God offendeth against the Common order of the Church hurteth the Authority of the Magistrate and woundeth the Conscience of the weak Brethren Where by traditions I suppose is meant the Laws and Canons of the Church as the words following do intimate which speak of the Common order of the Church and Authority of the Magistrate Thus much of the Laws of the Church Neither are such meetings onely against the Laws of the Church but against sundry statute Laws of the Kingdom also in that behalf made and provided In the Statute of 35 Eliz. 1. It is provided that if any person or persons above 16 years old shall refuse to repair to some Church Chapel or usual place of Common-prayer to hear divine Service and receive the Communion or come to and be present at any Assemblies Conventicles or Meetings under Colour or pretence of any Exercise of Religion contrary to the Laws and Statutes And if any person shall obstinately refuse to repair to some Church Chapel or usual place of Common-prayer or by any motion persuasion inticement or allurement of any other willingly joyn in or be present at any such Assemblies Conventicles or Meetings under Colour or pretence of any such Exercise of Religion contrary to the Laws and Statutes of this Realm as is aforesaid which refers to other Statutes formerly made and yet of force against Conventicles as well as this one shall be committed to prison and there remain without bail untill be conform and untill he make an open Submission in the words set down in the Statute viz. I. A. B. do humbly acknowledge and confess that I have grievously offended God in contemning her Majesties Godly and lawfull Government and Authority by absenting my self from Church and from hearing divine Service contrary to the godly Laws and Statutes of this Realm and in using and frequenting unlawfull and disorderly Conventicles and Assemblies under Colour and pretence of Exercise of Religion And I am heartily sorry for the same c. And I do promise and protest without any dissimulation that from henceforth I will from time to time obey and perform her Majesties Laws and Statutes in repairing to Church and hearing divine Service and doe my utmost endeavour to maintain and defend the same Neither can it be pretended as it is by some that this Statute was made or stands in force against any other sort of People than those in question viz. against Popish recusants onely and not against Protestant dissenters as they call themselves The answer is easie out of the words of the said Statute For in the beginning of the Statute the Persons that are concerned in obedience to it are expressed in these general and large words Any person or persons whatsoever above the Age of 16 which shall refuse to repair to Church and willingly join in and be present at any Conventicle or Meeting c. Which words comprehend and take in Persons of all Religions Sects and Persuasions whatsoever And whereas the penalty of the Statute to all that shall refuse Obedience and Conformity to it is abjuration of the Realm or to be proceeded against as Felons There is a Proviso toward the End of the Statute that sixeth the penalty altogether upon Protestant recusants and not on Popish In these words Provided that no Popish recusant or feme Covert shall be compelled or bound to abjure by virtue of this Act. And lest the Popish recusants should be the onely Persons therein meant or intended the Conventiclers of our Age make themselves more perfect Recusants than that Statute supposeth For whereas that makes absence from the Prayers of the Church for one Month together a Crime sufficient to render them obnoxious to the penalties of that Act these men for the most part withdraw themselves for many Years together and for ought I see if they are let alone resolve so to doe all the days of their lives In Anno 22. Caroli 2di Regis there was a Statute made to prevent and suppress seditious Conventicles as the Title of that Statute truly calls them wherein Every Person of the Age of 16 years and upward that shall be present at any Assembly Conventicle or Meeting under Colour or pretence of any Exercise of Religion in other manner that according to the Liturgy and Practice of the Church of England in any place within the Kingdom of England Dominion of Wales and Town of Berwick upon Tweed at which Conventicle or meeting there shall be 5 persons or more assembled together is made liable to suffer the penalties of 5 s for his first fault and for his second 10 s and so onward the Preacher to suffer the penalty of 20 ll And the owner of the house or ground that shall wittingly and willingly suffer such Conventicle Meeting or unlawfull Assembly to be held to suffer the penalty of 20 ll In the late Act for Uniformity all Non-conformist Ministers and disabled and prohibited from preaching any Sermon or Lecture indefinitely either publick or private And for as much as the King's Majesty by the Law of God and the Land of right is and ought to be master of all the assemblings together of any of his Subjects therefore what Meetings soever are not allowed and authorized by the Laws of the Realm are adjudged by the Learned in the Laws to fall within the compass of those Statutes that forbid and punish Riots and unlawfull Assemblies and are or may justly be presumed to be in terrorem populi and in the Event it is to be feared will prove to be contrary to the peace of our Sovereign Lord the King And by the Law all the King's Liege-people are commanded to assist in the suppressing of them upon pain of imprisonment and to make fine and ransome to the King Notwithstanding all which good Laws this practice hath continued in the Church these several years and still doth notwithstanding His Majesties reinforcement of their execution by his late Proclamation in open defiance and contempt of all Authority as if the Laws of the Church and Realm were but fulmen inane a shadow of a Cloud that vanisheth as soon as it is made and as if obedience to Magistracy were no part of Christian duty Concerning these Laws of the Realm to silence clamour I will touch lightly at five things I. That the King being next under God within his Dominions supreme in the Church on Earth hath Power and Authority over the Persons of Ministers as well as of any other his Subjects He being Custos utriusque tabulae having both tables committed to him as well the first that concerns our religious duties to God as the other that concerns our civil duties to men may and ought to make such laws as conduce as well to the peace and order in the Church as as godliness and honesty Pertinet hoc ad reges seculi Christianos ut temporibus suis pacatam velint matrem suam Ecclesiam unde
in that regard forbid us to minister to our Church I see not by what warrant in God's word we should think our selves bound notwithstanding to exercise our Ministry still except we should think such a Law of Ministry to lie upon us that we should be bound to run upon the Swords point of the Magistrate or oppose Sword to Sword which I am sure Christianity abominates 2. Yea suppose the Magistrate should doe it unjustly and against the Will of the Church and should therein sin yet doth not the Church in that regard cease to be a Church nor ought she therein resist the Will of the Magistrate nor doth she stand bound in regard of her affection to her Minister how great and deserved soever to deprive her self of the protection of the Magistrate by leaving her publick standing to follow her Minister in private and in the dark refusing the benefit of other publick Ministers which with the good leave and liking of the Magistrate she may enjoy 3. Neither do I know what Warrant any ordinary Minister hath by God's word in such a case so to draw any such Church or People to his private Ministry that thereby they should hazard their outward Estate and quiet in the Common-wealth where they live when in some competent measure they may publickly with the grace and favour of the Magistrate enjoy the ordinary means of salvation by another And except he hath a Calling to minister in some other Church he is to be content to live as a private member untill it shall please God to reconcile the Magistrate unto him and to call him again to his own Church From which words of this learned Non-conformist it may easily be gathered that those persons who are now by the unquestionable Legitimate power of the Kingdom for their Non-compliance with the present legal Establishment in the Church deposed from their Ministry if they contain not themselves in quietness and silence as other private Christians do and ought but will without a Call of Authority undertake still to preach the word and draw People after them to their private Ministry they are condemned by the most sober and judicious of their own party and the case of them and their followers is adjudged to be far different from that of the Apostles and primitive Christians their practice unwarrantable by the word of God and manifestly tending to Sedition and Schism But what speak I of the single Testimony and Judgment of one man of that way and perswasion though a learned and judicious one whenas we have extant to the World the like verdict agreed upon long since by the joint consent of sundry Godly and learned Ministers of this Kingdom then standing out and suffering in the cause of inconformity and published by Mr. William Rathband for the good of the Church and the better setling of mens unstable minds in the truth against the subtile insinuations and plausible pretences of that pernicious evil of the Brownists or Separatists For in the 4 th page of that Book First they justifie themselves against the objection of that faction in yeilding to the suspensions and deprivations of the Bishops acknowledging their Power to depose who did ordain them and their own duty to acquiesce therein and in quietness and silence to subject themselves thereunto in expressions so full to my present purpose that I should have transcribed them for the Reader 's satisfaction were it so that I had not been prevented by the reverend and worthy Authour of the Continuation of the Friendly Debate As to that place of Scripture Act. 4. 19. 20. which they acknowledge to be very unskilfully alledged by the adversary they make this threefold answer to shew the difference betwixt the Apostles case and theirs First they say they that inhibited the Apostles were known and professed Enemies of the Gospel Secondly the Apostles were charged not to teach in the Name of Christ nor to publish any part of the Doctrine of the Gospel Which Commandment might more hardly be yeilded unto than this of our Bishops who are not onely content that the Gospel should be preached but are also preachers of it themselves Thirdly the Apostles received not their Calling and Authority from men nor by the hands of men but immediately from God himself and therefore also might not be restrained nor deposed by men whereas we though we exercise as function whereof God is the Authour and we are also called of God to it yet are we also called and ordained by the hands and ministry of men and may therefore by men be also deposed and restrained from the exercise of our Ministry I cannot think that any of the Learned sort of the Non-conformists now are ignorant of these things nor that if their hearts were known their Judgments differ in this case from that of their ancient brethren but I fear the busie upholders and promoters of Conventicles in our Age notwithstanding their prohibition by Law to preach at all sin against their own light and conscience in so doing But I proceed 4. Now Laws being thus made against all such unlawfull Meetings and all such His Majestie 's Laws being no way contrary to God's word all his Subjects stand bound in the obligation of obedience to them and that for conscience sake Rom. 13. 5. 1 Pet. 2. 13. Tit. 3. 1. And under pain of Damnation if they wilfully resist and disobey Rom. 13. 2. And therefore it is that in the Schools they call disobedience to the King's Laws Sacrilege for though the trespass seem to be directed but against a man yet in that man whose Office and consequently his person is sacred God is opposed and his ordinance violated The King's Laws though in themselves in regard of their particular Constitution they put no special obligation upon us under pein of sin and damnation yet in a general relation to that God who is the original of all Power and hath commanded us to obey Authority their neglect or disobedience involves us in guilt and exposeth us to Sin and consequently to Damnation Civilibus legibus quae cum pietate non pugnant eo quisque Christianus paret promptius quo fide Christi est imbutus plenius Every Christian by how much the more he hath of the grace of faith by so much the more ready he is to conform to the Laws of men which are not contrary to the Laws of God All power is of God That therefore which Authority enjoins us God enjoins us by it the Command is mediately his though passing through the hands of men Hoc jubent imperatores quod jubet Christus quia cum bonum jubent per illos non nisi Christus jubet When Kings command what is not disagreeable with Christ's Commands Christ commands by them and we are called to obey not onely them but Christ in them But is not suffering obedience And if men are willing to submit
