upon him; we esteem him most, whose exposition most
commends the Book, and shows that the Author, not only was free
from error, but did excellently well where he is not understood. And
if such an account happen not to be given, we impute it rather to the
Interpreter then the Poet.
22. Thus the good Father; whose words I have transcribed at large, as
being remarkable to the present purpose; he also shows that the
mind of no Author is to be learnt from one averse to his doctrine: as
that 'tis vain to inquire of Aristotle's Books from one of a different
Sect: Or of Archimedes from Epicurus: the discourse will be as
displeasing as the speaker; and that shall be esteemed absurd, which
comes from one that is envied or despised.
23. A third preparative to our reading should be prayer. The
Scripture as it was dictated at first by the holy Spirit, so must still
owe its effects and influence to its cooperation. The things of God,
the Apostle tells us, are spiritually discerned, 1 Cor. 2.14. And though
the natural man may well enough apprehend the letter, and
grammatical sense of the Word; yet its power and energy, that
insinuative persuasive force whereby it works on hearts, is peculiar
to the spirit; and therefore without his aids, the Scripture whilst it
lies open before our eyes, may still be as a Book that is sealed, Isaiah.
29.11. be as ineffective as if the characters were illegible.
24. Besides our Savior tells us the devil is still busy to steal away the
seed as soon as it is sown, Mat. 13.17. And unless we have some
better guard then our own vigilance, he is sure enough to prosper in
his attempt. Let it therefore be our care to invoke the divine Aid; and
whenever we take the Bible into our hands, to dart up at least a
hearty ejaculation, that we may find its effects in our hearts. Let us
say with holy David, open thou mine eyes O Lord, that I may see the
wondrous things of thy Law. Blessed art thou O Lord, O teach me thy
statutes, Ps. 119. Nay indeed 'twil be fit matter of a daily solemn
devotion, as our Church has made it an annual in the Collect on the
second Sunday in Advent: a prayer so apt and fully expressive of
what we should desire in this particular, that if we transcribe not
only the example, but the very words, I know not how we can form
that part of our devotion more advantageously.
25. In the second place we are to consider what is required of us at
the time of reading the Scripture; which consists principally in two
things. The first of these is attention, which is so indispensably
requisite, that without it all Books are alike, and all equally
insignificant: for he that adverts not to the sense of what he reads,
the wisest discourses signify no more to him, then the most exquisite
music do's to a man perfectly deaf. The letters and syllables of the
Bible are no more sacred than those of another Book; 'tis the sense
and meaning only that is divinely inspired: and he that considers
only the former, may as well entertain himself with a spelling-book.
26. We must therefore keep our minds fixed and attent to what we
read: 'tis a folly and lightness not to do so in human Authors; but 'tis
a sin and danger not to do so in this divine Book. We know there can
scarce be a greater instance of contempt and disvalue, then to hear a
man speak, and not at all mind what he says: yet this vilest affront do
all those put upon God, who hear or read his Word, and give it no
attention. Yet I fear the practice is not more impious than it is
frequent: for there are many that read the Bible, who if at the end of
each Chapter they should be called to account, I doubt they could
produce very slender collections: and truly 'tis a sad consideration,
that that sacred Book is read most attentively by those, who read it as
some preach the Gospel, Phil. 1.15. out of envy and strife. How
curiously do men inspect, nay ransack and embowel a Text to find a
pretense for cavil and objection, whilst men who profess to look
there for life and salvation, read with such a reckless heedlessness, as
if it could tell them nothing they were concerned in: and to such 'tis
no wonder if their reading bring no advantage, God is not in this
sense found of those that seek him not, Isaiah. 65.1. 'tis Satan's part
to serve himself of the bare words and characters of holy Writ, for
charms and amulets: the virtue God has put there consists in the
sense and meaning, and can never be drawn out by drowsy
inadverting Readers.
