A65285:135
A Body of Practical Divinity
A body of practical divinity consisting of above one hundred seventy six sermons on the lesser catechism composed by the reverend assembly of divines at Westminster : with a supplement of some sermons on several texts of Scripture / by Thomas Watson ...
London: printed for Thomas Parkurst, 1692
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Quest. Who shall have the Power of interpreting Scriptures?
The Papists do assert that it is in the Power of the Church. If you ask who they mean by the Church? They say the Pope, who is Head of it, and he is Infallible; so Bellarmine. But that Assertion is false, because many of the Popes have ⟨p. 16⟩been ignorant and vicious, as Platina affirms, who writes of the Lives of the Popes: Pope Liberius was an Arian, and Pope John XXII. denied the Immortality of the Soul; therefore Popes are no fit Interpreters of Scripture: Who then?
The Papists do assert that it is in the Power of the Church. If you ask who they mean by the Church? They say the Pope, who is Head of it, and he is Infallible; so Bellarmine. But that Assertion is false, because many of the Popes have ⟨p. 16⟩been ignorant and vitious, as Platina affirms, who writes of the Lives of the Popes: Pope Liberius was an Arian, and Pope Iohn XXII. denied the Immortality of the Soul; therefore Popes are no fit Interpreters of Scripture: Who then?
Ans. The Scripture is to be its own Interpreter, or rather the Spirit speaking in it: nothing can cut the Diamond but the Diamond; nothing can interpret Scripture but Scripture; the Sun best discovers its self by its own Beams; the Scripture interprets itself in easy places to the Understanding. But the Question is concerning hard places of Scripture, where the weak Christian is ready to wade beyond his depth, who shall interpret here?
Ans. The Scripture is to be its own Interpreter, or rather the Spirit speaking in it: nothing can cut the Diamond but the Diamond; nothing can interpret Scripture but Scripture; the Sun best discovers its self by its own Beams; the Scripture interprets itself in easie places to the Understanding. But the Question is concerning hard places of Scripture, where the weak Christian is ready to wade beyond his depth, who shall interpret here?