〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , They wrest . They deal with Scripture as Chimicks deal with natural bodies , torturing them to extract that out of them , which God and Nature never put in them . Scripture is a rule which will not fit it self to the obliquity of our conceits , but our perverse and crooked discourse , must fit it self to the straightness of that rule . A learned Writer in the age of our fathers , commenting upon Scripture , spake most truly , when he said , Fa●er . That his Comments gave no light unto the Text , the Text gave light unto his Comments . Other Expositions may give rules and directions for understanding their Authors , but Scripture gives rules to Exposition it self , and interprets the Interpreter . Wherefore when we made in Scripture , non pro sententia divinarum Scripturarum , as St. Austine speaks , sed pro nostra itae dimicantes ut tam velimus Scripturarum esse quae nostra est : When we strive to give unto it , and not to receive from it the sense : when we factiously contend to fasten our conceits upon God ; and , like the Harlot in the Book of Kings , take our dead and putrified fancies , and lay them in the bosome of Scripture , as of a mother ; then are we guilty of this great sin of wresting of Scripture . The nature of which will the better appear , if we consider a little , some of those motioners which drive us upon it . One very potent and strong mean , is the exceeding affection and love unto our own opinions and conceits . For grown we are unto extremities on both hands : we cannot with patience either admit of other mens opinions , or endure that our own should be withstood . As it was in the Lacedaemonian army , almost all were Captains : so in these disputes , all will be leaders : Schol. in Thucyd. and we take our selves to be much discountenanced , if others think not as we do . So that the complaint which one makes , concerning the dissention of Physicians about the diseases of our bodies , is true likewise in these disputes which concern the cure of our souls , Hinc illae circa aegros miserae sententiarum concertationes , nullo idem censente , ne videatur accessio alterius . Plin. From hence have sprung those miserable contentions about the distemper of our souls , singularity alone , and that we will not seem to stand as cyphers to make up the sum of other mens opinions , being cause enough to make us disagree . A fault antiently amongst the Christians so apparent , that it needed not an Apostolical spirit to discover it , the very heathen themselves , to our shame and confusion , have justly , judiciously , and sharply taxt us for it . Ammianus Marcellinus passing his censure upon Constantius the Emperour : Christianam religionem absolutam & simplicem ( saith he : and they are words very well worth your marking ) Christianam religionem absolutam & simplicem anili superstitione confudit . In qua scrutanda perplexius quam componenda gratius , excitavit dissidia plurima , quae progressa fusius aluit concertatione verborum , dum ritum omnem ad suum trahere conatur arbitrium . The Christian Religion , a Religion of great simplicity and perfection , he troubled with dotage and superstition . For going about rather perplexedly to search the controversies , then gravely to compose them , he raised great stirs , and by disputing spread them far and wide , whilst he went about to make himselfsole Lord and Commander of the whole Profession . Now ( that it may appear wherefore I have noted this ) it is no hard thing for a man that hath wit , and is strongly possest of an opinion , and resolute to maintain it , to find some places of Scripture , which by good handling will be woed to cast a favourable countenance upon it . Pythagoras's Scholars having been bred up in the doctrine of Numbers , when afterward they diverted upon the studies of Nature , fancied unto themselves somewhat in natural bodies like unto Numbers , and thereupon fell into a conceit , that Numbers were the principles of them . So fares it with him , that to the reading of Scripture comes fore-possest with some opinion . As Antipheron Orietes in Aristotle thought , that every where he saw his own shape and picture going afore him : so in divers parts of Scripture where these men walk , they will easily perswade themselves , that they see the image of their own conceits . It was , and is to this day , a fashion in the hotter Countreys , at noon , when the Sun is in his strength , to retire themselves to their closets or beds if they were at home , to cool and shady places if they were abroad , to avoid the inconvenience of the heat of it . To this the Spouse in the Canticles alluding , calls after her Beloved as after a shepherd , Shew me , O thou whom my soul loveth , where thou feedest thy flock where thou dost rest at noon . The Donatists conceiting unto themselves , that the Church was shut up in them alone , being urged by the Fathers to shew how the Church , being universal , came on a suddain thus to be confin'd to Africk : they had presently their Scripture for it , for so they found it written in the Canticles , Indica , quem diligit anima mea , ubi pascas , ubi cubes in meridie . In which Text , meridies doubtless , as they thought , was their Southern Countrey of Africk , where the Shepherd of Israel was , and no where else , to feed his flocks . I may not trouble you with instances in this kind : little observation is able to furnish the man of slenderest reading with abundance . The Texts of Scripture which are especially subject to this abuse , are those that are of ambiguous and doubtful meaning . For as Thucydides observes of the fat and fertile places of Greece , that they were evermore the occasions of stirs and seditions● the neighbouring Nations every one striving to make it self Lord of them : so is it with these places that are so fertile , as it were , of interpretation , and yeild a multiplicity of sense : they are the Palaestra for good wits to prove masteries in , where every one desires to be Lord and Absolute .

