CHAPTER VIII. THE POWER OF THE CHURCH RESPECTING ARTICLES OF FAITH, AND ITS LICENTIOUS PERVERSION, UNDER THE PAPACY, TO THE CORRUPTION OF ALL PURITY OF DOCTRINE.

The next subject is the power of the Church, which is to be considered as residing, partly in the respective bishops, partly in councils, and those either provincial or general. I speak only of the spiritual power which belongs to the Church. Now, it consists either in doctrine, in legislation, or jurisdiction. The subject of doctrine contains two parts—the authority to establish doctrines, and the explication of them. Before we enter on the particular discussion of each of these points, we would apprize the pious readers, that whatever is asserted respecting the power of the Church, they should be mindful to refer to the end for which Paul declares it to have been given, namely, “to edification, and not to destruction;” [899] and all who make a legitimate use of it, consider themselves as nothing more than “servants of Christ,” [900] and the people’s “servants for Jesus’ sake.” [901] Now, the only way to edify the Church is, for the ministers themselves to study to preserve to Jesus Christ his rightful authority, which can no longer be secure than while he is left in possession of what he has received from the Father, that is, to be the sole Master in the Church. [902] For of him alone, and of no other, is it said, “Hear ye him.” [903] The power of the Church, therefore, is not to be depreciated, yet it must be circumscribed by certain limits, that it may not be extended in every direction, according to the caprice of men. It will, therefore, be highly useful to observe how it is described by the prophets and apostles. For if we simply grant to men the power which they may be pleased to assume, it must be obvious to every one, what a door will be opened for tyranny, which ought never to be seen in the Church of Christ.

II. Here, therefore, it is necessary to remember, that whatever authority and dignity is attributed by the Holy Spirit, in the Scripture, either to the priests and prophets under the law, or to the apostles and their successors, it is all given, not in a strict sense to the persons themselves, but to the ministry over which they were appointed, or, to speak more correctly, to the word, the ministration of which was committed to them. For if we examine them all in succession, we shall not find that they were invested with any authority to teach or to answer inquiries, but in the name and word of the Lord. For when they were called to their office, it was at the same time enjoined that they should bring forward nothing of themselves, but should speak from the mouth of the Lord. Nor did he send them forth in public to address the people, before he had instructed them what they should say, that they might speak nothing beside his word. Moses himself, the prince of all the prophets, was to be heard above all others; but he was first furnished with his commission, that he might not be able to announce any thing except from the Lord. Therefore the people, when they received his doctrine, were said to “believe the Lord and his servant Moses.” [904] The authority of the priests also, that it might not fall into contempt, was confirmed by the severest punishments. [905] But, on the other hand, the Lord shows on what condition they were to be heard, when he says, “My covenant was with Levi. The law of truth was in his mouth.” And just afterwards, “The priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth; for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts.” [906] Therefore, if a priest would be heard, it was necessary for him to prove himself the messenger of God, by faithfully communicating the commands which he had received from his master; and where attention to the priests is enjoined, it is expressly stated, that “they shall teach the sentence of the law” [907] of God.

III. The power of the prophets is fully and beautifully described in Ezekiel. “Son of man,” says the Lord, “I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel; therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me.” [908] When he is commanded to hear from the mouth of the Lord, is he not prohibited to invent any thing of himself? And what is it to give warning from the Lord, but, to speak in such a manner as to be able to declare with confidence that the message he has brought is not his own, but the Lord’s? The Lord expresses the same thing in other words in the prophecy of Jeremiah: “The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream; and he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully.” [909] He clearly delivers a law for them all; its import is, that he permits no one to teach more than he has been commanded; and he afterwards gives the appellation of “chaff” to every thing that has not proceeded from himself alone. Not one of the prophets opened his mouth, therefore, without having first received the words from the Lord. Hence their frequent use of these expressions: “The word of the Lord,” “The burden of the Lord,” “Thus saith the Lord,” “The mouth of the Lord hath spoken;” and this was highly necessary; for Isaiah exclaimed, “I am a man of unclean lips;” [910] and Jeremiah said, “Behold, I cannot speak, for I am a child.” [911] What could proceed from the pollution of the one, and the folly of the other, but impure and foolish speeches, if they had spoken their own words? But their lips were holy and pure, when they began to be the organs of the Holy Spirit. While the prophets were bound by this law to deliver nothing but what they had received, they were likewise adorned with eminent power and splendid titles. For when the Lord declares, “See, I have this day set thee over the nations, and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, and to build, and to plant,” he at the same time assigns the reason—“Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth.” [912]