Name of God agreed on by Common-consent and without any Contradiction of the Scripture although they are not of the same Authority with the Scriptures Yet I beleive even those things to be from THE HOLY GHOST Hinc fit ut quae sunt hujusmodi c. Hence it comes to pass that those things which are of this nature I neither will disallow nor dare I with a good Conscience Quis enim ego sum c. For who am I that I should dissallow that which the whole Church approves of So far that worthy Authour The next whose judgment in this case I shall produce is Mr. Calvin in his Commentary on the Epistle to the Corinthians Quinetiam hinc colligere promptum est has posteriores scilicet Ecclesiae Leges non esse habendas pro humanis traditionibus quandoquidem fundatae sint in hoc generali mandato liquidam approbationem habent quasi ex ore CHRISTI IPSIVS Where shewing the difference betwixt the tyrannical Edicts of the Pope and the Laws of the true Church in which discipline and order are contained he saith Whence it is easie to be gathered that the Laws of the Church are not to be accounted humane traditions seeing they are founded upon the general precept of the Apostle and have as clear an approbation as if they had been delivered from the mouth of Christ Himself For saith he elsewhere Dico sic esse humanam traditionem ut simul sit divina It is so an humane tradition as that it is also divine Dei est quatenus est pars deeoris illius cujus cura observatio nobis per Apostolum commendatur hominum autem quatenus simpliciter designat quod in genere fuit indicatum magis quam expositum It is of God fo far forth as it is a part of that order and decency the care and observation whereof is commanded and commended to us by the Apostle It is of men so far forth as it simply names or signifies that which was in general uttered rather that particularly expounded Take a third testimony from that burning and shining Light of the French Church Licet quae a regia aliis Legitimis petestatibus rite praecipiuntur sunt de jure positivo quod tamen illis postquam ita constitutae sunt pareatur est de jure divino cum Legitimae potestates omnes a Deo sint Deique vices in suo ordine teneant dumque illis obedimus eorumque praecepta observamus Deo pariter in illis paremus Deique praeceptum voluntatem exequimur Although those things which are commanded by the King's Authority or other lawfull Powers under him are of positive right Yet it is of divine institution that we should obey them in those things which they command seeing all lawfull Powers are of God and supply the place of God in their several orders Therefore while we obey them and keep their Commandments we obey God in them and so fulfill the Will and Command of God Learned Beza shall be the next that shall give in his verdict to this truth Nam etsi Conscientias proprie solus Deus ligat c. For although God alone can properly bind the Conscience yet so far as the Church with respect to order and decency and thereby to Edification doth rightly enjoyn or make Laws those Laws are to be observed by all pious persons and they do so far bind the Conscience as that no man wittingly and willingly with a purpose to disobey can either doe what is so forbidden or omit what is so commanded without Sin To these above named add we in the last place the verdict of our own learned and judicious Mr. Hooker To the Laws saith he thus made id est according to the general Law of Nature and without contradiction to the positive Law of Scripture and received by a whole Church they which live within the bosome of that Church must not think it a matter of indifference either to yield or not to yield obedience Is it a small offence to despise the Church of God My son keep thy Father's Commandments saith Solomon and forget not thy Mothers instructions bind them both always about thine heart It doth not stand with the duty we owe to our heavenly Father that to the ordinance of our Mother the Church we should shew our selves disobedient Let us not say we keep the Commandments of one when we break the Laws of the other For unless we observe both we obey neither And what doth let but that we may observe both when they are not one to the other in any sort repugnant Yea which is more the Laws of the Church thus made God himself doth in such sort authorize that to despise them is to despise in them him Thus far that most judicious Authour Yea one of the reformed Churches have put it into their very Confession That those Laws of the Church deserve to be esteemed divine rather than humane Constitutions From all which it appears that Ecclesiastical Canons and Constitutions are not merely man's Laws but God's also both because they are composed and framed by those Fathers by divine Authority and have their general foundation in Scripture and also because they are ordained for the Glory of God for Edification order and decency of the Church and the better fulfilling and keeping the Laws of God For as we have a Command from Christ to tell the Church when any one is refractary and perverse So have they which are complained of to the Church that Command from Christ also to hear the Voice of God in the Church and in disobeying the Church they disobey God And if Children and Servants are bound by the Law of God to obey their Parents and Masters in all things that are reasonable honest and just and in their obedience they obey and serve God himself Eph. 6. 1. Col. 3. 20. 24. Tit. 2. 9. 10. then it can be no less pleasing to God that Christians who live in the bosome of the Church should be obedient and conformable unto the lawfull Precepts and Constitutions of their spiritual Mother the Church of Christ and the Rulers thereof It is very truly said by Calvin Semper nimia morositas est ambitiosa A frowardness and aptness to quarrell with the proceedings of the Church is accompanied with ambition and pride It is not because the Church takes too much power on her but because they would be under none It is ambition to have all Government in their own hands that is the Cause why some will not be subject to any All which hath been said of this matter is agreeable with the Doctrine of the Church of England who in her twentieth Article saith The Church hath power to decree and make Laws So in her 34th Article That whosoever through his private judgment willingly and purposely doth break the Traditions and Ceremonies of the Church which be not repugnant to the word of
disorder in the Church of Christ and his Service For what is a Church without order but a kind of an Hell above ground Where order is wanting what is a Kingdom but a Chaos of Confusion Yea But such a Ministry and such Meetings and Assemblies as are in question are contrary to the order God hath in his word established in his Church For the order God hath set in his Church is that his People should be distinguished into flocks and that every flock should have its own shepherd It is God's ordinance saith Mr. Hildersham as it is agreeable to good order that Christians should be sorted into Congregations according to their dwellings that they who dwell next together should be of the same Congregation and from thence the name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a parish first came As it is against all reason and scripture that a people scattered about some here and some there in several parts of the Country should voluntarily associate and combine themselves in a distinct body under what Ministry they please and that best suits with their humour and call themselves a Church as the manner of some is So it is agreeable with the very light of nature and dictates of right reason that a people in a vicinity and neighbourhood dwelling together ought to join together with those of that neighbourhood according as most conveniently they may for the worship and service of God We reade of the Church of God at Rome Corinth Galatia Ephesus c. And of seven Epistles written from Heaven to seven several Churches all which had their abode at the places whence the Churches bare their Names these are scripture Churches saith a Presbyterian It is the ordinance of God that every Flock or Congregation should have their own pastour Take heed to the flock over whom the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers Timothy appointed Titus to ordain Elders in every City i. e. wheresoever there was a body of people for a fit Congregation there must be a Pastour or Elder placed Whence it appears that even in the Apostles days there was a distinction of Churches and Congregations for the Elders had their flocks over whom the Holy Ghost made them Overseers The like is said of Paul and Barnabas that they ordained Elders in every Church Hence saith Calvin may be gathered the difference betwixt the office of those Elders and that of the Apostles These had no certain station in the Church but still went up and down hither and thither to plant new Churches Rom. 15. 19. 20. 23. 24. 1 Cor. 4. 17. Act. 1. 8. Rom. 1. 14. 2 Tim. 1. 11. 2 Cor. 10. 14. 16. But the other were by God's appointment fixed and tyed to their own proper Congregations and Flocks Act. 14. 23. Act. 20. 28. Tit. 15. â—1 Pet. 5. 1. The diminutive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 used in Luc. 12. 32. Act. 20. 28. 1 Pet. 5. 2. 3. Not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth intimate as much for parvum gregem significat it signifies a small part of the great flock distinguished from the rest And indeed the state and condition of the Ministers and Ministry of the Church requires that every Pastour should not take care of all the Flock or Church but that rather they should have certain portions or Congregations of God's People committed to them particularly amongst whom they should bestow their care and pains For this cause St. Paul took course to send certain Ministers to certain particular Churches as Crescens to Galatia Titus to Dalmatia and Tychicus to Ephesus Vnde rectissime colligimus saith a Learned Casuist auditores ordinariis pastoribus contentos esse oportere ne eos in crimen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conjiciant So 't is God's ordinance that Flocks Congregations should be contented with and depend on their own Pastours This appears by that charge of the Apostle We beseech you brethren to know them to own and acknowledge them that labour among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their works sake Again remember them that have the rule over you which have spoken to you the word of God And again obey them that have the rule over you and submit your selves for they watch for your Souls as they that must give an account that they may doe it with joy and not with grief In both places the Command of God is for Obedience to Pastours not any such as people themselves according to their own humours shall chuse but it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the seventh verse and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the 17 th verse In both places YOVR RVLERS such as are lawfully set over you by those that are in Authority in the Church And even as St. Paul commends Epaphroditus to the Philippians as their ordinary Pastour and commands them to receive him in the Lord with all gladness and to hold such in repâ—tation So he doth the like to other Churches commanding them to honour and obey their own Pastours which he would never have done if it had been lawfull for people with neglect of their own Ministers to follow whom they please People are much mistaken if they think they are so much at their own disposal as that they may put themselves under the teaching and care of what Minister they have a mind to though never so excellent and orthodox For 1. First God is not so careless of the precious Souls of his People in his Church as to leave them at random to shift for themselves every one according to his own foolish fancy but doth dispose of them himself by his good providence by the hand of those who from and under him have Authority so to doe to the care and charge of Pastours of his own appointment the respective Ministers of those Parishes and places where they with other of his People do cohabite And therefore the form of our institutions to our several charges runs in these words Curam regimen omnium animarum parochianorum tibi plenarie in Domino committimus The definition that our Saviour Christ gives of a Church is a Shepherd and his Sheep that will hear his voice A lawfull Minister and a Flock or Congregation lawfully committed to his charge make up a true Church Hereunto accord the Judgment of the Fathers St. Chrysostome in an homily de recipiendo Severiano begins thus Sicuti capiti Corpus cohaerere necessarium est ita Ecclesiam Sacerdoti Principi Populum As it is necessary that the body cleave to the head so it is likewise of necessity that the Congregation cleave to the Priest and the People to their Prince To which the saying of St. Cyprian agrees Illi sunt Ecclesia plebs sacerdoti adunita pastori suo grex adhaerens The Church is a Congregation of believers united to their Minister and a
