It is said of Valentinian, that when the rude Scythians made an incursion into the territories of the Roman empire, he so overstrained his lungs, in calling upon his troops, that he presently died: so vehement must we be, when any main thing is in question: neither voice nor life must be spared, in the cause of the Almighty. The gloss, that is putt upon the Act of Innocent the IVth., in the Council of Lyons, who graced the dignity of Cardinalship with a Red Hat, is, that it was done with an intention, as Martinus Polonus construes it, to signify they should be ready to shed their blood for Christ and his Gospel, might well fit every Christian; perhaps, somewhat better, than those delicate mates of princes. Whom should we imitate, but him, whose name we bear; who fulfilled that of the Psalmist, his type, The zeal of thine house haik even caten me up? Ps. Ixix. 9. John ii. 17. We must be zealous: we must not be furious. It is in matter of religion, as with the tending of a still: if we put in too much fire, it burns; if too little, it works not: a middle temper must be kept. A heat there must be, but a moderate one. We may not be in our profession, like a drowzy judge upon a Grecian Bench, who is fain to bite upon beans, to keep himself from sleeping: neither may we be like that Grecian player, who acted mad Ajax, upon the stage: but we must be soberly fervent, and discreetly active. St. Paul's spirit was stirred within him, at Athens, to see the idol-altars amongst those learned philosophers; and it breaks out of his mouth, in a grave reproof: I do not see him put his hand furiously to demolish them. And if a Juventius and Maximinian, in the heat of zeal, shall rail on wicked Julian at a feast, he justly casts their death, not upon their religion, but their petulancys. It was a well-made decree in the Council of Eliberis, that if any man did take upon him to break down the idols of the heathen, and were slain in the place, he should not be reckoned amongst the martyrs. There must be, then, two moderators of our zeal; Discretion and Charity; without either and both of which, it is no other than a wild distemper; and, with them, it is no less than the very life blood of a Christian, or the spirits of that blood. From the common acts of both these, joined together, shall result these following maxims, as so many useful Rules of our Christian Moderation. * Suid. v. Alas. † Bin. in vitâ Innocentii. † Suid. v. καμότρων. Theodor. I. iii. cap. 15. || Concil. Eliber. c. 60. Miles q. præsidiarius Rom. Felem, quam Ægyptii colebant ut Deum, interfecit: hinc tantus exortus tumultus, ut 7000 militum præsidiariorum trucidati sint. Melanct. Postill. Fer. ii. post Advent. ex Diodoro Sic. RULES FOR MODERATION IN JUDGMENT. RULE I TO DISTINGUISH OF PERSONS. THE first is, that we must necessarily distinguish betwixt persons, that are guilty of errors: for, as St. Austin well, it is one thing, to bear heretics; another thing, to be misled by a heretic: and, I may well add, according to our construction, it is one thing, to be a heretic; another thing, to be a hæresiarch. Those, These three degrees there are, even in the most dangerous errors of doctrine. There is a broacher and deviser of that wicked opinion there are abettors and maintainers of it, once broached : there are followers of it, so abetted: and all these, as they are in several degrees of mischief, so they must all undergo an answerable, whether aggravation or mitigation of our censure. who, by false teachers, are betrayed into that error, wherein now, either by breeding or by misinformation, they are settled, are worthy of as much pity, as dislike: those, who, out of stiffness of resolution and stomach of side-taking, shall uphold and diffuse a known error, are worthy of hatred and punishment: but those, who, out of ambition, or other sinister respects, shall invent and devise pernicious doctrines, and thereby pervert others for their own advantages, are worthy of a Maranatha, and the lowest hell. We do easily observe it thus, in all real offences of a high nature, Absalom contrives the conspiracy against his father: the captains second and abet it; the common people follow both of them, in acting it. He should be an ill judge of men and actions, who should but equally condemn the author of the treason, and those that follow Absalom with an honest and simple heart. Neither is it otherwise, in the practice of all those princes, who would hold up the reputation of mercy and justice. While the heads of a sedition are hanged up, the multitude