27. This unattentiveness fore-stalls all possibility of good. How shall
that convince the understanding, or persuade the affections, which
do's not so much as enter the imagination. So that in this case the
seed seems more cast away then in any of those instances the parable
gives, Mat. 13. In those it still fell upon the soil, but in this it never
reaches that; but is scattered and dissipated, as with a mighty wind,
by those thoughts which have prepossessed the mind. Let no man
therefore take this sacred Book into his hand, till he have turned out
all distracting fancies, and have his faculties free and vacant for those
better objects which will there present themselves. And when he has
so disposed himself for attention, then let him contrive to improve
that attention to the best advantage.
28. To which purpose it may be very conducive to put it into some
order and method. As for instance, when he reads the doctrinal part
of Scripture, let him first and principally advert to those plain Texts
which contain the necessary points of Faith: that he may not owe his
Creed only to his education, the institution of his Parents or Tutors;
but may know the true foundation on which it is bottomed, viz. the
word of God, and may thence be able to justify his Faith: and as Saint
Peter exhorts, be ready to give an answer to every man that asks him
a reason of the hope that is in him, 1 Pet. 3.15. For want of this it is,
that Religion sits so loose upon men, that every wind of doctrine
blows them into distinct and various forms; till at last their
Christianity itself vapors away and disappears.
29. But let men be careful thus to secure the foundation, and then
'twill be commendable in them (who are capable of it) to aspire to
higher degrees of speculation: yet even in these it will be their safest
course chiefly to pursue such as have the most immediate influence
on practice, and be more industrious to make observations of that
sort, then curious and critical remarks, or bold conjectures upon
those mysteries on which God has spread a veil.
30. But besides a man's own particular collections, it will be
prudence in him to advantage himself of those of others, and to
consult the learned'st and best expositors; and that not only upon a
present emergency, when he is to dispute a point, (as most do) but in
the constant course of his reading, wherein he will most sedately,
and dispassionately judge of the notions they offer.
31. As to the choice of the portions of Scripture to be read in course,
though I shall not condemn that of reading the whole Bible in order,
yet 'tis apparent that some parts of it (as that of the Levitical Law)
are not so aptly accommodated to our present state, as others are;
and consequently not so edificatory to us: and therefore I cannot see
why any man should oblige himself to an equal frequency in reading
them. And to this our Church seems to give her suffrage; by
excluding such out of her public Lessons. And if we govern our
private reading by her measures, it will well express our deference to
her judgment; who has selected some parts of Scripture, not that she
would keep her children in ignorance of any, but because they tend
most immediately to practice.
32. Neither will the daily reading the Scripture in the rubrics order,
hinder any man from acquainting himself with the rest. For he may
take in the other parts as supernumeraries to his constant task, and
read them as his leisure and inclination shall prompt. So that all the
hurt that can accrue to him by this method, is the being invited to
read sometimes extraordinary proportions.
33. If it be objected, that to those who daily hear the Church Service,
'twill be a kind of tautology, first to read those Lessons in private,
which soon after they shall hear read publicly, I answer that
whatever men may please to call it, 'twill really be an advantage: For
he that shall read a chapter by himself with due consideration, and
consulting of good Paraphrasts, will have dived so far into the sense
of it, that he will much better comprehend it when he hears it read:
as on the other side, the hearing it read so immediately after will
serve to confirm and rivet the sense in his mind. The one is as the
conning, the other the repeating the Lesson; which every School-boy
can tell us is best done at the nearest distance to each other. But I
shall not contend for this, or any particular method; let the
Scriptures be read in proportion to every man's leisure and capacity,
and read with attention; and we need not be scrupulous about
circumstances, when the main duty is secured.
34. But as in the doctrinal, so in the preceptive part, there is a
caution to be used in our attention. For we are to distinguish
between those temporary precepts that were adapted to particular
times and occasions, and such as are of perpetual obligation. He that
do's not this may bring himself under the Jewish Law, or believe a
necessity of selling all and giving it to the poor because 'twas Christ's
command to the rich man; Mat. 19. or incur other considerable
mischiefs.