IV. If we advert to the apostles, they are certainly honoured with many extraordinary characters. It is said that they are “the light of the world,” and “the salt of the earth;” [913] that “he that heareth” them “heareth Christ;” [914] that “whatsoever” they “shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever” they “shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” [915] But their very name shows what degree of liberty they were allowed in their office; that if they were apostles, they were not to declaim according to their own pleasure, but to deliver with strict fidelity the commands of him who had sent them. And the language of Christ is sufficiently clear, in which he has defined their message by the following commission: “Go ye, and teach all nations whatsoever I have commanded you.” [916] He had even received and imposed on himself the same law, in order that no one might refuse to submit to it. “My doctrine,” says he, “is not mine, but his that sent me.” [917] He who was always the eternal and only counsellor of the Father, and was constituted by the Father the Lord and Master of all, yet because he sustained the office of a teacher, prescribed, by his own example, the rule which all ministers ought to follow in their teaching. The power of the Church, therefore, is not unlimited, but subject to the word of the Lord, and, as it were, included in it.

V. But whereas it has been a principle received in the Church from the beginning, and ought to be admitted in the present day, that the servants of God should teach nothing which they have not learned from him, yet they have had different modes of receiving instruction from him, according to the variety of different periods; and the present mode differs from those which have preceded it. In the first place, if the assertion of Christ be true, that “no man knoweth the Father except the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him,” [918] it must always have been necessary for those who would arrive at the knowledge of God, to be directed by that eternal wisdom. For how could they have comprehended the mysteries of God, or how could they have declared them, except by the teaching of him, to whom alone the secrets of the Father are intimately known? The saints in former ages, therefore, had no other knowledge of God than what they obtained by beholding him in the Son, as in a mirror. By this observation I mean that God never manifested himself to man in any other way than by his Son, his only wisdom, light, and truth. From this fountain Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and others, drew all the knowledge which they possessed of heavenly doctrine; from this fountain the prophets themselves drew all the celestial oracles which they spoke and wrote. But this wisdom has not always manifested itself in the same way. With the patriarchs God employed secret revelations; for the confirmation of which, however, he at the same time added such signs that they could not entertain the least doubt that it was God who spake to them. What the patriarchs had received, they transmitted from hand to hand to their posterity; for the Lord had committed it to them on the express condition that they should so propagate it. Succeeding generations, from the testimony of God in their hearts, knew that what they heard was from heaven, and not from the earth.

VI. But when it pleased God to raise up a more visible form of a church, it was his will that his word should be committed to writing, in order that the priests might derive from it whatever they would communicate to the people, and that all the doctrine which should be delivered might be examined by that rule. Therefore, after the promulgation of the law, when the priests were commanded to teach “out of the mouth of the Lord,” the meaning is, that they should teach nothing extraneous, or different from that system of doctrine which the Lord had comprised in the law; it was not lawful for them to add to it or to diminish from it. Afterwards followed the prophets, by whom God published new oracles, which were to be added to the law; yet they were not so new but that they proceeded from the law, and bore a relation to it. For in regard to doctrine, the prophets were merely interpreters of the law, and added nothing to it except prophecies of things to come. Except these, they brought forward nothing but pure explication of the law. But because it pleased God that there should be a more evident and copious doctrine, for the better satisfaction of weak consciences, he directed the prophecies also to be committed to writing, and to be accounted a part of his word. To these likewise were added the histories, which were the productions of the prophets, but composed under the dictation of the Holy Spirit. I class the Psalms with the prophecies, because what we attribute to the prophecies is common to the Psalms. That whole body of Scripture, therefore, consisting of the Law, the Prophets, the Psalms, and the Histories, was the word of God to the ancient Church; and to this standard the priests and teachers, even to the coming of Christ, were bound to conform their doctrine; nor was it lawful for them to deviate either to the right hand or to the left, because their office was wholly confined within these limits, that they should answer the people from the mouth of God. And this may be inferred from that remarkable passage of Malachi, where he commands the Jews to remember the law, and to be attentive to it, even till the publication of the gospel. [919] For in that injunction he drives them off from all adventitious doctrines, and prohibits even the smallest deviation from the path which Moses had faithfully showed them. And it is for this reason that David so magnifies the excellence of the law, and recounts so many of its praises; to prevent the Jews from desiring any addition to it, since it contained every thing necessary for them to know.