A second thing occasioning us to transgress against Scripture , and the discreet and sober handling of it , is our too quick and speedy entrance upon the practise of interpreting it , in our young and green years , before that time and experience have ripened us , and setled our conceits . For that which in all other business , and here likewise doth most especially commend us , is our caute●ous and wary handling it . But this is a flower seldome seen in youths garden . Aristotle differencing age and youth , makes it a property of youth , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , to suppose they know all things , and to be bold in affirming : and the Heathen Rhetorician could tell us , that by this so speedy entring upon action , and so timely venting our crude and unconcocted studies , quod est ubique perniciosissimum , praevenit vires fiducia , a thing which in all cases is most pernicious . Presumption is greater then strength , after the manner of those , who are lately recovered out of some great sickness , in whom appetite is stronger then digestion . These are they who take the greatest mysteries of Christian Religion , to be the fittest arguments to spend themselves upon . So E●kins in his Chry●opassus , a work of his so termed , wherein he discusses the question of predestination , in the very entrance of his work tells us , That he therefore enterpris'd to handle this argument , because forsooth he thought it to be the fittest question in which he might Iuveniles calores exercere . The antient Masters of Fence amongst the Romans , were wont to set up a Post , and cause their young Schollars to practise upon it , and to foin and fight with it , as with an adversary . Instead of a Post , this young Fencer hath set himself up one of the deepest Mysteries of our profession , to practise his freshmanship upon . Which quality , when once it finds Scripture for its object , how great inconvenience it brings with it , needs no large discourse to prove . St. Ierome , a man not too easily brought on to acknowledge the errours of his writings , among those few things which he doth retract , censures nothing so sharply as the mistake of his youth in this kind : In adolescentia provocatus ardore & studio Scripturarum , allegorice interpretatus sum Abdiam Prophetam , cujus historiam nesciebam . He thought it one of the greatest sins of his youth , that being carried away through an inconsiderate heat in his studies of Scripture , he adventured to interpret Abdias the Prophet allegorically , when as yet he knew not the Historical meaning . Old men , saith our best natural Master , by reason of the experience of their often mistakes , are hardly brought constantly to affirm any thing , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , they will always cautelously interline their speeches with it may bees , and peradventures , and other such particles of wariness and circumspection . This old mens modesty , of all other things , best fits us in perusing those hard and obscure Texts of holy Scripture . Out of which conceit it is , that we see St. Austine in his books , de Genesi ad literam , to have written onely by way of questions and interrogations , after the manner of Aristotle in his Problemes , That he might not ( for so he gives his reason ) by being ever positive prejudice others , and peradventure truer interpretations : that every one might choose according to his liking , & ubi quid intelligere non potest , Scripturae Dei det honorem , sibi timorem : and where his understanding cannot attain unto the sense of it , let him give that honour and reverence which is due unto the Scripture , and carry himself with that aw and respect which befits him . Wherefore not without especial providence it is , that the holy Ghost by St. Paul , giving precepts to Timothy , concerning the quality of those who were to be admitted to the distributing of Gods holy word , expresly prescribes against a young Schollar , lest , saith he , he be puft up . For as it hath been noted of men , who are lately grown rich , that they differ from other rich men onely in this , Arist. Rhet. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , that commonly they have all the faults that rich men have , and many more : so is it as true in those who have lately attained to some degree and mediocrity of knowledge . Look what infirmities learned men have , the same have they in greater degree , and many more besides . Wherefore if Hippocrates in his Physician required these two things , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , great industry , and long experience ; the one as tillage to sow the seed , the other as time and season of the year to bring it to maturity : then certainly by so much the more are these two required in the spiritual Physician , by how much he is the Physician to a more excellent part .

