themselves; whatsoever is more than yea or nay, is not always evil, but it always cometh of evil. And, therefore, the Essenes esteemed every man that was put to his oath no better than an infamous person, a perjurer, or at least suspected, not esteemed a just man: and the heathens would not suffer the priest of Jupiter to swear, because all men had great opinion of his sanctity and authority: and the Scythians derided Alexander's caution and timorous provision, when he required an oath of them; "Nos religionem in ipsa fide novimus; Our faith is our bond:" and they who are willing to deceive men will not stick to deceive God, when they have called God to witness P. But I have a caution to insert for each, which I propound as an humble advice to persons eminent and publicly interested. 22. First: That princes, and such as have power of decreeing the injunction of promissory oaths, be very curious and reserved, not lightly enjoining such promises, neither in respect of the matter trivial, nor yet frequently, nor without great reason enforcing. The matter of such promises must be only what is already matter of duty or religion; for else the matter is not grave enough for the calling of God to testimony but when it is a matter of duty, then the oath is no other than a vow, or promise, made to God in the presence of men. And because Christians are otherwise very much obliged to do all which is their duty, in matters both civil and religious, of obedience and piety; therefore it must be an instant necessity, and a great cause, to superinduce such a confirmation as derives from the so sacredly invocating the name of God; it must be when there is great necessity that the duty be actually performed, and when the supreme power either hath not power sufficient to punish the delinquent, or may miss to have notice of the delict. For in these cases it is reasonable to bind the faith of the obliged persons by the fear of God after a more special manner; but else there is no reason sufficient to demand of the subject any farther security than their own faith and contract. The reason of this advice relies upon the strictness of the words • Curtius, lib. vii. ℗ Qui non reverentur homines, fallent Dcos. -- Cicero pro Roscio. 4 Οὐ γὰρ πίστεως τεκμήριον πολυορκία, ἀλλὰ ἀπιστίας ἐστὶ, παρὰ τοῖς εὐφρονοῦσι. - Philo in Decal. of this precept against promissory oaths, and the reverence we owe to the name of God. Oaths of allegiance are fit to be imposed in a troubled state, or to a mutinous people: but it is not so fit to tie the people, by oath, to abstain from transportations of metal, or grain, or leather, from which, by penalties, they are with as much security, and less suspicion of iniquity, restrained. 23. Secondly: Concerning assertory oaths and depositions in judgment, although a greater liberty may be taken in the subject matter of the oath, and we may, being required to it, swear in judgment, though the cause be a question of money, or our interest, or the rights of a society; and St. Athanasius purged himself by oath before the emperor Constantius: yet it were a great pursuance and secu rity of this part of Christian religion, if, in no case, contrary oaths might be admitted, in which, it is certain, one part is perjured to the ruin of their souls, to the intricating of the judgment, to the dishonour of religion; but that such rules of prudence and reasonable presumption be established, that upon the oath of that party which the law shall choose, and, upon probable grounds, shall presume for, the sentence may be established. For, by a small probability, there may a surer judgment be given, than upon the confidence of contradictory oaths; and after the sin the judge is left to the uncertainty of conjectures as much as if but one part had sworn; and to much more, because such an oath is, by the consent of all men, accepted as a rule to determine in judgment. By these discourses we understand the intention of our blessed Master in this precept: and I wish by this, or any thing else, men would be restrained from that low, cheap, unreasonable, and inexcusable vice of customary swearing, to which we have nothing to invite us that may lessen the iniquity, for which we cannot pretend temptation, nor allege infirmity, but it begins by recklessness and a malicious carelessness, and is continued by the strength of habit, and the greatest immensity of folly. And I consider that Christian religion, being so holy an institution, to which we are invited by so great promises, in which we are in * Αλλ' οἶπες πρότεροι ὑπὲς ὅρκια δηλήσαντο Hom. Iliad. lib. iv. structed by so clear revelations, and to the performance of our duties compelled by the threatenings of a sad and insupportable eternity, should more than sufficiently endear the performance of this duty to us. The name of a Christian is a high and potent antidote against all sin, if we consider aright the honour of the name, the undertaking of our covenant, and the reward of our duty. The Jews eat no swine's flesh, because they are of Moses, and the Turks drink no wine, because they are Mahometans; and yet we swear for all we are Christians, than which there is not in the world a greater conviction of our baseness and irreligion. Is the authority of the holy Jesus so despicable? are his laws so unreasonable, his rewards so little, his threatenings so small, that we must needs, in contempt of all this, profane the great name of God, and trample under foot the laws of Jesus, and cast away the hopes of heaven, and enter into security to be possessed by hell-torments for swearing, that is, for speaking like a fool, without reason, without pleasure, without reputation, much to our disesteem, much to the trouble of civil and wise persons with whom we join in society and intercourse? Certainly hell will be heated seven