§. XXII.
Now, though the grossest of these Abuses be swept away by Protestants; yet the evil Root still remains, and is nourished and upheld; and the Science kept up, as being deemed necessary for a Minister: For, while the pure Learning of the Spirit of Truth is despised and neglected, and made ineffectual, Man’s fallen earthly Wisdom is upheld; and so in that he labours and works with the Scriptures, being out of the Life and Spirit which those that wrote them were in, by which only they are rightly understood, and made Use of. Merchandizing with the Scriptures: What it is. See also 2 Pet. 2. 3.And so he that is to be a Minister, must learn this Art or Trade of Merchandizing with the Scriptures, and be that which the Apostle would not be, to wit, a Trader with them, 2 Cor. ii. 17. That he may acquire a Knack from a Verse of Scripture, by adding his own barren Notions and Conceptions to it, and his uncertain Conjectures, and what he hath stolen out of Books; for which End he must have of Necessity a good many by him, and may each Sabbath-day, as they call it, or oftener, make a Discourse for an Hour long; And this they call the Preaching of the Word.and this is called the Preaching of the Word: Whereas the Gift, Grace, and Spirit of God, to teach, open, and instruct, and to preach a Word in Season, is neglected, and so Man’s Arts and Parts, and Knowledge, and Wisdom, which is from below, are set up and established in the Temple of God, yea, and above the little Seed; which in Effect is Antichrist, working in the Mystery. Thus Antichrist is established above the Seed of the Kingdom.And so the Devil may be as good and able a Minister as the best of them; How the Devil may be a Minister of the Priests Gospel.for he has better Skill in Languages, and more Logick, Philosophy and School Divinity, than any of them; and knows the Truth in the Notion better than they all, and can talk more eloquently than all those Preachers. But what availeth all this; Is it not all but as Death, as a painted Sepulchre, and dead Carcase, without the Power, Life and Spirit of Christianity, which is the Marrow and Substance of a Christian Ministry? And he that hath this, and can speak from it, though he be a poor Shepherd, or a Fisherman, and ignorant of all that Learning, and of all those Questions and Notions; yet speaking from the Spirit, his Ministry will have more Influence towards the converting a Sinner unto God, than all of them who are learned after the Flesh; as in that Example of the old Man at the Council of Nice did appear.