Certain disputations of right to sacraments, and the true nature of visible Christianity defending…

That I may the better manifest this, I shall examine all the considerable Descriptions of that faith which I can meet with. The Papists themselves are not agreed in this business: sometime they speak as if a bare Assent would serve the turn; but commonly they add that there is a Necessity also of consent, 1. To be subject to the Church. 2. To live under the Ordinances. And if they take the Intention of the party or Parents; or their Godfathers and Godmothers to be necessary, as they do the Intention of the Priest, then a bare Profession with them will not serve, nor can they tell when any one is baptized.

Mr. Blake doth speak so much, and purposely of this Point, that one would think we may expect an exact Description of this faith from him, if from any man: especially in his last Book, when I had so earnestly Entreated him before to do it, because of the omission of it in his former Book: And yet even in this hath he done nothing but involve and obscure his meaning ⟨p. 164⟩more than before: though I had purposely urged him to a plain discovery of his sense, even somewhat beyond the bounds of modesty, as it is esteemed of in common cases: For I perceived that the stress of our differences did rest much in this; because no wise man will leave his grounds till he see where he may have better; unless he mean to be for nothing, or of no Religion: there's no reason a man should upon every opposed difficulty relinquish that he hath.

Mr. Blake doth speak so much, and purposely of this Point, that one would think we may expect an exact Description of this faith from him, if from any man: especially in his last Book, when I had so earnestly Intreated him before to do it, because of the omission of it in his former Book: And yet even in this hath he done nothing but involve and obscure his meaning ⟨p. 164⟩more than before: though I had purposely urged him to a plain discovery of his sense, even somewhat beyond the bounds of modesty, as it is esteemed of in common cases: For I perceived that the stress of our differences did rest much in this; because no wise man will leave his grounds till he see where he may have better; unless he mean to be for nothing, or of no Religion: there's no reason a man should upon every opposed difficulty relinquish that he hath.