VII. But when, at length, the Wisdom of God was manifested in the flesh, it openly declared to us all that the human mind is capable of comprehending, or ought to think, concerning the heavenly Father. Now, therefore, since Christ, the Sun of Righteousness, has shone upon us, we enjoy the full splendour of Divine truth, resembling the brightness of noonday, whereas the light enjoyed before was a kind of twilight. For certainly the apostle intended to state no unimportant fact when he said, that “God, who, at sundry times, and in divers manners, spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son;” [920] for he here suggests, and even plainly declares, that God will not in future, as in ages past, speak from time to time by one and another, that he will not add prophecies to prophecies, or revelations to revelations, but that he has completed all the branches of instruction in his Son, so that this is the last and eternal testimony that we shall have from him; for which reason this whole period of the New Testament, from the appearance of Christ to us in the first promulgation of his gospel, even to the day of judgment, is designated as “the last time,” “the last times,” “the last days;” in order that, being content with the perfection of the doctrine of Christ, we may learn neither to invent any thing new or beyond it ourselves, nor to receive any such thing from the invention of others. It is not without cause, therefore, that the Father has given us his Son by a peculiar privilege, and appointed him to be our teacher, commanding attention to be paid to him, and not to any mere man. He has recommended his tuition to us in few words, when he says, “Hear ye him;” [921] but there is more weight and energy in them than is commonly imagined; for they call us away from all the instructions of men, and place us before him alone; they command us to learn from him alone all the doctrine of salvation, to depend upon him, to adhere to him, in short, as the words express, to listen solely to his voice. And, indeed, what ought now to be either expected or desired from man, when the Word of Life himself has familiarly presented himself before us? It is rather necessary that the mouths of all men should be shut, since he has once spoken, in whom it has pleased the heavenly Father that all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge should be hidden, [922] and has spoken in a manner becoming the wisdom of God, in which there is no imperfection, and the Messiah, who was expected to reveal all things; [923] that is, has spoken in such a manner as to leave nothing to be said by others after him.

VIII. Let us lay down this, then, as an undoubted axiom, that nothing ought to be admitted in the Church as the word of God, but what is contained first in the law and the prophets, and secondly in the writings of the apostles, and that there is no other method of teaching aright in the Church than according to the direction and standard of that word. Hence we conclude, also, that the apostles were allowed no more discretion than the prophets before them—namely, to expound the ancient Scripture, and to show that the things delivered in it were accomplished in Christ; but this they were only to do from the Lord, that is to say, under the guidance and dictation of the Spirit of Christ. For Christ limited their mission by this condition, when he ordered them to go and teach, not the fabrications of their own presumption, but whatsoever he had commanded them. [924] And nothing could be more explicit than what he said on another occasion: “Be not ye called Rabbi; for one is your Master, even Christ.” [925] To fix this more deeply in their minds, he repeats it twice in the same place. And because their weakness was such that they were unable to comprehend the things which they had heard and learned from the lips of their Master, the Spirit of truth was promised to them, to lead them into the true understanding of all things. [926] For that restriction is to be attentively remarked, which assigns to the Holy Spirit the office of suggesting to their minds all that Christ had before taught them with his mouth.