I will adde yet one third motioner to this abuse of Scriptures and that is , The too great presumption upon the strength and subtilty of our own wits . That which the Roman Priest sometimes told an over-pleasant and witty Vestal Virgin , Coli Deos sancte magis quam scite , hath in this great work of exposition of Scripture an especial place . The holy things of God must be handled sancta , magis quam scite ; with fear and reverence , not with wit and dalliance . The dangerous effects of this have appeared , not in the green tree onely , in young heads , but in men of constant age , and great place in the Church . For this was that which undid Origen , a man of as great learning and industry , as ever the Church had any ; whilst in sublimity of his wit , in his Comments on Scripture , conceiving Meteors and airy speculations , he brought forth those dangerous errors , which drew upon his person the Churches heaviest censure , and upon posterity the loss of his works . Subtle witted men in nothing so much miscarry as in the too much pleasing themselves in the goodness of their own conceits ; where the like sometimes befalls them which befell Zeuxi● the Painter , who having to the life pictured an old woman so pleas'd himself with the conceit of his work , that he died with laughing at it . Heliodor Bishop of Tricca in Thessaly , the Author of the Ethiopick Story , a polite and elegant , I confess , Nicephorus . but a loose and wanton work , being summon'd by a Provincial Synod , was told , that which was true , That his work did rather endanger the manners , then profit the wits of his Reader , as nourishing loose and wanton conceits in the heads of youth : and having his choice given him , either to abolish his work , or to leave his Bishoprick ; not willing to lose the reputation of wit , chose rather to resign his place in the Church , and as I verily think , his part in heaven . And not in private persons alone , but even in whole Nations , shall we find remarkable examples of miscarriage in this kind . The Grecians , till barbarism began to steal in upon them , were men of wonderous subtlety of wit , and naturally over indulgent unto themselves in this quality . Those deep and subtle Heresies concerning the Trinity , the Divinity of Christ , and of the holy Ghost , the Union and Division of the Divine Substance and Persons , were all of them begotten in the heat of their wits ; yea , by the strength of them were they conceived , and born , and brought to that growth , that if it had been possible for the gates of hell to prevail against the Church , they would have prevailed this way . Wherefore as God dealt with his own land , which being sometimes the mirrour of the world for fertility and abundance of all things , now lies subject to many curses , and especially to that of barrenness : so at this day is it with Greece , where sometimes was the flow and luxury of wit , now is there nothing but extream barbarism and stupidity . It is in this respect so degenerated , that it scarcely for some hundred of years hath brought forth a child that carries any shew of his fathers countenance : God as it were purposely plaguing their miserable posterity with extreme want of that , the abundance of which their fathers did so wantonly abuse . The reason of all , that hitherto I have in this point delivered , is this , Sharpness of wit hath commonly with it two ill companions , Pride , and Levity . By the first it comes to pass , that men know not how to yeild to another mans reasonable positions ; by the second , they know not how to keep themselves constant to their own . It was an excellent observation of the wise Grecian , Thucyd. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , &c. Sad and dull spirited men usually manage matters of State , better then quick and nimble wits . For such for the most part have not learnt that Lesson , the meaning of that voice that came to the Pythagorean , that was desirous to remove the ashes of his dead friend out of his grave , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , Things lawfully setled and composed must not be moved . 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , saith Iulian , Men over busie are by nature unfit to govern : for they move all things , and leave nothing without question and innovation : 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , as Nazianzen speaks , Out of desire to amend what is already well . And therefore we see that for the most part such , if they be in place of Authority , by unseasonable and unnecessary tampering , put all things into tumult and combustion . Not the Common-wealth alone , but the Church likewise hath received the like blow from these kind of men . Nazianzen in his six and twentieth Oration , discoursing concerning the disorders committed in the handling of Controversies , speaks it plainly , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , &c. Great wits , hot and fiery dispositions have raised these tumults . From these it is ( saith he ) that Christians are so divided . We are no longer a Tribe and a Tribe , Israel and Iudah , two parts of a small Nation : but we are divided kindred against kindred , family against family , yea , a man against himself . But I must hasten to my second general part , The persons here accounted guilty of abuse of Scripture .

