1Though all that is said may be a reasonable preparative to faith, it is more cogent evidence which is necessary to ⟨p. 259⟩convince us, that Jesus Christ is the Saviour of the world. That a man appearing like one of us, is the Eternal Word of God incarnate, is a thing which no man is bound to believe, without very sound evidence to prove it. God hath made Reason essential to our Nature: it is not our weakness, but our natural excellency, and his Image on our nature. Therefore he never called us to renounce it, and to lay it by: for we have no way to know Principles, but by an Intellectual discerning them in their proper Evidence: and no way to know conclusions by, but by a rational discerning their necessary connection to those principles. If God would have us know without reason, he would not have made us reasonable creatures: man hath no way of mental discerning or knowledge, but by understanding things in their proper evidence: to know without this, were to know without knowledge. Faith is an act or species of knowledge, it is so far from being contrary to reason, that it is but an act of cleared elevated reason: it is not an act of immediate intuition of God or Jesus Christ himself; but a knowledge of the truth by the divine evidence of its certainty: they that wrangle against us, for giving reason for our Religion, seem to tell us, that they have none for their own; or else reprehend us for being men. If they had to do with them, who make God to be but the Prime Reason, would they say that Faith is something above Reason, and therefore something above God? I believe that our Reason or Intellection is far from being univocally the same thing with God's: but I believe that God is Intellection, Reason or Wisdom eminenter, though not formaliter: and that though the name be first used, to signify the lower derivative Reason of many, yet we have no higher to express the Wisdom of God by, nor better notion to apprehend it by, than this which is its Image. I conclude therefore, that
1THough all that is said may be a reasonable preparative to faith, it is more cogent evidence which is necessary to ⟨p. 259⟩convince us, that Jesus Christ is the Saviour of the world. That a man appearing like one of us, is the Eternal Word of God incarnate, is a thing which no man is bound to believe, without very sound evidence to prove it. God hath made Reason essential to our Nature: it is not our weakness, but our natural excellency, and his Image on our nature. Therefore he never called us to renounce it, and to lay it by: for we have no way to know Principles, but by an Intellectual discerning them in their proper Evidence: and no way to know conclusions by, but by a rational discerning their necessary connexion to those principles. If God would have us know without reason, he would not have made us reasonable creatures: man hath no way of mental discerning or knowledge, but by understanding things in their proper evidence: to know without this, were to know without knowledge. Faith is an act or species of knowledge, it is so far from being contrary to reason, that it is but an act of cleared elevated reason: it is not an act of immediate intuition of God or Jesus Christ himself; but a knowledge of the truth by the divine evidence of its certainty: they that wrangle against us, for giving reason for our Religion, seem to tell us, that they have none for their own; or else reprehend us for being men. If they had to do with them, who make God to be but the Prime Reason, would they say that Faith is something above Reason, and therefore something above God? I believe that our Reason or Intellection is far from being univocally the same thing with God's: but I believe that God is Intellection, Reason or Wisdom eminenter, though not formaliter: and that though the name be first used, to signifie the lower derivative Reason of many, yet we have no higher to express the Wisdom of God by, nor better notion to apprehend it by, than this which is its Image. I conclude therefore, that
- 1Q. Unde probamus libros Religionis nostrae divina esse in spiratione conscriptos? R. Ex multis, quorum primum est ipsius Scripturae veritas: deinde ordo rerum, consonantia praeceptorum, modus locutionis fine ambitu, puritasque verborum. Additur conscribentium & praedicantium qualitas, quod divina homines, excelsa vates, infacundi subtilia, non nisi divino repleti spiritu tradidissent. Tum praedicationis virtus, quam dum praedicaretur (licet à paucis despectis) obtinuit. Accedunt his rectificatio contrariorum, ut Sybillarum vel Philosophorum; expulsio adversariorum, utilitas consequentium, exitus eorum quae per acceptationes & figuras & praedictiones, quae praedicta sunt ad postremum; miracula jugiter facta, donee Scriptura ipsa susciperetur à gentibus. De qua hoc nunc ad proximum miraculum sufficit, quod ab omnibus suscepta cognoscitur. Junilius African, de part. div. Leg. l. 2. c. 29.