35. Thus frequently commands are put in comprehensive indefinite
words, but concern only the Generality to whom the Law is written;
and not those who are entrusted with the vindication of their
contempt. Accordingly 'tis said, thou shalt not kill, Mark. 10.19.
which concerns the private person; but extends not to the Magistrate
in the execution of his office, who is a revenger appointed by God,
and bears not the sword in vain, Rom. 13.4. So the injunction not to
swear at all, Mat. 5.34 refers to the common transactions of life; but
not those solemn occasions where an oath is to give glory to God, and
is the end of all strife, Heb. 6.16. Yet these mistakes at this day
prevail with Anabaptists and Quakers, and bottom their denial of the
Magistrates power to protect his Subjects by war; and to determine
differences in Peace, by the oath of witnesses in judicial proceedings.
36. There is another distinction we are to attend to; and that is
between absolute and primary commands, and secondary ones: the
former we are to set a special remark upon, as those upon whose
observance or violation our eternal life or death inseparably depends.
And therefore our first and most solicitous care must be concerning
them. I mention this, not to divert any from aspiring to the highest
degrees of perfection: but to reprove that preposterous course many
take, who lay the greatest weight upon those things on which God
lays the least; and have more zeal for oblique intimations, then for
express downright commands; nay think by the one to commute for
the contempt of the other. For example, fasting is recommended to
us in Scripture, but in a far lower key then moral duties: rather as an
expedient and help to virtue, then as properly a virtue itself. And yet
we may see men scrupulous in that, who startle not at injustice, and
oppression (that clamorous sin that cries to heaven) who pretend to
mortify their appetites by denying it its proper food, or being
luxurious in one sort of it; and yet glut their avarice, eat up the poor,
and devour widows houses, Mat. 23.
37. To such as these 'twould be good advice to fix their attention on
the absolute commands, to study moral honesty, and the essentials
of Christianity; to make a good progress there, and do what God
indispensably requires: and then it may be seasonable to think of
voluntary oblations: but till then they are so far from homage, that
they are the most reproachful flattery; an attempt to bribe God
against himself; and a sacrilege, like that of Dionysius; who took
away Apollo's golden robe, and gave him a stuff one.
38. The second thing requisite in our reading is application: this is
the proper end of our attention: and without this we may be very
busy to very little purpose. The most laborious attention without it,
puts us but in the condition of those poor slaves that labor in the
mines: who with infinite toil dig that ore of which they shall never
partake. If therefore we will appropriate that rich treasure, we must
apply, and so make it our own.
39. Let us then at every period of holy Writ, reflect and look on
ourselves as the persons spoke to. When we find Philip giving
baptism to the Eunuch upon this condition that he believe with all
his heart, Act. 8. let us consider that unless we do so; our baptism
(like a thing surreptitiously obtained) conveys no title to us; will avail
us nothing.
40. When we read our Savior's denunciation to the Jews, except ye
repent, ye shall all likewise perish; Lu. 13.5. we are to look on it as if
addressed immediately to ourselves; and conclude as great a
necessity of our repentance. In those black catalogues of crimes
which the Apostle mentions, 1 Cor. 6.10. and Gal. 5.19, 20, 21. as
excluding from the Kingdom of heaven, we are to behold our own
guilts arraigned, and to resolve that the same crimes will as certainly
shut heaven gates against us, as those to whom those Epistles were
immediately directed. In all the precepts of good life, and Christian
virtue, we are to think ourselves as nearly and particularly
concerned, as if we had been Christ's Auditors on the Mount. So
proportionably in all the threats and promises we are either to
tremble or hope, according as we find ourselves adhere to those sins
or virtues to which they are affixed.
41. This close application would render what we read operative and
effective, which without it will be useless and insignificant. We may
see an instance of it in David; who was not at all convinced of his
own guilt by Nathan's parable (though the most apposite that was
imaginable) till he roundly applied it, saying, thou art the man: 2
Sam. 12. And unless we treat ourselves at the same rate, the Scripture
may fill our heads with high notions, nay with many speculative
truths, which yet amounts to no more than the Devils theology, Ja.
2.19. and will as little advantage us.