The persons are noted unto us in two Ephitets , Vnlearned , Vnstable . First , Vnlearned . It was St. Ierom's complaint , that practitioners of other Arts could contain themselves within the bounds of their own Profession , Sola Scripturarum ars est , quam sibi omnes passim vendicant ; Hanc garrula anus , hanc delirus senex , hanc sophista verbosus , hanc universi praesumunt , lacerant , docent antequam discant : every one presumes much upon his skill , and therefore to be a teacher of Scripture : 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ( so Nazianzen speaks ) as if this great mystery of Christianity were but some one of the common , base , inferiour , and contemptible trades . I speak not this as if I envied , that all , even the meanest of the Lords people should prophesie : but onely that all kind of men may know their bounds , that no unlearned beast touch the hill , lest he be thrust through with a dart . It is true which we have heard , Surgunt indocti & rapiunt Regnum coelorum : they arise indeed , but it is as St. Paul speaks of the resurrection , every man in his own order . Scripture is given to all , to learn : but to teach , and to interpret , onely to a few . This bold intrusion therefore of the unlearned into the chair of the Teacher , is that which here with our blessed Apostle I am to reprehend . Learning in general is nothing else , but the competent skill of any man in whatsoever he professes . Usually we call by this name onely our polite and Academical Studies ; but indeed it is common to every one , that is well skill'd , well practised in his own mystery . The unlearned therefore , whom here our Apostle rebukes , is not he that hath not read a multiplicity of Authors , or that is not as Moses was , skilful in all the learning of the Egyptians : but he that taking upon him to divide the word of God , is yet but raw and unexperienced ; or if he have had experience , wants judgment to make use of it . Scripture is never so unhappy , as when it falls into these mens fingers . That which old Cato said of the Grecian Physicians , Quandocunque ista gens literas suos dabit , omnia corrumpet , is most true of these men ; whensoever they shall begin to tamper with Scripture , and vent in writing their raw conceits , they will corrupt and defile all they touch Quid enim molestiae tristitiaeque temerarii isti praesumptores , &c. De Genesi ad literam . as S. Austin complaineth : for what trouble and anguish these rash presumers ( saith he ) bring unto the discreeter sort of the brethren , cannot sufficiently be exprest , when being convinced of their rotten and ungrounded opinions ; for the maintaining of that which with great levity and open falshood they have averred , they pretend the authority of these sacred Books , and repeat much of them even by heart , as bearing witness to what they hold : whereas indeed they do but pronounce the words ; but understand not either what they speak , or of what things they do affirm . Belike as he that bought Orpheus Harp , thought it would of it self make admirable melody , how unskilfully soever he touch'd it : so these men suppose , that Scripture will sound wonderful musically , if they do but strike it , with how great infelicity or incongruity soever it be . The reason of these mens offence against Scripture , is the same with the cause of their miscarriage in civil actions : 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , saith Thucydides , 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 . Rude men , men of little experience , are commonly most peremptory : but men experienced , and such as have waded in Business , are slow of determination . Quintilian making a question , why unlearned men seem many times to be more copious then the learned ( for commonly such men never want matter of discourse ) answers , That it is , because whatsoever conceit comes into their heads , without care or choice they broach it , cum doctis sit electio & modus : whereas learned men are choice in their invention , and lay by much of that which offers it self . Wise hearted men , in whom the Lord hath put wisdom and understanding , to know how to work all manner of work for the service of the sanctuary , like Bezaleel and Aholiab , refuse much of the stuff which is presented them . But this kind of men whom here our Apostle notes , are naturally men of bold and daring spirits , Quicquid dixerint hoc legem Dei putant , as St. Ierome speaks ; whatsoever conceit is begotten in their heads , the Spirit of God is presently the father of it : Nec scire dignantur quid Prophet● , quid Apostoli senserint , sed ad suum sensum incongrua aptant testimonia . But to leave these men , and to speak a little more home unto mine own Auditory : Let us a little consider , not the weakness of these men , but the greatness of the business , the manage of which they undertake . So great a thing as the skill of Exposition of the Word and Gospel is , so fraught with multiplicity of Authors , so full of variety of opinion , must needs be confest to be a matter of great learning , and that it cannot , especially in our days , in short time , with a mediocrity of industry be attained . For if in the Apostles times , when as yet much of Scripture was scarcely written , when God wrought with men miraculously , to inform their understanding , and supplied by revelation what mans industry could not yield ; if , I say , in these times St. Paul required diligent reading , and expresly forbad greenness of Scholarship : much more then are these conditions required in our times , wherein God doth not supply by miracle our natural defects , and yet the burden of our profession is infinitely increast . All that was necessary in the Apostles times , is now necessary , and much more . For if we adde unto the growth of Christian learning , as it was in the Apostles times , but this one circumstance ( to say nothing of all the rest ) which naturally befalls our times , and could not be required at the hands of those who guided the first ages of the Church : that is , the knowledge of the state and succession of doctrine in the Church from time to time ; a thing very necessary for the determining the controversies of these our days : how great a portion of our labour and industry would this alone require ? Wherefore if Quintilian thought it necessary to admonish young men , that they should not presume themselves satis instructos , si quent ex iis , qui breves circumferuntur , artis libellum edidicerint , & velut decretis technicorum tutos putent : if he thought fit thus to do in an Art of so inferiour and narrow a sphere , much more is it behoveful , that young Students in so high , so spacious , so large a profession , be advised not to think themselves sufficiently provided , upon their acquaintance with some Notitia , or Systeme of some technical divine . Looke upon those sons of Anak , those Giant-like , voluminous Writers of Rome , in regard of whom , our little Tractates , and pocket Volumes in this kind , what are they but as Grashoppers ? I speak not this like some seditious or factious spie , to bring weakness of hands , or melting of heart upon any of Gods people : but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , to stir up and kindle in you the spirit of industry , to inlarge your conceits , and not to suffer your labours to be copst and mued up within the poverty of some pretended method . I will speak as Ioshua did to his people , Let us not fear the people of that land , they are as meat unto us , their shadow is departed from them : the Lord is with us , fear them not . Onely let us not think , sedendo & votis debellari posse , that the conquest will be gotten by sitting still and wishing all were well : Livie . or that the walls of these strong Cities will fall down , if we onely walk about them , and blow rams horns . But as the voice of Gods people sometime was , by the sword of God and of Gideon , so that which here gives the victory must be the grace of God and our industry . For by this circumcised , narrow , and penurious form of study , we shall be no more able to keep pace with them , then a child can with Hercules . But I forbear , and pass away unto the second Epithet , by which these rackers of Scriptures are by St. Peter stiled Vnstable .

