Ib. p. 201.
As reverend Bishop Ussher hath manifested that the Western Creed, now
called the Apostles' (wanting two or three clauses that now are in it)
was not only before the Nicene Creed, but of much further antiquity,
that no beginning of it below the Apostles' days can be found.
Remove these two or three clauses, and doubtless the substance of the
remainder must have been little short of the Apostolic age. But so is
one at least of the writings of Clement. The great question is: Was this
the Baptismal Symbol, the 'Regula Fidei', which it was forbidden to put
in writing;--or was it not the Christian A. B. C. of the 'Catechumeni'
previously to their Baptismal initiation into the higher mysteries, to
the 'strong meat' which was not for babes'? [2]
Ib. p. 203.
Not so much for my own sake as others; lest it should offend the
Parliament, and open the mouths of our adversaries, that we cannot
ourselves agree in fundamentals; and lest it prove an occasion for
others to sue for a universal toleration.
That this apprehension so constantly haunted, so powerfully actuated,
even the mild and really tolerant Baxter, is a strong proof of my old
opinion,--that the dogma of the right and duty of the civil magistrate
to restrain and punish religious avowals by him deemed heretical,
universal among the Presbyterians and Parliamentary Churchmen, joined
with the persecuting spirit of the Presbyterians,--was the main cause of
Cromwell's despair and consequent unfaithfulness concerning a
Parliamentary Commonwealth.
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