IX. Therefore Peter, who had been fully taught by his Master how far his office extended, represents nothing as left for himself or others, but to dispense the doctrine committed to them by God. “If any man speak,” says he, “let him speak as the oracles of God;” [927] that is, not with hesitation or uncertainty, like persons conscious of no sufficient authority, but with the noble confidence which becomes a servant of God furnished with his certain commission. What is this but rejecting all the inventions of the human mind, from whatever head they may proceed, in order that the pure word of God may be taught and learned in the Church of believers? What is this but removing all the decrees, or rather inventions of men, whatever be their station, that the ordinances of God alone may be observed? These are the spiritual “weapons, mighty through God to the pulling down of strong-holds,” by which the faithful soldiers of God “cast down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.” [928] This is the extent of the power with which the pastors of the Church, by whatever name they may be distinguished, ought to be invested;—that by the word of God they may venture to do all things with confidence; may constrain all the strength, glory, wisdom, and pride of the world to obey and submit to his majesty; supported by his power, may govern all mankind, from the highest to the lowest; may build up the house of Christ, and subvert the house of Satan; may feed the sheep, and drive away the wolves; may instruct and exhort the docile; may reprove, rebuke, and restrain the rebellious and obstinate; may bind and loose; may discharge their lightnings and thunders, if necessary; but all in the word of God. Between the apostles and their successors, however, there is, as I have stated, this difference—that the apostles were the certain and authentic amanuenses of the Holy Spirit, and therefore their writings are to be received as the oracles of God; but succeeding ministers have no other office than to teach what is revealed and recorded in the sacred Scriptures. We conclude, then, that it is not now left to faithful ministers to frame any new doctrine, but that it behoves them simply to adhere to the doctrine to which God has made all subject, without any exception. In making this observation, my design is to show, not only what is lawful to individuals, but also to the universal Church. With respect to particular persons, Paul had certainly been appointed by the Lord an apostle to the Corinthians; yet he denies that he had any dominion over their faith. [929] Who can now dare to arrogate to himself a dominion which Paul testifies did not belong to him? If he had sanctioned such a license of teaching, that whatever the pastor delivered, he might require, as a matter of right, that the same should be implicitly believed, he would never have recommended to the same Corinthians such a regulation as this: “Let the prophets speak two or three, and let the other judge. If any thing be revealed to another that sitteth by, let the first hold his peace.” [930] For here he exempted none, but made the authority of every one subject to the control of the word of God. But the case of the universal Church, it will be said, is different. I reply—Paul has obviated this objection in another place, when he says that “faith cometh by hearing, and hearing, by the word of God.” [931] But if it be the word of God alone upon which faith is suspended, towards which it looks, and on which it relies, I ask what is there left for the word of the whole world? Here it will be impossible for any man to hesitate who has really known what faith is. For it ought to rest on such firm ground as to stand invincible and undismayed in opposition to Satan, to all the machinations of hell, and to all the assaults of the world. This stability we shall find in the word of God alone. Besides the reason which we are here required to consider is of universal application—that God denies to man the right of promulgating any new article of faith, in order that he alone may be our Master in spiritual doctrine, as he alone is true beyond all possibility of deceiving or being deceived. This reason is no less applicable to the whole Church than to every individual believer.

X. But if this power, which we have shown to belong to the Church, be compared with that which has now for some ages past been claimed over the people of God by the spiritual tyrants who have falsely called themselves bishops and prelates of religion, there will be no more resemblance than there is between Christ and Belial. It is not my intention here to expose the shameful methods in which they have exercised their tyranny: I shall only state the doctrine, which they defend in the present age, not only by their writings, but also by fire and sword. As they take it for granted that a universal council is the true representative of the Church, having assumed this principle, they at once determine, as beyond all doubt, that such councils are under the immediate direction of the Holy Spirit, and therefore cannot err. Now, as they themselves influence the councils, and even constitute them, the fact is, that they assume to themselves all that they contend for as belonging to the councils. They wish our faith, therefore, to stand or fall at their pleasure, that whatever they may have determined on one side or the other, may be implicitly received by our minds as fully decided; so that if they approve of any thing, we must approve of the same without any hesitation; and if they condemn any thing, we must unite in the condemnation of it. At the same time, according to their own caprice, and in contempt of the word of God, they fabricate doctrines which, for no other reason than this, they require to be believed. For they acknowledge no man as a Christian, who does not fully assent to all their dogmas, affirmative as well as negative, if not with an explicit, at least with an implicit faith, because they pretend that the Church has authority to make new articles of faith.

