An answer to the discourse of Mr. William Sherlock, touching the knowledge of Christ,…

To which the Answer is easy, God is the Husbandman with reference to both, planting the Vine Christ, and dressing the Branches Christians. The third reason is, Christ speaks of branches in him, which bear no fruit, and there can be no such branches in the person of Christ: But as the Learned Whitaker hath observed against Stapleton, that place, Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away: Joh. 15.2. May be read thus, Every branch which beareth not fruit in me, he taketh away. The words, in me, being referred not to ⟨p. 177⟩the Branch, but to the Fruit: But being read as is usual, the answer is obvious; our Saviour in this Verse speaks not of true real Branches, which are always fruitful, but of seeming ones, which are barren; they seem to be in Christ, but are not.

To which the Answer is easie, God is the Husbandman with reference to both, planting the Vine Christ, and dressing the Branches Christians. The third reason is, Christ speaks of branches in him, which bear no fruit, and there can be no such branches in the person of Christ: But as the Learned Whitaker hath observed against Stapleton, that place, Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away: Joh. 15.2. May be read thus, Every branch which beareth not fruit in me, he taketh away. The words, in me, being referred not to ⟨p. 177⟩the Branch, but to the Fruit: But being read as is usual, the answer is obvious; our Saviour in this Verse speaks not of true real Branches, which are always fruitful, but of seeming ones, which are barren; they seem to be in Christ, but are not.

When Christ speaks in the first Person, ¹I, and in me, he cannot mean this of his Person, but of his Church and Doctrine, according as the circumstances require: Thus Ver. 5. I am the true vine, ye are the branches, he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit; for without me ye can do nothing: I would willingly learn what sense can be made of this, if we understand it of the Person of Christ; for it is not very intelligible, how we can be in the Person of Christ; and it is more unintelligible how we can be in the Person of Christ, and the Person of Christ in us at the same time, which is a new piece of Philosophy, called Penetration of Dimensions; and that our fruitfulness should depend upon such an Union, is as hard as all the rest.