IN the learning which the world teaches , it were almost a miracle to find a man constant to his own tenets . For not to doubt in things in which we are conversant , is either by reason of exellency and serenity of understanding , throughly apprehending the main principles on which all things are grounded , together with the descrying of the several passages from them unto particular conclusions , and the diverticles and blind by-paths which Sophistry and deceit are wont to tread ; and such a man can nature never yeild : or else it is through a sensless stupidity , like unto that in the common sort of men , who conversing among the creatures , and beholding the course of heaven , and the heavenly host , yet never attend them , neither ever sinks it into their heads to marvel , or question these things so full of doubt and difficulty . Even such a one is he , that learns Theology in the School of Nature , if he seem to participate of any setledness or composedness of conscience . Either it never comes into his head to doubt of any of those things , with which the world hath inured him : or if it doth , it is to no great purpose , he may smother and strangle , he can never resolve his doubt . The reason of which is this , It lies not in the worlds power to give in this case a text of sufficient authority to compose and fix the thoughts of a soul , that is dispos'd to doubt . But this great inconvenience , which held the world in uncertainty , by the providence of God is prevented in the Church . For unto it is left a certain , undoubted , and sufficient authority , able to exalt every valley , and lay low every hill , to smooth all rubs , and make our way so open and passable , that little enquiry serves . So that as it were a wonder in the School of Nature , to find one setled and resolved ; so might it seem a marvel that in the Church any man is unstable , unresolved . Yet notwithstanding , even here is the unstable man found too , and to his charge the Apostle lays this sin of Wresting of Scripture . For since that it is confest at all hands , that the sense and meaning of Scripture is the rule and ground of our Christian tenets , whensoever we alter them , we must needs give a new sense unto the word of God . So that the man that is unstable in his Religion , can never be free from violating of Scripture . The especial cause of this levity and flitting disposition in the common and ordinary sort of men , is their disability to discern of the strength of such reasons , as may be framed against them . For which cause they usually start , and many times fall away , upon every objection that is made . In which too sudden entertainment of objections , they resemble the state of those , Seneca . who are lately recovered out of some long sickness , qui & si reliquias e●●ugerint , suspicionibus tamen inqui●tantur , & omnem calorem corporis sui calumniantur : Who never more wrong themselves , then by suspecting every alteration of their temper , and being affrighted at every little passion of heat , as if it were an ague-fit . To bring these men therefore unto an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 , and to purchase them a setledness of mind ; that temper that St. Austine doth require in him that reads his Book , tales meorum Scriptorum velim judices , qui responsionem non semper des●derent , quum his quae le guntur audierint aliquid contradici : The same temper must be found in every Reader of Scripture , he must not be at a stand , and require an answer to every objection that is made against them . For as the Philosopher tells us , that mad and fantastical men , are very apprehensive of all outward accidents , because their soul is inwardly empty and unfurnished of any thing of worth which might hold the inward attention of their minds : so when we are so easily dor'd and amated with every Sophism , it is a certain argument of great defect of inward furniture and worth , which should as it were ballance the mind , and keep it upright against all outward occurrents whatsoever . And be it that many times , the means to open such doubts be not at hand , yet , as St. Austin sometime spake unto his Scholar Licentius , concerning such advice and counsel as he had given him , Nolo te cansas rationesque rimari , quae etiamsi reddi possint , fidei tamen , qua mihi credis non cas debeo : so much more must we thus resolve of those lessons which God teacheth us ; the reasons and grounds of them , though they might be given , yet it fits not that credit and trust which we owe him , once to search into , or call in question . And so I come to the third general part , the Danger of Wresting of Scripture , in the last words , unto their own Damnation .