Without such
a revelation, the believing, or not believing, that proposition, or
book, to be of divine authority, can never be matter of faith, but
matter of reason; and such as I must come to an assent to only by
the use of my reason, which can never require or enable me to
believe that which is contrary to itself: it being impossible for
reason ever to procure any assent to that which to itself appears
unreasonable.
In all things, therefore, where we have clear evidence from our
ideas, and those principles of knowledge I have above mentioned,
reason is the proper judge; and revelation, though it may, in
consenting with it, confirm its dictates, yet cannot in such cases
invalidate its decrees: nor can we be obliged, where we have the clear
and evident sentience of reason, to quit it for the contrary
opinion, under a pretence that it is matter of faith: which can have
no authority against the plain and clear dictates of reason.
7. Things above reason are, when revealed, the proper matter of
faith. But, Thirdly, There being many things wherein we have very
imperfect notions, or none at all; and other things, of whose past,
present, or future existence, by the natural use of our faculties,
we can have no knowledge at all; these, as being beyond the
discovery of our natural faculties, and above reason, are, when
revealed, the proper matter of faith.
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