of the bond of Charity is equally as dangerous and damnable as Apostasie from the Faith and as destructive and inconsistent to the nature and being of the Church one as the other 4. What sufficient convincing proof can our Church-forsakers make that they are not faln from the true Faith as well as from Christian Charity seeing they are subdivided into so many severall Parties and Sects some whereof and not the smallest number viz. the Quakers are totally apostatized from all Christianity others are faln in part as the Anabaptists Antinomians c. And those of them that do now and then come to Church perhaps because they cannot tell how to dispose of themselves otherwise studiously absent themselves from the profession of our Faith contained in the Creeds and if any of them chance to be there at that time yet they willfully refuse to observe and obey that godly and laudable command and custome of the Church grounded on good authority of God's word to stand up to their Belief 5. If they are not yet quite faln from the Faith yet their Schism and departure from the Church is a fair step towards it where are they likely to stay unless God marvellously stop them who are departed from his house The Prodigal Son 's leaving his Father's Family was the first step to all that lewd course of Life that afterwards he took The Donatists of old did not at first dissent in matters of Faith from the Catholick Church but their Schism did soon produce Heresie as an Ulcer or Wound being inflamed doth soon beget a Fever In the mean time whatever they esteem themselves or are esteemed of others to be they are indeed no more true Members of the Church than Tares or Chaff are part of the Wheat or than Mutineers are part of an Army Haeretici Schismatici non sunt ex vera Ecclesia sed tantummodo Ecclesiae immisti sicut excrementa sunt quidem in corpore sed non de corpore Alsted Lexic Theol. p. 359. Now whilst I write these things I weep mine eye mine eye runneth down with water I cannot refrain my self but must cry out alas alas for my dear mother the poor distressed distracted and divided Church of England I will bewail thee with the weeping of Iazer I will water thee with my tears my bowels shall sound like a harp for thee and my inward parts like pipes That thine own Children like Iacob and Esau should so jar and disagree in their Womb as to endanger the very life of her that bore them by their strugling What Brethren have we not all one God one Christ one Spirit one Baptism one Scripture one hope of Eternal Salvation And can we not close and communicate together in the Worship and Service of that one blessed Creator mercifull Saviour and most sweet Comforter Are our differences about I know not what grown to such an height that we cannot goe to Church together joyn in one confession of Sin profession of Faith Prayer each with and for other hear the same Scriptures read and preached and sit together at the same Table partake of that same heavenly Feast to which we are altogether most lovingly invited So great is the crime of our present Age in this that Posterity shall never be able to add to it Oh tell it not in Gath publish it not in the Streets of Ashcalon lest the Daughters of the Philistines rejoyce lest the Daughters of the uncircumcised triumph What will very Pagans say when they shall see Christians thus divided As Clemens Alexandrinus brings in the Heathen exprobrating our Religion for untrue Quia omnis secta Christianismi titulum sibi vendicat tamen alia aliam execratur condemnat because every Sect challengeth to it self the Title of true Christianity yet one curseth and condemneth another What can they otherwise think but that the God and Christ whom we all pretend to serve is what he abhors to be the authour of confusion Oh what Musick is this in the Ears of Papists to hear of our discords Did Herod and Pontius Pilate agree as friends to crucifie Christ and shall Christians that profess themselves to be his Members disagree as mortal Enemies about their Service of him Oh Religion Religion Hast thou not Enemies enough abroad in the World that seek thy destruction but thy deadliest wound must be received in the house of thy friendâ— Like Ioseph thou art basely sold by thine own Brethren when thou art bringing them necessary food like Sampson thou art betray'd into the hands of the Philistines by those that pretend zeal for thee and like thy blessed Master thou art delivered up to thy mortal Foes by thine own treacherous Disciples what Ocean can furnish mine eyes with tears enough to pour out for the scandal and matter of rejoycing that these things do give to thine adversaries and for thy much feared ruine that this portends Alas Alas that those who pretend much tenderness in lesser matters should make no Conscience at all of endeavouring thy Preservation and Prosperity by keeping the unity of the Spirit in the bond of Peace What shall I say of those Men but as our Saviour of his Enemies Father forgive them for they know not what they doe The Lord open their eyes that they may see and perswade Japhet to dwell in the Tents of Shem. Oh all ye my Brethren that make an unchristian separation from the Society of your Christian Friends and Neighbours in the publick worship of God especially you to whom I stand nearest related I beseech you in the bowels of our common Saviour do not thus give advantage to the adversaries of our Religion to endeavour and hope for the speedy overthrow both of us and it and in the mean time to laugh in their sleeves at our divisions saying there there so would we have it I beseech you Brethren in the name of our Lord Iesus Christ that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no Schisms amongst you that ye be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment If there be any Consolation in Christ if any comfort of Love if any fellowship of the Spirit if there be any bowels of Mercies fulfill ye my joy that ye be like minded having the same love being of one accord of one mind Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves It is promised as a blessed Fruit of the Gospel the envy of Ephraim shall cease and the adversaries of Judah shall be cut off Ephraim shall not envy Judah and Judah shall not vex Ephraim but they shall fly upon the shoulders of the Philistines toward the West they shall spoil them of the East together they shall lay their hands upon Edom and Moab and the Children of Ammon shall obey them Oh that all animosity and prejudice were banished from
cannot be the Ordinance of God for the working of grace that is performed without any manner of Commission or Authority For the necessity of keeping that good order which God hath commanded in his Church requires that no man should attempt any thing of that important nature and high concernment upon his own head or by a power derived no higher than from himself Whosoever shall take upon him to preach God's word in order to the Conversion or saving of souls must be able to give a good answer to that question which the chief Priest and Elders of the People put to our Saviour Christ when he was teaching in the Temple By what Authority doest thou these things and who gave thee this Authority He that cannot make a sufficient and satisfactory reply to it and yet shall adventure upon the work may justly be accounted rash indiscreet and more hasty than needeth or than wisedom requireth But such is the Ministry in question undertaken without any Authority or Commission For all the Authority and Commission that a Minister hath in a constituted setled Church he receives in his ordination Before that he had no Authority or Warrant at all to preach the word or to perform any ministerial Act. Now all the Authority that a Minister of the Church of England hath delivered to him in his ordination is expressed in these words Take thou Authority to preach the word and to administer the Holy Sacraments in the Congregation where thou shalt be lawfully appointed thereunto In which words it is plain that the exercise of his Ministry is restrained to lawfull appointment as to the place where it shall be exercised What that lawfull appointment is I need not trouble my self or the reader here to look into seeing the Ministry in question hath not the least colour of it or pretence to it for it is supposed to be in a place where there is another lawfully appointed to perform the same In the Council of Chalcedon where there were 630 Fathers met about the year of our Lord 451 It was thus decreed Neminem absolute ordinari jubemus Presbyterum aut Diaconum nec quemlibet in Ecclesiasticâ ordinatione constitutum Eos autem qui absolute ordinantur decrevit sancta synodus vacuam habere manûs impositionem That none should be ordained absolutely whether Presbyter or Deacon or any in Ecclesiastical orders and whosoever should be absolutely ordained the Holy Synod decreed his ordination void And the 33th Canon of the Church of England â—aith That it hath been long since provided by many Decrees of ancient Fathers that none should be admitted either Deacon or Priest who had not first some certain place where he might use his function For though in ordination the person ordained is made a Minister of the Catholick Church and being ordained to a function he may by the appointment of those that have Authority in the Church or with leave of the Pastour of the Congregation preach any where And although as Mr. Baines observes It is good for a Minister to be like a young Woman so full breasted that she can both feed her own Child and lend a draught upon intreaty to her Neighbours Yet he is not a Catholick Minister of the Church as the Apostles and Evangelists were whose office being extraordinary is long since ceased in the Church and therefore ought not to take upon himself to preach any where Neither yet did the Apostles themselves doe so as hath been proved though their Commission was without Limit as to place But kept within their Line measured forth by God to them It was never God's intention that the two Tribes of Levi and Gad should be confounded one with another nor is it any way agreeable with Scripture rules and order that a Minister should be a wandring star but fixed regularly in some Orb of the Church as a Pastour of some Flock or Congregation of his People Seeing therefore none is lawfully appointed to perform the ministerial function or any part of it in such a place as is in question but the Minister of that Congregation acts of the Ministry done by any other Person that shall intrude himself among them without and against his consent contrary to lawfull appointment and all good constitution that concern admission of Ministers to pastoral charges are done without any Authority Commission or effect and consequently cannot be God's Ordinance who doth not use to send any to preach in order to the working of grace in means hearts without any Power or Authority yea against both ARGUMENT VIII THAT cannot be the ordinance of God as instrumental to the work of grace that instead of building up People in Faith and Holiness demolisheth Christian Duty and in the natural tendency of it produceth sinfull and pernicious effects 'T is true these may accidentally follow through the Corruption of man's nature and Satan's suggestions upon the most right and purest dispensation of God's word and ordinances St. Peter speaks of some that stumble at the word And St. Paul saith to some we are the savour of death unto death as to other some the savour of life unto life The word preach'd like the water of jealousie when it is received into an honest and good heart it doeth it good and makes it fruitfull but when into a corrupt it doeth hurt and causeth it to rot Yet the most proper intent and genuine fruit and effect of it is to doe good to inlighten convince convert and save means souls But the Ministry in question doth directly produce sinfull and pernicious effects and such as a tender heart may tremble to think on I would not have the reader expect that I should here make a particular enumeration of every one of those sinfull fruits and effects that are produced by the Ministry of intruders and upholders of Conventicles for that is a thing no more possible for me to doe than it is for any man particularly to reckon up every one of the many thousands of absurdities that will unavoidably follow in dispute upon one that is granted or yielded to I will content my self therefore and let the reader doe the like with the mention of so many of them onely as I here use arguments against the practice which is the proper cause of them and thousands more First it tends to the breaking of that bond of near relation that is and ought to be betwixt a Pastour and his flock Though it be a truth well known to but a few in this age and little considered by any yet it is nevertheless certain and undoubted that there is a very intimate relation betwixt a lawfull Pastour and his People The Scripture seems to assert a kind of Matrimonial union betwixt them A Minister is after a sort married to that Congregation over whom he is lawfully set and they to him Our legal incumbency on a Church is our Marriage to that Church Hence is that phrase