XI. First, let us hear by what arguments they prove this authority to have been given to the Church; and then we shall see how far their allegations respecting the Church contribute to support their cause. The Church, they say, has excellent promises, that she is never to be forsaken by Christ, her spouse, but will be led by his Spirit into all truth. [932] But of the promises which they are accustomed to allege, many are given no less to each believer in particular, than collectively to the whole Church. For though the Lord was addressing the twelve apostles when he said, “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world;” [933] and “I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another comforter, even the Spirit of truth;” [934] he made these promises not only to the apostles considered as a body, but to every one of the number, and even to the other disciples whom he had already received, or who were afterwards to be added to them. Now, when they interpret these promises, replete with peculiar consolation, in such a sense as if they were given to no individual Christian, but only to the whole Church collectively, what is this but depriving all Christians of the confidence with which such promises ought to animate them? Here I do not deny that the whole society of believers, being adorned with a manifold variety of gifts, possesses a more ample and precious treasure of heavenly wisdom, than each particular individual; nor do I intend that these things are spoken of believers in common, as if they were all equally endued with the spirit of understanding and doctrine; but we must not allow the adversaries of Christ, in defence of a bad cause, to wrest the Scripture to a sense which it was not intended to convey. Leaving this remark, I freely acknowledge that the Lord is continually present with his servants, and that he guides them by his Spirit; that this is not a spirit of error, ignorance, falsehood, or darkness, but “the spirit of wisdom, and revelation, and truth,” from whom they may certainly learn “the things that are given to” them “of God,” or, in other words, “may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints.” [935] But as it is nothing more than the first fruits, a kind of foretaste of that Spirit that is enjoyed by believers in the present state, even by those of them who are favoured with more excellent graces than others, there remains nothing for them, but that, conscious of their imbecility, they solicitously confine themselves within the limits of the word of God; lest, if they proceed far by their own sense, they should wander from the right way, in consequence of being not yet fully enlightened by that Spirit, by whose teaching alone truth is distinguished from falsehood. For all confess with Paul, that they have not yet attained the mark; therefore they rather press on towards daily improvement, than boast of perfection. [936]

XII. But they will object, that whatever is partially attributed to every one of the saints, completely and perfectly belongs to the whole Church. Notwithstanding the plausibility of this position, yet I deny it to be true. I admit that God distributes the gifts of his Spirit by measure to every member of his Church, in such a manner that nothing necessary is wanting to the whole body, when those gifts are bestowed in common. But the riches of the Church are always such as to be very far from that consummate perfection boasted by our adversaries. Yet the Church is not left destitute in any respect, but that it always has what is sufficient; for the Lord knows what its necessity requires. But to restrain it within the bounds of humility and pious modesty, he bestows no more than he sees to be expedient. Here, I know, they are accustomed to object, that the Church has been “cleansed by the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish;” [937] and that for this reason it is called “the pillar and ground of the truth.” [938] But the former of these passages rather indicates what Christ is daily performing in his Church, than any thing that he has already accomplished. For if he is daily sanctifying, purifying, polishing, and cleansing his people, it must be evident that they still have some spots and wrinkles, and that something is still wanting to their sanctification. How vain and visionary is it to imagine the Church already perfectly holy and immaculate, while all its members are the subjects of corruption and impurity! It is true that the Church is sanctified by Christ, but it is only the commencement of their sanctification that is seen in the present state; the end and perfect completion of it will be when Christ, the Holy of Holies, shall fill it truly and entirely with his holiness. It is likewise true that its spots and wrinkles are effaced, but in such a manner that they are in a daily course of obliteration, till Christ at his coming shall entirely efface all that remains. For, unless we admit this, we must of necessity assert, with the Pelagians, that the righteousness of believers is perfect in the present life, and with the Cathari and Donatists, must allow no infirmity in the Church. The other passage, as we have already seen, has a meaning totally different from what they pretend. For after Paul had instructed Timothy in the true nature of the office of a bishop, he says, “These things I write unto thee, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God;” and to enforce his conscientious attention to this object, he adds, that the Church itself is “the pillar and ground of the truth.” [939] Now, what is the meaning of this expression, but that the truth of God is preserved in the Church, and that by the ministry of preaching? As in another place he states, that Christ “gave some apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, that we be no more carried about with every wind of doctrine,” or deluded by men, but that, being enlightened with the true knowledge of the Son of God, we may “all come into the unity of the faith.” [940] The preservation of the truth, therefore, from being extinguished in the world, is in consequence of the Church being its faithful guardian, by whose efforts and ministry it is maintained. But if this guardianship consists in the ministry of the prophets and apostles, it follows that it wholly depends on the faithful preservation of the purity of the word of God.

