us is with us.”  So we see the coat of our Saviour was entire without seam, and so is the doctrine of the Scriptures in itself; but the garment of the Church was of divers colours and yet not divided.  We see the chaff may and ought to be severed from the corn in the ear, but the tares may not be pulled up from the corn in the field.  So as it is a thing of great use well to define what, and of what latitude, those points are which do make men mere aliens and disincorporate from the Church of God.

(10) For the obtaining of the information, it resteth upon the true and sound interpretation of the Scriptures, which are the fountains of the water of life.  The interpretations of the Scriptures are of two sorts:  methodical, and solute or at large.  For this divine water, which excelleth so much that of Jacob’s well, is drawn forth much in the same kind as natural water useth to be out of wells and fountains; either it is first forced up into a cistern, and from thence fetched and derived for use; or else it is drawn and received in buckets and vessels immediately where it springeth.  The former sort whereof, though it seem to be the more ready, yet in my judgment is more subject to corrupt.  This is that method which hath exhibited unto us the scholastical divinity; whereby divinity hath been reduced into an art, as into a cistern, and the streams of doctrine or positions fetched and derived from thence.

(11) In this men have sought three things, a summary brevity, a compacted strength, and a complete perfection; whereof the two first they fail to find, and the last they ought not to seek.  For as to brevity, we see in all summary methods, while men purpose to abridge, they give cause to dilate.  For the sum or abridgment by contraction becometh obscure; the obscurity requireth exposition, and the exposition is deduced into large commentaries, or into commonplaces and titles, which grow to be more vast than the original writings, whence the sum was at first extracted.  So we see the volumes of the schoolmen are greater much than the first writings of the fathers, whence the master of the sentences made his sum or collection.  So in like manner the volumes of the modern doctors of the civil law exceed those of the ancient jurisconsults, of which Tribonian compiled the digest.  So as this course of sums and commentaries is that which doth infallibly make the body of sciences more immense in quantity, and more base in substance.

(12) And for strength, it is true that knowledges reduced into exact methods have a show of strength, in that each part seemeth to support and sustain the other; but this is more satisfactory than substantial, like unto buildings which stand by architecture and compaction, which are more subject to ruin than those that are built more strong in their several parts, though less compacted.  But it is plain that the more you recede from your grounds, the weaker do you conclude; and as in nature, the more you remove yourself from particulars, the greater peril of error you do incur; so much more in divinity, the more you recede from the Scriptures by inferences and consequences, the more weak and dilute are your positions.