图书图片
PDF
ePub

Luke xii. 57.

their own Judgment, and faid unto them, Tea, and why even of your own felves judge ye not what is Right? And, John x. 37. if I do not the Works of my Father, believe me not. Was not this Appealing to their Judgment, whether He did the Works of His Father, or not? And as many as followed their own Judgment they believed on Him: But they who were tyed up Implicitly to the Authority of the Church, they rejected Him, they faid, Have any

John vii. 48. of the Rulers, or of the Pharifees be

lieved on Him? But this People who knoweth not the Law are Curfed.

L. If a Man durft difpute the Methods of Providence, it would feem ftrange that God did not order it fo, as that the Church fhould have first known their Mefiab when He came, and have declared Him to the People, and then they all would have Believed on Him.

G. The Apostle fays, That the foolishness of God is wifer than Men. And he 1 Cor. i. 25. gives the Reafon in the Words following, why God chose the foolish things of the World to confound the Wife, that no Fiefh fhould Glory in his Prefence, but he that Glorieth, let him Glory in the Lord. And he applieth this to the Cafe we are upon, to the Revelation of Jefus Chrift when he came. For if he had been Received upon the Declaration and Authority of the Church, We had Gloried in the Church, whose Authori

ty,

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

ty would have been Prior and Superior to that of Christ himself, as being the Ground upon which we believed Him. But as the Sun cannot be feen but by his own Light, fo God and Chrift cannot otherwise be known; no Adventitious or Borrowed Light can fhew the Original Light whence all leffer Lights are deriv'd, which, like the Moon and Stars, Disappear at the Prefence of the Sun. So the Church difappeared at the Prefence of Chrift, who was known by His own Light only, We beheld his Glory, the Glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of Grace and Truth. Here was no going to the Church to know which was He? Or if you had, fhe would have mifled you. It would have been like going to the Moon to ask where the Sun was. The Church is the Moon, and the Stars are the particular Bifhops and Doctors, and other Eminent Men; But Chrift is the Sun of Righteousness, and He will not give His Glory to another.

John i. 14.

L. But few believed Chrift when He came, or in all His Life, for it is faid, that He was to the Jews a Stumbling-Block, and to the Greeks foolishness.

I Cor. i. 23.

G. The Stumbling-block to the Jews was the Authority of their Church against Him, as I have fhewed. And the Greeks, that is, the Gentiles, could not till after the Refurrection of Christ have any Notion of the Oeconomy of our Redemption by Him. Nor was He preached unto them till after the

Vifion of the Sheet to St. Peter A&. x. For the Gospel was to be preached to the Jews first, but when they Rejected it, leaning upon the Infallibility of their Church, then

A&t. xiii.46. it was fent to the Gentiles. Who being free from that Stumbling-Block of the Church, received it readily, and now make up the whole Body of the Chriftian Church throughout the World.

And this teaches us another thing, that is, That an Infallible Guide (fuppofing fuch a one) would not be an Infallible Affurance to us, unless we were Infallible too: For befides our not knowing Him, or mistaking another for Him, for there has been Falfe Chrifts, We might Mifunderstand his Doctrine, and turn it to quite contrary Purposes from what He intended. This was the Cafe in our Saviour's Time. He was a Guide truly Infallible, and yet how few followed Him, notwithftanding all His Miracles and Heavenly DoErine? Therefore while we are Fallible our felves, and lyable to Errors, and Mistakes, in vain do we Grope after an Infallible Affurance, otherwise than the Evidence of things makes them Plain to that Reafon which God has given us.

The Angels of Heaven fell: Adam fell from his Innocency. And the Seven Bishops who were the Seven Stars in the Right Rev. i. 20. Hand of Christ, and the Seven Golden Candlesticks, the Seven Churches in the midst of which He walked, these all are

Fallen;

Fallen; and what are We that we expect Infallibility? What Bishop, what Church now is lo Infallibly Seated as thefe beloved Seven were? What Church has a Promife of being Exempted from that General Defection which is foretold will be before the Second Coming of Christ, when He shall not find Faith upon the Earth? Or may we not rather think, that the Plea of Infallibility in the Church of Rome (fo many ways Detected) which hides Repentance from her Eyes, and hinders her to Return from any of her Errors, which by this means continually Flow without any Ebbing on any Side, I fay, May we not think this always Increasing Cor ruption the chief Cause to bring on that Univerfal Defection in the latter times? Does it not seem to haften apace, to be even at the Doors, when we fee no Abfurdity fo Great, no Text of Scripture fo Full and Express, to be too hard for this Infallibility? Not the Denying of all our outward Senfes at once, and owning that we neither See, Hear, Feel, Tafte, nor Smell! Not the exprefs Inftitution of the Lord's Supper in both Kinds, to which the Council of Conftance claps a Non Obftante, and takes away the Cup from the Laity! Not the Authority and Strong Reafoning of the Apoftles, 1 Cor. xiv. against Publick Prayer in an Unknown Tongue! All these are OverRuled by Infallibility! And many more we have to Inftance in the particular Doctrines in Dispute with the Church of Rome: In G

all

all which, by Vertue of her Unlimited and Infallible Power of Interpretation, the leaves no Text of Scripture of any Meaning, other than fhe thinks fit to put upon them, let the Words be never fo Exprefs. And this indeed is no other than taking the Scriptures wholly from us, while we must not Read them with our own Understanding. And the Refult of this, is, That the whole Foundation of our Faith is in the Church of Rome, without Scripture or any thing else, because the Scripture and every thing elfe is put Abfolutely and Implicitly in her Power. And yet no Man alive knows what this Church of Rome is, or where to be found? I mean that Church of Rome to which the Infallibility is annexed. For if you travel to Rome, you will fee nothing there but what, by a Modern Diftinction, you call the Court of Rome. Where then is this Infallible Church of Rome ? Some place it in the Pope alone, as the only Heir of St. Peter, and Living Judge of Controverfy, and therefore above all Councils, and the whole Body of the Church put together: Others like not this, and because some Popes have proved Heretical, and have been Cenfured and Depofed for it; and others of them have proved moft Wicked and Flagitious Men, who befides the Viciousness of their own Lives, have filled the World with Blood, Rebellions, and Ufurpations, in pursuance of the Depofing Power they have aflumed over Princes; for these and other Reasons, they

Would

« 上一页继续 »