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unknown tongue; and the remedy he prefcribes SER M. against the accidental mischief and inconvenience of CXIII. knowledge, is not ignorance, but charity to go. vern their knowledge, and to help them to make right use of it; ver. 20. of that chap. after he had declared that the fervice of GoD ought to be performed in a known tongue, he immediately adds, " brethren, be not children in understanding; howbeit in malice be ye children, "but in understanding be ye men." He commends knowledge, he encourageth it, he requires it of all chriftians; fo far is he from checking the purfuit of it, and depriving the people of the means of it. And indeed there is nothing in the chriftian religion, but what is fit for every man to know, because there is nothing in it, but what is defigned to promote holiness and a good life; and if men make any other use of their knowledge, it is their own fault, for it certainly tends to make men good; and being fo useful and neceffary to fo good a purpose, men ought not to be debarred of it.

Thirdly, let it be confidered, that the proper and natural effects and confequences of ignorance are equally pernicious, and much more certain and unavoidable, than those which are accidentally occafioned by knowledge; for fo far as a man is ignorant of his duty, it is impoffible he should do it. He that hath the knowledge of religion, may be a bad christian, but he that is deftitute of it, can be none at all. Or if ignorance do beget and promote fome kind of devotion in men, it is fuch a devotion as is not properly religion, but fuperftition; the ignorant man may be zealously fuperftitious, but without fome measure of knowledge, no man can be D4

truly

SER M. truly religious.

CXIII.

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"That the foul be without knowledge it is not good," fays Solomon, Prov. xix. 2. because good practices depend upon our knowledge, and must be directed by it; when as a man that is trained up only to the outward performance of fome things in religion, as to the faying over fo many prayers in an unknown tongue, this man cannot be truly rel gious, because nothing is religious that is not a reasonable service; and no fervice can be reafonable, that is not directed by our understanding. Indeed, if the end of prayer were only to give GoD to understand what we want, it were all one what language we prayed in, and whether we understood what we afked of him or not: but fo long as the end of prayer is to teftify the sense of our own wants, and of our dependance upon God for the supply of them, it s impoffible that any man should in any tolerable propriety of fpeech be faid to pray, who does not underftand what he afks; and the faying over so many pater nofters by one that does not understand the meaning of them, is no more a prayer, than the repeating over fo many verses in Virgil. And if this were good reafoning, that men must not be permitted to know fo much as they can in religion, for fear they should grow troublesome with their knowledge, then certainly the best way in the world to maintain peace in the chriftian church, would be to let the people know nothing at all in religion; and the beft way to fecure the ignorance of the people would be to keep the priests as ignorant as the people, and then to be fure they could teach them nothing but then the mifchief would be, that out of a fondness to maintain peace in the christian church, there would be no church, nor no christianity;

chriftianity; which would be the fame wife contri- SER M. vance, as if a prince fhould destroy his fubjects, to keep his kingdom quiet.

Fourthly, let us likewife confider, that if this reafon be good, it is much ftronger for withholding the fcriptures from the priests, and the learned, than from the people; because the danger of starting errors and herefies, and countenancing them from fcripture, and managing them plaufibly and with advantage, is much more to be feared from the learned, than from the common people; and the experience of all ages hath fhewn, that the great broachers and abetters of herefy in the christian church, have been men of learning and wit; and most of the famous herefies, that are recorded in ecclefiaftical history, have their name from fome learned man or other; fo that it is a great mistake to think that the way to prevent error and heresy in the church, is to take the bible out of the hands of the people, fo long as the free ufe of it is permitted to men of learning and skill, in whose hands the danger of perverting it is much greater. The antient fathers, I am fure, do frequently prescribe to the people the conftant and careful reading of the holy fcriptures, as the fureft antidote against the poison of dangerous errors, and damnable herefies; and if there be fo much danger of feduction into error from the oracles of truth, by what other or better means can we hope to be fecured against this danger? if the word of GOD be fo cross and improper a means to this end, one would think that the teachings of men should be much less effectual; fo that men muft either be left in their ignorance, or they must be permitted to learn from the word of truth; and whatever

force

SERM. force this reafon of the danger of herefy hath in it, CXII. to deprive the common people of the use of the

fcriptures, I am fure it is much stronger to wrest them out of the hands of the priests and the learned, because they are much more capable of perverting them to fo bad a purpose.

Fifthly, and laftly, this danger was as great and visible in the age of the apostles, as it is now; and yet they took a quite contrary courfe: there were herefies then, as well as now, and either the fcriptures were not thought by being in the hands of the people to be the cause of them, or they did not think the taking of them out of their hands a proper remedy. The apostles in all their epistles, do earnestly exhort the people" to grow in knowledge," and commend them for " fearching the scriptures," and charge them that "the word of God fhould dwell "richly in them." And St. Peter takes particular notice of fome men wrefting fome difficult paffages in St. Paul's epiftles, as likewife in the other fcriptures, to their own deftruction, 2 Pet. iii. 16. where fpeaking of St. Paul's epiftles, he fays, "there are "fome things hard to be understood, which they "that are unlearned and unstable wreft, as they do. "alfo the other fcriptures, to their own deftruction." Here the danger objected is taken notice of; but the remedy prescribed by St. Peter, is not to take from the people the ufe of the fcriptures, and to keep them in ignorance; but after he had cautioned against the like weakness and errors, he exhorts them to grow in knowledge," ver. 17, 18. "ye there

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fore, beloved, feeing ye know these things before," (that is, feeing ye are fo plainly told and warned of this danger) "beware left ye alfo being led away " with

6

CXIII.

"with the error of the wicked, fall from your own SER M. "steadfastness; but grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our LORD and SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST," (that is, of the chriftian religion;) believing, it seems, that the more knowledge they had in religion, the lefs they would be in danger of falling into damnable errors. I proceed to the

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Second obfervation, viz. that the knowledge of our duty, and the practice of it, may and often are separated. This likewife is fuppofed in the text, that men may, and often do know the will of GOD, and their duty, and yet fail in the practice of it. Our SAVIOUR elsewhere fuppofeth, that many "know "their master's will, who do not do it," and he compares those " that hear his fayings, and do them "not, to a foolish man that built his houfe upon "the fand." And St. James fpeaks of fome, "who "are hearers of the word only, but not doers of it," and for that reason fall fhort of happiness. And this is no wonder, because the attaining to that knowledge of religion which is neceffary to falvation is no difficult task. A great part of it is written in our hearts, and we cannot be ignorant of it if we would; as that there is a GOD, and a providence, and another state after this life, wherein we shall be rewarded, or punished, according as we have lived here in this world; that GOD is to be worshipped, to be prayed to for what we want, and to be praised for what we enjoy. Thus far nature instructs men in religion, and in the great duties of morality, as juftice, and temperance, and the like. And as for revealed religion, as that Jesus CHRIST the Sox of God came into our nature to fave us, by revealing our duty more clearly and fully to us, by giving us a

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