spiritualiter nati sint Saith St. Augustine He may upon just Cause depose discharge and put to silence any Minister whatsoever within his Dominions as to the Execution of his Ministerial function either in publick or private Ministers as well as others are under civil jurisdiction for Every Soul is bound to be subject to the higher powers And St omnis anima cur non est vestra Quis vos excepit ex universalitate If every soul then the Souls of Ministers as well as others For who excepted them from the universality Qui dicit omnem excludit nullam He that saith every Soul excludeth no Soul It was impiously said of That the Clergy ought not for any cause to be cited before the civil Magistrate or to be judged by him it being absurd that the sheep should judge the shepherd Christ himself taking upon him man's nature was subject to humance Authority submitting himself to Caiaphas and Pilate so far as to be apprehended arraigned condemned and executed True saith Bellarmine de facto Christ was subject to Pilate but de jure he ought not to have been so And that power over him which he did acknowledge was given to Pilate from above Iohn 19. 11. was onely a bare permission To which we answer if we simply respect the Dignity of Christ's person being the Son of God then we acknowledge that he neither was nor could be subject to any man But if we consider the dispensation of his incarnation and that form of a Servant which he took on himself whereby he became Man and under the Law then de jure as he was a Jew he was a Subject to that power which at that time had the rule And what Pilate unjustly did against Christ that we grant God did onely permit But he had a lawfull Jurisdiction over his person not by God's permission onely but by his effectual will But suppose it were true which Bellarmine saith yet the Example of Christ maketh never the less for the Confirmation of the truth for which I allege it For if he submitted himself to a power over him that was usurped onely and not approved of by God but barely permitted then certainly they are very far from the Humility that was in Christ Jesus that refuse to be obedient and subject to just and lawfull powers which are ordained of God and set over them And therefore when Christ said date quae sunt Caesaris Caesari give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's he spake as well to the high Priests Scribes and Pharisees as to the People St. Paul whose apostolical authority and spiritual Weapons were able to bring down every opposition yet acknowledged that he must be judged by Caesar as his lawfull Superiour Bellarmine's distinction of de facto and de jure will stand him in no more stead here than it did before for to say the Roman Emperour was St. Paul's Judge de facto but not de jure is to doe St. Paul a manifest injury For if the emperour had no right to judge him why would he then make use of the benefit of an appeal to Caesar when no body compelled him so to doe and why did he at another time shelter himself under the Privilege of a Citizen of Rome By his very professing himself to be a Roman he doth acknowledge himself to be subject to the same Laws and to the same Lord that other Romans were and that he had no more exemption or immunity from subjection and obedience to the Roman Laws than that Tribune who said with a great sam have I obtained this freedom The Scriptures do give us an instance of King Solomon's deposing Abiathar from the Priesthood The text saith that King Solomon did thrust out Abiathar from being Priest before the Lord. Neither doth the Holy Ghost mention this historically onely as thing done but by way of approbation as a thing well and rightly done This the Iesuites themselves who are the onely men I know who question the Sovereign power in this Case confess Remarkable to this purpose are the words of one of them Alii non dubitant dicere Solomonem in eo facto injuste egisse usurpando potestatem quam non habebat ego vero id affirmare non audeo propter verba Scripturae quae ex Cap. 3. allegavi Et quia apud antiquos patres expositores non invenio factum illud inter peccata Solomonis numeratum sive in culpam tributum Some saith he doubt not to say that Solomon in that Act did unjustly in usurping more power than did belong to him But I dare not say so both for the words of the Scripture which I have before alleged out of the third Chapter and also because among the ancient Fathers and Expositours I find not this Act of his reckoned for any of Solomon's sins or him blamed for it The words which he saith he alleged out of the third Chapter are these And Solomon loved the Lord his God walking in the ways of David his Father onely he sacrificed and burnt incense in the high places Which exception saith he shews that Kings Solomon untill that time had kept the Commandments of God and consequently sinned not in that fact in deposing Abiathar And if the Kings of Israel might execute such power why not the Kings of England also Who will say that the Power of Christian Kings and Princes is shorter now than that of the Kings of Iudah and the religious Princes of the Primitive Christian Church was That the nursing Fathers under the Gospel are abridged in Authority of what they were under the Law And the reason and wisedom of this Nation in Parliament hath adjudged this to be a just Cause of such deposition and silencing of any when he shall refuse to submit and be obedient and conformable to such Laws and Constitutions as they have declared to be Very comfortable to all good People desirous to live in Christian Conversation most profitable to the State of the Realm upon which the Mercy Favour and Blessing of Almighty God is in no-wise so readily and plentifully powered as by Common-Prayer due using of the Sacraments and often preaching of the Gospel with devotion of the hearers And that nothing conduceth more to the setling the peace of this Nation which is desired of all good men nor the honour of our Religion and the Propagation thereof than an universal Agreement in the publick Worship of Almighty God Which is a thing so amiable and excellent in it self that it hath extracted an acknowledgment and commendation of it from the Mouths of the Divines of the Presbyterian persuasion themselves For in a Book of theirs entitled A Vindication of the Presbyterial Government published by the Ministers and Elders met together in a provincial Assembly November 2 d. 1649. They have these words It is the Duty of all Christians to study to enjoy the
Ordinances of Christ in unity and uniformity as far as is possible Which our Liturgy sets up by prescribing the manner of it Whereas otherwise all will be left to the chance of mens wills which saith Doctour Hammond can no more be thought like to concur in one form than Democritus's Atomes to have met together into a world of beautifull Creatures without any kind of providence to dispose them For the Scriptures call for unity and uniformity as well as purity and verity And surely it is not impossible to obtain this so much desired unity and uniformity because that God hath promised that his Children shall serve him with one heart and with one way and with one shoulder And that in the days of the Gospel there shall be one Lord and his Name one And Christ hath prayed that we may be all one as the Father is in him and he in the Father And he adds a most prevalent reason That the World may believe that thou hast sent me Nothing hinders the propagation of the Gospel so much as the division and separation of Gospel-professours If it be God's promise and Christ's prayer it is certainly a thing possible to be obtained and a duty incumbent upon all good Christians to labour after Secondly as it cannot be denyed that the Civil Magistrate hath authority over the persons of Ministers so 't is as true that he hath power to act for the regulation of all their Ecclesiastical meetings and assemblies though not to act in sacris Yet circa sacra non ad docendum quod est sacerdotale yet ad jubendum quod est regale As Constantine the Emperour told the Bishops whom he invited to a banquet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ye are Bishops within the Church and I am ordained by God's Grace a Bishop without the Church That the King of England saith Sir Henry Spelman is persona mixta endowed as well with Ecclesiastical authority as with temporal is not onley a solid position of the Common Law of this Land but confirmed unto us by the continual practice of our ancient Kings ever since and before the Conquest even in hottest times of Popish fervency For this cause at their Coronation they are not onely Crowned with the Diadem of the Kingdom and girt with the Sword of justice to signisie their temporal authority but are anointed also with the oil of Priesthood and cloathed stola Sacerdotali and veste Dalmatica to demonstrate this their Ecclesiastical jurisdiction whereby the King is said to be in Law the Supremus ordinarius and in regard thereof among other Ecclesiastical rights and prerogatives belonging to him is to have all the tithes through the Kingdom in the places that are not of any Parish for some such there be and namely divers Forests Magistrates we grant can neither preach the word nor administer the Sacraments any more than Vzziah could burn incense or offer Sacrifice to God Yet they are nursing Fathers of the Church not to give the milk of the word and Sacraments but of disclipline and Government During the old Testament times the King's power extended to the instituting and commanding of such Religious meetings as do no where appear to be either instituted or commanded of God or his Servant Moses v. g. The solemnity of the Passover which was to be kept by the Law of Moses but seven days by a special Command of King Hezekiah with the consent of the people was commanded to be kept other seven days The Feast of Purim in Commemoration of the deliverance of the Nation of the Iews under Ahasuerus the Persian King was instituted by Hester and Mordecai Moses onely Commanded one day of Fasting to be yearly observed viz. in the seventh month But the Kings and Magistrates of the people instituted other yearly solemn Fasts So that in the times of the latter Prophets there were four yearly Fasts observed viz. besides that yearly in the seventh month three others in the fourth fifth and tenth month Now if they may by their authority institute and enlarge why not then as well abridge and restrain Provided the publick assembling together of God's people according to Divine appointment be no-way prejudiced or infringed If the Magistrate may appoint then he may forbid too Law reason and sense teach that appointing and forbidding belong to one power Thirdly neither can there be any ground of quarrell made against the justness of these Laws forbidding Conventicles For as it is well observed by a worthy Divine before me that Law is undoubtedly just in which there is a concurrence of the justice of these four causes of Law wherein the whole of a Law doth consist viz. the justice of the final efficient formal and material causes of Laws 1. The final Cause of End of a just Law is that it tend to the common and publick good And of this the Lawgivers are to be Judges and not the Subjects And most unreasonable it were that what the Lawgivers shall adjudge to be for the publick good should be made to yeild to private and particular mens interests 2. The efficient Cause of a just Law is the lawfull power of the person or persons in authority that made the Law Otherwise Laws are onely so in name and not indeed And as Aquinas Violentiae magis quam leges They are rather acts of violence than Laws And it is a sure rule in Logick Causa aequivoca non infert effectum a sentence passed by one that is no Judge binds not the party 3. The right form of a Law is that it be a rule of rectitude for humane actions according to the guidance of distributive justice giving to every one according to his demerits 4. The matter of a Law must be a thing that is good according to the rule of universal justice at leait indifferent A Law wherein these 4 things concur must needs be good and obligatory to all persons that are concerned in it Now in which of these the aforesaid Laws against Conventicles are faulty I know not Perhaps some will say in the latter the Matter of it is not good to lay a restraint on Religious Assemblies and Meetings It were so indeed if Religious Assemblies and Meetings were forbidden But I think it will appear in the sequel that these in question are not such whatsoever some conceive them to be It were so if all Religious Meetings or Assemblies were forbidden But blessed be God 't is otherwise We have still 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the publick ancient lawfull and orderly assemblies allowed commanded and encouraged by Authority in all places of the Kingdom and onely such meetings by the Law forbidden as are private new and disorderly and tend to Faction and Schism and such other evils as are not without trembling to be mentioned Lastly I answer with that learned Casuist Dr. Sanderson that it is not necessarily requisite that whatsoever is established