is dismissed with a general pardon. And if, in all good and commendable things, the first inventor of them is held worthy of a statue or record, when as the following practicers are forgotten; why should there not be the like difference, in evil? Those poor souls therefore, who do zealously walk in a wrong way, wherein they are set by ill guides, may not be put into the same rank with their wicked misleaders. As we have reason to hope God will be merciful to the well-meant errors of those silly ones; so must we enlarge the bowels of our compassion to their miscarriage while, in the mean time, we may well pray, with the Psalmist, that God would not be merciful to those, that offend of malicious wickedness. * Aug. de Utilitate Cred. c. i. RULE II. TO DISTINGUISH OF TRUTHS AND ERRORS. SECONDLY, we must distinguish between truths necessary, and truths additional or accessory; truths essential, and accidental truths; truths fundamental, and truths superedified: and, in them, truths weighty and important, and truths slight and merely scholastical: for these are worthy of a far-different consideration. Those truths, which are of the foundation and essence of religion, are necessarily to be known, believed, embraced of all men; and the obstinate opposers of them are worthy of our careful avoidance and hardest censure. Truths important, though not fundamental, are worthy of our serious disquisition and knowledge. All other truths are commendable; and may be of good use, in their kinds and places: but so, as that he, who is either ignorant of them or otherwise minded concerning them, hath his own freedom; and must not, so he trouble not the common peace, forfeit our charitable opinion. We see it is thus in the body. There are some vital parts: a wound received in them, is no less than mortal. There are other, which, though useful and serviceable, and such as make up the integrity of the body; yet such as, wherein the main fort of life doth not consist: these cannot be hurt, without pain; but may be hurt, without much peril. There are yet, besides these, certain appendances to the outward fabric of the body, which serve both for decency and convenience; the loss whereof may be with less danger, but not with less smart than of some limb: to tear off the hair, or to beat out a tooth, is far from manslaughter; yet an act of violence, and a breach of peace. It is no otherwise, in the body of religion. A limb may be maimed, or a joint displaced; yet the heart whole: some appendance may be violated; and yet the body whole. It is a true word, that of Columbanus* of old, that "necessary truths are but few." Not many stones need to make up the foundation of Christian faith: twelve will serve: whereas many quarries, perhaps, may be laid in the superstructure. There are some things, saith Gerson, which are De necessitate fidei; whereof we may not doubt: other things are De pietate vel devotione fidei; wherein there is more scope of belief. That, which he speaks of historical verities, is no less true in doctrinal. I know no book so necessary for these times, as that De Paucitate Credendorum: nor any one article of our belief more needful, than that we need not believe more than the Apostles. Other points may be the care of Scholars; need not be of Christians. It was the observation of wise and learned Erasmus, which hath run oftentimes in my thoughts: "The doctrine of the Church," *Columban. c. v. Pauca sunt necessaria vera. saith he*, "which, at the first, was free from quarrels, began to depend upon the aids and defences of Philosophy: this was the first degree of the Church's declination, to the worse. Wealth began to come upon her, and power grew with it. The authority of emperors, taking upon them to intermeddle in the affairs of religion, did not much help to further the sincerity of the faith. At last, it came to sophistical contentions: thousands of new articles brake forth from thence, it grew to terrors and threats; and, since, to blows." Lo the miserable degrees of the Church's disturbance. We have almost lost religion and peace, in the multiplicity of opinions. It is worth observing, by what degrees it pleased God to communicate to us men, his will and our duty. At the first, we hear of no charge given to our first parents, but of refraining from the Tree of Knowledge. Afterwards, as the Jewish Doctors teach, there were six only precepts imposed on Adam, and his seed: the first, against idolatry, that he should worship no other Gods; the second, of his veneration of the only true God; the