that is, that of things otherwise uncertain and depending on humane credit, there should be had such certainty as humane affairs require. For an Oath was instituted by God, by force of the Light of Nature, for a remedy of humane defects about Truth; that among mortals it should be Truths last garrison, as oft as all other kinds of proof do fail. But this end would be wholly overthrown, and there could be no certain credit among men, if it were free for the swearer, at his own arbiterment, what he speaketh in words to cause belief, by some tacit ambiguity in swearing, or after he hath sworn, by finding out some new, and as it were, posthumous comment so to disable it, as that it shall lose all its force, and be utterly ineffectual. If either of these were lawful an Oath should not be the end of strife, but the beginning, and should rather give occasion for new contradictions and strifes, than end the old ones. Open but this window once, and then what can be thought of so false, for the defence ⟨p. 327⟩whereof some eff•ge or lurking-hole may not he devised, whereby it may be freed from being a lie. In the mean time, what perverseness, is it that That should by dishonest men be turned into an instrument of deceiving, which was instituted by the most wise God to be a help to credit (or mens belief of one another?) Verily, unless one will rather use God's sacred institution to another purpose, than that to which it was instituted (which a godly man will not easily do) that which is the end of an Oath, the same ought to be the end of the swearer: And that is, so to make the hearer to believe, that he may become more certain and secure of the Truth of that which before was doubtful. But he that dissembleth, studieth to breed a false belief in the hearers, and so doth not only suffer another to be deceived (which yet is contrary to Charity when he may and ought to hinder it;) but also intendeth to deceive; which is not only against all Justice and Honesty, but it is also conjoined with the greatest wrong to God, and contempt of his name. And verily to me scarce any other sort of Perjury doth more diametrically seem to be against either the scope of the third Commandment, or the very words (of not taking the name of God in vain) than that which ariseth from this dissimulation. For as the word Vanity doth properly and adequately comprehend all that which is any way false;
that is, that of things otherwise uncertain and depending on humane credit, there should be had such certainty as humane affairs require. For an Oath was instituted by God, by force of the Light of Natue, for a remedy of humane defects about Truth; that among mortals it should be Truths last garrison, as oft as all other kinds of proof do fail. But this end would be wholly overthrown, and there could be no certain credit among men, if it were free for the swearer, at his own arbiterment, what he speaketh in words to cause belief, by some tacite ambiguity in swearing, or after he hath sworn, by finding out some new, and as it were, posthumous comment so to disable it, as that it shall lose all its force, and be utterly ineffectual. If either of these were lawful an Oath should not be the end of strife, but the beginning, and should rather give occasion for new contradictions and strifes, than end the old ones. Open but this window once, and then what can be thought of so false, for the defence ⟨p. 327⟩whereof some eff•ge or lurking-hole may not he devised, whereby it may be freed from being a lie. In the mean time, what perverseness, is it that That should by dishonest men be turned into an instrument of deceiving, which was instituted by the most wise God to be a help to credit (or mens belief of one another?) Verily, unless one will rather use God's sacred institution to another purpose, than that to which it was instituted (which a godly man will not easily do) that which is the end of an Oath, the same ought to be the end of the swearer: And that is, so to make the hearer to believe, that he may become more certain and secure of the Truth of that which before was doubtful. But he that dissembleth, studieth to breed a false belief in the hearers, and so doth not only suffer another to be deceived (which yet is contrary to Charity when he may and ought to hinder it;) but also intendeth to deceive; which is not only against all Justice and Honesty, but it is also conjoyned with the greatest wrong to God, and contempt of his name. And verily to me scarce any other sort of Perjury doth more diametrically seem to be against either the scope of the third Commandment, or the very words (of not taking the name of God in vain) than that which ariseth from this dissimulation. For as the word Vanity doth properly and adequately comprehend all that which is any way false;
