canonical books. as being of infinite number, and mere dependance on the Bafil, in his 2d tome, writing of true faith, tells his auditors, he is bound to teach them that which he hath learned out of the Bible: and in the fame treatise he faith, "that feeing the commandments of the Lord are faithful, and fure for ever, it is a plain falling from the faith, and a high pride, either to make void any thing therein, or to introduce any thing not there to be found:" and he gives the reafon, "for Chrift faith, My fheep hear my voice, they will not follow another, but fly from him, because they know not his voice." But not to be endless in quotations, it may chance to be objected, that there be many opinions in the fathers which have no ground in fcripture; fo much the lefs, may I say, fhould we follow them, for their own words fhall condemn them, and acquit us that lean not on them; otherwise these their words will acquit them, and condemn us. But it will be replied, the fcriptures are difficult to be underflood, and therefore require the explanation of the fathers. It is true, there be fome books, and especially fome places in those books, that remain clouded; yet ever that which is moft neceffary to be known is most easy; and that which is most difficult, fo far expounds itself ever, as to tell us how little it imports our faving knowledge. Hence, to infer a general obfcurity over all the text, is a mere fuggeftion of the devil to diffuade men from reading it, and cafts an afperfion of dishonour both upon the mercy, truth, and wifdom of God. We count it no gentleness, or fair dealing in a man of power amongst us, to require ftrict and punctual obedience, and yet give out all his commands ambiguous and obfcure, we should think he had a plot upon us; certainly fuch commands were no commands, but fnares. The very effence of truth is plainnefs and brightness, the darkness and crookedness is our own. The wifdom of God created understanding, fit and proportionable to truth, the object and end of it, as the eye to the thing visible. If our understanding have a film of ignorance over it, or be blear with gazing on other falfe glifterings, what is that to truth? If we will but purge with fovereign eyefalve that intellectual ray which God hath planted in us, then we would would believe the scriptures protesting their own plainness and perfpicuity, calling to them to be inftructed, not only the wife and learned, but the fimple, the poor, the babes, foretelling an extraordinary effufion of God's spirit upon every age and fex, attributing to all men, and requiring from them the ability of fearching, trying, examining all things, and by the fpirit difcerning that which is good; and as the fcriptures themfelves pronounce their own plainness, fo do the fathers teftify of them. I will not run into a paroxyfm of citations again in this point, only inftance Athanafius in his forementioned first page: "The knowledge of truth," faith he, "wants no human lore, as being evident in itself, and by the preaching of Chrift now opens brighter than the fun." If thefe doctors, who had fcarce half the light that we enjoy, who all, except two or three, were ignorant of the Hebrew tongue, and many of the Greek, blundering upon the dangerous and fufpectful tranflations of the apoftate Aquila, the heretical Theodotion, the judaized Symmachus, the erroneous Origen; if these could yet find the Bible fo easy, why fhould we doubt, that have all the helps of learning, and faithful induftry that man in this life can look for, and the affiftance of God as near now to us as ever? But let the fcriptures be hard; are they more hard, more crabbed, more abftrufe than the fathers? He that cannot understand the fober, plain, and unaffected ftyle of the fcriptures, will be ten times more puzzled with the knotty Africanisms, the pampered metaphors, the intricate and involved fentences of the fathers, befides the fantaftic and declamatory flashes, the crossjingling periods, which cannot but difturb, and come thwart a fettled devotion, worfe than the din of bells and rattles. Now, fir, for the love of holy Reformation, what can be faid more against thefe importunate clients of antiquity than the herself their patronefs hath faid? Whether, think ye, would the approve ftill to doat upon immeafurable, innumerable,and therefore unneceffary and unmerciful volumes, choofing rather to err with the fpccious name of the fathers, or to take a found truth at the hand of a plain upright man, that all his days hath been diligently reading the holy fcriptures, fcriptures, and thereto imploring God's grace, while the admirers of antiquity have been beating their brains about their ambones, their dyptichs, and meniaias? Now, he that cannot tell of ftations and indictions, nor has wafted his precious hours in the endless conferring of councils and conclaves that demolish one another, (although I know many of thofe that pretend to be great rabbies in these ftudies, have scarce faluted them from the ftrings, and the titlepage; or to give them more, have been but the ferrets and moufehunts of an index :) yet what paftor or minifter, how learned, religious, or difcrete foever, does not now bring both his cheeks full blown with œcumenical and fynodical, fhall be counted a lank, fhallow, infufficient man, yea a dunce, and not worthy to speak about reformation of church-difcipline. But I truft they for whom God hath reserved the honour of reforming this church, will eafily perceive their adverfaries' drift in thus calling for antiquity: they fear the plain field of the fcriptures; the chafe is too hot; they feek the dark, the bushy, the tangled foreft, they would imbosk: they feel themselves ftrook in the transparent ftreams of divine truth; they would plunge, and tumble, and think to lie hid in the foul weeds and muddy waters, where no plummet can reach the bottom. But let them beat themselves like whales, and spend their oil till they be dragged afhore: though wherefore fhould the miniters give them so much line for shifts and delays? wherefore fhould they not urge only the gospel, and hold it ever in their faces like a mirror of diamond, till it dazzle and pierce their mifty eyeballs? maintaining it the honour of its abfolute fufficiency and fupremacy inviolable: for if the fcripture be for reformation, and antiquity to boot, it is but an advantage to the dozen, it is no winning caft: and though antiquity be against it, while the scriptures be for it, the cause is as good as ought to be wifhed, antiquity itself fitting judge. But to draw to an end; the fecond fort of those that may be juftly numbered among the hinderers of reformation, are libertines; thefe fuggeft that the discipline fought would be intolerable for one bishop now in a diocese, we should then have a pope in every parish. It will not be requifite requifite to answer these men, but only to discover them for reason they have none, but luft and licentiousness, and therefore answer can have none. It is not any discipline that they could live under, it is the corruption and remissnefs of difcipline that they feek. Epifcopacy duly executed, yea, the turkish and jewish rigour against whoring and drinking; the dear and tender difcipline of a father, the fociable and loving reproof of a brother, the bofom admonition of a friend, is a prefbytery, and a confiftory to them. It is only the merry friar in Chaucer can difple* them. Full sweetly heard he confeffion, He was an eafy man to give penance. And fo I leave them; and refer the political difcourfe of episcopacy to a second book. * A contraction of disciple. OF REFORMATION IN ENGLAND. THE SECOND BOOK. SIR, Ir is a work good and prudent to be able to guide one man; of larger extended virtue to order well one houfe: but to govern a nation piously and juftly, which only is to fay happily, is for a fpirit of the greateft fize, and divineft mettle. And certainly of no less a mind, nor of lefs excellence in another way, were they who by writing laid the folid and true foundations of this science, which being of greatest importance to the life of man, yet there is no art that hath been more cankered in her principles, more foiled, and flubbered with aphorifming pedantry, than the art of policy; and that moft, where a man would think fhould leaft be, in chriftian commonwealths. They teach not, that to govern well, is to train up a nation in true wisdom and virtue, and that which springs from thence, magnanimity (take heed of that), and that which is our beginning, regeneration, and happieft end, likeness to God, which in one word we call godliness; and that this is the true flourishing of a land, other things follow as the fhadow does the fubftance; to teach thus were mere pulpitry to them. This is the masterpiece of a modern politician, how to qualify and mould the fufferance and fubjection of the people to the length of that foot that is to tread on their necks; how rapine may ferve itself with the fair and honourable pretences of public good; how the puny law may be brought under the |