Berm. XXXV. again f l dangerous Mi l lakes in Religion. 25 Y II. -When all is done, the Matter muff be left to God, who only knóweth the Hearts ofall the Children of Men. We cannot fee into the Hearts of Men, nor know all their Circumftances, and how they may have provoked God to forfake them, and give them up to Error and Delufion,, becaufe they would not receive the truth in the love of it, that they might befaved. And as on the one hand God will confider all Mens Circumftances, and the Difadvantages they were under for coming to theknowledge of the Truth, and make allowance to Men for their in vincible Errors, and forgive theip upon a general Repentance. So on the other hand, he who fees the infincerity of Men, and that the Errors of their Under- 'landings did proceed from grofs Faults of their Lives, will deal with . them ac- cordingly. But if Men be honett and fincere, God, who hath faid, if any Man will dohis Will, he fhall know of the DoElrine, will certainly be as good as his Word. It now remains only to draw foine Inferences from this Difcourfe, and they (hall be thefe Three. Firf, From this Text, and what hath been difcourfed upon it, we may infer how flender and ill.grounded the Pretence of the ChurchofRome to Infallibility is; whether they place it in thePope, or in a General Council, or in both. TheTaft is the moft general Opinion ; and yet it is hard to underftand how Infallibility can refult from the Pope's Confirmation of a GeneralCouncil, when neither the Council was Infallible in framing its Definitions, nor the Pope in confirming them. If theCoon; cil were Infallible in framing them, then they needed no Confirmation : If they were not, then Infallibility is only in the Pope that confirms them, and then it is the Pope only that is Infallible. But no Man that reads thefe Words of our Savi- our, if any Man ,will do bis Will, be(hall know of the Doflrine, would ever ima- gine that the Bithop of Rome (whoever he thall happen to be ) were fecured from all fatal Errors in Matters of Faith, much lefs that he were Endowed with an Infal- lible Spirit, in judging what Doltrines are from God, and what not : For it can- not be denied, but that many of their Popes have been notorioufly Wicked and Vicious in their Lives: Nay Bellarmine himfelf acknowledgeth, that for a Sue- ceffionof Fifty Popes together, there was not one Pious and Virtuous Man that fate in that Chair ; and,fome of their Popes have been Condemned and Depofed for Heretic ; and yet after all this, the Pope, and thegoverning part of that Church, would bear the World in hand that he is Infallible. But if this Saying of our Sa- viour be true, that ifany Man will do his Will, he fball know of his Doflrine, whether it be of God ; then every honett Man that fincerely defires to do the Will of God, hath a fairer Pretence to Infallibility, and a clearer Text for it, than is to be found in the whole Bible for the Infallibility ofthe Bithop of Rome. What would the Church of Rome give, that there were but as exprefs a Text in Scti- pture for the Infallibility of their Popes, as this is for the fecurity of every good Man, in hisJudgment ofDohtrines ( which makes Infallibility needlefs ?) What an infufferable Noife, and what.endlefs Triumphs would they make upon it, if it had been any where faid in the Bible, That if any Man be Bithop of Rome, and fit in St. Peter's Chair, he(hall know of my Doflrine whether it be of God ? Had there been but fuels a Text as this, we fhould never have been troubled with their impertinent citationof Texts, and their remote and blind Inferences from Pafce Oves, and fuper bane Petram ; Feedmy Sheep ; and upon this Rock will I buildmy Church ; to prove the Pope's Infallibility. And yet no Man of Senfe or Reafon e- ver extended the Text I am fpeaking to, fo far as to attempt- to prove from it the Infallibility of every good Man ; but only his fecurityfrom fatal Errors and Mi- flakes in Religion. The largeft Promifes that are made in Scripture of fecurity from Error and Mittake aboutDivine Things, are made to good Men, who fin', cerely delireto do the Will of God. And if this be fo, we mull conclude feveral Popes to have been the furtheft from Infallibility ofany Men in the World. And indeed there is not a more compendious way to perfwade Men that the Chriftian Religion is a Fable, than to fet up a Lewd and Vicious Man for the Oracle of it. K k 2 Nay,
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