But for the ignorant weak Christian, I say, 1. He knoweth all these Articles that I have named; but 2. perhaps not with so ripe a manner of apprehension as is formed into mental words, or which he can express in words to others: I find my self in my studies, that I have sometimes an apprehension of a Truth before I have ripened that conception for an expression. 3. And perhaps they are not Methodical and Distinct in their conceptions, and cannot say that there are just so many Articles. Every sick man can understand what it is to desire and accept of such a man to be his Physician; and herein he first verily desireth health, and secondly, desireth Physic as a means to Health, and thirdly, desireth the Physician in order to the use of that means, and fourthly, therein doth take him to be a Physician, and fifthly, to have competent skill, and sixthly, to be in some measure faithful, to be trusted, and seventhly, doth place some confidence in him, &c. all this and more is truly in his mind; and yet perhaps they are not ripened and measured into such distinct conceptions, as that he can distinctly tell you all this in tolerable Language, or doth observe then as distinct Conceptions in himself (and whether uno intuitu the eye and the Intellect may not see many Objects, though ab objectis, the acts must be called many and divers, is a Controversy among Philosophers; and as I remember Pet. Hurtad. de Mendoza affirmeth it.) But if you your selves will form all these into distinct conceptions, and ask your Catechist his judgement of them, its like ⟨p. 419⟩he can make you perceive at least by a Yea or Nay, that he understands them all. The new formed body of the Infant in the Womb hath all the Integral parts of a man; and yet so small that you cannot so easily discern them as you may do the same parts when he is grown up to manhood. So the knowledge of every particular Essential Article of faith is truly in the weakest Christian in the very moment of his conversion; but perhaps it may be but by a more crude imperfect Conception, that observeth not every Article distinctly, nor any of them very clearly, but his knowledge is both too dim and too confused. And yet I must say that it is not only such as some Papists call a Virtual or Implicit Faith or knowledge, As to believe only the General Revelation and the formal Object; as that the Scripture is Gods Word, and God is true:
But for the ignorant weak Christian, I say, 1. He knoweth all these Articles that I have named; but 2. perhaps not with so ripe a manner of apprehension as is formed into mental words, or which he can express in words to others: I find my self in my studies, that I have somtimes an apprehension of a Truth before I have ripened that conception for an expression. 3. And perhaps they are not Methodical and Distinct in their conceptions, and cannot say that there are just so many Articles. Every sick man can understand what it is to desire and accept of such a man to be his Physitian; and herein he first verily desireth health, and secondly, desireth Physick as a means to Health, and thirdly, desireth the Physitian in order to the use of that means, and fourthly, therein doth take him to be a Physitian, and fifthly, to have competent skill, and sixthly, to be in some measure faithful, to be trusted, and seventhly, doth place some confidence in him, &c. all this and more is truly in his mind; and yet perhaps they are not ripened and measured into such distinct conceptions, as that he can distinctly tell you all this in tolerable Language, or doth observe then as distinct Conceptions in himself (and whether uno intuitu the eye and the Intellect may not see many Objects, though ab objectis, the acts must be called many and divers, is a Controversie among Philosophers; and as I remember Pet. Hurtad. de Mendoza affirmeth it.) But if you your selves will form all these into distinct conceptions, and ask your Catechist his judgement of them, its like ⟨p. 419⟩he can mak you perceive at least by a Yea or Nay, that he understands them all. The new formed body of the Infant in the Womb hath all the Integral parts of a man; and yet so small that you cannot so easily discern them as you may do the same parts when he is grown up to manhood. So the knowledge of every particular Essential Article of faith is truly in the weakest Christian in the very moment of his conversion; but perhaps it may be but by a more crude imperfect Conception, that observeth not every Article distinctly, nor any of them very clearly, but his knowledge is both too dim and too confused. And yet I must say that it is not only such as some Papists call a Virtual or Implicite Faith or knowledge, As to believe only the General Revelation and the formal Object; as that the Scripture is Gods Word, and God is true:
