A rule need not prove itself — canonicity not required from Scripture
Click or tap any sentence to jump there. The side buttons skip a paragraph.
The fullness and sufficiency we give sacred Scripture do not require that Scripture prove its own principles — for example, that this or that book is divine and canonical.
Any rule is perfect when it measures everything else of its kind.It need not be the rule of itself.
No science asks its first principles to prove themselves; that is absurd and impossible.Principles are perfect enough in their kind if from them everything belonging to that science can be proved.
Latin
XV. Sed plenitudo & sufficientia quam Scripturae sacrae tribuimus, nullo modo requirit, ut ex ea fidei principia probari & demonstrari possint, verbi gratia, hunc, aut illum librum divinum esse atque Canonicum. Etenim cujusvis regulae perfectio in eo consistit, ut sit reliquorum omnium quae sunt ejusdem generis mensura, minime vero ut sit regula sui ipsius. Neque in ulla disciplina requiritur in principiis, ut seipsa probent & demonstrent, quod absurdum est & impossibile, sed in suo genere sat perfecta habentur, si ex iis omnia quae ad talem scientiam, & disciplinam pertinent, probari & demonstrari possint.