42. It now remains that we speak of what we are to do after our
reading; which may be summed up in two words: Recollect and
practice. Our memories are very frail as to things of this nature. And
therefore we ought to impress them as deep as we can, by reflecting
on what we have read. It is an observation out of the Levitical Law,
that those beasts only were clean, and fit for sacrifice, that chewed
the cud, Lev. 11.4. And though the ceremony were Jewish, the moral
is Christian, and admonishes us how we should revolve and ruminate
on spiritual instructions. Without this what we hear or read slips
insensibly from us, and like letters writ in chalk, is wiped out by the
next succeeding thought: but recollection engraves and indents the
characters in the mind. And he that would duly use it, would find
other manner of impressions; more affective and more lasting, then
bare reading will leave.
43. We find it thus in all Sciences: he that only reads over the rules,
and lays aside the thoughts of them together with his Book, will
make but a slow advance; whilst he that plods and studies upon
them, repeats and reinforces them upon his mind, soon arrives to an
eminency. By this it was that David attained to that perfection in
God's Law as to out-strip his teachers, and understand more than the
Ancients, Psal. 119.99, 100. because it was his meditation as himself
tell us, ver. 97.99.
44. Let us therefore pursue the same method; and when we have
read a portion of Scripture, let us recollect what observable things we
have there met with: what exhortations to virtue, or determents from
vice; what promises to obedience, or menaces for the contrary: what
examples of God's vengeance against such or such sins, or what
instances of his blessing upon duties. If we do this daily, we cannot
but amass together a great stock of Scripture documents, which will
be ready for us to produce upon every occasion. Satan can assault us
nowhere, but we shall be provided of a guard, a Scriptum est; which
we see was the sole armor the captain of our salvation used in his
encounter with him, Mat. 4. ver. 4.7. and 10. and will be as successful
to us, if we will duly manage it.
45. The last thing required as consequent to our reading, is practice.
This is the ultimate end, to which all the fore-going qualifications are
directed. And if we fail here, the most assiduous diligence in all the
former will be but lost labor. Let us mean never so well, attend never
so close, recollect never so exactly; if after all we do not practice, all
the rest will serve but to enhance our guilt. Christianity is an active
Science, and the Bible was given us not merely for a theme of
speculation, but for a rule of life.
46. And alas, what will it avail us that our opinions are right, if our
manners be crooked? When the Scripture has showed us what God
requires of us, nay, has evinced to us the reasonableness of the
injunctions, the great agreeableness which they have to the
excellency of our nature: and has backed this with the assurance that
in keeping of them there shall be a great reward, Ps. 19.11. if in the
midst of such importunate invitations to life we will choose death; we
are indeed worthy, as the wise man speaks, to take part with it, Wis.
1.16. our crimes are hereby increased to a monstrous bulk, and also
deprived of that veil and shelter which darkness and ignorance
would have given them. And a vicious Christian may have cause at
the last day to wish that he had studied the Alcoran rather than the
Bible. His sensualities might then have pleaded, that they were but
the anticipating his Paradise, taking up that beforehand, which his
Religion proposed to him as his summum bonum, his final and
highest aim. But with what confusion must a Christian then appear,
whose institution obliges him to mortify the flesh: and yet has made
it the business of his life, not only to satisfy, but even to enrage, and
enflame its appetites? that has set up a counter-discipline to that of
the Gospel he professes; and when that requires austerities and selfdenials, to reduce corrupt nature to a tameness and subjection; has
not only pulled off the bridle, but used the spur; contrived Arts to
debauch even corruption itself; and has forced his relucting nature
upon studied and artificial lewdness? Such men may be thought to
have read the Scripture with no other design but to be sure to run
counter to it; that by informing themselves of God's will, they may
know the more exactly how to affront and contradict it.