by Law should be bonum positive that it should be an act of vertue but it is sufficient if it be bonum negative that is nothing sinfull or morally evil as all vices are Otherwise there should be no room for Laws about middle and indifferent things And suppose a Law should be defective in regard of the efficient final or formal cause yet if the matter of it be such as may be done without sin â—t binds the Subject to obedience And that the forbearance of such illegal meetings as are in question may be done without sin and that those dissenting brethren who have been ejected for their non-compliance in Uniformity to the present legal establishment being under a legal restraint as to the use of their Ministerial Function may without sin forbear the irregular use of their gifts and labours in the said private meetings to the undermining and confronting of the Laws the increase of Sedition Schism and divers other Horrid Evils I think is out of question Learned Beza thought so or else he had never returned such an answer as he did to that Case of Conscience which was proposed to him by certain English Ministers who in the Reign of Q. Eliz. were silenced for non-conformity The case proposed being Whether they might or ought not to preach notwithstanding their being prohibited by man's law His answer verbatim is Tertium illud nempe ut contra Regiam Majestatem Episcoporum voluntatem Ministerio suo fungantur magis etiam exhorrescimus propter eas causas quae tacentibus etiam nobis satis intelligi possunt He was so far from thinking it lawfull that he trembled at the thought of such a thing that they should exercise their Ministry contrary to the Queen's Laws and the will of the Governours of the Church And the same hath been the judgment of Antiquity in the like case The ancient and orthodox Fathers of the Church being met together in Council at Antioch in the first year of the Reign of Aurelianus the Emperour and in the year of Christ according to Eusebius 269. decreed Non licere Episcopo vel Clerico si exauthorizatus fuerit ministrare That if any Bishop being condemned by a Council or any Presbyter or Deacon by his Bishop should presume to Preach or meddle with any thing of or belonging to the Sacred Office of the Ministry there should never be any hope for him ever to be restored again by any other Council or Synod And all that Communicated with him should be cast out of the Church As may be seen more at large in that Canon Of the like judgment were the Divines of the Presbyterian-way touching those learned Godly and orthodox Ministers who suffered ejection out of their livings and deprivation of all they had in the late times of troubles by a pretended authority of Parliament for their adherence to his late Majesty of ever Blessed memory When the Earl of Northumberland discoursing with Mr Calamy about the supplying of above fifty Churches in London void of Ministers told him That they must restore some of the sequestred Clergy of London and admit them to preach again for unless they did so the Parliament could not find men of ability to preach in London Mr Calamy replied God Forbid As it is recorded and published to the world in a Book called Persecutio undecima Printed in the year 1648. page 42. And if the thought of the Restauration of those worthies to their Office how unjustly soever they were suspended from it was in the judgment of that person rejected with indignation as a thing offensive and either forbidden or wished to be forbidden of God how much more execrable and abominable a thing would he have thought it to be if they should have taken upon them as some now do under a lawfull power to preach again without any readmission by that power that silenced them yea in opposition and defiance of it And because no testimony is so fit to convince any party as that which proceeds from their own Mouths Let therefore the Judgment of a Non-conformist otherwise a Person in Learning Sobriety and Solidity inferiour to few of his generation be heard and weighed in this case He writes in defence of our Church assemblies against those who being silenced for Non-conformity as he was yet not as he did separated themselves from the publick Congregations and not enduring to have their Mouths stopped or to sit down in silence thought themselves bound according to the Example of the Apostles Act. 4. 19. and 5. 29. to exercise their Ministry though not in publick yet in private Meetings notwithstanding any Legal prohibition to the contrary First he distinguisheth betwixt the calling of the Apostles and that of the Ministers now The former as they had their ministry immediately from God so had they the designation of that ministry to their persons immediately from God also And therefore the exercise of it was not restrainable or to be forborn at the Commandment of men The latter though their ministry be from God also yet have their Calling to that ministry or the designation of that office to such and such particular persons from men in God's ordinary way and cannot exercise that function but by virtue of that Calling wch they have from men And therefore saith he in common sense they ought to obey man forbidding them the exercise of a Calling which they do exercise by virtue of a Calling from men Otherwise there should be no power so to depose a man from his Ministry but that notwithstanding any Command from the Church or State he is still to continue in the exercise of his ministry and should be bound to give that example which the Apostles did which is not onely absurd but a conceit tending plainly to manifest Sedition and Schism Afterwards he hath these words Neither were some of the Apostles onely forbidden so as that others should be suffered to preach the same Gospel in their places but the utter abolition of the Christian Religion was manifestly intended in silencing them But over Churches whereof we are Ministers are no private and secret Assemblies such as hide themselves from the face of a persecuting Magistrate but are publick professing their worship and doing their Religion in the face of the Magistrateâ— and State yea and by his Countenance Authority and Protection And we Are set over those Churches not onely by a calling of our People but also by Authority from the Magistrate who hath an armed power to hinder such publick actions who is also willing to permit and maintain other true Ministers of the Gospel in those places where he forbiddeth some And thereupon the said Authour makes this threefold Conclusion 1. If after our publick Calling to minister in such a known and publick Church not by the Church onely but by the Magistrate also the Magistrate shall have matter against us just or unjust as to our obedience it matters not and shall
to the Penalty of the Law is not that sufficient to discharge the Conscience from the guilt of disobedience Casuists that are of that Judgment say it holds true onely in those Laws whereof there are but very few in the World that are purely penal And the Laws which we now speak of are not such for these are partly Moral binding to doe or to leave undone some moral Act and partly Penal in case of Omission of what the Laws command or Commission of what the Laws forbid then to undergoe the Punishment the Laws inflict Now in these mixt Laws suffering the Penalty doth not discharge the Conscience from the guilt of sin For it is a rule of sure truth which Casuists give in such cases Omnis praeceptio obligat ad culpam Every just Command of those who have lawfull Authority to command leaves a guilt of sin upon those mens Consciences who do not obey The reason is because where a Law made by lawfull Authority requires active obedience and imposeth a Penalty in case of disobedience the Conscience of the subject stands bound primarily and intentionally to the performance of the duty therein enjoined As for the Penalty threatned that is a secondary and accidental thing to the Law added to keep up the reputation and esteem thereof in the minds of those who are concerned in it and to affright them from the neglect and disobedience of it So that though the suffering the Penalty of the Law in case of the transgression of it be as much as can be required of the Law-giver yet God by whom Kings reign and who requires subjection to Authority and that for Conscience sake will not hold such persons guiltless that doe not the things commanded in the Law The malefactour satisfies the Law at the time of his execution but who will say that without repentance of his fact the guilt of sin remains not still upon his Conscience or that he shall be acquitted at God's tribunal 5. Neither are they the Laws of the Church and Kingdom of England onely that are against such Meetings and Ministry as are in question But the godly Kings and Princes of the primitive Christian-Church have ever made the like Eusebius tells us that Constantine the Great made a Law that no Separatists or Schismaticks should meet in Conventicles and commanded that all such places where they were wont to keep their Meetings should be demolished and that they should not keep their factious Meetings either in publick places or private houses or remote places but that they should repair to their parochial Churches And in the next Chapter he saith that by that Law the memory of most of those Sectaries was forgotten and extinguished Sozomen reports that Theodosius the great decreed that the Sectaries whose petition for liberty he had first torn in pieces should not assemble together but all of them repair to their own publick Congregations otherwise to be banished their Country to be branded with some infamy and not to be partakers of Common privileges and favours with others And our neighbours and brethren of Scotland of the Presbyterian judgment did in one of their late general Assemblies since the enacting of their solemn League and Covenant make a special Canon against all private Meetings the direct tendency there of being to the overthrow of that Uniformity by them covenanted to be endeavoured in all the Churches of the three Kingdoms The very Heathens themselves by their Laws have made all such Assemblies illegitimate which the highest Authority did not cause to meet though they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to doe solemn Sacrifice to their Gods as may appear by Solon's Laws and in their practice they have shewed themselves ready to yeild obedience to their Governours in desisting from such irregular Conventions when they have been required Though Demetrius his Assembly came together disorderly and of their own heads rushed into the Theatre and there kept a shouting and Crying two hours together some one thing some another not knowing most of them wherefore they came together Yet when the Town-clark who had Authority did dismiss them they added not one fault to another but broke off their disorderly Meeting presently And they shew themselves more refractary than Demetrius himself who doe otherwise And if it be well considered the practice in question will be found to interfere with it self and to carry in the very face of it a convincing Testimony of its evil and unwarrantableness For if it be lawfull for these men to preach in private Meetings as they do and have a long time done why do they not take upon them to adventure to preach in the publick and Church-assemblies also What is it that makes them abstain from the latter and yet take liberty in the former Is it in obedience to the Law of the Land which forbids them to preach in publick The same Law forbids them to preach in private also It cannot be denied but that one is forbidden as well as the other Then this must needs be turned upon them why do they not obey in the one as well as in the other since they cannot but acknowledge that both are forbidden in the same Law surely if it were the Care and Conscience and desire to obey lawfull Authority according as Christian duty binds them that makes them silent in publick the same Conscience the same care and desire would make them sit down in silence in private also If it be said that they therefore abstain from publick preaching because it more exposeth them to the danger and penalty of the Law than private doth Then this must be retorted upon them also that their obedience is not such as God requireth for Conscience but for wrath Good men obey for Conscience but those that obey for wrath have not the fear of God before their Eyes For none contemns the power of man unless he hath first despised the Power of God And shall that be accounted by any sober Christian to be the ordinance of God or means of his appointment to beget grace in mens souls that is so repugnant to good Laws both of Church and State which we all stand bound in Conscience to observe and obey is contradictory to it self and hath in it that which proclaims to all that will open their Eyes to look into it its unlawfulness and sin God forbid ARGUMENT II. THAT cannot be the ordinance of God or means of grace that is contrary to that order which God himself by his word hath established in his Church For God is not the Authour of disorder and confusion But the Devil In the Church God's Command is for order in all things Let all things be done decently and in order And St. Paul did as well rejoice to see the order as the faith of the Church of Coloss. Onely Death and Hell have no order And it is a kind of death to a godly Christian to see