times hotter for a customary swearer, and every degree of his unreasonableness will give him a new degree of torment, when he shall find himself in flames, for being a stupid, an atheistical, an irreligious fool. This only I desire should be observed, that our blessed Master forbids not only swearing by God, but by any creature; for every oath by a creature does involve and tacitly relate to God. And therefore, saith Christ, "Swear not by heaven, for it is the throne of God;' and he that sweareth by the throne of God, " sweareth by it, and by him that sitteth thereon." So that it is not a less matter to swear by a creature than to swear by God; for a creature cannot be the instrument of testimony, but as it is a relative to God; and it, by implication, calls the God of that creature to witness. So that although, in such cases in which it is permitted to swear by God, we may, in those cases, express our oath in the form of advocating and calling • Ομνυμι δ ̓ ἱερὸν αἰθέρ', οἴκησιν Διός. — Sophoc. Menal. Qui per salutem suam jurat, Deum jurare videtur; respectu enim divini numiris jurat. — Ulpian. J. C. Concil. Chalc. c. 25. the creature, (as did the primitive Christians swearing by the health of their emperor, and as Joseph swearing by the life of Pharaoh, and as Elisha swearing by the life of Elias', and as did St. Paul, protesting " by the rejoicing he had in Jesus Christ "," and as we, in our forms of swearing in courts of judicature, touch the Gospels, saying, “So help me God, and the contents of this book ;" and in a few ages lately past, bishops and priests sometimes swore upon the cross, sometimes upon the altar, sometimes by their holy order :) yet we must remember that this, in other words and ceremonies, is but a calling God for witness; and he that swears by the cross, swears by the holy crucifix, that is, Jesus crucified thereon. And these, and the like forms, are, therefore, not to be used in ordinary communication, because they relate to God; they are as obligatory as the immediate invocation of his holiness and majesty; and it was a Judaical vanity to think swearing by creatures was less obliging: they are just with the same restraints made to be religious as the most solemn invocation of the holy and reverend name of God, lawful or unlawful as the other: unless the swearing by a creature come to be spoiled by some other intervening circumstance, that is, with a denying it to relate to God; for then it becomes superstition as well as profanation, and it gives to a creature what is proper to God; or when the creature is contemptible, or less than the gravity of the matter, as if a man should swear by a fly, or the shadow of a tree or when there is an indecorum in the thing, or something that does, at too great distance, relate to God: for that which, with greatest vicinity, refers to God in several religions, is the best instrument of an oath, and nearest to God's honour; as in Christianity are the holy sacrament, the cross, the altar, and the Gospels; and, therefore, too great a distance may be an indecency next to a disparagement. t 2 Kings, ii. 2. u 1 Cor. xv. 31. Vide suprà, num. 19. × Per tua jurares sacra, tuumque caput. — Mart. Deut. xxx. 19. Isa. i. 2. Micah, i. 2. S. August. Epist. ad Publicolam; et lib. li. Duo Patroni, Sect. Si quis juraverit; et lib. Non erit, D. de Jurejurando. Tertul. ad Scap. Testor, chara, deos teque, tuumque Dulce caput, magicas invitam accingier artes. Virgil. lib. iv. Æneid. Perque suos illam quondam jurâsse recordor, Perque meos oculos; et doluere mei. -- Ovid. This only may be added to this consideration; that although an oath, which is properly calling God or God's relative into testimony, is to be understood according to the former discourse; yet there may be great affirmations or negations respectively, and confirmed by forms of vehement asseveration, such as the customs of a nation or consent shall agree upon: and those do, in some cases, promote our belief, or confirm our pretensions, better than a plain yea or no; because, by such consent, the person renders himself infamous if he breaks his word or trust. And although this will not come under the restraint of Christ's words, because they are not properly oaths, but circumstances of earnest affirmation or negation; yet these are human attestations, introduced by custom or consent; and as they come not under the notion of swearing, so they are forms of testimony and collateral engagement of a more strict truth. The Fourth Commandment. 24. The holy Jesus having specified the great commandment of "loving God with all our heart," in this one instance of hallowing and keeping his name sacred, that is, from profane and common talk, and less prudent and unnecessary intercourses, instanced in no other commandment of Moses: but having frequent occasion to speak of the sabbath, for ever expresses his own dominion over the day, and that he had dissolved the bands of Moses in this instance; that now we were no more obliged to that rest which the Jews religiously observed by prescript of the law y; and by divers acts against securities of the then received practices, did desecrate the day, making it a broken yoke, and the first great instance of Christian liberty. And when the apostle gave instructions that "no man should judge his brother in a holy day, or new moons, or the sabbath-days "," he declared all the Judaical feasts to be obliterated by the sponge which Jesus tasted on the cross; it was within the manuscript of ordinances, and there it was cancelled. And there was * Καὶ μετὰ τὸ σαββατίσαι ἑορταζέτω ὁ φιλόχριστος τὴν κυριακήν. ̓Ανὴς ἀγαθὸς πᾶσαν ἡμέραν ἑος τὴνἡγεῖται. Ignat. Ep. ad Magnes. Diog. Clem. Apost. Constit. lib. vii. c. 24, et lib. viii. Tertul. Monog. Canon. Apost. 65. et Zonar, in cund. Vide etiam Synod. Laodic. 2 Col. ii. 16. |