I confess I cannot read the account of these transactions, their ascribing their anathemas and curses to Christ and the Holy Trinity, and their decisions as to the faith, to the Holy Ghost, without indignation at the horrid abuse of those sacred names. Their very meeting to pronounce damnation on their adversaries, and to form creeds for the consciences of others, is no less than a demonstration that they had no concurrence of the Son of God, no influence of the Holy Spirit of God. The faith was already settled for them, and for all other christians, in the sacred writings, and needed no decision of councils to explain and amend it. The very attempt was insolence and usurpation. Infallibility is a necessary qualification for an office of such importance. But what promise is there made to councils of this divine gift? or, if there should be any such promise made to them; yet the method of their debates, their scandalous arts to defame their adversaries, and the contradictions they decreed for truth and gospel, prove, to the fullest conviction, that they forfeited the grace of it. And indeed, if the fruits of the spirit are love, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness and meekness, there appeared few or no signs of them in any of the councils. The soil was too rank and hot to produce them.
I wish, for the honour of the former times, I could give a better account of these assemblies of the clergy, and see reason to believe myself that they were, generally speaking, men of integrity, wisdom, candour, moderation and virtue. The debates of such men would have deserved regard, and their opinions would have challenged a proper reverence. But even had this been the case, their opinions, could have been no rule to others; and how great a veneration soever we might have had for their characters, we ought, as men and christians, to have examined their principles. There is one rule superior to them and us, by which christians are to try all doctrines and spirits; the decision of which is more sacred than that of all human wisdom and authority, and every where, and in all ages, obligatory. But as the ancient councils consisted of men of quite other dispositions; and as their decisions in matters of faith were arbitrary and unwarranted; and as those decisions themselves were generally owing to court practices, intriguing statesmen, the thirst of revenge the management of a few crafty interested bishops to noise and tumult, the prospects and hopes of promotions and translations, and other the like causes, the reverence paid them by many christians is truly surprising; and I cannot account for it any way but one, viz. that those who thus cry up their authority, are in hopes of succeeding them in their power; and therefore would fain persuade others that their decrees are sacred and binding, to make way for the imposing of their own.
It would be well worth the while of some of these council-mongers to lay down some proper rules and distinctions, by which we may judge what councils are to be received, and which to be rejected; and particularly why the four first general councils should be submitted to, in preference to all others. Councils have often decreed contrary to councils, and the same bishops have decreed different things in different councils; and even the third and fourth general councils determined the use of the word PERSON in an infinitely different sense from what the two first did. Heretical councils, as they are called, have been more in number than some orthodox general ones, called by the same imperial authority, have claimed the same powers, pretended to the same influence of the Holy Ghost, and pronounced the same anathemas against principles and persons. By what criteria or certain marks then must we judge, which of these councils are thieving, general, particular, orthodox, heretical, and which not? The councils themselves must not be judges in their own cause; for then we must receive, or reject them all. The characters of the bishops that composed them will not do, for their characters seem equally amiable and christian on each side. The nature of the doctrine, “as decreed by them,” is far from being a safe rule; because, if human authority, or church power makes truth in any case, it makes it in every case; and therefore, upon this foot, the decrees at Tyre and Ephesus are as truly binding, as those at Nice and Chalcedon. Or, if we must judge of the councils by the nature of the doctrine, abstracted from all human authority, those councils can have no authority at all. Every man must sit in judgment over them, and try them by reason and scripture, and reject and receive them, just as he would do the opinions of any other persons whatsoever[whatsoever]. And, I humbly conceive, they should have no better treatment, because they deserve none.
SECT. V.
The imposing Subscriptions to Human Creeds unreasonable and pernicious.
If then the decrees of fathers and councils, if the decisions of human authority in matters of religion are of no avail, and carry with them no obligation; it follows, that the imposing subscriptions to creeds and articles of faith, as tests of orthodoxy, is a thing unreasonable in itself, as it hath proved of infinite ill consequence in the church of God.
