I Hope you will not quarrel with the Creed.

I take the Creed called Athanasius's (tho' the Author is unknown) to be an excellent Explication of the Doctrine of the Trinity: And could wish that it were more used and learnt of all. But I am not so far to judge other Men, as to conclude all Men certainly damned for ever that are not so well skilled in that Mystery, as to believe every word there written.

I have heard Learned Men say, That the Assent and Consent is not to be extended to the Damnatory Clauses, but only the Doctrinal Articles.

They that can make Laws and Oaths speak or mean what they list, need not stick at any thing. Is not the Damnatory part a part of the Book of Common-Prayer, and contained in it?

But they prove thus, that it meaneth no such Consent or Approba∣tion. The Liturgy requireth you to read the Apocrypha, and yet not to believe all things in it to be true; For, say they, divers things in To∣bit are evidently false: And so tho' it bind you to use and read Atha∣nasius's Creed, it binds you not to believe all in it to be true.

This Cheat is too gross to deceive a School-Boy with. Is Athanasius's Creed a real part of the Common-Prayer Book, con∣tain'd in it, or not?

Yes, no doubt; we there find it both contained and prescribed Verbatim.

Is the Apocrypha any part of the Common-Prayer Book, and contained in it, or not?

If there be any Sentences out of it there inserted, those are part; else the Apocrypha is no part of the Book: It is only the Order to read it that is a part.

Is not this a palpable Deceit, to argue that we are not bound to Assent and Consent to that which is contained in the Book, because we are not so bound to that which is not contained in it?