328 P eçiauo gait. Church of Paftors, and thofe gathered in a Council to define the Canon of Scripture. Saint Paul fpeaks of a Church which is The Pillar and Ground of the Truth, I Tim. 3. )15. But, as our learned Whitaker bath obferved, That is not the Church of Paflors but of Be- lievers; and in truth the Word of Life is more purely held' forth in the Lives and Experiences of Believers, than in the Gifts of Pàílors. This Thefts fome of their Grandees have profecüted even to-Blafphemy, faying, That without the judgment of the Church they would give no More credit to Matthew than to Livy, and va- lue the Scriptures much as they doFf ps Fables. That this Opinion is falle is as clear as the Light : true Faith is a pure infufion, which hangs on the irradiating Spirit as a Beam on the Sun, and in Scripture fees, with the creden- da, the reafon of believing in the Divine Au- thority ftàmped thereon. The Miniftery tifed about it may be Mans, but the Authority on Thea which it leans mull be Gods, rota caufa, tota Nat..Tit. radix, toturn fundamentum credendi vcrbir Pei 209. debet effe,,quia ipfe dicit, faith Raimunduf De Sabunde. tlnlefs we believe God for himfelf Òur Faith is not Divine; if the Fulciment of it be humane, it is loch it felt. Saint Paul would not have Our Faith /land in the wifdom Corn- of men, .r Cor. a. 5. Saint Jerom faith, In bo- ment. in mine fees vana, vera in Deo eft ; and a little af- Mich. 7. ter, Nolite credere in ducibus, non in Epif opo, non in Presbytero, non in Diacono, non in 4u;?- libet hominum dignitate, If Believers believe 'the
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