47. Nay, so it is, too many unto malice add contempt; are not content
only sullenly to resist its Precepts, but despise and revile them also;
arraign the wisdom of God, and pronounce the divine Laws to be
weak and impertinent; lay their Scenes of ridiculous mirth in the
Bible; rally in the sacred Dialect, and play the Buffoons with the most
serious thing in the world. An impious licentiousness which is now
grown to that height, that it is one of the wonders of God's
longsuffering, that there are not as many eminent instances of the
vengeance, as there are of the guilt. I have formerly complained of it,
and must still crave leave to do so. It is indeed so spreading an
infection, that we can never be sufficiently armed against it. Som
degrees of it have tainted many who have not utterly renounced their
reverence for the Bible: there being those who in their solemn moods
own it as God's word, and profess they must finally stand or fall by its
verdict; who yet in their jocular humors make light and irreverent
applications of its phrases and sentences, furnish out their little jests
in its attire, and use it as if they thought it good for nothing else.
48. And certainly this abuse in men that own the Bible, is infinitely
more monstrous then in those who defy it: the later look on it as a
common thing, and use it as such: but for those who confess it
sacred, thus to prostitute it, is a flat contradiction as much against
the rules of Discourse as Religion: 'tis to offer the same abuse to
Christ in his Word, which the rude soldiers did to his person; to bow
the knee before it, and yet expose it as an object of scorn and
laughter. But sure there cannot be two things more inconsistent,
then the avowing it to be dictated by God in order to the most
important concern of man, and yet debase it to the vilest purposes;
make it the drudge and hackney to our sportful humors, and bring it
out as the Philistines did Samson, only to make us merry, Jud. 16.25.
49. Indeed one would wonder how that should become a proper
instrument for that purpose, that those doctrines of righteousness,
temperance and judgment to come (everywhere scattered through
that Book) which set heathen Felix a trembling, should set Christians
a laughing: and yet should men cite the same things and phrases out
of another Author, there would be no jest in it. It seems therefore
that the spirit and essence of this sort of wit lies in the profaneness.
How absurd is it then for men that do not utterly abjure Religion, to
affect this impious sort of raillery, which has nothing but daring
wickedness to recommend it? For certainly, of all the ways of
discourse that ever pretended to wit, this has the least claim to it.
50. What strength of reason, or height of fancy is there, in repeating
of phrases and fragments of Books, when what they would say, they
might much more properly express in their own words? In any other
instance but this of the Bible, it would pass rather for a defect then
an excess of wit. But that which I suppose renders it so taking, is,
that it is the cheapest expedient for men to arrive to that reputation.
Men that cannot go to the cost of anything that is truly ingenious,
can by this means immediately commence wits; if they can but
charge their memories with half a dozen Texts, they need no other
furniture for the trade: these mangled and transposed, will be ready
at all turns, and render them applauded by those who have no other
measure of wit, but its opposition to Piety. But would God, men
would look a little before them, and consider what the final
reckoning will be for such divertissements; and if the whole world be
an unequal exchange for a soul, what a miserable Merchant is he that
barters his for a bald insipid jest? such as a sober man would avoid
were there no sin in it.
51. I know men are apt to flatter themselves, that these lighter frolics
will pass for nothing, so long as they do not seriously and maliciously
oppose God's word: but I fear they will find God in earnest, though
they be in jest. He that has magnified his Word above all things, Psal.
138.2. cannot brook that we should make it vile and cheap, play and
dally with it. And if it were a capital crime to convert any of the
perfume of the Sanctuary to common use, Ex. 30.32. can we think
God can be pleased to see his more sacred Word, the theme of our
giddy mirth, and have his own words echoed to him in profane
drollery?
52. But besides 'tis to be considered that this wanton liberty is a step
to the more solemn and deliberate contempt of God's word: custom
do's strangely prescribe to us; and he that a while has used anything
irreverently, will at last bring his practice into argument, and
conclude that there is no reverence due to it. God knows we are
naturally too apt to slight and easy apprehensions of sacred things;
and had need to use all Arts and Instruments to impress an awe upon
our minds.
