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THE CAUSES AND CURE

OF

MENTAL ERRORS.

ABRIDGED BY THE REV. C. BRADLEY.

err.

INTRODUCTION.

An error is a departure or deviation in our opinions or judgments from the perfect rule of the divine law; and to this, all men, by nature, are not only liable, but inclinable. Indeed man, by nature, can do nothing else but "He goeth astray as soon as he is born;" he makes not one true step till renewed by grace, and many false ones after his renovation. The life of the holiest man is a book with many errata; but the whole edition of a wicked man's life is but one continued error. He who thinks he cannot err, manifestly errs in so thinking. A good man may err, but is willing to know his error; and will not obstinately maintain it, when he once plainly discerns it.

The word of God is our rule, and must therefore be the only test and touchstone to try and discover errors. It is not enough to convince a man of error, that his judgment differs from other men's; you must bring it to the word, and try how it agrees or disagrees therewith; else he that charges another with error, may be found in as great an error himself. None are more disposed easily to receive and tenaciously to defend errors, than those who are the heads or leaders of erroneous sects; especially after they have fought in the defence of bad causes, and deeply engaged their reputation.

The following discourse may be called, "A Blow at the Root." And though you will here find the roots of many errors laid bare and open, which comparatively are of far different degrees of danger and malignity, yet I am far from censuring them alike; nor would I have any that are concerned in lesser errors to be exasperated, because their lesser mistakes are mentioned with greater and more pernicious ones. This candor I not only intreat, but justly challenge from my reader.

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS CONCERNING THE RISE AND INCREASE OF ERRORS.

Observation 1.-Truth is the proper object, the natural and pleasant food, of the understanding.

KNOWLEDGE is the assimilation of the understanding to the truths received by it. Nothing is more natural to man, than a desire to know. Knowledge never cloys the mind, as food does the natural appetite; but as the one increases, the other is proportionably sharpened. The minds of all who are not wholly immersed in sensuality, spend their strength in the laborious search and pursuit of truth; sometimes climbing up from the effects to the causes, and then descending again from the causes to the effects. Fervent prayer, sedulous study, fixed meditation, are the labors of inquisitive souls after truth. All the objections and counter-arguments the mind meets in its way, are but the pauses and hesitations of an inquiring soul, not able to determine whether truth lies on this side or on that.

Answerable to the sharpness of the mind's appetite, is the pleasure and delight it feels in the discovery and acquisition of truth. When it has racked and tortured itself on knotty problems, and at last discovered the truth it sought for, with what joy does the soul dilate itself, and run, as it were, with open arms, to clasp and welcome it!

The understanding of man, at first, was perspicacious and clear. All truths lay obvious in their comely order and beauty before it. "God made man upright," Eccl. vii. 29. This rectitude of his mind consisted in light and knowledge, as appears by the prescribed method of his recovery; "Renewed in knowledge, after the image of him that created him." Col. iii. 10. Truth in the mind, or the mind's union with truth, being part of the divine image in man, discovers to us the sin and mischief of error, which is a defacing, so far as it prevails, of the image of God.

No sooner was man created, but by the exercise of knowledge he soon discovered God's image in him; and by his ambition after more, lost what he had. So that now there is a cloud spread over truth by ignorance and error, the sad effects of the fall.

Observation 2.-Of knowledge there are divers sorts and kinds.

Some knowledge is human and some divine; some speculative and some practical; some ingrafted as the notions of mbrality, and some acquired by painful search and study : but of all knowledge, there is none like that divine and supernatural knowledge of saving truths revealed by Christ in the scriptures. Hence arises the different degrees both of the sinfulness and danger of errors, those errors being always the worst, which are committed against the most important truths revealed in the gospel.

These truths lie enfolded either in the plain words, or, in evident and necessary consequences from the words, of the Holy Scripture. Scripture consequences are of great use for the refutation of errors. It was by a scripture consequence that Christ successfully proved the resurrection against the Sadducees, Mat. xxii. 31.

Some think that reason and natural light are abundantly sufficient for the direction of life; but certainly nothing is more necessary to us for that end than the written word; for though the remains of natural light have their place and use in directing us about natural and earthly things, yet they are utterly insufficient to guide Div. No. XVII.

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us in spiritual and heavenly things. "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God." "Onee were ye darkness; now are ye light in the Lord;" that is, by a beam of heavenly light shining from the Spirit of Christ through the written word, into your minds.

The scriptures of the old and new testament make jointly the solid foundation of a Christian's faith. Hence, in Eph. ii. 20, we are said to be built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets. We are bound therefore to honor old testament scriptures as well as new, they being part of the divine canon; and must not scruple to admit them as sufficient and authentic proofs for the confirmation of truths, and refutation of errors. Christ referred the people to them, John v. 39; and Paul preached and disputed from them, Acts xxvi. 22.

Observation 3.-To the attainment of divine knowledge from the scriptures, some things are naturally, yet less principally requisite; and some things absolutely and principally necessary.

The natural qualifications desirable in the subject are clearness of apprehension, solidity of judgment, and fidelity of memory. These are desirable requisites to make the understanding susceptible of knowledge. But the irradiation of the mind, by the Spirit of God, is principally necessary. "He shall guide you into all truth."

When this spiritual light shines upon a mind, naturally enriched and qualified with the three fore-mentioned requisites, that mind excels others in the riches of knowledge. And yet the teaching of the Spirit very much supplies and recompenses the defects and weaknesses of these qualifications. Whence two things are remarkable; first, that men of great abilities, clear apprehensions, strong judgments, and tenacious memories, do not only frequently fall into gross errors and damnable heresies themselves, but become heresiarchs, or heads of erroneous factions, drawing multitudes into the same sin and misery with themselves. And, secondly, it is no less remarkable, that men of weaker parts, through the sanctification and direction of the Spirit, for which they have humbly

waited at his feet in prayer, have not only been directed and guided by him into the truth, but so confirmed and fixed therein, that they have been kept sound in their judgments in times of abounding errors; and firm in their adherence to it in days of fiercest persecution.

Observation 4.-Among the many impediments to the obtaining of true knowledge, and the settling of the mind in the truth and faith of the gospel, these three things are of special importance-ignorancé, curiosity, and error.

Ignorance slights it, or despairs of attaining it. Truth falls into contempt among the ignorant, from sluggishness and apprehension of the difficulties that lie in the way to it. "Wisdom is too high for a fool." Curiosity runs beside or beyond it. This pride and wantonness of the mind puffs it up with a vain conceit, that it is not only able to penetrate the deepest mysteries revealed in the scriptures, but even unrevealed secrets also. "Intruding into those things which he hath not seen; vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind." But error militates directly against truth, contradicts and opposes it, especially when an error is maintained by pride against inward convictions, or means of better information. It is bad to maintain an error for want of light, but abundantly worse to maintain it against light.

Observation 5.Error is binding on the conscience as well as truth; and altogether as much, and sometimes more influential on the affections.

It presents not itself to the soul in its own name and nature as error; but in the name and dress of truth, and under that notion binds the conscience, and vigorously influences the affections; and then being more indulgent to lust than truth is, it is so much the more embraced by the deceived soul; Acts xxii. 4. The heat that error puts the soul into differs from religious zeal, as a feverish does from a natural heat; which is not indeed so benign and agreeable, but much more fervent and scorching. A

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