truth in the World viz. that Christ was the holy one of God because he had no calling so to doe The words of St. Paul are full to the same purpose How shall they believe on him of whom they have not heard And how shall they hear without a Preacher And how shall they preach except they be sent The Apostle speaks of such preaching and hearing as should beget Faith and by which Grace is ordinarily wrought and increased in the Soul and upon which People may expect God's Blessing Now thus none can hear without a Preacher neither can any thus preach i. e. profitably to beget Faith except he be sent They cannot be succesfull in their Ministry without a Mission They may talk as Usurpers but not preach as God's Ambassadours They may satisfie the Itch of the Ear but they cannot be instrumental to work Grace in the heart God will not concur with that Ministry he sends not Our Saviour Christ Faith Iohn 10. 8. All that ever came before me are Thieves and Robbers Why Moses and the Prophets the Priests and Levites were before Christ. Were they all Thieves and Robbers and none of them true Pastours The Emphasis lies in the word came which being rightly understood makes it as true that all that ever came or shall come after Christ are Thieves and Robbers also as well as those that came before him St. Hierome's note upon the text makes it clear Venerunt inquit Christus non qui missi sunt de quibus Propheta veniebant a se ego non mittebam eos Our Saviour doth not say that all that were sent before him were Thieves and Robbers but all that came before me Plainly shewing that whosoever shall come amongst the People of God his Church to perform the Office of the Ministry of his own accord without a lawfull Sending is a Thief and a Robber and none of Christ's true Sheep will or ought to hear him But it will be said the Preaching and Ministry of such Persons as are in question is the Preaching and Ministry of Persons sent for they are Persons in holy Orders and Ministers ordained 1. I deny not but that some of such Persons as are in question may be lawfully ordained Ministers all are not to my knowledge yet it followeth not presently from thence that they are sent to preach or to perform Acts of the Ministry For it may so be in a true setled and constituted Church that for a lawfull Cause and by lawfull Authority a Person ordained may be deposed and justly suspended from performing any ministerial Acts as Abiathar in the Church of the Jews was by King Solomon Otherwise Ministers in their Office were Lawless and exempt from all legal and just Restraint and Censure And although a Person in holy Orders cannot have his Ordination ordinarily made void by any quoad internam potestatem in regard of the inward Power of Order that is conferred on him in his Ordination so as upon his Restauration he need be re-ordained yet it may be made void quoad externam executionem in regard of the outward Execution of that Power in the Church either in publick or private either for a set-time or season or else during his Life It is in the Power of the Church and Governours thereof to suspend a Minister from the Execution of his Office though it be not in their Power to rase out that Characterem insculptum that intrinsical Authority received in his Ordination And a Person so lawfully suspended by Authority as is said may he in such a case execute the Office of the Ministry or may he not If so then Acts of lawfull Authority in the Church signifie nothing Governours and Government and Church-discipline is a mere empty Name and but a Cypher Then might Abiathar have executed the High-priest's Office Notwithstanding King Solomon's Exauctoration of him And so the Ordinance of God in the Church to which all stand bound in Conscience to be in subjection will be made void and of none effect If not then such Ministers as notwithstanding their legal Restraint or suspension from Execution of their Office do yet constantly execute the same by preaching and other ministerial Duties otherwise than by the Law they are allowed cannot be said to be sent of God since they are inhibited by God's Vicegerents on Earth and consequently have not that sending which the word of God saith is necessary to those whose preaching is to be instrumental to work Faith and other saving Graces in the Hearts of God's People But what calling or sending can such a Minister as is in question pretend to for his setting up a Course of House-preaching or other ministerial Acts in the place or Parish where there is a publick constant preaching Minister established by Law If he hath any it must be either extraordinary or ordinary for there is not a third way of calling or sending Extradordinary calling or sending is that which is done by God himself immediately without the Concurrence or Ministry of any humane Help or Authority Not of man nor by man Either 1. By divine Vision or Revelation and thus St. Paul was called and sent to preach the Gospel at Macedonia A Vision appeared to Paul in the Night saying come over into Macedonia and help us And after he had seen the Vision immediately we endeavoured to go into Macedonia assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us to preach the Gospel unto them 2. By secret impulse on mens spirits for this work wrought by the extraordinary Power of God in the Primitive times Such was Philip the Deacon's going to the City of Samariah and preaching the Gospel unto them after the dispersing the Church at Ierusalem Such also was the Calling of those who at the same dispersion first preached Christ at Phoenicia and Cyprus and the Hand of God was with them though otherwise they were but private Persons Now I think no wise men will pretend to these extraordinary Callings or Sendings in these days It is sufficient to say they are extraordinary and such as but in like Cases cannot be expected Extraordinary onely take place where ordinary are not to be had The internal and extraordinary sending is secret and invisible and therefore it is not sufficient for a man to say that he is sent of God seeing every Heretick may say the same but he ought to prove his extraordinary and invisible Calling by the working of some Miracle or by some special testimony of Scripture 'T is true Iohn Baptist had 〈◊〉 immediate and extraordinary Calling and yet wrought no Miracle that was reserved for the Messiah of whom he was the immediate Forerunner to manifest himself unto the world by but then that Calling of his was foretold and witnessed by plain testimonies of Scripture And the manner of his Birth and Condition of his Life as it was well known to all Israel were
no other than miraculous and extraordinary Ordinary calling or sending to any place to preach the Gospel and to execute the Office of a Minister there in a setled and constituted Church is when a Person in holy Orders hath the cure and care of a Flock or Congregation of God's People committed to him to preach the Gospel to them and to perform all other ministerial Acts amongst them by the Ministry of those Men who under God have Authority so to doe according to good and wholsome Ecclesiastical Laws and Constitutions in that behalf made and established God calleth ordinarily by his Church her voice is his Therefore whensoever the Church of God that is the learned wise godly and such as the Church hath publickly appointed for that purpose saith to any thou shalt he sent to such a place thou shalt goe for us then doth God call Saith Mr. Perkins Sending implies the Act of another that hath Power and Authority to send He cannot be said to be sent that comes to a place and there takes upon him to preach and doe all ministerial Acts of his own accord He comes not in Christ's Name but his own And a Christian can in nothing shew himself more impudent than in embracing such as Teachers sent from God that come in their own Names If one come in his own Name him ye will receive saith Christ to the Jews blaming them much for it And because there are so many that are apt to run before they are sent it is necessary that wheresoever any Person undertakes to preach the word his calling to that work be clear and manifest both in respect of his own Comfort and the Peoples profit Though St. Paul was immediately called of God yet he was sent to Ananias for imposition of his hands that it might be clear to the Church that he was called And when he was to be sent to the Gentiles he was again by imposition of hands ordained or appointed to be their Doctour that so his Calling might be publickly declared to be lawfull and that none else might intrude into it And if this were necessary in him who was immediately called of God how much more necessary is it in all those who have not now that extraordinary Calling but onely are mediately ordained and appointed to that work by those men who under God have power to send and appoint Pastours over the several Flocks of his People in the Church Now if such a person as is in the question cannot make out his calling or sending by one of these two ways to such a Town or Parish where he takes upon him thus to execute the Office or any part of it of a Minister certainly then he hath no Calling or sending at all But is like one that shall enter into another man's house at the window or some other way than by the door and that we know is no fair possession of an house he that enters in at the windows ought to be thrown out of doors Of such our Saviour saith Verily verily I say unto you he that entreth not by the door into the sheepfold but climbeth up some other way the same is a Thief and a Robber And if such as they can be no other who baulking the lawfull and ordinary way of entrance by the Authority of those who derive their power on earth from Christ and break in without yea against the Laws and Leave of their Governours that act in Christ's Name and Stead then are not they sent of God and consequently have none of God's promises of blessing annexed to their Ministry This is that which renders the best actions that can be performed by the Sons of Men to be sinfull when they are done unlawfully and by such as have no particular Calling or Command for the doing of them This doth quite alter and diversifie the nature of actions so as that they are varied from what otherwise they would be to some other things It is a rule as true as old Bonum extra proprium subjectum in malum mutatur Every good thing out of its proper place and subject is turned into evil V. g. In the natural body of man the hand is a very good and usefull member for the offices of Common life yet if the hand be out of its proper place and grow either out of the Head or Leg or elsewhere where it ought not it is no longer a good or usefull member but a deformed and monstrous excrescence of Nature In the body politick or state the execution of wrath upon him that doeth evil is a very just and good work yet if it be done by one that hath no Authority or Commission at least in such a place or circuit it is not justice but murther Ammon abusing his Sister Tamar by filthy incest ought by the Law of God to dye Absolom killed him with the Sword and in so doing he did the very thing that God commanded Yet Absolom sinned greatly in doing it because he was not the man that ought to have done it but David the King In the Ecclesiastick body the Church the preaching the word is an excellent ordinance of God for the saving of them that believe as foolish as the world do account it But if it be performed by one that hath no Authority or Commission for so doing nay that is under a just and legal prohibition and restraint from the doing it at all it is not preaching but quite another thing even what the Apostle calls it beating the air Whensoever a Commandment is limited to persons and places that Command makes it a sin to them if they leave the thing required undone and the not commanding yea forbidding makes it a sin to others that shall doe it because 't is the Precept that makes the thing to such persons in such places to be lawfull or sinfull Wrath hath been revealed from Heaven on such as have rashly adventured on a thing that in it self hath been very good yet had no particular Command for it This appears plainly in the case of Vzzah Though his intention was good yet it belonged not to him to touch the Ark for the charge and care thereof was committed to others It is the Policy of Satan if he cannot prevail with men to abide and abound in those things which are materially evil but they will needs be doing good then he will draw them on to doe that good unlawfully without a calling to it or warrant for it And it were well that People who are so easily misled by the specious pretext of good were not ignorant of this Wile of the Devil whereby he deceives simple souls not a few When we set upon the performance of any thing it should not be enough to weigh with our selves how good it is but to look what warrant we have to doe it The manner of performances is to be regarded as well as the matter For
