Besides this Book of the Law,there was no other book,from the time of Moses till after the Captivity,received amongst the Jews for the law of God.For the prophets,except a few,lived in the time of the Captivity itself;and the rest lived but a little before it,and were so far from having their prophecies generally received for laws as that their persons were persecuted,partly by false prophets,and partly by the kings were seduced by them.And this book itself,which was confirmed by Josiah for the law of God,and with it all the history of the works of God,was lost in the Captivity,and sack of the city of Jerusalem,as appears by that of II Esdras,14.21,"Thy law is burnt;therefore no man knoweth the things that are done of Thee,or the works that shall begin."And before the Captivity,between the time when the law was lost (which is not mentioned in the Scripture,but may probably be thought to be the time of Rehoboam when Shishak,King of Egypt,took the spoil of the Temple)and the time of Josiah,when it was found again,they had no written word of God,but ruled according to their own discretion,or by the direction of such as each of them esteemed prophets.
From hence we may infer that the Scriptures of the Old Testament,which we have at this day,were not canonical,nor a law unto the Jews,till the renovation of their covenant with God at their return from the Captivity,and restoration of their Commonwealth under Esdras.But from that time forward they were accounted the law of the Jews,and for such translated into Greek by seventy elders of Judaea,and put into the library of Ptolemy at Alexandria,and approved for the word of God.Now seeing Esdras was the high priest,and the high priest was their civil sovereign,it is manifest that the Scriptures were never made laws,but by the sovereign civil power.
By the writings of the Fathers that lived in the time before that Christian religion was received and authorized by Constantine the Emperor,we may find that the books we now have of the New Testament were held by the Christians of that time (except a few,in respect of whose paucity the rest were called the Catholic Church,and others heretics)for the dictates of the Holy Ghost;and consequently for the canon,or rule of faith:such was the reverence and opinion they had of their teachers;as generally the reverence that the disciples bear to their first masters in all manner of doctrine they receive from them is not small.Therefore there is no doubt but when St.Paul wrote to the churches he had converted;or any other Apostle or Disciple of Christ,to those which had then embraced Christ;they received those their writings for the true Christian doctrine.But in that time when not the power and authority of the teacher,but the faith of the hearer,caused them to receive it,it was not the Apostles that made their own writings canonical,but every convert made them so to himself.
But the question here is not what any Christian made a law or canon to himself,which he might again reject by the same right he received it,but what was so made a canon to them as without injustice they could not do anything contrary thereunto.That the New Testament should in this sense be canonical,that is to say,a law in any place where the law of the Commonwealth had not made it so,is contrary to the nature of a law.For a law,as hath been already shown,is the commandment of that man,or assembly,to whom we have given sovereign authority to make such rules for the direction of our actions as he shall think fit,and to punish us when we do anything contrary to the same.When therefore any other man shall offer unto us any other rules,which the sovereign ruler hath not prescribed,they are but counsel and advice;which,whether good or bad,he that is counselled may without injustice refuse to observe;and when contrary to the laws already established,without injustice cannot observe,how good soever he conceiveth it to be.I say he cannot in this case observe the same in his actions,nor in his discourse with other men,though he may without blame believe his private teachers and wish he had the liberty to practise their advice,and that it were publicly received for law.For internal faith is in its own nature invisible,and consequently exempted from all human jurisdiction;whereas the words and actions that proceed from it,as breaches of our civil obedience,are injustice both before God and man.Seeing then our Saviour hath denied his kingdom to be in this world,seeing he hath said he came not to judge,but to save the world,he hath not subjected us to other laws than those of the Commonwealth;that is,the Jews to the law of Moses,which he saith he came not to destroy,but to fulfil;and other nations to the laws of their several sovereigns,and all men to the laws of nature;the observing whereof,both he himself and his Apostles have in their teaching recommended to us as a necessary condition of being admitted by him in the last day into his eternal kingdom,wherein shall be protection and life everlasting.Seeing then our Saviour and his Apostles left not new laws to oblige us in this world,but new doctrine to prepare us for the next,the books of the New Testament,which contain that doctrine,until obedience to them was commanded by them that God had given power to on earth to be legislators,were not obligatory canons,that is,laws,but only good and safe advice for the direction of sinners in the way to salvation,which every man might take and refuse at his own peril,without injustice.
