CHAPTER I. THE APOSTLES EYE-WITNESSES OF OUR LORD, ST. PAUL AN APOSTLE. MANY PERSONAL He that desireth to espy light at a narrow hole, must lay his eye near, if he mean to discover at large. So must he be curious in considering the Scriptures, that meaneth to discern those things that are not declared there at large, but are collected by circumstance, or consequence; especially in matters which we view at this distance of time, which representeth to us things done then through a mist of succeeding custom. Those that seek for mines have their virgula divina, a rod, which they hold even-balanced over the place where they hope for a vein, which if it hit right, the rod of itself bendeth B towards the earth. Our Lord in the Gospel commandeth us to search the Scriptures, as men would seek for mines or treasure: let us keep an even balance of judgment, not bowing but as the vein of truth swayeth it; for if we put the grains of affection and prejudice into the goldscales which we weigh nice truths with, no marvel if the lighter go down. Now because the question concerneth the Apostles' time and the next to it, and the purpose is, to represent the form pointed at in Scripture, by comparing it with such passages of historical truth and primitive practice as shall seem best to express it, let us, in the first place, consider the nature of their charge, that it may appear how far the Church retaineth a succession of it. For true it is, divers personal qualities are requisite in an Apostle, because they were to preach the Gospel to all nations. They must be men to witness those things they had seen our Lord do, those words they had heard Him speak, upon their own knowledge; and therefore men that had conversed with Him from the beginning of His doctrine. It is that St. Peter required at the choice of Matthias (Acts i. 21), “Of these men, that have companied with us all the while that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, .... must one be ordained for a witness of His resurrection with us." It is that the same Apostle challengeth (1 Pet. v. 1), "The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ." He condescendeth to the rank of presbyters, when he saith, "who am also an elder;" but he voucheth the privilege of an Apostle, when he addeth, "and a witness of the sufferings of Christ." And his fellow-Apostle of the Gentiles to the same purpose (1 Cor. ix. 1), "Am I not an Apostle? am I not free have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord?" As if to be an Apostle required one that had seen the Lord, which was supplied to him by his raptures and vi sions; as the hearing His doctrine was supplied unto him by that revelation by which he avoucheth to have received His Gospel, in the beginning of his Epistle to the Galatians. This is that God had provided for satisfaction of common sense,men that could witness, upon the credit of their eyes and ears, what they published. But it required greater matters to convince the world of those things which reason could not evidence: the gifts of the Holy Ghost, for knowledge, for language, for miracles, for all the like were requisite in a marvellous nature for those that undertook to preach the Gospel to all nations. This was the Apostles' charge; and the power this charge importeth, the endowments it requireth, are personal, wherein no man pretendeth to succeed the Apostles. But the execution of this charge, reason telleth us, must needs proceed, and experience of that which is written telleth us it did proceed, according to the exigence of their several opportunities, con |