I call it an “unreasonable custom,” not only because where there is no power to make creeds for others, there can be no right to impose them; but because no one good reason can be assigned for the use and continuance of this practice. For, as my Lord Bishop of London admirably well explains this matter[[378]], “As long as men are men, and have different degrees of understanding, and every one a partiality to his own conceptions, it is not to be expected that they should agree in any one entire scheme, and every part of it, in the circumstances as well as the substance, in the manner of things, as well as in the things themselves. The question therefore is not in general about a difference in opinion, which, in our present state, is unavoidable; but about the weight and importance of the things wherein christians differ, and the things wherein they agree. And it will appear, that the several denominations of christians agree both in the substance of religion, and in the necessary inforcements of the practice of it. That the world and all things in it, were created by God, and are under the direction and government of his all-powerful hand, and all-seeing eye; that there is an essential difference between good and evil, virtue and vice; that there will be a state of future rewards and punishments, according to our behaviour in this life; that Christ was a teacher sent from God, and that his apostles were divinely inspired; that all christians are bound to declare and profess themselves to be his disciples; that not only the exercise of the several virtues, but also a belief in Christ is necessary, in order to their obtaining the pardon of sin, the favour of God, and eternal life; that the worship of God is to be performed chiefly by the heart, in prayers, praises, and thanksgivings; and, as to all other points, that they are bound to live by the rules which Christ and his apostles have left them in the holy scriptures.” Here then, adds the learned bishop, “is a fixed, certain, and uniform rule of faith and practice, containing all the most necessary points of religion, established by a divine sanction, embraced as such by all denominations of christians, and in itself abundantly sufficient to preserve the knowledge and practice of religion in the world. As to points of greater intricacy, and which require uncommon degrees of penetration and knowledge; such indeed have been subjects of dispute, amongst persons of study and learning, in the several ages of the christian church; but the people are not obliged to enter into them, so long as they do not touch the foundations of christianity, nor have an influence upon practice. In other points it is sufficient that they believe the doctrines, so far as they find, upon due enquiry and examination, according to their several abilities and opportunities, that God hath revealed them.”
This incomparable passage of this reverend and truly charitable prelate, I have transcribed intire; because it will undoubtedly give a sanction to my own principles of universal benevolence and charity. His lordship affirms, that “all denominations of christians agree in the substance of religion, and in the necessary enforcement of the practice of it;” inasmuch as they do all believe firmly and sincerely those principles which his lordship calls, with great reason and truth, “a fixed, certain, and uniform rule of faith and practice, as containing all the most necessary points of religion, and in itself abundantly sufficient to preserve the knowledge and practice of religion in the world.”
My inference from this noble concession, for which all the friends to liberty, in church and state, throughout Great Britain, will thank his lordship, is this; that since all denominations of christians do, in his lordship’s judgment, receive his fixed, certain, and uniform rule of faith, and embrace all the most necessary points of religion; to impose subscriptions to articles of faith and human creeds, must be a very unreasonable and needless thing: for either such articles and creeds contain nothing more than this same rule of faith and practice, and then all subscription to them is impertinent, because this is already received by all denominations of christians, and is abundantly sufficient, by the bishop’s own allowance, to preserve the knowledge and practice of religion in the world; or such articles and creeds contain something more than his lordship’s fixed rule of faith and practice, something more than all the most necessary points of religion, something more than is sufficient to preserve the knowledge and practice of religion in the world, h. e. some very unnecessary points of religion, something on which the preservation of religion doth not depend; and of consequence, subscriptions to unnecessary articles of faith, on which religion doth not depend, can never be necessary to qualify any person for a minister of the church of Christ, and therefore not for the church of England, if that be part of the church of Christ. And this is the more unnecessary[unnecessary], because, as his lordship farther well observes, “the people are not obliged to enter into them, so long as they do not touch the foundations of christianity,” i. e. so far as his lordship’s certain, fixed and uniform rule, which contains all necessary points of religion, is not affected by them. And if the people are not obliged to enter into points of great intricacy and dispute, I humbly conceive the clergy cannot be obliged to preach them; and that of consequence it is as absurd to impose upon them subscriptions to such things, as to oblige them to subscribe what they need not preach, nor any of their people believe.
Upon his lordship’s principles, the imposing subscriptions to the hard, unscriptural expressions of the Athanasians and Arians, by each party in their turns, and to the thirty-nine articles of the church of England, must be a very unreasonable and unchristian thing; because, the peculiarities to be subscribed, do not one of them enter into his specified points of religion, and of consequence are not necessary to preserve religion in the world; and after so public a declaration of charity towards all denominations of christians, and the safety of religion and the church, upon the general principles he hath laid down, there is no reason to doubt but his lordship will use that power and influence which God hath entrusted him with, to remove the wall of separation in the established church, in order to the uniting all differing sects, all denominations of christians, in one visible communion; and that he will join in that most christian and catholic prayer and benediction of one of his own brethren; though disapproved of by another of narrower principles, “[[379]]blessed be they who have contributed to so good a work.”