safe for any to follow such a President The Apostle pronounceth a woe to them that walk in the way of Cain Those that walk in his way can expect no less than to arrive at the place whither he is gone before And if ye would know who they are that so walk the Apostle tells you these are they that separare themselves Pareus his gloss on the words are not unworthy observation Quia sibi ipsi fâ—â—gunt peculiarem cultum ideo sese segregant ab eorum Ecclesia ac coetu They feign to themselves a peculiar way and manner of worship therefore they will not joyn with us in ours but withdraw from our assemblies as if he had purposely described the humour of the men of our times However such may pretend to the Spirit as if they were more Sanctified than their Brethren yet the Apostle by infallible guidance pronounceth them Sensual not having the Spirit And that is the reason they keep the Unity of the Church no better For as Fulgentius saith Tales itaque faciles sunt ad divisionem quia spiritum non habent in quo uno membra Christi charam servant Spiritualiter unitatem Such persons are prone to all divisions because they have not that Spirit in whom alone all the Members of Christ do Spiritually keep Unity among themselves as a dear and pretious thing As the Soul in man's Body doth cease to quicken any Member sundred from the Body and the scattered bones in Ezekiel's Vision received no life till they were incorporated and knit together in one by Sinews Flesh and Skin so the Spirit of God which is the Soul of this mystical Body denies the derivation of Grace and Comfort to those that separate themselves from it If they say we are a true Church and that they and their Party separating from us and meeting in private assemblies are a Church also and so they do not separate and withdraw themselves from the Church Then I say that their Church in that case refusing Communion with ours is at least a distinct Church from ours and so there are two Churches of England in this Nation And so they make Christ to have two bodies distinct under one head which is contrary to sundry plain Texts of Scripture Though there be threescore Queens and fourscore Concubines and Virgins without number yet my Dove my undefiled is but one We being many are one body in Christ. And As the body is one and hath many members and all the members of that one body being many are one body so is Christ. Again There is one Body one Spirit one Hope one Lord one Faith c. And is Christ divided There cannot be two such opposite Churches in one Nation but one of them must needs be an Harlot and not the Spouse of Christ. And that their Church as they call it and not ours is so may easily be made to appear to any man that will vouchsafe to weigh matters in the balance of Reason and Judgment The whole World is divided betwixt God and the Devil there is not a third Party that can challenge any share in the Race of mankind All Societies and Companies of Men and Women in the world are either the Church of Christ or the Synagogue of Satan Rev. 3. 9. An assembly of Saints or a congregation of evil doers Psal. 26. 5. And that theirs is not the Church of Christ appears thus Those assemblies or congregations where there is no true and lawfull Pastor nor true and lawfull Flock are not the Churches of Christ but of Satan for as it hath been shewed before out of the Scriptures and Fathers a lawfull Minister and a Flock or Congregation of People lawfully committed to his charge make up a Church that is the definition of a particular Church But their Churches as they call them have neither true and lawfull Pastors nor Flocks therefore they are not the Churches of Christ but the Synagogues of Satan and Congregations of evil doers That they have no true and lawfull Pastors is â—lear 1. Because many of them that head those unlawfull meetings and assemblies were never ordained by Prayer and Imposition of hands as by Gospel-Rules they ought to be but are mere Lay-men that take upon them to preach and perform Ministerial Duties that were never called thereunto This is true not onely in the assemblies of the Quakers but of others also by what name soever they may be called that separate from our Churches I know it to be so in divers places 2. Those of them that were ordained are as to the execution of their Ministry committed to them in their Ordination during the time of their Non-conformity under a legal suspension by the highest and fullest Power and Authority of this Nation to which we are all bound in Conscience to be in Subjection 3. Suppose that neither of the former were true yet they are not true and lawfull Pastors of those that flock after them seeing they have not the Pastoral cure and care of the Souls of any of them committed to their charge by any that under God have Authority in the Church but are commanded to contain themselves in quietness and silence And that they have no true and lawfull Flocks in their Congregations appears in this that their Assemblies Congregations consist altogether of wandring Sheep that are gone astray from their own lawfull Pastors and sinfully separated from the Congregations and Flocks to which of right they belong and gathered together into a Schismatical and separate meeting and Society and so make up a Congregation of evil doers and Synagogue of Satan If this were rightly and seriously considered I think it would startle the minds and shake the confidence of many of them who bless themselves in their new-found way of Religion and Worship boast of their number and compass Sea and Land to make Proselytes that at least they might be equally the Children of Hell with themselves If they say our Church is corrupt we have that amongst us that we should not have or not that which we ought to have I say then First Suppose it be so which I think will yet require more pains than have yet been bestowed to prove yet let them consider what Peter Martyr judiciously saith Non ob quamcunque maculam Christi Ecclesiam ita Excidere ut Dei non amplius appelletur Every little blemish in the face of a Church cannot cast her off from being God's The Church in Canticles is said to be fair as the Moon which in the Hebrew Tongue is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lebanah for her whiteness and bright shining And yet the Moon is not so white but still some spots remain therein and even uncapable of illumination from the Sun Coelum ipsum nulla serenitas tam colata purgat ut non alicujus nubeculae flocculo resignetur In the clearest Heaven some specled
preaching abroad out of his own precincts whether upon intreaty or otherwise we need not inquire seeing he had an Apostolical power which was of universal extent in it self and such as no Minister now can lay claim to His Commission was as the rest of the Apostles were general and originally not confined to any one place as other Ministers are but they were to teach all Nations Yet because every one of them could not travel and preach in every Countrey therefore it pleased the Lord afterwards in Wisedom for good Causes to order it as it were by a second Decree that Paul should specially have a care of and preach to the Gentiles Yet this did no way diminish his Apostolical Authority nor forbid him from preaching at all to the Iews or Peter to the Gentiles if occasion did serve for of Paul it is expresly said that he was to carry Christ's Name both to the Gentiles and to the Children of Israel And it is generally believed that he was the Authour of the Epistle to the Hebrews And of St. Peter it is not doubted that he both at Antioch and elsewhere preached the Gospel both to Iews and Gentiles The Apostolical power did extend to all Nations but the Conveniency of the Church did require that some of them should be fixed to one sort of People in one place and some to another 'T is true St. Paul saith he was troubled with the care of all the Churches i. e. as he was an Apostle so the care of all the Churches lay upon him quod ad jus attinet potestatem saith Camero he had right and power to take care of all the Churches as an Apostle and so differing from all Bishops and Presbyters now And doubtless as all good Ministers of Christ do he did take all the care that lawfully he might or could of the whole Church of Christ especially of all those within his own precincts and of his own planting which by an usual Synecdoche in Scripture are termed all Yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for order and peace sake it pleased God that their persons and labours should be appointed for several distinct parts of the World as in his infinite Wisedom he saw was most convenient for the better propagation of the Gospel of Christ in all the World And it is the observation of the Excellent Divine Martin Chemnitius in his Commentary on that temporary precept of our Saviour Christ to his Disciples Goe not into the way of the Gentiles c. Hoc temporarium praeceptum fideles verbi Dei ministros admonet ut singuli se intra metas legitimae suae vocationis ad pascendum illum Dei gregem qui ipsis commissus est 1 Pet. 5. 2. contineant nec latiùs evagentur aut falcem suam in alterius pastoris messem nisi speciali concessione vel vocatione mittant This temporary percept doth warn all the faithful Ministers of God's word that all of them should contain themselves within the bounds of their lawfull Calling to feed that flock of God that is committed unto them and not to wander abroad or thrust their hook into the harvest of another Pastour without his special leave or calling By all which it appears that a forcible or surreptitious entry of one Minister into another's charge is destitute of all Scripture president or allowance and therefore cannot be the Ordinance of God The Example of the Apostles meeting and preaching sometimes in private Houses I conceive cannot but most impertinently be urged to defend the practice I here dispute against For 1. 'T is not to the question which is of a setled constituted Church where a preaching Ministry is established by Law The Christian Church in the Apostles days was not â—etled and established as is ours but in a way to be so 2. The Magistrate was then heathen all the World over ours now Christian Publick preaching and Christian meetings were not then suffered our Church-Assemblies are not onely allowed and protected but commanded by Sovereign Authority 3. They had then either none at all or very few Christian-Churches erected and so were forced to meet where they could we want not Churches but hearts to resort to them 4. The Apostles had a general and extraordinary call to preach any where through all Coasts and Parts of the World where they were appointed to plant Churches so have not the Persons in question The office of an Apostle or Evangelist is now ceased 5. It can never be proved that the Apostles did or would have made use of their private meetings either in competition with or opposition to the publick Ordinances of God as our modern Conventicles are but in subserviency according as the necessity of those times did require to what publick and solemn Assemblies they could then or might in after-times enjoy For as our Saviour made use of all private Conferences and Meetings not in separation from competition with or opposition against but in professed subserviency to the Synagogue-service and Temple-worship of the Jewish Church so I am perswaded that the Apostles of Christ together with the primitive Christians would have done the like had the case in their time with respect to the publick exercise of Christian Religion been the same or the like to what it was in our Saviour Christ's time with respect to the publick exercise of the Religion of the Iews But forasmuch as there were no Conventions for publick exercise of Christian Religion permitted or commanded in those times untill the Roman Empire and other Kingdoms of the World became Christian it was therefore a thing impossible that the private Meetings of the Apostles and those primitive Christians should be so made use of in subordination to the publick Assemblies as were the private Meetings of our Saviour and his Disciples in the Jewish Church So that the case and condition of Christianity in the primitive times is so different from and contrary to what it is in the Church of England where the publick worship is protected and commanded by Authority that their private Meetings cannot possibly hold any proportion or similitude with ours So that to argue from private Meetings in those times of persecution of Christianity to private Meetings in England in these days is to take away the subject of the question and then to argue the case 6. Neither did one Apostle then thrust himself into the place where another was to labour but contained himself within the compass of his Line and portion of God's People that he was appointed to preach to But the matter in question is of a quite contrary nature viz. of a silenced Minister's intruding himself in amongst a People over whom there is a preaching Ministry established and there taking upon him to gather Conventions teach that People and perform ministerial Acts amongst them contrary to good Laws without the consent yea against the allowance of the Pastour of the place So that neither the
