in the same state. munion of the church, they are not even externally members of it, like those who are justly excommunicated for their sins.

But if separated from the com

VIII. Those who upheld the Mosaic law after the decree of the apostles in the Council of Jerusalem, were heretics; and yet the apostles held communion with them (Acts xxi. 20.). Therefore they formed part of the church.

Answer. The apostles had not decreed the abolition of legal observances as related to the Jews, but only to the Gentiles; but those who were zealous of the law in this place were Jews. Therefore they were not disobedient to the apostles.

IX. We are forbidden to judge other men's doctrines to be heretical or false by the following passage: "Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth; yea, he shall be holden up for God is able to make him stand. One man esteemeth one day above another; another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind" (Rom. xiv. 4, 5.).

Answer. These differences of opinion related to matters in which difference was justifiable, not to matters of faith clearly revealed by Christ. In such matters of opinion we grant, that it is unlawful to condemn our neighbours; but "If any man preach any other gospel than that has been preached, let him be anathema" (Gal. i. 9.); and "If any come unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house" (2 John 10.). Therefore we are bound to reject heretics, and consequently must have some means and some right to determine what is heresy.

X. "In a great house there are not only vessels of

gold and of silver, but also of wood and earth; and some to honour, and some to dishonour," &c. (2 Tim. ii. 20.) The apostle here includes heretics and false teachers in the church, having just before spoken of Hymenæus and Philetus (v. 17.).

Answer. Assuming that the apostle here speaks of heretics as "vessels of wood and earth" made to "dishonour," he only refers to those who having not yet been openly separated, or excommunicated, are imperfectly in the church; and, even of these, he declares, that they are to "dishonour," that is to destruction. A fortiori then all those who are openly separated from the church.

XI. Sincerity, or a full persuasion that our interpretation of God's law is right, is always sufficient to justify us in God's sight, even if we are in error. (This is the principle of Hoadly and his disciples.)

Answer. I reply with Rogers, that if this alone be in all cases sufficient, then no one is strictly bound to obey any laws of Christ in the meaning he intended in them: no plainness is sufficient to oblige us to understand them, and there can be no such thing as a culpable mistake. Even he who rejects Christianity because he is persuaded it is false, must be as acceptable to God, as he who accepts it because he believes it true. Yet our Saviour denounced heavy woes against those who rejected him (Matt. xi. 21.; Mark xvi. 16.). I maintain, on the contrary, as a self-evident position, that Christians are bound to obey the laws and believe the doctrine of Christ, and that nothing but natural incapacity, or blameless ignorance, can be pleaded in excuse for their not doing so.

a Visible and Invisible Church, part i. c. 6.

APPENDIX TO CHAP. V.

ON THE DOCTRINE OF FUNDAMENTALS.

Dr. Waterland, in his discourse on Fundamentals, observes, that since the beginning of the seventeenth century this subject has passed through many learned and judicious hands, "most of them complaining of the perplexities appearing in it, but all bearing testimony to the great weight and importance of it." According to certain theologians of Holland, Germany, and Geneva, quoted by him, the questions of toleration, heresy, secession, schism, union of churches, excommunication, &c. all depend on distinguishing fundamentals in religion. It appears, I think, on examining various controversies which have almost entirely turned on this point, that the perplexity so much and so justly complained of, has arisen, and must continue to prevail, from the use of the term "Fundamental." This term is capable of so many meanings as applied to Christian doctrine, and it actually is, has been, and must continue to be, used in so great a diversity of senses, that it is morally impossible to avoid perplexity while it is employed in controversy. As an ambiguous term, as conveying no one definite notion, it seems unqualified to be of any practical utility in questions of controversy.

1. The term "fundamental" may rightly and properly be applied to very different notions in religion. It may mean what is at the basis of all religion; that is, belief in the existence and attributes of God, or it may express what is the first step in the Christian re

a Waterland's Works by Van Mildert, vol. viii. p.

87.

ligion-belief in Christ as the Messiah, or as a messenger sent from God. It may signify those articles of Christianity from which others seem to be derived. It may with equal propriety mean articles of faith clearly revealed by Christ, as distinguished from opinions or doctrines deduced by human reasoning. It may mean those doctrines which are necessary to be explicitly believed or known by all men in order to salvation, or those doctrines which must be believed by every one to whom they are sufficiently proposed, or which must be believed either explicitly, or else implicitly, in order to salvation. The term "fundamental" may be employed without any impropriety in any one of these senses, and even in others which it is needless to specify in this place. There is nothing in the term itself which fixes it to any one of them. It seems to imply by its constitution any thing which is at the foundation or beginning, and therefore is important or essential in some sense or other, either positively essential to Christianity itself, or relatively essential to us or some of us, in some sense. This vagueness and generality of the term itself is not limited by common usage; for

2. The term fundamental is actually used in the greatest variety of meanings by different writers of eminence, and even by the same writers. Chillingworth in one part of his "Religion of Protestants," says: "That may be sufficiently declared to one (all things considered) which (all things considered), to another is not sufficiently declared; and consequently that may be fundamental and necessary to one which to another is not 80 b " In a few pages afterwards he says: "Fundamental points are those only which are revealed by

b Religion of Protestants, chap. iii. s. 13.

God, and commanded to be preached to all and believed by all" In the first quotation fundamentals are regarded as doctrines which must be believed by those only to whom they are sufficiently declared; in the second, they are regarded as doctrines necessary to be believed by all men. Laud in one place understands by them, doctrines which must be believed expressly and explicitly by all men without exception, and which no man can be ignorant of without loss of salvation d. In another place he says, that certain points "are not formally fundamental for all men, but for such as are able to make or understand them," &c. Accordingly, he teaches in one place that the Apostles' Creed contains all fundamentals'; in another, that not only the creed itself but certain deductions from it are fundamental". Waterland regards fundamentals in religion or Christianity as matters "so necessary to its being, or at least its well-being, that it could not subsist, or not maintain itself tolerably without it "." Here are two very different notions in the same definition of fundamentals; one which connects these with the very existence of religion, another which connects them only with its perfection. This may suffice as a specimen of the great diversity of meanings in which the term is used by writers of respectability. In fact, all those various senses which I have alluded to above as fairly and rightly to be connected with the term, have been really in fact so connected by writers of our own churches, and of various other churches and sects.

3. Waterland observes, with perfect truth, that there