Matthew 7:16-18

16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?

Ver. 16. Ye shall know them by their fruits] That is, chiefly by their doctrines, which tend either to the infecting of the judgment with error or tainting of the life with uncleanness, or both; and commonly both, as those ancient heretics, whose pernicious, or, as other copies read, lascivious, ways many followed; by reason of whom the way of truth was evil spoken of (ταις ασελγειαις), 2Pe 2:2. St Austin observeth, that in the loose and lascivious heretics, many foul mouthed men met with matter of blaspheming the name of Christ, because they also would needs be held Christians. And Epiphanius adds, that for their sakes many heathens would not so much as have any conversation with Christians, or hear them speak. {a} Who hath not heard what a stumblingblock and obstacle to the conversion of the Jews, is the idolatry of the Papists and the blasphemies of other Christians? By their fruits they know such persons not to be of God, as their predecessors argued of our Saviour: "This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day," Joh 9:16. The proposition here was sound, had they not mistook themselves in the assumption, "He that keepeth not the sabbath is not of God." We may also safely reason in like sort. Such and such deny or question principles, as the Anti-trinitarians, Arians, Eutychians, and others not a few in the primitive Church, so pestered with arch-heretics, that it was then, as Erasmus hath it, a noble thing to be a Christian. Had these been of God, they would have hearkened to his word, Joh 8:47, which is plain in principles, and commandeth to hate false heterodox opinions, Psa 119:104, and those that broach them, buzzing doubts in men’s heads, Rom 16:17; Joh 10:5. That heretic confuted by Junius took an ungainly course for his own satisfaction, who confessed that he had spent two-and-twenty years in trying religions. He had been with Jews, Arians, Mahometans, and such sects; that at length he might find truth among them, which is, as he saith, Viam per avia quaerere, to seek truth by wandering through all sorts of errors. {b} But truth, 1. is divine, grounded upon the Scriptures; wherein we have a most sure word, as Peter hath it; and self-sufficient, saith Paul, for instruction in righteousness, to make the man of God perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. So that it is impossible God’s elect should be finally deceived, 2Pe 1:19; 2Ti 3:16-17; though for a time they may be fearfully miscarried, as the young prophet was by the old Bethelite. and Barnabas by Peter, because they are all taught of God, Isa 30:21; they have an unction within them, Mat 24:24, the Holy Ghost that enlighteneth both the organ and the object, Joh 7:17; Joh 2:20; Job 22:28; and so teacheth them all things, that they understand the Scriptures, and grow to a certainty, Psa 19:7; Pro 1:4. All Christ’s sheep are rational, and will not follow a stranger, Joh 10:5; though they are simple to evil, yet they are wise to that which is good. If they be of any standing, and worth their years, as we say, they have a full assurance of understanding, Col 2:2; Col 2:7, and they are rooted and established in the faith, and in the present truth, 2Pe 1:12. So that, though man or angel should object against it, yet they would not yield to him, Gal 1:8-9. For he that is spiritual discerneth all things, as having the mind of Christ, 1Co 2:16; a spirit of discerning, and senses exercised to differentiate good from evil, Heb 5:14; being able to give a reason of that he believeth, 1Pe 3:15, to perform a reasonable service, even the obedience of faith, Rom 12:1; Rom 16:26; whence floweth and followeth rest to his soul, Jer 6:16, and abundant consolation, Col 2:2. Say he cannot answer all the cavils of an adversary, yet he can hold the conclusion; and though he cannot dispute, yet he can die, as that martyr said, in defence of the truth, whereof he is fully persuaded in his own mind, Rom 14:5, bottomed upon Scriptures, and ballasted therewith, as St Ambrose saith the bee is with a little stone, that she be not blown away with the wind. {c} Secondly, truth is single, one and the same, at agreement with itself. But error is manifold, dissonant, and contradictory to itself. How often doth Bellarmine deny that in one place that he had affirmed in another! That the Scripture is the very word of God, saith he, can by no means be assured out of Scripture. But in another discourse, forgetting what he had said, he affirmeth, that among other arguments of the divinity of the Scriptures, there is sufficient proof to be had out of the Scriptures themselves. So he cannot bethink himself, if you will believe him, where in all holy writ there is any promise made of pardon of sins to such as confess them to God. {d} Again, he teacheth that the substance of the bread in the sacrament is not turned into the substance of Christ’s body productive, as one thing is made of another; but that the bread goes away, and Christ’s body cometh into the room of it adductive, as one thing succeeds into the place of another, the first being voided. And this, saith he, is the opinion of the Church of Rome, himself being reader of controversies at Rome. But Suarez, reader at Salamanca in Spain, confutes Bellarmine’s opinion, terming it translocation, not transubstantiation; and saith it is not the Church’s opinion. So the greatest Popish clerks cannot determine how the saints know our hearts and prayers; whether by hearing, or seeing, or presence everywhere, or by God’s relating or revealing men’s prayers and need unto them. All which ways some of them hold as possible or probable, and others deny them, and confute them as untrue. Thus these great master builders are confounded in their language, and thus hard it is to know what the Church malignant holdeth; her own dearest and learnedest sons know not, God having delivered them up to the efficacy of error, which frets as a gangrene, and spreads as leaven, scouring the whole lump, 2Th 2:11; 2Ti 2:17. Look how the heathens were at a mere uncertainty in their opinions and devotions; as the mariners in Jonah prayed to their several gods, and bade him do likewise. Others of them usually closed up their prayers with Diique, Deaeque, omnes, All gods and goddesses, lest haply they might mistake in any one. So are heretics. Having once stepped over the pale of truth, they know not where or when they shall stop or stay, but run on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived, 2Ti 3:13. Bertius and Barret, of Aminians became professed Papists; which differ no more, saith a learned man, than the Stoics of old did from the Cynics, by the wearing of their cloaks only. If the Lutherans admit to universal grace, the Huberians will thereupon bring in universal election, the Puccians natural faith, the Naturalists (as that Cistercian monster lately imprisoned at London did) will explode Christ and the Scriptures. A pestilent sect there was not long since in Arragon, whose founders were a hypocritical crew of their priests, who affecting in themselves and their followers a certain angelic purity, fell suddenly to the very counterpoint of justifying bestiality. These called themselves illuminati, as if they only had been in the light, and all the world besides in darkness. So besides the Gnostics, who held themselves to be the only knowing men, the Manichees derived their name of manna, because that whatsoever they taught was to be taken as food from heaven. Irenaeus tells us of some that counted their own writings to be gospels. And the family of love set out their Evangelium regni, Gospel of the kingdom. {e} Anabaptists brag much of their enthusiasms; and the Jesuits vaunt that the Church is the soul of the world, the clergy of the Church, and they of clergy; and yet for their wickedness, though a man, saith one, should declaim against them, till all the sand of the sea had run through his hour glass, he could not possibly want matter. Can there any grapes be gathered of these thorns, any figs of these thistles? {f} Our Saviour makes use of these common proverbs to prove that this is so plain a truth, that none can be ignorant of it, if he have but his eyes in his head, or do not wink wilfully, as those qui ut liberius peccent, libenter ignorant, who are willingly ignorant, that they may sin without control.