53. It will sure then be very unsafe for us to trifle with them, and by
so undue a familiarity draw on that contempt which we should make
it our care to avoid. The wise man says, he that contemns small
things, shall fall by little and little, Eccl. 19.1. And though no degree
of irreverence towards God or his Word, can be called a small thing
absolutely considered, yet comparatively with the more exorbitant
degrees it may: and yet that smaller is the seed and parent of the
greatest. It is so in all sins; the kingdom of Satan, like that of God,
may be compared to a grain of mustard seed, Mat. 13.31. which
though little in itself, is mighty in its increase.
54. No man ever yet began at the top of villainy, but the advance is
still gradual from one degree to another; each commission
smoothing and glibbing the way to the next. He that accustoms in his
ordinary discourse, to use the sacred Name of God with as little
sentiment and reverence, as he do's that of his neighbor or servant;
that makes it his common by-word, and cries Lord and God upon
every the lightest occasion of exclamation or wonder, this man has a
very short step to the using it in oaths, and upon all frivolous
occasions; and he that swears vainly, is at no great distance from
swearing falsely. It is the same in this instance of the Scriptures: He
that indulges his wit to rally with them, will soon come to think them
such tame things that he may down-right scorn them: And when he
is arrived to that, then he must pick quarrels to justify it, till at last he
arrive even to the height of enmity.
55. Let every man therefore take heed of setting so much as one step
in this fatal circle; guard himself against the first insinuation of this
guilt: and when a jest offers itself as a temptation, let him balance
that with a sober thought, and consider whether the jest can quit the
cost of the profanation. Let him possess his mind with a habitual
awe, take up the Bible with solemner thoughts, and other kind of
apprehensions then any human Author: and if he habituate himself
to this reverence, every clause and phrase of it that occurs to his
mind, will be apter to excite him to devout ejaculations then vain
laughter.
56. It is reported of our excellent Prince, King Edward the sixth; that
when in his Council Chamber, a Paper that was called for happened
to lie out of reach, and the Person concerned to produce it, took a
Bible that lay by, and standing upon it reached down the Paper: the
King observing what was don, ran himself to the place, and taking
the Bible in his hands, kissed it, and laid it up again. Of this it were a
very desirable moral, that Princes, and all persons in authority,
would take care not to permit any to raise themselves by either a
hypocritical or profane trampling upon holy things. But besides that,
a more general application offers its self; that all men of what
condition soever, should both themselves abstain from every action
that has the appearance of a contempt of the holy Scripture; and also
when they observe it in others, discountenance the insolence: and by
their words and actions give Testimony of the veneration which they
have for that holy Book, they see others so wretchedly despise.
57. But above all let him who reads the Scripture seriously, set
himself to the practice of it, and daily examine how he proceeds in it:
he that diligently do's this, will not be much at leisure to sport with
it: he will scarce meet with a Text which will not give him cause of
reflection, and provide him work within his own breast: every duty
enjoined will prompt him to examine how he has performed; every
sin forbid, will call him to recollect how guilty he has been, every
pathetic strain of devotion will kindle his zeal, or at least upbraid his
coldness: every heroic example will excite his emulation. In a word,
every part of Scripture will, if duly applied, contribute to some good
and excellent end. And when a thing is proper for such noble
purposes, can it be the part of a wise man to apply it only to mean
and trivial? Would any but an Idiot waste that Sovereign Liquor in
the washing of his feet, which was given him to expel poison from his
heart? And are not we guilty of the like folly when we apply God's
word to serve only a ludicrous humor: and make ourselves merry
with that which was designed for the most serious and most
important purpose; the salvation of our souls. And indeed whoever
takes any lower aim then that, and the virtues preparatory to it in his
study of Scripture, extremely debases it.
58. Let us therefore keep a steady eye upon that mark, and press
towards it as the Apostle did; Phil. 3.14. walk by that rule the holy
Scripture proposes; faithfully and diligently observe its precepts, that
we may finally partake its promises. To this end continually pray we
in the words of our holy mother the Church unto Almighty God, who
has caused all holy Scripture to be written for our learning; that we
may in such wise hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest
them, that by patience and comfort of his holy Word, we may
embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting Life,
which he has given in our Savior Jesus Christ.
FINIS.
|
|