XIII. And that the readers may better understand upon what point this question principally turns, I will briefly state what our adversaries require, and wherein we oppose them. When they assert that the Church cannot err, their meaning is, as they themselves explain it, that as it is governed by the Spirit of God, it may safely proceed without the word; that whithersoever it goes, it can neither think nor speak any thing that is not true; and, therefore, that if it determine any thing beyond or beside the Divine word, the same is to be considered in no other light than as a certain oracle of God. If we grant the first point, that the Church cannot err in things essential to salvation, our meaning is, that its security from error is owing to its renouncing all its own wisdom, and submitting itself to the Holy Spirit, to be taught by means of the word of God. This, then, is the difference between us. They ascribe to the Church an authority independent of the word; we maintain it to be annexed to the word, and inseparable from it. And what is there surprising that the spouse and disciple of Christ is subject to her Lord and Master, so as to be assiduously and sedulously awaiting his commands and instructions? For it is the order of a well regulated family, for the wife to obey the command of the husband; it is the order of a well disciplined school, that nothing be heard there but the instructions of the master. Wherefore let not the Church be wise of itself, nor think any thing of itself, but let it fix the boundary of its wisdom where Christ has made an end of speaking. In this manner it will distrust all the inventions of its own reason; but in those things in which it is supported by the word of God, it will not waver with any distrust or hesitation, but will rest upon it with strong certainty and unshaken constancy. Thus confiding in the amplitude of the promises it has received, it will have an excellent support for its faith, so that it cannot doubt that the Holy Spirit, the best guide in the right way, is always present with it; but, at the same time, it will remember what advantage the Lord intends should be received from his Spirit. “The Spirit,” says he, “whom I will send from the Father, will guide you into all truth.” But how will this be done? Christ says, “He shall bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.” [941] He announces, therefore, that nothing more is to be expected from his Spirit, than that he will enlighten our minds to discover the truth of his doctrine. Wherefore it is very judiciously observed by Chrysostom, that “many boast of the Holy Spirit; but in those who speak from themselves this is a false pretence. As Christ testified that he spake not of himself, because he spake from the law and the prophets, so, if, under the name of the Spirit, any thing be obtruded that is not contained in the gospel, let us not believe it. For as Christ is the accomplishment of the law and the prophets, so is the Spirit, of the gospel.” These are the words of Chrysostom. Now, it is easy to infer how great is the error of our adversaries, who boast of the Holy Spirit for no other purpose than to recommend, under his name, doctrines strange and inconsistent with the word of God, whereas it is his determination to be connected with the word by an indissoluble bond; and this was declared by Christ when he promised him to his Church. And so he is, in point of fact. The sobriety which the Lord has once prescribed to his Church, he will have to be perpetually observed; and he has forbidden the Church to add any thing to his word, or to diminish any thing from it. This is the inviolable decree of God and of the Holy Spirit, which our adversaries endeavour to abrogate, when they pretend that the Church is governed by the Spirit without the word.

