ON MATTERS OF BELIEF. 1 03 



.what fhe commands us to believe, however ill at eafe 

 our poor murmuring reafon may find herfelf in the 

 chains of implicit faith and paffive obedience. For to 

 what doctor, or to what doctors of theology, of our 

 own perfuafion, fhall we grant the right of prescribing 

 to us what and how we mould believe ? to chalk out 

 the line over which we muft not trefpafs in inquiring 

 after truth, in driving after light, in endeavouring to 

 clear our minds from perplexed, material, unfuitable, 

 modes of representation in matters of religion, and 

 which are incompatible with the firft principles of rea- 

 fon ? Who dare be fo bold as to make his underhand - 

 ing, his Sagacity, not only the Standard, but even the 

 rule and the law of all others ? If it was allowed, two 

 or three hundred years ago, to rife up again ft authority 

 and decrees, again ft popes, church-doctors, and coun- 

 cils : fince when has it been diiailowed to a 61 in like 

 manner again ft the authority and decrees of never fo 

 great a number of proteftant church- doctors, who, as 

 far as my knowledge reaches, have no more authentic 

 credentials to fhew for their infallibility, than the right 

 holy fynod of Trent ? Might our forefathers try all 

 things, and hold faft to that which was beft (i. e. what 

 was beft, according to their then perceptions and in- 

 ward convictions) : why not alfo we ? Why mould we 

 not dare to profecute what they only began but could 

 not finifh ? what, in the very nature of the cafe, can 

 never be finished ? Who gave them a right to fhackle 

 the understandings of their pofterity ; to comprefs their 

 belief into formularies ; to force upon them modes of re- 

 presentation that are incompatible with the perceptions 

 and knowledge which the farther growth of all the fci- 



h 4 ences 