whilst he would strike his foe They cannot confute it without condemning themselves This unguided zeal will be sure to run far enough from Popery and so runs into it as he that sails round the Globe the farther he goes after he is half way the nearer he approacheth to the place whence he set out The Quakers a considerable part of the Nonconformists railed at Popery till they began to be taken for Jesuits or their Disciples The like Stygma the Apostle St. Iude casts upon such Persons There are certain men crept in unawares c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 How disgracefully and disdainfully the Scripture seems to speak of them who irregularly and contrary to good order and lawfull appointment intrude themselves as Teachers into the Church under pretence of Religion They creep in amongst People they come in by stealth as if they came in at a Window or Back-door insinuating themselves into flocks and societies of God's People creeping to Conventicles professing themselves to be the onely Gospel-preachers and pure Worshippers of God as if all Religion were lost except what they bring and profess Whereas they are indeed unless we will mince the Appellation the Holy Scripture fastens on them but a new sort of Creepers gotten into the body of the Church From such saith the Holy Ghost turn away Again St. Paul Now we command you brethren in the name of the Lord Iesus Christ that ye withdraw your selves from every brother that walketh disorderly and not according to the Tradition he hath received from us With more Apostolical Gravity and Authority a Duty cannot be urged on Christians than this of withdrawing or separating from such as walk 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 disorderly The Metaphor say Expositours is borrowed from the custome of War wherein every Souldier hath his proper station and employment appointed him from which when he swerves he becomes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of his rank Now in an Army every Officer hath his place Company and Command assigned him by his General whereunto he must keep and from which he must not stir And if he should leave his place and take upon him either to make an attempt on the Enemy of his own head without Commission and Orders from his General though with never so good success or Command in another Company than that which is assigned and allotted to him by Authority he is guilty of a breach of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 good order and discipline that ought to be in an Army and brings in a most odious and destructive disorder and confusion and so deserves to be either quite cashiered or otherwise by Martial Law severely to be punished Yea so absolutely necessary hath it been thought in the opinion of experienced Souldiers that the Laws and Orders of Martial-discipline in an Army should be strictly observed that whosoever have erred from it though in the least Punctilio have been adjudged worthy of death without mercy Famous to this purpose is that story we reade in Valerius Maximus of Manlius Torquatus Consul of the Romans in the Latin War who commanded his own Son to be beheaded for fighting the Enemy without his Father's Privity and Command though he was provoked thereunto by Geminius Metius General of the Tusculans and although he had obtained a signal Victory and very much and rich spoil Satiâ—s esse judicans patrem forti silio quam patriam militari disciplina carere Judging it better that a Father should be deprived of a valiant Son than that his Country should want Military discipline The Church is by Christ twice together in one place said to be an Army with banners he that is the Commander in chief is God himself holy just and wise not the Authour of Confusion but the institutour and lover of order and the hater and punisher of such as wilfully transgress such good rules of wholsome discipline as he either immediately by himself or mediately by his Deputies on earth shall establish amongst his People And is Discipline so needfull in an Army and can it be thought needless in the Church Is our spiritual warfare of less danger of concernment than our bodily Shall it be thought to be a venial offence to be committed without danger when a person shall undertake to intrude himself into the place and company of another and lead on and engage a Party in the Church militant into ways of schism and profaneness in opposition to the way of true Religion and Worship of God established not onely without any lawfull allowance but contrary to all Law and Discipline both Civil and Ecclesiastical The baseness and wickedness of such doings is excellently displayed by Learned Doctor Henry More in his Apology annexed to the second part of his enquiry into the Mystery of iniquity Because some men saith he think themselves of more popular gifts for Prayer and Exhortation for these to spur out and run on in a Career without attending the direction of their Superiours were as if the Toy should take those Troopers that are best horsed to set madly a gallopping because they find their horses will goe so freely and so turn the orderly March of the Army into a confused Horse-race and put themselves into a rout even without the assault or pursuit of any Enemy Can it be pleasing to Christ that any should follow such men in their irregular and hare-brain'd ways when his Apostle bids all men from such to withdraw To what end should there be such flocking after them unless their followers could be partakers of some spiritual benefit from them But this cannot be For their disorderly walking and busie medling where they have not to doe renders all they doe unprofitable and is in effect a spending of a great deal of pains to no purpose wearying themselves out to weave the Spiders Webb and to sow to the wind The Apostle doth most excellently express it in a most elegant allusion of words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 working not at all but are busie-bodies Their work is neither lawfull nor profitable For seeing that the Ministers of Christ are disposed of in the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the dispensation of God it doth follow that those things which they teach or doe receive their force and effect not from their own wills and authority but from the Authority Approbation and Concurrence of him that sends them And therefore what a Minister doeth contrary to the will of God cannot be of any force or effect at all as to the accomplishment of the end on mens souls for which God ordained the Ministry for he is bound to preach not onely those things but in that manner as God hath appointed God's Command for a separation and withdrawing from such dividing house-creeping and disorderly Persons must needs argue their Ministry not to be his ordinance since he so brands it and gives such Cautions against it ARGUMENT VII THAT
opposition to that which themselves oppose Beza Interprets it thus prout hoc vel illud illis arriserit as this or that best pleafeth them The second is the itch of the ear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a disease very common yet never so Epidemical as in these days And there are two things that very much stir and provoke this humour 1. Novelty If the thing either for the matter or the manner of it be new and strange our Athenâ—an dispositions will soon incline us to spend our whole time in it Let a Physician be never so learned honest experienced and successfull in his place yet if but an Empirick or Mounteâ—ank come into the Country and set up his Stage though he doeth nothing but put off deceitfull and Sophisticate Drugs and takes mens money yet he shall not want at all times a full resort to him because he is a new-corner and his pretended method and means of cure are new and unusual In Religion also people are naturally 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 apt to be led away with insatiable desire of hearing new men and new things and listen rather to fables than to wholesome words that are according to godliness rather admire and adore the new conceits of every Novellist than receive the great mysteries of Salvation in love of the truth from him whom God hath set to watch over their Souls Mitte quod scio dic quod nescio is their Motto we have heard this man long enough our Ears itch now to attend to some other what we know is stale things fresh and unheard do better please us It is not the word but the man they desire to hear And therein they shew themselves to be the most observant disciples of the great Masters of errour and deceipt the Papists For this is a Doctrine taught by Stapleton in the tenth of his quodlibets non quid loquitur sed quis à bono Catholico attendendum est A good Catholick ought not to regard what is spoken but who it is that speaks And if the speaker prove a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and stuff up his discourse with idle and impertinent stories how fabulous soever he shall find more attention and applause from such humorous hearers than he that with greatest evidence of the spirit and power makes known the Oracles of God But certainly that man is under a very great distemper of body that grows weary of his good ordinary food The stomach is very sickly when it cannot take in any solid meat but the fancy is still working after rarities And if ever that person recover his former health he will find that his body will never hold to be in better temper than when he keeps to his ordinary Diet. 2. Prohibition by Authority Things denied are always most desired and the enjoyment of them is therefore the sweeter because restrained by Law Audax omnia perpeti Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas Ever since our first parents transgressed in eating the forbidden fruit all the sinfull posterity of Adam are ready to run most dangerous adventures for a taste of that which they should not touch How just and reasonable soever the prohibition is yet it will allways be looked on with a jealous Eye by those that are concerned in it as if there were a more than ordinary excellency in the thing denyed and it were therefore kept from us by our Superiours though they mean us never so much good in it because they envy us the enjoyment of it Whence it comes to pass that as beasts though their own pasture be never so good yet if they are bounded in they cannot contain themselves but will adventure to leap the hedge that they may goe farther though they fare worse Were it so that the doors of our Churches were shut up by Authority People forbidden to resort thither or to attend the Ministry of their own Pastours any more and commanded to frequent the private meetings of strangers onely the would these People be soon weary of their restraint and pretend great zeal to God's house and the place where his honour dwells then would their Souls seem to long and even to faint within them for the Courts of the Lord to see his Power and his Glory so as they have seen it in his Sanctuary Then would they seem to account their own Ministers worthy of double honour to receive them in the Lord with all gladness and to hold them in reputation Oh the strange nature of the Sons of men to whom a Legal prohibition is a forcible invitation that know not the worth of Mercies but by the loss of them Fifthly it alienates the affections of People from the true worship of God established by Law in our Church shakes the minds of the weak and begets even in those who have professed they have not the least exception against it but suspect somewhat amiss in it onely upon this ground because they see others of whose judgments they have a good confidence withdraw from it and chuse rather to frequent private meetings than to serve God in the publick Congregations Who have not heard the railings and revilings that have proceeded out of the mouths of those who are the favourers and followers of these unlawfull Assemblies against the Book of Common-prayer And who may not observe their constant and studyed withdrawing from the use of it That book which 1. For the Authours and Compilers of it was composed by the most Learned and Holy Doctours Martyrs and Confessours that the Church of England ever had who spent their times studies and lives in opposing the Idolatry and Superstition of the Romish Church Set forth at first in the Reign and by the Authority of King Edward the Sixth who for his Piety Zeal Learning and Wisedom was accounted the miracle of nature Peter Martyr in an Oration of his at Argentine saith thus of his death Praeter omnem spem acerbâ luctuosâ morte sublatus est Edvardus Angliae Rex Monarcharum Christiani orbis candidum Lumen pietatis Legitimus alumnus Evangelii Christi propugnator acerrimus Besides all expectation Edward King of England is taken away by lamentable and cruel Death who was the clear light of all the Monarchs of the Christian World the true Son of Piety and the most zealous and earnest Defender and Maintainer of the Gospel of Christ. And in an Oration of his at Tigurum he gives this Testimony of him Obiit prohdolor obiit Edvardus ille sanctissimus Rex quo adolescente nescio an Sol doctiorem proâ—â—aetate sanctiorem atque prudentiorem usquam viderit The most Holy King Eward is dead and I know not whether the Sun ever saw a more Learned for his age and a more sanctified and wise Prince And again in an Epistle to Queen Elizabeth speaking of the zeal and care of several godly and religious Kings in reforming Religion and establishing the true Worship of God saith