CHAP. I. The first point of Faith is to believe there is a God. 7 than hath been said, to believe there is a God; otherwise we must believe not only in God the Father, in Christ the Son, and in the Holy Ghost, but in the catholic church, in the communion of saints, in the forgiveness of sins, and in the resurrection of the body, and in life everlasting, seeing the Greek particle (usually expressed by the Latin in) is annexed after the same manner to all these objects of our belief, as is apparent in the ancient Greek Creeds. And he that diligently reads the translation of the Septuagint shall find the Greek phrase, which is verbatim rendered by the Latin in Deum credere, "to believe in God," promiscuously used for the other, credere Deo, "to believe God." 2. Or if, besides the evident records of the ancient copies, personal witnesses be required, amongst the ancient I know few, amongst modern writers none, more competent than those which are expressly for us, as Beza, Mercera, Drusius, unto whom we may add Ribera and Lorinus. Now as to use the benefit of a truth known and testified is always lawful, so in this case it is to us most expedient, almost necessary. For either I did not rightly apprehend whiles I read it, or at least now remember not, how the schoolman removes the stumblingblock which he had placed in the very entry to this Creed-If to believe in God be as much as to put trust or confidence in him, by exacting a profession of this Creed at all men's mouths we shall en-839 force a great many to profess a lie: for of such as not only out of ordinary charity, but upon particular probabilities, we may safely acquit from actual atheism a Com. in Gen. xv. 6: vide 2 Reg. xvii. 14. b Observationum, lib. 3. c. I. The position prefixed by way of title to his chapter is, Recte dici ex Hebraismo, [credos in Mo sem, et in resurrectionem mor- c Ribera in cap. 3. Iona, or contradicting infidelity, a great number do not put their trust or confidence in God: this being the mark whereat the belief of novices must aim, not the first step they are to make in this progress. And for myself, (until I be better instructed,) if a poor dejected soul should come unto me with a complaint of his distrust or diffidence, I would not instantly urge him to make proclamation of his trust in God against his conscience; for this were to quench smoking flax, by violent blowing those weak and smothered sparkles, which should be charily revived by mild and gentle breathing. The contrary advice on my part, or practice on his, should not want an approved pattern; to confess his present unbelief, whiles he prays for future increase of such weak belief, as he may safely make profession of. And as the fire, once throughly kindled, bursts out of its own accord into a lasting flame; so belief, once inwardly planted, will naturally bring forth steadfast confidence, without further plantation or superaddition of any new belief or persuasion. Many beginning their faith the other way, may for a long time be stiffly persuaded that they believe in God, when indeed they do not truly believe him, his word, or his mercies. These no man firmly can believe but he shall assuredly believe in him, yea, put his whole trust and confidence in his goodness. Howbeit, as much as now I write would hardly be permitted me, in most men's hearing, to speak, without this or the like interpellation-Shall we then believe in saints, or good angels, because we assuredly believe there be such natures? or shall we say the wicked angels believe in God, because they believe his being more firmly than we can do, and know his word as clearly? 3. That inferior subjects salute not every officer in the court after the same manner they do the prince, is not because they see not the one as perfectly as the other; rather, the more fully they discern them by one and the same unerring sight, the better they conceive the different respect which is due to their several presences. Angels we believe are ministering spirits, appointed to execute God's will, whose majesty they adore as fervently as we do; putting greater confidence in his mercy than we can do, even because their knowledge of it is more clear, their experience of it more undoubted. But the better we believe this their subordination unto God, the less shall we be inclined to believe in them, the more to put our confidence in God, in whom even the angels trust. Again, admitting trust or affiance in God to receive continual increase, according to the growth of our belief of his word or being; that devils, albeit they believe or know both more clearly than the best of us, should notwithstanding perpetually remain without any trust or affiance in him or his mercies, no man, upon just examination of the difference between their collapsed estate and ours, can deem strange or doubtful, much less a doubt, as some in their writings suppose, insoluble, unless we make trust or affiance in God essentially to difference our belief of his being from theirs. If the king's majesty should proclaim a general pardon to a number of known rebels, and vow execution of judgment without mercy upon some principal offenders which had maliciously and cunningly seduced their simplicity, I suppose his will and pleasure equally manifested to both, and so believed, would as much dishearten the one as encourage the other to rely upon his clemency. 840 Such altogether, notwithstanding, is the case of men and wicked angels: the one believes Christ took the woman's seed, and therefore cannot, without such wilful mistrust of the promise of life as was in his first parents unto God's threats of death, despair of redemption by the eternal sacrifice: the other as firmly believe, or rather evidently know, that Christ in no wise took the angelical nature, and without this ground, the better they believe his incarnation, the less are their hopes of their own redemption. 4. Briefly, the bringing of souls to God being the end, as of our preaching, so of our writing; the first point, as I conceive, we are to teach such as desire to come unto him, is, to believe that he is; the second, that he is a rewarder of all them that diligently seek him. Not all the eloquence of men or angels, not the most pathetical exhortations the one can frame, or the most forcible impulsions the other can use, are half so powerful to draw our hearts after our God, as the distinct orthodoxal explication of his essence and attributes, of his power, his wisdom, and goodness, either general in respect of all the works of his hands, or peculiar to mankind, visibly set forth unto us in the life, the actions, and passions of our Saviour. What belief soever is not conceived from sober and frequent meditations of these truths, what confidence soever is not brought forth by belief so conceived, will by Satan one time or other easily be impeached of bastardy. Even when this faith by which we now walk shall be converted into perfect sight, everlasting confidence shall not outstart, but rather follow it. Much less should we, in this vale of darkness, begin our edification in faith at the open profession of assured or consummate confidence, or seek to frame it by imitation of such outward practices, as strength of faith and full assurance of God's favours, have emboldened hearts thoroughly inflamed with sincere zeal of truth, to undertake. The truth then supposed, as chief supporter to the discourse following, is, that without some prece CHAP. II. Disputation is not the Way to reclaim an Atheist. 11 dent defect of our apprehensions, there can be no want of true confidence and fail we may, as most do, in apprehensions either of the verity, unity, or of the nature and attributes of the Godhead. The internal original, or manner of our defects or errors in these three points, we are to set down in this book; the right explication of the article proposed in the next. CHAP. II. Disputation is not the readiest Way to cure or reclaim an Atheist. To dispute with such as deny manifest and received principles, were to violate a fundamental law of the schools; which in matters of faith and sacred morality is to be religiously kept, as in other respects, so chiefly in this; that general maxims, whence particular truths and conclusions of best use must be derived, can hardly be proved by arguments more clear and evident than themselves. Now to interpose proofs of less truth or perspicuity than is the matter to be proved, is but to eclipse the evidence of it, (which of itself would in due season shine to calm and purified meditations,) or to provoke such as delight in trying masteries of strength or skill in arguing, to assault truths otherwise safe enough from all attempts, did they not see them so weakly guarded upon preparation. Thus the discovery of timorous looks or mean provision often encourageth 841 base and cowardly thieves to encounter passengers, whose number or presence they durst not behold, if they did not betray themselves. For this reason, amongst others, I will not in the first place use the benefit of divers schoolmen's labours, to prove, by strength of speculative reason, there is a God; although they bring abundance of reasons, all irrefragable to an ingenuous, well-disposed contemplator: but unto such |