VERS. XVI.
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And every one presseth into it.
THESE words may be varied into a sense plainly contrary, so far that they may either denote, the entertainment, or the persecution of the Gospel. Quivis in illud vi perrumpit, saith Beza: Every one breaketh into it by force: which points at the former sense of these words. Vulg. Quivis in illud vim facit: Every one commits violence upon it: which points to the latter. I have admitted of the former, as that which is the most received sense of that passage in Matth. XI. 12. but the latter seems more agreeable in this place, if you will suppose a continued discourse in our Saviour from vers. 15. and that one verse depends upon another. They do indeed seem independent, and incohe∣rent one with another: and yet there is no reason why we may not suppose a connexion though at the first view it is not so perspicuous. We may observe the manner of the Schools in this very difficulty. In both the Talmuds what frequent transitions are there, infinitely obscure and inextricable at first sight, and seemingly of no kind of coherence; which yet the Expositors have made very plain and perspicuous, very coherent with one another.
I would therefore joyn and continue the discourse in some such way as this.
You laugh me to scornn 1.1 and have my Doctrine in derision, boasting your selves above the sphere of it, as if nothing I said, belonged at all to you. Nor do I wonder at it, for where∣as the Law and the Prophets were until John, yet did you deal no otherwise with them but changed and wrested them at your pleasure by your traditions and the false glosses ye have put upon them. And when with John Baptist the Kingdom of Heaven arose and made its entry among you, 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉; Every one useth violence and hostility against it, by contradiction, persecution, and laughing it to scorn. And yet, though you by your foolish Traditions have made even the whole law void and of none effect, it is easier certainly for Heaven and Earth to pass away, than that one tittle of the Law should fail. Take but an instance in the first and most antient precept of the Law, the man shall cleave unto his wife; which you by your Traditions and ar∣bitrary Divorces have reduced to nothing: but that still remains, and will remain for ever in its full force and vertue; and he that puts away his wife (according to the licen∣tiousness of your Divorces) and marrieth another, committeth adultery.