Wesley Corpus

1. The Second thing you proposed was, “to throw together all which those Fathers have delivered concerning the persons said to have been endued with the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit.” (Ibid.) “Now, whenever we think or speak with reverence,” say you, “of those primitive times, it is always with regard to these very Fathers whose testimonies I have been collecting. And they were indeed the chief persons and champions of the Christian cause, the Pastors, Bishops, and Martyrs of the primitive Church; namely, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Theo philus, Tertullian, Minutius Felix, Origen, Cyprian, Arnobius, Lactantius.” Sir, you stumble at the threshold. A common dictionary may inform you that these were not all either Pastors, Bishops, or Martyrs. 2. You go on as you set out: “Yet none of these have any where affirmed, that they themselves were endued with any power of working miracles.” (Page 22.) You should say, With any of those extraordinary gifts promised by our Lord, and conferred on his Apostles. No! Have “none of these anywhere affirmed, that they themselves were endued” with any extraordinary.gifts? What think you of the very first of them, Justin Martyr Either you are quite mistaken in the account you give of him elsewhere, (pages 27, 30,) or he affirmed this of himself over and over. And as to Cyprian, you will by and by spend several pages together (page 101, &c.) on the extraordinary gifts he affirmed himself to be endued with. But suppose they had not anywhere affirmed this of them selves, what would you infer therefrom ? that they were not endued with any extraordinary gifts? Then, by the very same method of arguing, you might prove that neither St. Peter, nor James, nor John, were endued with any such. For neither do they anywhere affirm this of themselves in any of the writings which they have left behind them. 3. Your argument concerning the apostolic Fathers is just as conclusive as this. For if you say, “The writers following the apostolic Fathers do not affirm them to have had any miraculous gifts; therefore they had none;” by a parity of reason you must say, “The writers following the Apostles do not affirm them to have had any miraculous gifts; therefore the Apostles had none.” 4.