XIV. Here, again, they cavil, that it was necessary for the Church to add some things to the writings of the apostles, or at least for the apostles themselves afterwards to supply in their discourses what they had not so explicitly delivered in their writings, because Christ declared to them, “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now;” [942] and that these are the ordinances which have been received by usage and custom without the Scripture. But what effrontery is here betrayed! I confess that the disciples were ignorant, and not very docile, when the Lord made this declaration to them; but they were not so stupid, when they committed their doctrine to writing, as to render it necessary for them afterwards to supply in their discourses what they had from ignorance omitted in their writings. But if, when they published their writings, they had already been led by the Spirit into all truth, what hindered them from comprising and leaving on record in those writings a perfect system of evangelical doctrine? Let us grant our opponents, however, what they ask: only let them enumerate those things which required to be revealed, and are not contained in the apostolical writings. If they dare to attempt this, I will reply in the words of Augustine, “Where the Lord has been silent, which of us can say, These things or those are intended; and if he dare to say so, how will he prove it?” But why do I contend a point that is unnecessary? For even children know that the apostolic writings, which these men represent as incomplete and essentially deficient, contain the fruit of that revelation which the Lord then promised them.

XV. What, say they, did not Christ place the doctrines and decrees of the Church beyond all controversy, when he commanded him who should dare to contradict it, to be regarded “as a heathen man and a publican?” [943] In the first place, Christ in that text makes no mention of doctrine, but only asserts the authority of the Church in pronouncing censures for the correction of vices, in order that its judgment may not be opposed by any who are admonished or reproved. But leaving this remark, it is astonishing, that they have no more modesty than to presume to boast of that passage. For what will they extort from it, but that it is unlawful to despise the consent of the Church, which never consents to any thing except the truth of the word of God? The Church is to be heard, they say. Who denies it? For it pronounces nothing but from the word of the Lord. If they require any thing further, let them know that these words of Christ afford them no support. Nor ought it to be esteemed too contentious in me to insist so strenuously on this point—That it is not lawful for the Church to invent any new doctrine, or to teach and deliver, as of Divine authority, any thing more than the Lord has revealed in his word. All persons of sound judgment perceive how exceedingly dangerous it would be if so much power were once granted to any man. For they see how wide a door is opened to the scoffs and cavils of the impious, if we assert that the decisions of men are to be received by Christians as articles of faith. It is also to be remarked, that Christ spoke according to the established order of his own time, and gave this name to the Sanhedrim, that his disciples might learn afterwards to reverence the solemn assemblies of the Church. And thus, on the principle of our adversaries, every city and village would have an equal liberty to frame new articles of faith.

XVI. The examples which they allege are nothing to the purpose. They say that the baptism of infants arose, not so much from any express command of Scripture, as from the decree of the Church. It would be a most miserable asylum, if, in defence of infant baptism, we were compelled to have recourse to the mere authority of the Church; but it will be shown in another place, that the fact is very different. So when they object, that the Scriptures nowhere affirm what was pronounced in the Council of Nice, that the Son is of the same substance with the Father, they do great injury to the fathers of that council, as if they had presumptuously condemned Arius for having refused to subscribe to their language, while he professed all the doctrine which is contained in the writings of the prophets and apostles. The word consubstantial, (ὁμοουσιος,) I confess, is not to be found in the Scripture; but while, on the one hand, it is so often affirmed that there is but one God, and, on the other, Christ is so frequently called the true and eternal God, one with the Father, what have the Nicene fathers done, but simply expressed the natural sense of the Scripture, in declaring the Father and the Son to be of one and the same substance? And Theodoret the historian states, that Constantine the emperor opened that council with the following preliminary address: “In disputes on Divine subjects, we are to adhere to the doctrine of the Holy Spirit; the books of the evangelists and apostles, with the oracles of the prophets, fully reveal to us the will of God. Wherefore, laying aside all discord, let us take the decision of all questions in debate from the words of the Spirit.” There was no one at that time who opposed these holy admonitions. No one objected, that the Church might add something of its own, that the Spirit had not revealed every thing to the apostles, or, at least, that they had not transmitted the whole to posterity in writing, or any thing of the like nature. If what our adversaries contend for be true, in the first place, Constantine acted unjustly in depriving the Church of its power; and in the next place, when none of the bishops rose to vindicate that power, their silence was not to be excused from treachery, for on that occasion they must have betrayed the rights of the Church. But from the statement of Theodoret, that they readily received what was said by the emperor, it is evident that this novel dogma of our adversaries was at that time altogether unknown.