third, against bloodshed; the fourth, against wild and incestuous lusts; the fifth, against stealth; the sixth, concerning due administration of justice. After these, one yet more was added to Noah and his sons, of not eating flesh alive, viz. in the blood of it; Gen. ix. 4. Yet, after this, one more was given to Abraham, concerning circumcision. At last, the complete Law is given, in Ten Words, to Moses in Horeb. The Judicials are for commentaries upon those Moral statutes. With these, God's people contented themselves; till traditions began to be obtruded upon them, by presumptuous teachers. These, our Saviour cries down, as intolerable, insolent depravations of the Law. The Messiah is come. With how few charges, doth he load his people! that they should believe, repent, deny themselves, constantly profess him, search the Scriptures, follow peace, love one another, and communicate in his remembrance: and his Apostles, with only, Go, teach, and baptize; and strive who shall serve best. After his glorious ascension into heaven, the Apostles, assembled in their Council at Jerusalem, lay no other new weight upon the Gentile converts, but to abstain from pollutions of idols, from fornication, things strangled, and blood. When the Church was well enlarged and settled, what did the four General Councils offer to the world, but the condemnation of those four heresies, which then infested the Church + ? Time and busy heads drew on these varieties of conclusions and deductions, which have bred this grievous danger and vexation to God's people: insomuch, as it is now come to that pass, that, as he said of old, it is better to live in a commonwealth where nothing is lawful, than where every thing; so, it may no less justly * Doctrina Christi, quæ priùs nesciebat λoyouaxias, capit à Philosophic præsidiis pendere: hic erat primus, &c. Eras. Præfat. ad Opera Hilarii. + Nunquam audivimus Petrinos, aut Paulinos, aut Bartholomæanos, &c. sed, ab initio, una prædicatio Apostolorum. Epiph. 1. i. be said, that it is safer to live where is no faith professed, than where every thing is made matter of faith. The remedy must be, that our judgments revert to that first simplicity of the Gospel, from which the busy and quarrelsome spirits of men have drawn us; and that we fix and rest there. RULE III. TO AVOID CURIOSITY IN THE DISQUISITION OF TRUTHS. Therein, of the simplicity of Former Times, and the over-lashing of ours. To which end, it shall be requisite, thirdly, to avoid curiosity, in the search or determination of immaterial and superfluous truths. I know not whether the mind of man be more unsatiable in the desire of knowledge, or more unweariable in the pursuit of it; which we are all apt to affect upon several grounds: for, as Bernard* well, some would know that they might be known; this is vanity others, that they might sell their knowledge; this is baseness: some, that they may edify others; this is charity: some, that they may be edified; this is wisdom: and, some, lastly, would know only that they may know; this is fond curiosity; a vicious disposition of the soul, which doth not more shew itself in the end, than in the object of our knowledge; for, surely, to seek after the knowledge of those things, which are necessary or useful, can be no other than praise-worthy. There are, saith St. Austint, two kinds of persons, very commendable in religion: the former, those who have found the truth; the latter, those who do studiously enquire for it. It is most true of those truths, which are important and essential; but, to spend ourselves in the search of those truths, which are either unrevealed or unprofitable, it is no other than a labour ill lost. Yet, alas, these are they, which commonly take up the thoughts of men. How busily have some disputed, whether Adam, if he had continued in his innocence, should have slept, or no; or, whether he would have needed that repose §! others, whether, if Adam, in his innocency, had known his wife, after she was conceived of child, he had in this sinned, or no ! others, if he had begotten children in the state of innocence, whether they should, immediately upon their birth, have had the use of their limbs and members, for their present provision, as other creatures have ¶! others, whether, in that first estate, there should have been more males or females born! others, what space there was, betwixt the creation of angels and man, and their fall ** ! E Senec. Gars de Neglig. * Bern. Serm. in Cant. 36. + Aug. de Utilitat. Cred. c. xi. Ibid. q. 89. Ibid. १ 88. |